Masechet Chullin Daf 7
Dec. 4th, 2018 01:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
seekingferret Daf 7
Interesting thoughts on religious Zionism here.
Rabbi Meir was seen eating untithed produce in Beit She'an, a city on the outskirts of Israel. Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi on this basis permitted eating untithed produce from Beit She'an. Why?
The Gemara says that Beit She'an was conquered by Yehoshua during the first conquest of Israel, but when Ezra and his followers retook the land with the permission of Cyrus, ending the Babylonian exile, they did not resettle Beit She'an. Therefore it does not have the status of being part of Eretz Yisrael anymore. And in fact, they may have deliberately not reincorporated Beit She'an into Eretz Yisrael because it was convenient to have control of some land that didn't have the status of being part of Eretz Yisrael. As a workaround in shemittah years, for example, to grow food for those who didn't have enough saved to last them the year.
I think that the particular odd status of Beit She'an that allowed this legal fiction is probably connected to the story of the East Bank in Bamidbar- Reuven, Gad, and half of Menashe got a special permission to settle the East Bank of the Jordan River, which was not technically part of Israel, on condition that they kept fighting with the rest of Israel until the whole land was conquered. They... did not entirely keep up this bargain, although they mostly did. At a certain point in the conquest, Israel got tired of war and kind of gave up, and eventually some of the Judges picked up the fight. Possibly losing Beit She'an was metaphysically connected to Menashe's failure to keep up its part of the bargain.
I'll argue that the liberal Jew's first response to this Gemara: "See, Greater Israel is nonsense, there's halakhic precedence for saying that Israel is not obligated to expand to its previous borders," is wrong. Halakha recognizes that different places can have different status with regard to the mitzvah of settling the land. Being part of Israel is not an all or nothing thing, but that doesn't mean that Greater Israel types, and religious Zionists generally, don't have a point that there are parts of Israel that Jews don't completely control that we think halakha obligates us to settle. (And none of this excuses anything when Greater Israel types say racist things about Arabs.)
I think it does demonstrate that the mitzvah of settling the land can be sensitive to pragmatic concerns. Which land we hold is a political issue as well as a religious and spiritual issue, and it can be religiously permissible to bend to political concerns in some areas. And also that it can be sensitive to religious compromise, surprisingly enough.
Also, as usual, the Gemara has wandered significantly afield. These obscure laws of tithing come up in the context of the digression about whether Hakadosh Baruch Hu miraculously prevents Tzadikim from eating improper food... If Rabbi Meir genuinely was not permitted halakhically to eat untithed produce from Beit She'an, he would have been prevented from doing so by a miraculous intervention, according to Rabbi Zeira. This all has very little to do with the laws of shechting chullin. Maybe eventually we'll return to that topic.
Interesting thoughts on religious Zionism here.
Rabbi Meir was seen eating untithed produce in Beit She'an, a city on the outskirts of Israel. Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi on this basis permitted eating untithed produce from Beit She'an. Why?
The Gemara says that Beit She'an was conquered by Yehoshua during the first conquest of Israel, but when Ezra and his followers retook the land with the permission of Cyrus, ending the Babylonian exile, they did not resettle Beit She'an. Therefore it does not have the status of being part of Eretz Yisrael anymore. And in fact, they may have deliberately not reincorporated Beit She'an into Eretz Yisrael because it was convenient to have control of some land that didn't have the status of being part of Eretz Yisrael. As a workaround in shemittah years, for example, to grow food for those who didn't have enough saved to last them the year.
I think that the particular odd status of Beit She'an that allowed this legal fiction is probably connected to the story of the East Bank in Bamidbar- Reuven, Gad, and half of Menashe got a special permission to settle the East Bank of the Jordan River, which was not technically part of Israel, on condition that they kept fighting with the rest of Israel until the whole land was conquered. They... did not entirely keep up this bargain, although they mostly did. At a certain point in the conquest, Israel got tired of war and kind of gave up, and eventually some of the Judges picked up the fight. Possibly losing Beit She'an was metaphysically connected to Menashe's failure to keep up its part of the bargain.
I'll argue that the liberal Jew's first response to this Gemara: "See, Greater Israel is nonsense, there's halakhic precedence for saying that Israel is not obligated to expand to its previous borders," is wrong. Halakha recognizes that different places can have different status with regard to the mitzvah of settling the land. Being part of Israel is not an all or nothing thing, but that doesn't mean that Greater Israel types, and religious Zionists generally, don't have a point that there are parts of Israel that Jews don't completely control that we think halakha obligates us to settle. (And none of this excuses anything when Greater Israel types say racist things about Arabs.)
I think it does demonstrate that the mitzvah of settling the land can be sensitive to pragmatic concerns. Which land we hold is a political issue as well as a religious and spiritual issue, and it can be religiously permissible to bend to political concerns in some areas. And also that it can be sensitive to religious compromise, surprisingly enough.
Also, as usual, the Gemara has wandered significantly afield. These obscure laws of tithing come up in the context of the digression about whether Hakadosh Baruch Hu miraculously prevents Tzadikim from eating improper food... If Rabbi Meir genuinely was not permitted halakhically to eat untithed produce from Beit She'an, he would have been prevented from doing so by a miraculous intervention, according to Rabbi Zeira. This all has very little to do with the laws of shechting chullin. Maybe eventually we'll return to that topic.