SUKKAH - 056a – סוכה – פרק חמישי – החליל, נו ע”א

The verse teaches (Devarim 18): “They shall eat portion for portion”^[1] — just as there is a share in the service, so is there a share in the eating.

תלמוד לומר חלק כחלק - This is written right after that earlier verse, which was established as referring to the festival.

חלק אכילה - Is equal among all of them, like the division of the service, which was included above from “and he comes with all the desire of his soul … and he shall serve.”

And what eating [does the verse come to teach]?

ומאי אכילה - It needed to teach us.

If you say the [eating of the] offerings —

אילימא אכילה דקרבנות - Of the sin-offering goats, and the breast and thigh [of the shelamim].

that is derived from there: (Vayikra 7) “It shall belong to the kohen who offers it”!

מהתם נפקא לכהן המקריב אותה וגו' - Whoever performs its service eats it; and since they were included in the service, it is obvious that they also eat.

Rather, [it teaches about] the lechem hapanim.^[2]

אלא לחם הפנים - It was needed to include [the lechem hapanim], which involves no service at all, for its service was already performed from the previous Shabbos.

One might think that even obligations that do not come on account of the festival, [but are offered] on the festival, [are shared by all]?

יכול אף חובות הבאות שלא מחמת הרגל ברגל - That they should acquire [a share in] their service and divide them.

The verse teaches (Devarim 18): “apart from what was sold by the fathers.”

ת"ל לבד ממכריו - Except for what the fathers sold to one another.

What did the fathers sell to one another?^[3]

ומה מכרו אבות זה לזה - That is, they stipulated among themselves that each would serve in his fixed week.

“I in my week and you in your week.”

אני בשבתי ואתה בשבתך - And vows, free-will offerings and communal offerings, which occur during the rest of the year as well and belong to the mishmar that is serving — do not include them in the festival rule, so that all would be equal in them; rather they belong to the mishmar of that week, as during the rest of the year. Therefore, of necessity, nothing was included by “they shall eat portion for portion” except, from the plain sense of the verse, something that has only eating, and that is the lechem hapanim, which has eating but no service.

“On Atzeres he says to him: Here you are …,” etc.^[4]

It was stated: Rav said: [First the blessing of the] sukkah, and afterwards zman.^[5]

סוכה ואח"כ זמן - One who did not recite shehecheyanu when making it, since it was already made and standing; and it was taught in Perek Lulav VaAravah (above, 46a): “When he enters to sit, he recites two [blessings]” — sukkah and zman; and Rav said: let him say sukkah first, and then zman.

Rabbah bar bar Chanah said: zman, and afterwards sukkah.

Rav said “sukkah and afterwards zman” — the obligation of the day takes precedence.

Rabbah bar bar Chanah said “zman and afterwards sukkah” — between the frequent and the infrequent, the frequent comes first.^[6]

זמן תדיר - For it applies on all the festivals.

Shall we say that Rav and Rabbah bar bar Chanah disagree in the dispute of Beis Shammai and Beis Hillel?

For the Rabbis taught: Matters [of dispute] between Beis Shammai and Beis Hillel concerning the meal:

דברים שבין ב"ש וב"ה בסעודה - Matters on which they disagreed in the laws of the meal.

Beis Shammai say: He blesses the day and afterwards blesses the wine;^[7]

מברך על היום - When he makes kiddush on Friday nights: the sanctification of the day first, and afterwards the blessing on the wine.

and Beis Hillel say: He blesses the wine and afterwards blesses the day.

Beis Shammai say: He blesses the day and afterwards blesses the wine, for the day causes the wine to come; and the day has already become holy, while the wine has not yet come.

שהיום גורם ליין שיבא - For were it not for kiddush, he would not need a cup before the meal. “And the day has already become holy” — that is, and another reason: the day became holy by itself at nightfall, while the wine had not yet come before him.

And Beis Hillel say: He blesses the wine and afterwards blesses the day, for the wine causes the kiddush to be said.

שהיין גורם לקידוש שתאמר - For if he had no wine, he would not make kiddush over nothing. The same applies to one who makes kiddush over bread: he puts the blessing on the bread first, for this same reason, since the bread takes the place of the wine.

Another explanation: the blessing on the wine is frequent and the blessing of the day is not frequent; between the frequent and the infrequent, the frequent comes first.

Shall we say that Rav holds like Beis Shammai, and Rabbah bar bar Chanah holds like Beis Hillel?

לימא רב - Who says that the obligation of the day takes precedence over the frequent, holds like Beis Shammai.

ורבה כב"ה - Who say that the frequent takes precedence.

Rav can tell you: I said it even according to Beis Hillel. Beis Hillel said so there only because the wine causes the kiddush to be said; but here, were it not for zman, would we not say [the blessing of the] sukkah?

