Daf Yomi: Zevachim 107 - hidden derashot

There are some awesome hidden derashot on Zevachim 107a. (I call a derash hidden if there is a surface and superficial way of reading it that seems 'light', but an alternative way of reading it with greater depth.)

הדתנן הזורק מקצת דמים בחוץ חייב מנלן
 נפקא ליה מדתניא
 דם יחשב לרבות הזורק דברי רבי ישמעאל רבי עקיבא אומר או זבח לרבות את הזורק

The 'straightforward' understanding of Rabbi Yishmael's derasha requires that we consult Rashi, who includes a later phrase from the pasuk as well (matching how they brayta appears in Sanhedrin):

דם יחשב דם שפך - לרבות את הזורק והאי קראי בשחוטי חוץ כתיבי:

That is, it is considered 'blood' guilt (liability) for spilling (throwing) blood. That is how Artscroll (footnote 16, in brackets) explains the difficult derasha.

I would suggest that the derasha simply focused on the words 'dam yechashev'. The peshat is that for **slaughtering** the sacrifice outside the Temple, it is considered bad, bloodshed, blood-guilt, shedding of blood. Rabbi Yishmael, in order to arrive at a (previously known?) halacha that throwing the blood also counts, narrowly focuses on the words 'dam yechashev' out of context (significance maximalism, context minimalism) and translates it as  'blood is also reckoned'.

What about Rabbi Akiva? His derasha is:
או זבח לרבות את הזורק

The full pasuk for Rabbi Akiva is:

וַאֲלֵהֶ֣ם תֹּאמַ֔ר אִ֥ישׁ אִישׁ֙ מִבֵּ֣ית יִשְׂרָאֵ֔ל וּמִן־הַגֵּ֖ר אֲשֶׁר־יָג֣וּר בְּתוֹכָ֑ם אֲשֶׁר־יַעֲלֶ֥ה עֹלָ֖ה אוֹ־זָֽבַח׃

The simple meaning is that the pasuk is talking about someone who offers a burnt offering (olah) or a sacrifice (zevach), but outside the Temple. And the simple derasha is that since it does not say 'olah u-zevach', using the 'and' conjunction, but instead adds a whole word (and an alef) to make it 'olah `o zavach', using the 'or' conjunction, this is a 'ribbuy', an inclusion. And we can use inclusions to include whatever we like which is somewhat related to the context, so we are including not just the act of bringing the korban, but also the act of sprinkling. (And so the gemara goes on the 'or' being used to divide, that one need not bring both an olah and a zevach, and then goes on a sytematic derasha chain, how each interprets the others source text.)

I would suggest an alternative understanding of the derasha. The last word in the pasuk is zevach. But since it is the last word of the pasuk, it takes on a pausal form, zavach, with a kametz, yet retaining the stress on the first syllable. With the 'and' connective, it would be clear that this is a noun, and the 'olah uzavach' are the object of 'asher yaaleh'. With the 'or' connective, the word zavach can be read as a verb instead. Namely, the past tense of 'zoveach'. Then, there are two actions. Asher = who. Yaaleh olah = brings (ascends) a burnt offering. O Zavach = or who was 'zoveach'. And this other action would then be the closely related act of 'yaaleh', namely sprinkling the blood.

Was Pinchas initially a kohen?

Someone, by email, called my attention to a dispute between the Zohar and the gemara as to whether Pinchas was initially a kohen, prior to his killing of Zimri and Cozbi.

Thus, towards the start of Pinchas, we read:

13. It shall be for him and for his descendants after him [as] an eternal covenant of kehunah, because he was zealous for his God and atoned for the children of Israel."		יג. וְהָיְתָה לּוֹ וּלְזַרְעוֹ אַחֲרָיו בְּרִית כְּהֻנַּת עוֹלָם תַּחַת אֲשֶׁר קִנֵּא לֵאלֹהָיו וַיְכַפֵּר עַל בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל:
		והיתה לו: בריתי זאת:
an eternal covenant of kehunah: For although priesthood had already been given to the descendants of Aharon, it was only given to Aharon and his sons, who were anointed with him, and to their descendants who were born after their anointing.  But Pinchas who was born before this and was not anointed, he did not come into the category of kehunah until now. And so do we learn in Zevachim 101b, Pinchas did not become a kohen until he killed Zimri.		ברית כהנת עולם: שאע"פ שכבר נתנה כהונה לזרעו של אהרן, לא נתנה אלא לאהרן ולבניו, שנמשחו עמו ולתולדותיהם שיולידו אחר המשחתן, אבל פינחס שנולד קודם לכן ולא נמשח, לא בא לכלל כהונה עד כאן. וכן שנינו בזבחים (קא ב) לא נתכהן פינחס עד שהרגו לזמרי:

