ואלה המשפטים, “and these are the ordinances, etc.;” Rashi has pointed out that whenever a paragraph in the Torah commences with the word אלה, this signifies that it is not a continuation of something that had been written previously. However, when the paragraph begins with the word: ואלה, “and these, etc., it signals some kind of continuation. From Rashi’s words it would appear that the laws promulgated from here on in did not originate at Sinai as when the Torah wrote in Exodus 19,20 that Hashem descended to Mount Sinai, the whole point was that He did so in order to give the people the whole Torah.In order to solve this apparent contradiction, we need to view the word: פסל used by Rashi to signify a break with what preceded it, is to be understood as in Exodus 34,1 where G–d told Moses to hew himself two Tablets to replace the ones he had shattered after coming down from the Mountain for the first time. The act of “hewing” means to separate what you carve out from a greater quantity of the same base material, i.e. rock. In other words, what we are going to read from here on in are laws that, though of the same origin as the Ten Commandments, had been separated somewhat in time from when and how they were presented to the people. What Rashi meant to tell us was that if this paragraph had commenced with the word אלה, I would have thought that what followed was not of Sinaitic origin at all. In order not to mislead the reader, the Torah added the prefix ו to make clear that what follows was also of Sinaitic origin, i.e. G–d taught Moses all the Torah while he was on the mountain for forty days and forty nights. The letter ו here has the same meaning as the word את in Exodus 9,29, where Moses said: כצאתי את העיר, “when I go out from the city.” We find a similar construction in Deuteronomy 28,69: אלה דברי הברית, “these are the words of the covenant, ”where the admonitions have been separated from the blessings. The blessings in that paragraph had been preceded by curses. We find something similar in Deuteronomy 1,1: אלה הדברים אשר דבר משה, “these are the words which Moses had spoken, etc.” where we cannot understand this as something unconnected to what preceded it, but the letter ו is omitted as we are dealing with a different Book of the Torah, one that had not been dictated to Moses, but which G–d had approved after the event as deserving to be part of the written Torah. In Genesis 2,4 the words אלה תולדות השמים והארץ, “these are the generations of heaven and earth are separated from the prehistoric period when the Torah had described the tohu vavohu which had preceded the creation of light.