אלא שהיין גורם כו' - Were it not that this reason also applies, they would not have put it first on account of its being frequent, for the obligation of the day takes precedence.

And Rabbah bar bar Chanah can tell you: I said it even according to Beis Shammai. Beis Shammai said so there only because the day causes the wine to come; but here, were it not for the sukkah, would we not say zman?

אי לאו סוכה - Were it not for sitting in the sukkah, would we not say zman? For example, travellers, who are exempt from the sukkah, say zman on account of the festival, as on the other festivals.

We learned [in our Mishnah]: “On Atzeres he says to him: Here is matzah, here is chametz.”

But here, where the chametz is primary and the matzah secondary, it teaches “here is matzah and here is chametz”!

דחמץ עיקר - For it is the obligation of the day.

ומצה טפל - For it is from the previous Shabbos; and it teaches that they distribute the matzah first — evidently the frequent takes precedence.

This is a refutation of Rav!

Rav can tell you: it is a dispute of Tannaim, as it was taught: “Here is matzah, here is chametz.” Abba Shaul says: “Here is chametz, here is matzah.”

Rav Nachman bar Rav Chisda expounded: Not like the words of Rav, who said “sukkah and afterwards zman”; rather, zman and afterwards sukkah.

And Rav Sheishes the son of Rav Idi said: sukkah and afterwards zman.

And the halachah is: sukkah and afterwards zman.

“The mishmar whose time is fixed … [etc.] and the other communal offerings”:^[8]

What does this come to include?

To include the bull for an unwitting communal error and the goats for idolatry.^[9]

פר העלם דבר של צבור - If it happened on the festival that they sinned through a ruling of the Beis Din.

“And it offers everything”:^[10]

What does this come to include?

To include the kayitz of the altar.^[11]

קייץ המזבח - When it is idle — the burning of the tamid is finished and no vow or free-will offering is brought — there were chests there, into which they put money: all the surplus funds mentioned throughout the Talmud, and wherever they said “they shall graze until they become blemished, and be sold, and their value shall go to free-will offerings”^[12] — and from these they buy olos for the kayitz of the altar. The word kayitz is like a person who eats figs as dessert at the end of a meal.

Mishnah

When Yom Tov is next to Shabbos, whether before it or after it, all the mishmaros were equal in the distribution of the lechem hapanim.

מתני' בין מלפניה בין מלאחריה - The Gemara explains: when Yom Tov falls after it, so that it is not the Shabbos within the festival — even so, since they must come early, on Friday, because of Yom Tov, for on Shabbos they cannot come, they share in the lechem hapanim. And likewise if Shemini [Atzeres] falls before it, on Friday: even though that Shabbos is not within the festival, they share in it, since they cannot leave.

If there was one day in between [to separate them], the mishmar whose time was fixed would take ten loaves, and the one who stayed behind would take two.

And during the rest of the year, the incoming [mishmar] takes six and the outgoing takes six.

Rabbi Yehudah says: The incoming takes seven and the outgoing takes five.

הנכנס נוטל שבע - The Gemara explains that the mishmaros change over on Shabbos: one serves in the morning and the other serves in the afternoon, as we say in the Gemara in a beraisa.

The incoming divide in the north, and the outgoing in the south.

הנכנסין חולקין ביניהם בצפון - What reaches them as their share, as we say in the Gemara: so that the incoming be seen [as entering], for the north is primary, since the Torah fixed it for the slaughter of kodshei kodashim.

והיוצאים חולקים בדרום - So that it be seen that they are leaving and going away; therefore they changed their place to a direction that is not primary.

Bilgah always divides in the south,^[13]

בילגה - The name of the mishmar.

לעולם חולקת בדרום - Even when it is entering; it is a penalty with which they penalized it, as the Gemara explains.

its ring is fixed,

וטבעתה קבועה - There were twenty-four rings in the Courtyard, at the place of the slaughterhouse, corresponding to the twenty-four mishmaros, set into the floor stones. The ring was open on one side: he would turn it upward, put the animal’s neck into it, and turn its opening back down toward the floor. Bilgah’s ring was fixed and could not be turned, so that it would have to use those of others, and that is a disgrace for it.

and its window is sealed.

וחלונה סתומה - There were windows in the Chamber of Knives, in the thickness of the walls of the chambers on the north side of the Heichal, where they stored their knives, as we learned in Maseches Middos (ch. 4, Mishnah 7); and they sealed Bilgah’s window.

Gemara

What is “before it” and what is “after it”?

If you say: “before it” — the first day of Yom Tov [falls before Shabbos]; “after it” — the last day of Yom Tov [falls after Shabbos] — that is the Shabbos within the festival!^[14]

Rather: “before it” — the last day of Yom Tov [falls before Shabbos, on Friday]; “after it” — the first day of Yom Tov [falls after Shabbos, on Sunday].