That gemara in Zevachim reads:

דאר"א א"ר חנינא לא נתכהן פינחס עד שהרגו לזמרי דכתיב (במדבר כה, יג) והיתה לו ולזרעו אחריו ברית כהונת עולם רב אשי אמר עד ששם שלום בין השבטים שנאמר (יהושע כב, ל) וישמע פינחס הכהן ונשיאי העדה וראשי אלפי ישראל

However, if we read that gemara in Zevachim carefully, we see that it is actually a machlokes whether Pinchas only became a kohen then. See the Point by Point Outline: For there is

(f) Answer: R. Nechemyah holds that Aninus Laylah is mid'Oraisa. (R. Yehudah holds that this is true for all generations, but not at the time of the Milu'im.)

(g) (Beraisa - R. Yehudah): ...Pinchas was with them! (He could have eaten it.)

(h) Question: Seemingly, this refutes R. Nechemyah!

(i) Answer: R. Nechemyah holds like R. Elazar (or Rav Ashi);

1. (R. Elazar): Pinchas did not become a Kohen until after he killed Zimri - "v'Haysah Lo ul'Zar'o Acharav Bris Kehunas Olam."

2. (Rav Ashi): He did not become a Kohen until after he resolved the conflict between the Shevatim (when Bnei Gad and Bnei Reuven built their own Mizbe'ach) - "va'Yishma Pinchas ha'Kohen..." (This is the first time he himself is called a Kohen.)

(j) Question: How does Rav Ashi explain "v'Haysah Lo ul'Zar'o..."?

(k) Answer: That was only a Brachah.

(l) Question: How does R. Elazar explain "va'Yishma Pinchas ha'Kohen"?

(m) Answer: That teaches that (all or most of) the future Kohanim Gedolim would descend from him.

Thus, at the least, there is Rav Ashi arguing with R' Eleazar. But further, there is an opinion that Pinchas was already a kohen, such that the gemara's question that Pinchas was with them, והלא פינחס היה עמהן, such that he could have eaten it, makes sense. Thus, there is certainly a dispute in place in midrash as to how to understand these pesukim.

Therefore, it would be no surprise if the Zohar presents an interpretation which differs from the one proffered by Rashi. Even without getting into early or late authorship, we can simply say that this reflects a competing midrashic understanding. 

The Zohar on Pinchas reads:

21. HE RESPONDS: come and see, any priest who kills a person is considered forever unfit for the priesthood because he has marred his own status, BECAUSE PRIESTHOOD IS THE STATUS OF CHESED AND KILLING A PERSON CONTRADICTS THIS. SINCE Pinchas HAD KILLED ZIMRI AND COZBI, he was legally barred from remaining a priest. But because he was zealous for the Holy One, blessed be He, He had to reinstate him, and also his seed after him for all time, into the priesthood. THIS IS THE MEANING OF THE WORDS, "BECAUSE HE WAS ZEALOUS FOR HIS ELOHIM." Rabbi Yitzchak said, Come and see: Pinchas is recorded above and below. 'ABOVE' MEANS before he came into the world. The reason his deeds were recorded BELOW is that he was among those who came out of Egypt.

At least according to the English translation here, it seems as if Pinchas was initially a kohen and lost that status, requiring reinstatement as a kohen. I am not so sure that we need to translate it like this. Nothing in the Aramaic original requires this interpretation. Thus, מן דינא פסיל לכהנא הוה does not mean that he was legally barred from remaining a priest. It could mean that he was legally barred from becoming a priest. So so, ליחסא ליה כהונת עלמין does not require a translation of reinstating.  We might be able to give a far-fetched haemonization.

Still, there is a reason they translated it as such. We are primed for such an interpretation from the law about someone who is already a priest who disqualifies himself.

But if the Zohar has him already a priest, does this not contradict Rashi? Why doesn't Rashi cite the Zohar? And why doesn't the gemara give this explanation?

