015b יש בקרבנות פרק שני תמורה טו ע"ב - YESH BEKORBONOS CHAPTER TWO TEMURAH

The Gemara adds a parallel beraisa. R’ Yosei says, on Ezra 8:35: “And those who came from the captivity, the children of the golah, offered burnt-offerings to God: twelve bulls for all Israel, ninety-nine rams, seventy-seven lambs, and twelve goats for a sin-offering; all of it a burnt-offering to God.”

כיוצא בו - It is not explained where this clause applies.

But how was the sin-offering offered up?

וחטאת מי קרבה עולה - As it is written: “and the twelve goats of the sin-offering, all of it an olah” (Ezra 8:35). That sin-offering too is not eaten, for R’ Yosei said the goats were brought for idolatry, one goat for each of the twelve tribes who served idols in the days of Zedekiah. A community brings a goat as a sin-offering for idolatry, as written in Parashat Shelach (Numbers 15:24). These goats are burned outside the camp as a hidden matter (kaparat ha’elem davar), as in Zevachim 47a; Menachot 27a derives this from the verse about the bull for a hidden matter.

Rava said: it was offered as an olah. Just as an olah is not eaten^[1], so this sin-offering is not eaten, since R’ Yosei said they were brought for idolatry.

And Rav Yehudah said in Shmuel’s name: [they were brought] for the idolatry that was done in the days of Tzidkiyahu^[2].

The question arises: for the one who holds that a communal sin-offering^[3] whose owners were atoned for is “dead”,

and he holds also that a communal sin-offering whose owners died^[4] is “dead”.

But here there are owners who died, and yet it was offered.

וקא קרבה - Even though the owners died during the seventy years they spent in Bavel.

Rav Pappa said: even for the one who holds that a communal sin-offering whose owners were atoned for is “dead”, a communal sin-offering whose owners died is not “dead”, because the community does not die^[5].

How does Rav Pappa know this?

If he derives it from the verse, as it is written (Psalms 45:17): “Instead of your fathers shall be your sons”^[6].

יהיו בניך - That is, the children stood in their place, and therefore their sin-offering was offered.

If so, the same should hold even for an individual’s sin-offering.

Rather, the reason is that the community does not die: these are the goats of the festival offerings and of Rosh Chodesh^[7], and the Torah says, “bring them from the Lishkah’s funds”^[8], the half-shekels. But perhaps the owners of those coins died?

היינו טעמא שאין הציבור מתים - That is, a communal sin-offering whose owners died is not “dead”, since the goats of the festival and Rosh Chodesh offerings are sin-offerings, and the Torah said to bring them from the Lishkah’s funds, the shekels that come in Adar. Although one might say that some of those who gave those coins died before the festivals, so that we would be offering a sin-offering whose owners had died, since they still had a share in them.

Rather, is it not to be concluded that the community does not die?

Alternatively: when they offered those sin-offerings [in Ezra’s time], they offered them for the brothers, those still alive from among those who had served idols in Tzidkiyahu’s days, as it is written (Ezra 3): “And many of the priests and Levites and heads of the fathers’ houses, the old men who had seen the first house^[9] on its foundation, wept with a loud voice, and many with a shout.”

כי אקרבינהו - To those goats of idolatry, in Ezra’s days.

אחיי אקרבינהו - On behalf of those who were still alive from among those who served idols in the days of Zedekiah.

ורבים בתרועה - Those who had not seen the first Temple were now shouting and rejoicing.

But perhaps these [who were still alive] were a minority^[10].

ודלמא הנך - That they were still alive, a minority of Israel. A minority is not offered as a majority is, but as individuals, each with its own goat. Since they offered a goat for each tribe, as for a majority, it is certain that a sin-offering whose owners died is offered; learn from this that a communal sin-offering does not die.

You cannot say so, since it is written (Ezra 3:13): [and the people could not distinguish the sound of the shout of joy] from the sound of the people’s weeping.

לקול בכי העם - From which it follows: many were those weeping over those who shouted, and the weepers were from the earlier generation.

