Shabbat 130

פסולות לכהונה

No: it was in order that they should not become accustomed to a foreign body. 'And he made a mikweh for them in the days of Nisan'. This supports Rab, for Rab said: Rain in the West [Palestine] is strongly testified to by the Euphrates;<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' Rashi: for when it rains in Palestine the water flows down to Babylon and causes the swelling of the Euphrates. Obermeyer, p 45 and n. 2 rejects this on hydrographical grounds, and explains that in most cases the rains in northern Mesopotamia in the Taurus range, where the Euphrates has its source, are the precursors of rain in Palestine. — Thus Rab too holds that the swelling of a river is caused chiefly through rain. ');">¹</span>

לא סבר כי היכי דלא לילפן גופא נוכראה

and he [Samuel's father] feared that the rainwater might exceed the running water.<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' I.e., the added rain water might exceed the normal volume of the river, in which case it is all regarded as rain water; v. p. 310, n. 11. ');">²</span>

ועביד להו מקוה ביומי ניסן מסייע ליה לרב דאמר רב מטרא במערבא סהדא רבה פרת סבר שלא ירבו הנוטפין על הזוחלין

Now, he differs from Samuel, who said: A river increases in volume from its beds.<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' Lit., 'rock'. Though it seems to swell through the rains, actually more water gushes upward from the river bed than is added by the rain. ');">³</span>

ופליגא דשמואל דאמר שמואל נהרא מכיפיה מיברך ופליגא דידיה אדידיה דאמר שמואל אין המים מטהרין בזוחלין אלא פרת ביומי תשרי בלבד:

But this conflicts with another [statement] of his. For Samuel said: No water purifies when flowing, save the Euphrates in the days of Tishri alone.<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' Which is in accordance with his father and with Rab. ');">⁴</span>

פורפת על האבן כו': והאמרת רישא פורפת אמר אביי סיפא אתאן למטבע

A WOMAN MAY WEIGHT [HER CLOAK] WITH A STONE, etc. But you say in the first clause, that she may weight it?<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' Which certainly means that she may do so in the first place on the Sabbath, since the preceding clause has already taught that she may wear a weighted cloak. ');">⁵</span>

בעי אביי אשה מהו שתערים ותפרוף על האגוז להוציא לבנה קטן בשבת

— Said Abaye: The second clause refers to a coin.<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' Which may not be handled on the Sabbath. ');">⁶</span>

תיבעי למ"ד מערימין תיבעי למאן דאמר אין מערימין

Abaye asked: May a woman evade [the Sabbath prohibition] by weighting [her cloak] with a nut in order to carry it out to her infant child on the Sabbath? This is a problem on the view of both him who maintains that an artifice may be used and him who holds that an artifice may not be used.<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' V. infra 120a. ');">⁷</span>

תיבעי למאן דאמר מערימין בדליקה התם הוא דאי לא שרית ליה אתי לכבויי אבל הכא אי לא שרית ליה לא אתי לאפוקי

It is a problem on the view that all artifice may be used in the case of a conflagration: that is only there, because if you do not permit it to him, he will come to extinguish it; but here, if you do not permit it, one will not come to carry it [sc. the nut] out.<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' Hence it is possibly forbidden. ');">⁸</span>

או דלמא אפילו למאן דאמר אין מערימין בדליקה התם דרך הוצאה בכך אבל הכא אין דרך הוצאה בכך אימא שפיר דמי תיקו:

Or perhaps, even on the view that all artifice may not be used; there that is a normal way of carrying [clothes] out;<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' E.g., clothes; merchants wear the clothes they have to sell (Rashi). ');">⁹</span>

<big><strong>מתני׳</strong></big> הקיטע יוצא בקב שלו דברי ר' מאיר

but here this is not a usual way of carrying it, and therefore I might say that it is well.<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' Since the first is the normal way of carrying, when one puts on more than he requires the excess is a mere burden, carried out in the normal manner; hence it is forbidden. But in the case under discussion, even if a person intentionally carries a nut out thus, without any subterfuge, he does not transgress by Biblical law and is not liable to a sin-offering, which is incurred only for doing a thing in its normal fashion. Hence a subterfuge may be permitted even by Rabbinical law (R. Jacob Emden, Novellae). ');">¹⁰</span> The question stands over. <b><i>MISHNAH</i></b>. A STUMP-LEGGED PERSON MAY GO FORTH WITH HIS WOODEN STUMP:<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' A log of wood hollowed out to receive the stump. ');">¹¹</span> THIS IS R. MEIR'S VIEW;