I don't see these as questions. First, Rashi was not cognizant of the Zohar. Whether this is because it was not authored yet, or because he was not one of the yechidei segulah. As proof of this, consider the following Rashi on Kiddushin 71a:

שם - בן שתים עשרה ובן ארבעים ושתים לא פירשו לנו:

"The name of 12 letters and of 42 letters they have not explained to us."

Meanwhile, citing from elsewhere:

The prayer Ana-Bekoach contains 42 words, the first letters of which form the mystical 42 letter, Name of G-D. The Holy Divine Name of 42 letters is discussed extensively in the Kabbalah, and is described in great detail in the Zohar and the writings of the Ari z”l.

So how could Rashi not know the specifics of the 42 letter name, and claim that לא פירשו לנו? It must be that he was not one of the yechidei segulah who passed down the Zohar.

So much for Rashi. What about the gemara? Well, we will just revert to the assertion that this was a matter of midrashic dispute.

Did Chazal believe in Gigantic Fish Eyeballs?

My answer is "almost certainly not", though this is indeed how Rashi understands the gemara. Let us start with the post, and question, at Rationalist Judaism:

Dear Rabbi!

I'm having difficulty with a passage the gemara (Zevachim 22) quotes from a braita, stating that if the eye of a large fish were to dissolve and pool in its socket; one would be able to immerse himself in it as if it were a mikva, provided it has the 40 saah required for a mikva. And this is codified as law in Rambam and Y"D (201.33). 

Without doubting chazal for a second, can this be explained or reconciled with modern science?
From what I recall the largest eye ball is that of a horse and or a squid (while the large fish whose primary senses are scent and sound have relatively small eyes) Which is still drop in the bucket from the 25-35 cubic feet of volume required for 40 saah. 

Any information or guidance would be greatly appreciated.

It is not the brayta actually which says this, but rather an Amora, Rav Yitzchak bar Avdimi, and as interpreted by a Rishon, Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki (=Rashi). Rabbi Slifkin explains that this cannot be explained with modern science, if one does not doubt Chazal for a second. See inside. This may well be true, assuming that this is the correct explanation of the gemara. But I don't think it is the correct explanation of the gemara.

And while the scientific difficulties are icing on the cake, there are text-internal reasons for thinking the gemara means something else.

The largest known eyeball of an animal, the collosal squid, is 27 centimenters, which is approximately 11 inches. Make this the diameter of a sphere, and the volume will be nowhere near the volume required for a mikveh. Maybe there are larger eyeballs, of larger animals, which we don't know about. I don't know.

However, let us turn to the gemara, in Zevachim 22a:

אמר ריש לקיש כל המשלים למי מקוה משלים למי כיור לרביעית אינו משלים למעוטי מאי אילימא למעוטי טיט הנדוק היכי דמי אי דפרה שוחה ושותה ממנו אפי' לרביעית נמי ואי אין פרה שוחה ושותה ממנו אפילו למקוה נמי אין משלים אלא למעוטי יבחושין אדומין אפילו בעינייהו נמי דהא תניא רשב"ג אומר כל שתחילת ברייתו מן המים מטבילין בו ואמר רב יצחק בר אבדימי מטבילין בעינו של דג

The text I marked in red is the voice of the narrator of the gemara, the setama de-gemara. Now, what is the gemara trying to prove, in this segment? The following: אלא למעוטי יבחושין אדומין אפילו בעינייהו נמי. Well, more as a rhetorical question. That is, do you think it is to minimize יבחושין אדומין?! This cannot be so, because אפילו בעינייהו נמי!

There are two aspects that the gemara needs to prove. The first is the יבחושין אדומין, which originated in the water. The second is that this is so even if it בעין. To this end, the setama harnesses two sources. Addressing the first aspect is a brayta  about things originating in the water: דהא תניא רשב"ג אומר כל שתחילת ברייתו מן המים מטבילין בו. Addressing the second aspect is a statement by an Amora: ואמר רב יצחק בר אבדימי מטבילין בעינו של דג.

This is strange, because how does one immerse in the eyeball of a fish? It is, after all, solid. And most fish are small, and their eyeballs will likely be small as well. Rashi helps us out:

בעינו של דג - דג גדול שנימוק שומן עינו בחורו:

Thus, Rashi solves the problem for us by saying that its eye melted in its socket, and it is a big fish. But both these facts are missing from the explicit gemara. Rashi may be right, that this was the intent of the gemara. But I am fixated on this choice of word בעינו, when what it is supposed to address the second aspect, אפילו בעינייהו נמי. I dislike the odds that an eyeball just happened to have been chosen as the example, when the setama is trying to prove something about fish creatures which are be'en.