And how could they be offered on their behalf, when they were deliberate sinners?

הא מזידין היו - In the days of Zedekiah.

R’ Yochanan said: it was a one-time measure^[11].

Indeed, that is reasonable.

ה"נ מסתברא - That it was a one-time measure.

For if you do not say so: granted, the bulls and the goats correspond to the twelve tribes^[12], but the lambs—to whom do they correspond?

בשלמא פרים שנים עשר - For the olah, and twelve goats for the sin-offering.

כנגד י"ב שבטים - This is a communal offering for idolatry: a bull as an olah and a goat as a sin-offering, in the section of Shelach Lecha.

Rather, it was a one-time measure.

We learned in a Mishnah: “Since the death of Yosef ben Yo’ezer of Tzeredah and Yosef ben Yochanan of Jerusalem, the clusters^[13] ceased; a man in whom all is found^[14].”

שהכל בו - Torah, fear of sin, and acts of kindness.

And Rav Yehudah said in Shmuel’s name: “All the clusters that stood for Israel from the days of Moses until the death of Yosef ben Yo’ezer learned Torah as Moses our teacher did; from then on they did not learn Torah as Moses our teacher did.”

But didn’t Rav Yehudah say in Shmuel’s name: “Three thousand laws^[15] were forgotten during the mourning for Moses; those that were forgotten were forgotten, and those that remained they learned as Moses our teacher did.”

דאישתכח אישתכח - Those that were forgotten.

ודגמירי - Those that were not forgotten they learned as Moses did.

But it was taught in a beraisa: “From the death of Moses, if the majority declared it impure, it was impure; if the majority declared it pure, it was pure.”

The answer: the heart was diminished^[16]; they could not restore what had been forgotten, and those that had not been forgotten they learned exactly as Moses did.

ליבא דאימעוט - The heart was diminished: they could not restore those that had been forgotten through the discussion of how the law goes, and they disagreed about them and followed the majority.

מגמר - [The laws] that were not forgotten they learned as Moses did.

In a beraisa it was taught: “All the clusters that stood for Israel from the days of Moses until the death of Yosef ben Yo’ezer of Tzeredah had no defect^[17]; from then on there was a defect in them.”

דופי - Defect: the question presumes there was no sin-defect among the clusters who were Israel’s leaders. Groaning (plani’et: sobbing, lamenting) in old French is crying out from heart-pain, like the groaning of Sisera’s mother (Judges 5).

And it was taught in a beraisa: “There was a pious man who was groaning from his heart; they asked the physicians, and they said: there is no cure for him unless he drinks hot goat’s milk^[18] in the morning.”

They brought a goat and tied it to the legs of his bed, and he would suck milk from it.

The next day his colleagues came to visit him; when they saw the goat, they said: “An armed robber^[19] is in his house, and we are going in to visit him?”

ליסטים מזויין - A small livestock cannot be guarded; it wanders and grazes in other fields.

They sat and investigated, and found no sin in him except that of that goat alone.

And he himself, at the hour of his death, said: “I know that I have no sin except that of that goat alone, for I transgressed the words of my colleagues.”

For the Sages said: one may not raise small livestock in Eretz Yisrael^[20].

And we hold: wherever it says “a story of a pious man,” or names R’ Yehudah ben Bava or R’ Yehudah bar Il’ai, and the Sages [mentioned] come after Yosef ben Yo’ezer of Tzeredah, they were many generations later.

ורבנן - And the Sages: R’ Yehudah bar Il’ai and R’ Yehudah ben Bava.

בתר יוסף בן יועזר דרי דרי הוו - That is, these came after Yosef ben Yo’ezer many generations later, and the Gemara teaches that no defect was found in them.

Tosafot

כיוצא בו אמר ר' יוסי - Thus it is taught in the Torat Kohanim (Sifra) on the verse (Leviticus 5:10) that discusses “and the second he shall make an olah”: just as an olah is not eaten, so this sin-offering is not eaten; and this is from that beraisa.