לפניהם, “before them.” Rashi sees in this word an exclusion of gentiles, to whom all these ordinances will not apply, even if they would adopt our system of civil law. [Presumably, he felt that otherwise that word is superfluous, as it is obvious that the laws would be addressed to the |sraelites. Ed.] Jews are not allowed to submit their litigation to a gentile court even if the rules of that court are like those of ours. Our author uses a parable to illustrate the point. Imagine that two sick persons go to a physician to have themselves examined. The physician tells one of them to eat, heartily and healthily, whereas he tells the second one to abstain from some of the very foods he had encouraged the first person to eat from heartily. The reason is that not every food is good for everyone. What is good for one patient may be very dangerous for the next patient. When the physician advised the first patient to eat heartily, the reason was that that patient was diagnosed as fatally ill, so that he might as well enjoy the time left for him on earth. The same advice to the second patient would prove very dangerous for him. The same reasoning applies to Jews and gentiles. We read in Ezekiel 20,25 concerning the gentiles that G–d had given them laws and statutes that they could not live by, whereas the laws He gave to the Israelites were designed to be for their benefit. [This verse is extremely difficult, and the reader is advised to read the commentary by Rabbi M.Eisemann in the Art Scroll edition of the Book of Ezekiel. Ed.] Rashi assumes that when the Israelites fail to observe G–d’s laws, they will eventually attribute their hardships to G–d’s laws having been harmful. We are taught in the Torah that the opposite is true. Compare Leviticus 18.5. This is also the reason why we are forbidden to eat all kinds of creeping creatures, as they are injurious to one’s health. These same creatures, if eaten by gentiles, are not harmful to them. This is also the meaning of Psalms 147,19: מגיד דבריו ליעקב, חוקיו ,” ,משפטיו לישראל. לא עשה כן לכל גוי, “He issus His commands to Yaakov, His statutes and rules to Israel; He did not do so for any other nation;” The following is a true story involving the convert Onkelos, a nephew of the Roman Emperor Hadrianus, who when wishing to convert was afraid of the wrath of his uncle the Emperor. He told his uncle that he wished to engage in business, whereupon his uncle asked him if he was short of capital, in which case he was willing to help him out. He told his uncle that he wished to travel and find out which merchandise was both in demand and easy to obtain. His uncle told him to seek out a field which was presently in a recession so that he could invest at low prices and profit when market conditions would improve. As a result, he went to the land of Israel, at that time in a deep depression commercially, and studied Torah from the scholars prior to undergoing circumcision for becoming a convert. He was told that the words of Torah would only reside within him permanently if he circumcised himself first. He followed this advice, circumcised himself and studied a great deal of Torah. When Rabbi Eliezer and Rabbi Joshua saw him, they noticed that his facial features had undergone a great change. They concluded that this was not Onkelos who had studied the Torah. When he began to ask the scholars questions, they told him that this was the result. When he returned to his uncle the Emperor, the latter asked him what had brought about the change in his facial features. He told him that he had studied the Torah and had himself circumcised. Upon being asked who had advised him to do this, he said: “you have.” He explained that his uncle had told him to acquire merchandise which was in a depression and patiently wait until this merchandise would appreciate in value. He had visited many nations and not found a single one which was in such a state of depression as the Jewish nation, so that he became convinced that their fortunes would improve drastically. He quoted the prophet Isaiah 49,7 who had predicted this already more than five hundred years earlier. The Emperor slapped his face and asked him once more what had prompted him to convert to Judaism. He told him that actually, he had gone to study the Torah, but had been told that the condition for being taught Torah was that he had to be circumcised, just as Yaakov. He quoted Psalms 147,20 where it has been spelled out by the use of the word בל, that only the people of Israel had been endowed with Torah knowledge that could be retained. (Tanchuma, Mishpatim section 5)

