Masechet Chullin Daf 62
Jan. 31st, 2019 09:17 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
seekingferretDaf 62
The Daf is very much about what I was saying yesterday about the difficulty of Talmudic minim. There are 24 nonkosher birds, but that doesn't mean that if we know 24 species of nonkosher birds, we know that any other species is kosher, because it could be that a species is part of a nonkosher min.
Rav Nachman proposes a rule that, since, as discussed on the previous Daf, tradition is that only two birds, the peres and the ozniya, only have one kosher siman and are nonkosher, that if you see an unknown bird and you are able to accurately identify the peres and ozniya, then you can be sure that it's a kosher bird. He then proposes a similar rule that, since tradition is that only one bird, the orev, has two kosher simanim and is nonkosher, that if you see an unknown bird and you are able to accurately identify the orev, then you can be sure that it's a kosher bird.
But this generates pushback. There are apparently several other birds in the orev family, including the zarzir and the white senunit, which are also nonkosher because they are also considered orev! So the Gemara modifies Rav Nachman's rule to say that you need not only be able to identify the orev, you need to be able to identify all members of its family.
Later, we discuss the 'cock of the swamp' and the 'hen of the swamp'. The cock of the swamp is unkosher, the hen of the swamp is kosher. Rabbi Elefant brings Rabbi Elchanan's interpretation of a machlokess between Rashi and Tosafos about this disagreement.
Rashi believes these are discussing the male and female of a single species; Tosafos says that this is impossible, if they were the same species we'd consider their kashrus together, so this must be two separate species... a species where both male and female are referred to as the swamp cock, and a species where both male and female are referred to as the swamp hen.
Rabbi Elchanan explains that the fundamental disagreement is about whether simanim are indicators of a kosher species (Tosafos), or if the indicators themselves are what make the species kosher (Rashi). Rashi's position is particularly surprising, and again points to the way in which the Rabbis' intuitions about animals are not the same as modern intuitions.
Meanwhile, the Gemara notes immediately afterward that later they discovered that the swamp hen was dores, a predator, and therefore nonkosher. This is where the key Rashi comes in that says that if we don't have a tradition that it's kosher, we cannot eat a bird. Of the four simanim of kosher birds, three are physical and can be easily verified. But the fourth is behavioral; needs to be observed in a living bird. How can we ever be sure that a bird isn't sometimes dores? And dores is of a different character than the other three simanim... The majority opinion of the mesorah is that if a bird is dores, it's automatically not kosher, whereas some birds that lack some of the other kosher simanim are kosher.
The Daf is very much about what I was saying yesterday about the difficulty of Talmudic minim. There are 24 nonkosher birds, but that doesn't mean that if we know 24 species of nonkosher birds, we know that any other species is kosher, because it could be that a species is part of a nonkosher min.
Rav Nachman proposes a rule that, since, as discussed on the previous Daf, tradition is that only two birds, the peres and the ozniya, only have one kosher siman and are nonkosher, that if you see an unknown bird and you are able to accurately identify the peres and ozniya, then you can be sure that it's a kosher bird. He then proposes a similar rule that, since tradition is that only one bird, the orev, has two kosher simanim and is nonkosher, that if you see an unknown bird and you are able to accurately identify the orev, then you can be sure that it's a kosher bird.
But this generates pushback. There are apparently several other birds in the orev family, including the zarzir and the white senunit, which are also nonkosher because they are also considered orev! So the Gemara modifies Rav Nachman's rule to say that you need not only be able to identify the orev, you need to be able to identify all members of its family.
Later, we discuss the 'cock of the swamp' and the 'hen of the swamp'. The cock of the swamp is unkosher, the hen of the swamp is kosher. Rabbi Elefant brings Rabbi Elchanan's interpretation of a machlokess between Rashi and Tosafos about this disagreement.
Rashi believes these are discussing the male and female of a single species; Tosafos says that this is impossible, if they were the same species we'd consider their kashrus together, so this must be two separate species... a species where both male and female are referred to as the swamp cock, and a species where both male and female are referred to as the swamp hen.
Rabbi Elchanan explains that the fundamental disagreement is about whether simanim are indicators of a kosher species (Tosafos), or if the indicators themselves are what make the species kosher (Rashi). Rashi's position is particularly surprising, and again points to the way in which the Rabbis' intuitions about animals are not the same as modern intuitions.
Meanwhile, the Gemara notes immediately afterward that later they discovered that the swamp hen was dores, a predator, and therefore nonkosher. This is where the key Rashi comes in that says that if we don't have a tradition that it's kosher, we cannot eat a bird. Of the four simanim of kosher birds, three are physical and can be easily verified. But the fourth is behavioral; needs to be observed in a living bird. How can we ever be sure that a bird isn't sometimes dores? And dores is of a different character than the other three simanim... The majority opinion of the mesorah is that if a bird is dores, it's automatically not kosher, whereas some birds that lack some of the other kosher simanim are kosher.