Ezra Schwartz and His Talmud

Ezra Schwartz tweeted to me and Einat Wilf:

it is tragic that Israel would remove Arab national rights, even while retaining individual rights.

And added:

As the talmud says:“Is it possible that there is anything at all which is permitted to a Jew, yet nonetheless is prohibited to a non-Jew?”TB Chulin 33a

And then further made it clear writing:

The point is, I believe it was wrong for non-Jews to refuse Jewish national rights, and I believe it is wrong for the Jews to refuse national rights to its non-Jewish minority.

Schwartz made Aliyah from Toronto in 2017, defines himself as Bnei Akiva Liberal and is studying towards his M.A. in Political Science at Hebrew University. In an article published in October 2017, he notes that we Jews are not permited "to ignore existing non-Jewish communities and act as if their land was our own."

He added

During the long centuries of exile, Jews desired an end to being treated as second-class citizens. Now that we have a country for ourselves, can we possibly treat the Palestinians in the same way? In the words of the Talmud: “Is it possible that there is anything permitted to a Jew, yet nonetheless prohibited to a non-Jew?”

Of course that is nonsense.  Jews never demanded national rights but equality as citizens.  Do Jews of, say, Brooklyn, have a right to declare the borough Zion, even if they would - as they were - a near majority of the population?

That Talmudic quote above appears here as well.  Is there a connection to the matter under discussion?

What is discussed there in Chulin?

What is discussed there is a situation when an animal is incorrectly slaughtered, so:

R. Aha b. Jacob said: One may conclude from the ruling of R. Simeon b. Lakish that an Israelite may be invited to partake of the intestines, but not a gentile. Why is this? — Because to an Israelite everything depends upon the slaughtering; therefore, since here the animal has been properly slaughtered he may partake of the intestines. To the gentile, however, everything depends upon the death of the animal4 [and not upon the slaughtering], for even stabbing would be sufficient; therefore the intestines [of an animal slaughtered by an Israelite] would be regarded as a limb [cut off] from a living animal.

Rav Papa raises a doubt:

‘As I was Sitting before R. Aha b. Jacob I thought of putting the question to him: Is there anything which is permitted to an Israelite and forbidden to a gentile? But I did not ask him this, for I said to myself: "He has himself suggested the reason for it"’.

In other words, first of all, we're talking pears and apples.  One matter is do Arabs in Israel deserve national rights in addition to personal political and civic rights and other liberties within a framework of equal citizenship. The other is whether a non-Jew may be denied eating a wrongly slaughtered beast simply because it is prohibited to a Jew, if my understanding of the discussion is correct.

Secondly, the "principle" Ezra quotes is rejected by Rav Papa as there is a rational reason for it. And see here.

Does not Ezra perceive that he not only has falsified a source but that the dictum he wishes to apply to a totally different concern is itself not applied by a Talmudic sage?


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Tolkien Talmud

Sound familiar?

R. Abbahu said that R. Eleazar said: The fire of Gehinnom has no power over the Scholars. It is an ad majus conclusion [to be drawn] from the salamander.* 
If now [in the case of] the salamander, which is [only] an offspring of fire, he who anoints himself with its blood is not affected by fire, how much more so the Scholars, whose whole body is fire, for it is written [Jer. 23, 29]: "Is not My word like as fire? saith the Lord". 

Resh Lakish said. The fire of Gehinnom has no power over the transgressors of Israel. 

Tractate Chagigah 27A.


________
*

A fabulous animal generated in fire which, according to the Midrash, must burn incessantly for seven days and nights; but Rashi here postulates seven years, and the Aruch (s.v.) seventy years. For a fun account of the legend, v. J. E. vol. X, pp. 646-7

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The Gnat Preceded the Mosquito

On Channel Two news, I saw a clip of a Muslim preacher comparing Ariel Sharon to Nimrod.

Odd, I thought to myself.

So I searched, and found this, compiled from Irshad: Wisdom of a Sufi Master by Shaikh Muzaffer Al Jerrahi 

Destruction of Nimrod
Namrood’s destruction was at hand. Allah Ta’ala had given him enough time to reform. But he imagined he had himself to thank for the respite he had been granted. He had become more and more cruel and unjust. His despotism knew no bounds. He summoned Hazrat Ibrahim (Alaihis Salaam) and said to him, “Tell your Allah that I neither fear Him nor need Him! Go tell Him that the whole world is in awe of me. All people are obedient to my command. If He is the God of heaven, I am God of the earth. Where are His armies? If the sky fell on my troops, they could hold it up with their lances. Tell Him I challenge Him to a battle. He has no say on earth. The whole earth belongs to me; it is my kingdom!”...

...Namrood himself left the battlefield, taking refuge in one of his castles. He thought he had saved his life by stopping up all doors and windows. In spite of the great miracle he had witnessed, he could not bring himself to repent and accept the Oneness of Allah Ta’ala. How could he do so, without overcoming his arrogance and pride? The scoundrel was wilfully obstinate in his
disbelief.