כי תקנה עבד עברי, “if you acquire a Hebrew servant;” according to Rashi, the scenario described here is that a thief who did not have the means to compensate his victim for what he had stolen, has been “sold” (i.e. the value of his labour for six years) by the court which had convicted him. [A Jew’s body cannot be sold by any court. Ed.] The procedure has been described in Exodus 22,2. Alternately, the person described in the Torah here has fallen on hard times and has sold his labour for six years to a “master” in order to pay off his creditors. If he had been “sold” by the court he does not automatically leave his master’s employment at the conclusion of six years service. Thus far Rashi on above verse. The problem is what prompted Rashi to write that someone sold by the court does not automatically conclude his service at the end of six years? We have a verse in Deuteronomy 15,12, according to which if someone who is a Jew or Jewess, has been “sold” to you, his contract is valid for six years be he a male or a female. He is to be released at the end of that period, and his master is to provide him with a minimal stake to enable him to establish himself economically from that point. (verses 13-14 there) Clearly, that verse and its provisions do not apply to someone who had “sold” himself but had been “sold” by the court. Rashi there also comments that the person in question had been sold by someone other than himself. We must assume therefore that Rashi was explaining the commentary of the Mechilta, according to which the words: כי תקנה apply to the son or daughter of the original master, who had died during these years. The question is whether the contract can be inherited by the master’s children, or in the event that the master did not leave behind any children, whether whosoever inherits the master’s estate this includes the unexpired period of such a servant’s contract. In the event that such a servant had been “sold” by the court would the contract expire automatically with the death of the original purchaser? The wording in Deuteronomy, כי ימכר לך, “if he has been sold to you,” as is distinct from the wording in our verse where the master is described as actively acquiring the servant, i.e. כי תקנה, suggest that the two situations described are not identical. In Deuteronomy the period of service is spelled out as being six years, adding that in the seventh year such a servant has to be released unconditionally, whereas in Exodus, in our verse the Torah adds the same clause. In Deuteronomy the word (unnecessary) ועבדך, “he shall serve you” is added. This reference to “you” is absent in our verse here. In Leviticus 25,39, where the subject of an impoverished Israelite selling himself is first raised, the Torah does not speak of a term of 6 years but a period concluding with the Jubilee year, a year when all such forced sales of land or labour are automatically reversed. If such servants are not released until the Jubilee year, it stands to reason that they continue serving the son or daughter of their master if he passed away before the onset of the Jubilee year (once in 50 years). This means that the verse we are dealing with, commencing with the words: “when you acquire, etc.,” must apply to someone who had been sold by the court. If the Torah, in dealing with the acquisition of a Jewish servant, had only written the one verse on the subject in our portion, I might have thought that such a “servant” would have to continue serving upon the death of his master either his son or even his brother. To prevent us from misunderstanding this, the Torah had to write when speaking of a servant who had been sold by the court: כי ימכר לך אחיך, “when your brother has been sold to you,” and it had to add: ועבדך שש שנים, “and he has to serve you, (the purchaser) for six years.” This excludes any service to an heir of the purchaser. We therefore find that on the one hand the text implies something additional, and on the other hand it implies something less. The Rabbis therefore interpreted the addition as being the heir if he is a son or a daughter, but excluding the brother in the event the master did not leave behind a son or daughter in the event that the servant had been sold by the court. We find in the Talmud, tractate Kiddushin, folio 17 that the Talmud asks what forces us to include as heir the son, while at the same time excluding the heir when he is a brother, i.e. not a direct descendant. The answer given is that a son takes the place of his father when it comes to inheriting landed property or a maidservant whom the father may assign to his son to inherit as maidservant, (wife) when of age. (Compare Leviticus 27,20 and Talmud tractate Erchin folio 25.) [At this point our author refers to Rashi saying that the whole concept of the servant leaving his master’s forced employment is a chidush, something not derived from standard methods of interpreting the Torah’s laws, and he proceeds to suggest that it could be a g’zeyrah shaveh, an accepted method of interpretation. As I have not found in my editions of Rashi, any reference to his saying that there is a chidush, I’ll skip this. Ed.]

ויצאה אשתו עמו, “his wife will leave that master’s employment with him (at the same time). Rashi asks correctly, granted that we have been told that his wife leaves with him, but where did we hear that this applies to his children? As an answer he cites the Talmud, tractate Kiddushin folio 22, that we learn from this verse that the master of the servant of which the Torah speaks here is obligated to look after the servant’s wife’s and family’s needs, if he had such when he was sold to him. Whereas it is clear that the master has to look after such a servants’ wife, it does not appear clear from the text that he is also obligated to look after the children of such a servant. We need to find a nuance in the text that would support this contention. Our author therefore suggests that this can be found in Leviticus 25,41, where the subject is someone who was forced to sell his labour as he had fallen on hard times, debts, etc; the Torah there states that the “master” must release both him and his family in the Jubilee year, showing that there is an unnecessary word. The word שכיר appears both in Leviticus and that same word appears again in Deut. 15,18. The scholars that do not accept this g’zeyrah shaveh as something that is traditional, but simply consider (Talmud Kiddushin there) the phrasing of the verse as sufficient.

אם אדוניו, “if his master etc.” here the Torah authorises the master of this Hebrew (unmarried) servant to give him one of his Canaanite slave-women as a “wife” to have children with, provided he had previously been married to a Jewish wife. If this “servant” had previously not been married, he cannot force him to enter into such a relationship with a Canaanite woman. This ruling is based on the words in verse 3: אם בגפו יבא בגפו יצא, ”if he came as a bachelor, he will leave as a bachelor.” The reason underlying this legislation is that if he had previously been married to a Jewish woman he will not feel attracted to a Canaanite slave woman.