על עבודה זרה שעשו בימי צדקיהו - This follows the one who holds that the community can sin with idolatry: each tribe brings a bull and a goat; hence they brought twelve goats of sin-offering for the twelve tribes.

קא סלקא דעתך דמאן דאית ליה חטאת שכיפרו בעליה מתה אית ליה נמי חטאת שמתו בעליה מתה - And if you ask: the Mishnah poses a difficulty. Here no one disputes that for a sin-offering whose owners died, the rule applies to an individual and not to the community, yet they disagree even about atonement. It can be answered that it is not the same: the Mishnah is clear that a sin-offering whose owners died does not apply to the community—that is when all the owners died and none remain; but here we suppose that some of the owners are still alive, and therefore it says it was offered.

והא הכא דאיכא מתו בעליה וקרבה - The Rashba asks: what does this have to do with “whose owners died”? The whole sugya deals with a sin-offering that was set aside and whose owners then died; here nothing was set aside. Rabbeinu Netanel says: if it could be offered without being set aside, there is atonement for the dead, and certainly if it was set aside and the owners then died it is fit to be offered. This is also implied in Horayot 6a, where the Gemara asks: “Is there not atonement for the dead?”

וקא קרבה - And if you ask: this also poses a difficulty for the one who holds that a [sin-offering that] wanders (tirah) is not fit to be offered; there is no one who holds that. It can be answered: since it did not go to death, it is fit even to be offered. So we find in Yoma 50a, where the Gemara speaks of a bull offered even with its blood, and asks: is this not a sin-offering whose owners died? It answers: since it comes also for communal atonement, it is not one whose owners died.

ליבא דאימעיט - That they had no heart to restore their forgetting; and on this they disagreed.

מיגמר הוו גמירי - What remained with them—those that they had not forgotten—they learned exactly as Moses did.

Notes

1. 1. An olah is burnt entirely on the altar, and none of it is eaten. A sin-offering’s flesh is normally eaten by the priests; Rava says these goats were burnt like an olah.
2. 2. Tzidkiyahu (Zedekiah), the last king of Judah, who reigned before the destruction of the First Temple.
3. 3. A sin-offering brought on behalf of the whole community for a communal transgression.
4. 4. A sin-offering whose owners died before atonement was made is “dead” and may not be offered.
5. 5. The Gemara’s conclusion: a community does not die out, so a communal sin-offering is not “dead” even if its owners died.
6. 6. Psalms 45:17. Here the sons stand in place of the fathers, so the sons’ sin-offering is offered in their stead.
7. 7. The goats of the festival and Rosh Chodesh additional offerings were sin-offerings.
8. 8. The annual half-shekel contribution, collected in Adar and kept in the Temple chamber (lishkah) for communal offerings.
9. 9. Ezra 3:12–13: the elders who had seen the First Temple wept at the laying of the foundation of the Second, while many others shouted with joy, so the sounds could not be told apart.
10. 10. A minority of the people is treated like individuals, not as the community; the question is whether these goats were offered as individual sin-offerings.
11. 11. A one-time ruling for a specific occasion, which does not set a precedent for later times.
12. 12. Twelve bulls and twelve goats correspond to the twelve tribes; the lambs do not clearly match any tribe, which is why the Gemara asks.
13. 13. “Clusters” (ashkulot) is the Mishnah’s term for the great sages of their generation, figuratively likened to clusters of grapes.
14. 14. Rashi: a man in whom everything is found: Torah, fear of sin and acts of kindness.
15. 15. The tradition that three thousand laws were forgotten during the mourning for Moses, and later generations could not restore them all.
16. 16. “A diminished heart”: they lacked the understanding to restore the laws that had been forgotten, and so they disagreed about them.
17. 17. A defect (dofi): a blemish or failing, here a flaw of sin.
18. 18. Hot goat’s milk, drunk warm, was prescribed as a remedy.
19. 19. “Lestes” is a robber, here an armed one. Rashi explains that the goat was taken for a robber because small livestock grazes in other people’s fields.
20. 20. Raising goats and other small livestock was prohibited in Eretz Yisrael because they damage trees and crops (see Bava Kamma 79b–80a).