What is the reason?

Since these come early and those stay late, the Rabbis enacted a measure so that they eat together.

“If there was one day …”:^[15]

חל יום אחד להפסיק בינתים - For example, the first day of Yom Tov fell on Monday, so they could have come on Sunday, yet they came early, on Friday; or the last day of Yom Tov fell on Thursday, so they could have left on Friday, yet they stayed there over Shabbos. All the mishmaros that stayed take only two loaves, and the mishmar whose time is fixed takes ten, which are divided between the incoming and the outgoing mishmar, as on all the Shabbosos of the year.

עד כאן לא קאמרי ב"ה התם אלא שהיין גורם לקידוש שתאמר - This is difficult: Beis Hillel do say that the wine is frequent! One can answer: it is not for this reason alone that [the wine] precedes the obligation of the day, so that we would say that for this reason zman should precede sukkah. And perhaps [the Gemara] comes only to settle Rav’s words according to his own view of the law, and not according to the reasons of Beis Hillel.

והלכתא סוכה ואח"כ זמן - We are not concerned about the anonymous Mishnah^[16] that teaches “here is matzah, here is chametz.” Alternatively, the lechem hapanim also counts as an obligation of the day, even though it is from the previous Shabbos.

Notes

1. 1. The verses (Devarim 18:6–8) say that a kohen who comes to the Mikdash “with all the desire of his soul” serves like all his brethren, and “they shall eat portion for portion.” The Gemara (55b) applies this to the festivals, when all the mishmaros come up to Yerushalayim and share equally.
2. 2. Lechem hapanim, the showbread: twelve loaves set out on the Shulchan in the Heichal every Shabbos. On the next Shabbos they were removed, replaced by fresh loaves, and eaten by the kohanim. Since no service remains to be done with them, a verse is needed to give all the mishmaros a share.
3. 3. The “fathers” are the heads of the priestly families. The kohanim were divided into twenty-four mishmaros (watches), each serving in the Mikdash for one week in turn; the “sale” is the arrangement they made among themselves that each serves in its own week.
4. 4. The Mishnah (55b): on Shavuos all the mishmaros share the Shtei HaLechem, the two loaves of chametz brought that day, together with the lechem hapanim, which is matzah; the one distributing says to each kohen, “Here is matzah, here is chametz.”
5. 5. “Zman” is the blessing shehecheyanu, said when a festival or a seasonal mitzvah arrives. On the first night of Sukkos, kiddush in the sukkah includes both the blessing leishev basukkah and shehecheyanu; the dispute is which comes first.
6. 6. The rule “tadir v’she’eino tadir, tadir kodem”: when two mitzvos meet, the more frequent one is done first. Shehecheyanu is said on every festival, while the blessing on the sukkah is said only on Sukkos.
7. 7. Kiddush on Shabbos and Yom Tov has two blessings over the cup: borei pri hagafen on the wine, and the blessing of the day, which declares the day holy (mekadesh haShabbos).
8. 8. The Mishnah (55b) teaches that on the festival the mishmar whose week it is offers the temidin, the vows and free-will offerings and the other communal offerings, which are not brought on account of the festival; only the festival offerings are shared by all.
9. 9. When the Sanhedrin issues a mistaken ruling and the community acts on it, a bull is brought (Vayikra 4:13–21); if the error concerned idolatry, a bull and a goat are brought (Bamidbar 15:24). These are communal offerings that are not festival offerings.
10. 10. The Mishnah (55b) adds that the mishmar of the week “offers everything” — beyond the items it listed, any other offering that is not brought on account of the festival.
11. 11. Kayitz hamizbe’ach: olos bought with surplus Temple funds and offered whenever the altar would otherwise stand idle, as a “dessert” for the altar (kayitz, the summer figs eaten at the end of a meal).
12. 12. “They shall graze until they become blemished”: a consecrated animal that may not be offered, and may not be redeemed while unblemished, is left to graze until it develops a blemish; it is then sold and the money goes to free-will offerings.
13. 13. Bilgah is one of the twenty-four mishmaros (Divrei HaYamim I 24:14). The Mishnah lists three marks of disgrace placed on it; the Gemara on the next amud explains why.
14. 14. During the festival all the mishmaros are present in the Mikdash in any case, so on a Shabbos within the festival they plainly share the lechem hapanim; the Mishnah would not need to teach it.
15. 15. The Mishnah’s case: one weekday separates Yom Tov from Shabbos, so the visiting mishmaros could have travelled on that day; their presence on Shabbos is not forced by the festival, and they receive only a token share.
16. 16. A stam (anonymous) Mishnah is one taught without a dissenting name; as a rule the halachah follows it. Tosfos asks why the halachah here is not like our anonymous Mishnah.