ורצע אדוניו את אזנו במרצע, “his master must pierce his ear with an awl;” why did the Torah choose the awl as the tool with which to pierce this servant’s ear? The numerical value of the letters in the word מרצע equals 400. It is to remind that servant that seeing that G–d had redeemed the Jewish people from 400 years of slavery, it is unbelievable that he should choose being enslaved to a human master voluntarily. G–d had stated categorically in Leviticus 25,55 כי לי בני ישראל עבדים, “for the Children of Israel are meant to be bound by a master- servant relationship only with their G–d,” not with any human being. If this man chooses to become indentured to a human master he deserves to be punished physically. (Talmud, tractate Kiddushin, folio 22, and Tossaphot on that folio.

ועבדו לעולם, “and he shall serve him “forever.” The word עולם here means: for the same length of time as the Levites perform their duties in the Temple. The word is used in this connection for the prophet Samuel whose mother had “given him” to G–d, i.e. to the Temple and the High Priest when he was 2 years old. Samuel died at the age of 52. (Samuel I 1,22) It follows that the length of time someone must serve a master when the Torah calls it לעולם, is no longer than 50 years.

וכי ימכור איש, “If someone “sells” his daughter, etc.;” according to Rashi, he can only do so while she is less than 12 years of age. If someone were to claim that the father can still do so when that daughter has demonstrated signs of puberty, and that person would argue that the work performed by a daughter belongs to her father even while she is between 12 years and 12 and a half years old, the Torah has added the word לאמה, “to become a maid-servant.” She cannot be “sold” as such when older than 12 years and a day.Some scholars are of the opinion that when a minor male had been “sold” by his father, that minor would be free to leave the employment of his masters when he displayed signs of puberty. This is totally erroneous, as nowhere did we read that a father may “sell” a son, and to draw a comparison from the text in Deuteronomy 15,12, where a male Israelite is described as “selling” himself is quite absurd. If that verse would speak about a minor boy, say an orphan, selling himself. This would be legally completely invalid as minors cannot do such a thing in Jewish law. The reason is that a Jewish court has no authority to penalise a minor. (Compare the addition to Rashi’s commentary on that verse)

לא תצא כצאת העבדים, the terms under which she leaves the employ of her “master” are not the same as apply to male “servants.” Ibn Ezra explains specifically that his master cannot force such a servant to perform labour outside the master’s home. [not found in the Ibn Ezra editions of Mossad harav Kook. Ed.]

והפדה, “he must help her to obtain her freedom;” the unusual phrasing means that he must do more than the law requires to give her freedom, i.e. enable her to avoid having to become someone else’s “slave” due to her being penniless. Rashi explains our verse as follows: if the servant girl had been sold for six years service, for say 600 dollars, and she had only worked for two years, she must give him 400 dollars upon her going free. If you were to ask what did her master loose in that scenario, seeing that he had received the correct percentage of the work performed? The answer is that the girl’s services becoming worth more every year she grew closer to adulthood, the master had paid her for work performed while she was too young to be worth what he had paid for. In other words, the master did sustain a financial loss by her early release.

ואם שלש אלה לא יעשה לה, “and if her master had not performed any of the three options offered him by the Torah, etc.” Rashi spells out what these three options were; a) he marries her; b) his son marries her; c) she pays to redeem herself. The interpretation of the three options do not refer to her enduring upon being married to her former master that her husband marries someone else in addition, less frequent opportunities to marital relations with her husband. Her entitlements to clothing, marital relations are unimpaired. When she reaches puberty she goes free and must receive a definite document of divorce to ensure that she can marry without problems.

ויצאה חנם, “she will leave for nothing without money” (to her master). This verse speaks of her leaving after having attained the status of נערה, the period between twelve years and a day, and twelve and a half years.

The additional words: אין כסף, “without money changing hands,” apply to a situation in which she has attained the status of בגרות, biological maturity, i.e. over twelve and a half years of age. (Talmud, tractate Kiddushin folio 4) The reason this had to be added is that if the Torah had not written this, we would have assumed that already the words ויצאה חנם apply to her having this status, which would have been a simple assumption to make. In the event that you the reader would raise the question that seeing that this girl is legally entitled to leave the employ of her master already when having attained the status of נערה, why would the Torah have to add anything further, the answer to this question given by the Talmud we quoted, is that if she had displayed symptoms of being unable to bear children, i.e. she never displayed the symptoms attesting to the fact that she had matured biologically, in which case the Torah rules that when she attains the age of twelve and a half she must be given her freedom regardless of any other considerations.