One lame mosquito, with a damaged wing, had been unable to obey the Divine Command to attack this stubborn infidel. It now addresses itself to Allah Ta’ala, saying, “Oh Allah, what a sinful and luckless creature I must be, that You should deprive me of my share in this battle. If only my leg and my wing had been sound, I would have done my bit in fighting this enemy of Yours!” Almighty Allah, Lord of the worlds, then gave it the command, “Go now! You destroy that accursed one!”  The lame mosquito made its way, limping to the castle where Namrood was hiding. Getting in through a keyhole, it went and settled on Namrood’s knee...For all his efforts Namrood still could not kill the mosquito, which now went up inside his nose.

...The mosquito started eating the membrane of Namrood’s brain. The tyrant beat his head from rock to rock. Now he had really begun to feel the pain of his defeat. He had felt no sympathy for the hundred thousand soldiers he had left on the battlefield, nor for their bereaved parents. His only thought had been to save his filthy skin and rotten soul by running to hide in his castle; but hiding could not save him from the dreaded claws of death...Namrood appointed salaried officials to hit him on the head with mallets. The blows gave him a brief respite, since they interrupted the insect’s work...One day, one of these servants wielded the mallet too hard, and Namrood’s evil soul departed. They laid his filthy corpse in the pit of hell which was his grave.

We should learn from this incident that arrogance and pride will lead us to nothing but destruction in both the worlds. The more arrogant one is the more disgraced one would end up...

That story is familiar to me, as it is to anyone who has learned Talmud and especially the Aggadic sections relating to the destruction of the Temple in Treatise Gittin. 

Page 56B:

...Vespasian sent Titus who said, Where is their God, the rock in whom they trusted? This was the wicked Titus who blasphemed and insulted Heaven. What did he do? He took a harlot by the hand and entered the Holy of Holies and spread out a scroll of the Law and committed a sin on it. He then took a sword and slashed the curtain. Miraculously blood spurted out, and he thought that he had slain himself, as it says, Thine adversaries have roared in the midst of thine assembly, they have set up their ensigns for signs. Abba Hanan said: Who is a mighty one like unto thee, O Jah? Who is like Thee, mighty in self-restraint, that Thou didst hear the blaspheming and insults of that wicked man and keep silent? In the school of R. Ishmael it was taught; Who is like thee among the gods [elim]? Who is like thee among the dumb ones [illemim]. Titus further took the curtain and shaped it like a basket and brought all the vessels of the Sanctuary and put them in it, and then put them on board ship to go and triumph with them in his city, as it says, And withal I saw the wicked buried, and they that come to the grave and they that had done right went away from the holy place and were forgotten in the city. Read not keburim [buried] but kebuzim [collected]; read not veyishtakehu [and were forgotten] but veyishtabehu [and triumphed]. Some say that keburim [can be retained], because even things that were buried were disclosed to them. A gale sprang up at sea which threatened to wreck him. He said: Apparently the power of the God of these people is only over water. When Pharaoh came He drowned him in water, when Sisera came He drowned him in water.

He is also trying to drown me in water. If he is really mighty, let him come up on the dry land and fight with me. A voice went forth from heaven saying; Sinner, son of sinner, descendant of Esau the sinner, I have a tiny creature in my world called a gnat. (Why is it called a tiny creature? Because it has an orifice for taking in but not for excreting.) Go up on the dry land and make war with it. Whenhe landed the gnat came and entered his nose, and it knocked against his brain for seven years. One day as he was passing a blacksmith's it heard the noise of the hammer and stopped. He said; I see there is a remedy. So every day they brought a blacksmith who hammered before him. If he was a non-Jew they gave him four zuz, if he was a Jew they said, It is enough that you see the suffering of your enemy. This went on for thirty days, but then the creature got used to it. It has been taught: R. Phineas b. ‘Aruba said; I was in company with the notables of Rome, and when he died they split open his skull and found there something like a sparrow two sela's in weight. A Tanna taught; Like a young dove two pounds in weight. Abaye said; We have it on record that its beak was of brass and its claws of iron. When he died he said: Burn me and scatter my ashes over the seven seas so that the God of the Jews should not find me and bring me to trial.

Bzzzzzzzzz.

^

Wonder What Obama Meant

we have seen faith wielded as a tool to divide us from one another - as an excuse for prejudice and intolerance. Wars have been waged. Innocents have been slaughtered. For centuries, entire religions have been persecuted, all in the name of perceived righteousness.

There is no doubt that the very nature of faith means that some of our beliefs will never be the same. We read from different texts. We follow different edicts. We subscribe to different accounts of how we came to be here and where we’re going next - and some subscribe to no faith at all.

But no matter what we choose to believe, let us remember that there is in religion whose central tenet is hate. There is no God who condones taking the life of an innocent human being. This much we know.

From

Remarks of President Barack Obama
National Prayer Breakfast
Thursday, February 5th, 2009
Washington, DC

and a correction:

Obama noted that

The Torah commands, "That which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow."

Not exactly. It's part of the Oral Torah.

The Written Torah has a verse "Love your neighbor as yourself".

What Obama quoted was the dictum of Hillel the Sage in The Babylonian Talmud, Shabbat 31a

It's easy to be correct if you have a better staff assistant.

The Difference in Study Method

I saw this picture of two Jews studying the Talmud. It's from an advertisement for a new edition of the Talmud, the "Veshinantem" Lublin Shas edition:



And I thought I spied something different.

And so, I checked.














And sure enough, no one else is holding a pen.