Rather, I am more than a bit inclined to posit that בעינו של דג was understood by the setama digemara as the actual substance of the fish, in its original form. The words match, and we don't have to imagine gigantic fish and melted eyeballs, not explicitly mentioned in the gemara. And I would further posit that the setama digemara got this right, and the Amora didn't intend this either, but was talking about an actually possible case, which works out with modern science.

Alas, Rashi would then be wrong. While I will say that Chazal, as well, are wrong about some scientific matters, some people will be more comfortable with Rishonim erring in matters of science than Chazal doing the same.

Now, Chazal might well have believed in enormous fish with enormous eyeballs. From Bava Batra 73b:

Rabbah b. Bar Hana further stated: Once we were travelling on board a ship and saw a fish in whose nostrils a parasite had entered. Thereupon, the water cast up the fish and threw it upon the shore. Sixty towns were destroyed thereby, sixty towns ate therefrom, and sixty towns salted [the remnants] thereof, and from one of its eyeballs three hundred kegs of oil were filled. On returning after twelve calendar months we saw that they were cutting rafters from its skeleton and proceeding to rebuild those towns.

Rabbah b. Bar Hana further stated: Once we were travelling on board a ship and saw a fish whose back was covered with sand out of which grew grass. Thinking it was dry land we went up and baked, and cooked, upon its back. When, however, its back was heated it turned, and had not the ship been nearby we should have been drowned.

and from the next amud, 74a:

R. Johanan related: Once we were travelling on board a ship and we saw a fish that raised its head out of the sea. Its eyes were like two moons, and water streamed from its two nostrils as [from] the two rivers of Sura.

Now, these gemaras in Bava Batra regarding Rabba bar bar Chana might well be allegorical. Though Tosafot in Chullin uses this to demonstrate that fish have nostrils, this is just establishing a basic biological fact about fish.

However, one thing to bear in mind is that others around that time took similar tales literally. Thus, there is the aspidochelone, mentioned by Pliny the Elder (where we find other parallels from Pliny in Chazal):

Pliny the Elder's Natural History tells the story of a giant fish, which he names pristis, of immense size; he also relates the tale of sailors landing on its back, only to discover that it was not in fact land when it submerged.

Also, in the Physiologus, an allegorical work based on "known" facts about the world.

"There is a monster in the sea which in Greek is called aspidochelone, in Latin "asp-turtle"; it is a great whale, that has what appear to be beaches on its hide, like those from the sea-shore. This creature raises its back above the waves of the sea, so that sailors believe that it is just an island, so that when they see it, it appears to them to be a sandy beach such as is common along the sea-shore. Believing it to be an island, they beach their ship alongside it, and disembarking, they plant stakes and tie up the ships. Then, in order to cook a meal after this work, they make fires on the sand as if on land. But when the monster feels the heat of these fires, it immediately submerges into the water, and pulls the ship into the depths of the sea.
Such is the fate of all who pay no heed to the Devil and his wiles, and place their hopes in him: tied to him by their works, they are submerged into the burning fire of Gehenna: for such is his guile."

Compare this with Rabba bar bar Chana's account of thinking it was dry land, lighting a fire, and the beast turning, such that they almost drowned. So it might well be intended allegorically, but maybe not.

In terms of gigantic eye-sockets, there is also the following from Niddah 24b, which also might be allegorical.

It was taught: Abba Saul stated, I was once a grave-digger and on one occasion there was opened a cave under me and I stood in the eye-ball of a corpse up to my nose. When I returned I was told that it was the eye of Absalom.

So it seems to be not outside the bounds of reason that Chazal believed in giant fish with gigantic eyeballs, in which one could immerse. Even so, I believe that my explanation in the gemara is better than the one proffered by Rashi. Of course, feel free to argue.

BTW, here is the Rambam on this, from Hilchot Mikvaot, perek 8:

 יא] כָּל שֶׁתְּחִלַּת בְּרִיָּתוֹ מִן הַמַּיִם, כְּגוֹן יַבְחוּשִׁין אֲדֻמִּין--מַטְבִּילִין בּוֹ; וּמַטְבִּילִין בְּעֵינוֹ שֶׁלַּדָּג.