מכה איש, “if someone strikes an adult male, etc;” Rashi compares this verse with a similar verse in Leviticus 24,17, reading איש כי יכה, “when an adult male strikes someone,” explaining that both verses are necessary. Verse 14 here, commencing with “if someone deliberately strikes some with intent to kill, but tries to make it look as if it was unintentional,” is also needed as explained by Rashi on that verse, i.e. that unless it had been written, I would have thought that penalties are in place only when the aggression was deliberate with intent to harm or kill. Without our verse one could have thought that killing a woman or injuring her, or doing so to a hermaphrodite would not be punishable, or would be punishable less severely. Rashi explains all this on verse 16 in our chapter.

ומכה אביו ואמו, “and if someone strikes his father or his mother;” the Torah here spells out the penalty, i.e. legal execution, without even having informed us that this is forbidden, an unusual construction. This question is raised by the Talmud, tractate Sanhedrin, folio 54. We have a rule that no court can convict a sinner except where the Torah has warned us of the sin in question being a sin. Granted that in the case of someone cursing a crowned head or even a deaf person who cannot even hear the curse, is forbidden, i.e. both a low-ranking person and a high ranking person must not be cursed, it is obvious that the same rule applies to social strata in between, and therefore each strata does not need to be written separately; compare (Exodus 22,7 and Leviticus 19,7) but where did the Torah spell out the prohibition to strike a human being without the penalty being spelled out simultaneously? We must fall back on Deuteronomy 25,3, where the Torah warns the court’s clerk not to apply more than the permitted number of lashes to a person convicted of these. If in the case where the physical punishment is mandatory even a minutely excessive force is specifically forbidden, it is clear that striking someone without the consent or even instruction by the court is forbidden, how much more so is striking someone without such legal cover forbidden! In fact, concerning the subject of physical punishment, the halachah is according to the view of Rabbi Meir, who said that if someone is guilty of two penalties, both physical punishment and a financial penalty, (and we do not apply both for the same sin) the physical punishment is not administered. (Talmud, tractate Ketuvot, folio 32) The only exception is if the financial penalty amounts to less that the lowest coin in circulation at the time in the country. In this respect, the halachah does not treat sins committed against father or mother differently from offences committed against someone else. If you were to ask that seeing the verse deals with the prohibition of striking one’s father, a sin which carries the death penalty, how could anyone have even imagined that the penalty would be 39 lashes, seeing that we have a rule that physical lashes are never an option for committing such a sin, (compare Talmud tractate Makkot folio 13), the answer is that we have two different expressions in the verse dealing with that subject in Deuteronomy 25,3. It says both: ארבעים יכנו לא יוסיף,, as well as פן יוסיף להכותו על אלה מכה רבה, “forty lashes he may give him, he must nor exceed this,” and “lest he should exceed above by inflicting a severe wound, etc.;” you may also argue that seeing the subject in our chapter deals with inflicting wounds, how could the penalty be one of execution by a court? How would I know that if the blow administered did not result in a visible wound that it would be punishable altogether? Furthermore, when the Torah speaks about cursing father and mother (Leviticus 20,9) execution is the penalty, how could it occur to anyone to think that the penalty would be 39 lashes? We would have to look at Leviticus 24,21 where the Torah decrees the death penalty for striking a human being, any human being, i.e. ומכה אדם יומת, “if he strikes a human being she shall be executed!” On that verse Rashi felt compelled to explain that the human being meant in that verse is one’s father, and that the reason is to contrast and to compare the penalty for striking animals and striking one’s father, where the former is punishable only by financial compensation to the owner of that animal. We could conclude that just as when said animal did not die from its wounds only a financial penalty is imposed, the same would be true for striking human being who does not die a result. The Torah therefore wrote the word יומת, “he shall be executed,” to show that the verse speaks of a human being who is the father of the man who struck him.(Compare Rashi on that verse.) It is not possible to say that the Torah there speaks of someone who had struck one’s father after he was dead, but the verse speaks of living animals and a living father being the victim. What is the difference between יומת and מות יומת, the usual term for legal execution? The former refers to a financial penalty, just as in Exodus 21,29, where the owner is not executed, but the Torah uses this word to show that he deserves to be executed. We know this as previously the Torah had written: כן ינתן בו, “thus it shall be rendered to him.” (verse 20) This was a clear reference to a financial penalty. In light of the above, we must understand the word יומת in Leviticus 20,9 as having been meant literally and applying to someone who struck his father or mother.

וגונב איש, but if someone kidnaps a person, etc.” the reason why this scenario is written between the verses where striking a father a or cursing him is written, is because the penalty for striking a father or kidnapping a person is death by strangulation, while the penalty for cursing one’s father is by stoning (more severe). In Leviticus 20,9, the penalty for cursing is described both as מות יומת, “he is sure to be executed,” plus the additional words: דמיו בו, “his blood(guilt) is upon him.” Although we might have thought that cursing one’s parent should carry a lighter sentence than physically assaulting him, seeing it does not involve an act, whereas striking includes an act of violence, the Torah decreed a more severe penalty for the cursing of one’s parent, i.e. death by stoning. According to the Talmud in tractate Sanhedrin, folio 49, the reason why a severe type of death penalty is applied for cursing one’s parents, is that the Torah compares the parents as deserving a similar degree of honour as that shown to G–d, seeing that the parents brought you into this world. Cursing G–d is punishable by stoning as we know from the blasphemer in Leviticus 24,14. Seeing that it impossible to strike G–d, any comparison with striking a parent is inappropriate. Hence the death penalty for that sin is chenek, strangulation. Furthermore, when someone was guilty of cursing his parents after they had died he is still guilty of the same sin, whereas if the same person had struck his father after he had died the death penalty does not apply, as it was part of the penalties listed for causing injury (Compare Mechilta Mishpatim, section 5.). It is impossible to inflict an injury upon someone who is already dead. Our author asks that if one cannot inflict injury after death and therefore the death penalty by stoning is not applied, why is the same not true of someone who cursed G–d, seeing it is impossible to harm Him in any way? Perhaps the fact that the subject of cursing G–d, and the penalty for this appears next to the subject of the blasphemer in Leviticus chapter 24, makes my question irrelevant.

אך אם יום או יומים, “but if he survives for a day or two, etc.” Rashi commenting on verse 20, explains that the subject in that verse was either a Canaanite slave or slave-woman, and that our verse was necessary to describe under what circumstances the scenario described here has been exempted from the general rule applying to someone who struck his Canaanite slave, fatally, with an object that could be assumed to cause death. If death was delayed by at least 24 hours, the master is not treated as a murderer, but as someone who had disciplined someone whom he owned physically. [At this point the author engages in a discussion of the applicability of two closely related principles of Torah exegesis, known as the thirteen principles of Rabbi Yishmael, something extremely complicated for anyone not familiar with these principles. This editor does not think that he is qualified to explain this adequately to his readers, and has decided that rather than to confuse the reader he will omit this. He points to what Rashi himself has written in his commentary on verse 12, that he will endeavour to explain this legislation and why it appears so many times in the Torah, each time in a slightly different format. If even Rashi felt this way, this editor may be forgiven for preferring to skip part of this. Ed.]

אם אסון יהיה, “if an unexpected complication resulted, such as the premature stillborn death of the fetus, etc.” according to the scholar in the Talmud who holds that if a person intended to kill A and killed B instead by mistake, he is still considered guilty of murder, seeing that he had violated the commandment of “a life for a life,” as having to be understood literally, there is no problem here. According to the scholar who holds that these words here are not to be taken literally, but that what is meant is a financial penalty/compensation, to be paid by the perpetrator. The third opinion in the Talmud, Tanna de bey Chiskiyah, holds that the perpetrator does not even have to pay a financial penalty to the heirs of the victim. This opinion is expressed in the tractate Baba Kamma, folio 35, and is based on the following interpretation of our verse: The words: אם אסון יהיה, “if a mishap will occur,” are referring to the woman pregnant with child, not to her fetus; then the rule נפש תחת נפש, “a life for a life is applied,” seeing she, a living human being had been killed. The author adds that it appears to him that what went wrong here was that the killer had intended to kill the man he was fighting with, but had erroneously killed this woman. If we had not had this verse we might have thought that no death penalty would apply seeing that what he had intended to do had not been carried out; the Torah therefore repeats this expression “a life for a life,” to remind us that regardless of who had been killed by him he deserves death for having intended to kill a human being, something he had intended to do, and something which carries the death penalty.

לחפשי ישלחנו, “he must set him free;” even if he had only knocked out one of his Canaanite slaves’ teeth. According to a Midrash, (asking the rhetorical question) will such a slave really be given his freedom just because he lost as tooth? The answer given is as follows: Cham, the son of Noach was cursed by G–d, [actually his son, seeing that he had previously been blessed by G–d and that blessing could not be nullified Ed.] for having seen his father naked, and having told his brothers instead of covering him. In our verse, the Torah says that if a slave is damaged in his eye or tooth (mouth) he is freed from slavery, just as Cham sinned with his eyes and mouth and was cursed to slavery.

סקול יסקל השור, “the (offending) ox must be stoned to death.” Rashi claims that from the words above we would not know that its flesh would be prohibited as food. This sounds very strange, seeing that it has not been killed by ritual slaughter, it is what is known as neveilah, and all animals that died other than by ritual slaughter are automatically forbidden to us as food. What did Rashi think that the words: “its meat must not be eaten” was needed for? It could be needed for a situation in which the ox in question had been ritually slaughtered after being convicted to die by stoning, before the decree could be carried out. In that event our verse insures that it will not allow the guilty party to circumvent the court’s decision, seeing that ritual slaughter could not be carried out on a dead animal. If you were to say that the prohibition here refers to the fetus found inside an animal that had been ritually slaughtered and was either close to be born, and comes out alive, or it had been carried for the full term of pregnancy and was dead, and the Torah decreed that ritual slaughter of the mother was not sufficient to permit this ben pekuah to be eaten, as is, it is considered as having died from natural causes and therefore cannot be eaten, the words לא יאכל, teach that it must not only not be eaten, but no other use may be made of it either.

ואם שור נגח הוא, “but if that ox had had a history of goring people, (and its owner had not taken proper precautions);“ The Talmud, tractate Baba Kamma folio 23, relates a dispute between two scholars, Abbaye and Rava whether the term נגח applies to an ox that already gored twice or whether even after having gored once, that animal belongs to the category of being potential a killer, and its owner being guilty of not having protected potential victims properly. The subject of their dispute is the meaning of the word תמול, usually understood to mean “yesterday.” According to the former scholar, even a single incident of goring suffices for the ox to be categorised as dangerous, and the prefix מ i.e. מתמול, would refer to the second offense by that ox, so that the words ולא ישמרנו, “and its owner did not watch it adequately,” would make him liable to stoning only the fourth time whereas according to the second scholar, basing himself on the word שלשום, “day before yesterday,” that ox’s status did not change from harmless to dangerous until after it had gored three times. According to Rava, the words ולא ישמרנו, would then mean that only after a third such occurrence did this ox change its category, and its owner became guilty on an additional count According to the Talmud in tractate Baba batra, folio 28, such an ox is subject to stoning only after it has gored the fourth time. seems therefore that Abaye found four sources in the Torah’s text supporting his view whereas Rava found only three. If you were to ask what difference this makes, [after all we do not decide questions of halachah on the written text of the Torah, but use it only as broad hints, Ed.] Rabbi Ezra hanavi claims that there is a difference. The difference would be if the fourth goring had occurred on the same day as the third goring. According to Abbaye, if the last goring would have occurred on the same day as the previous one, the owner as well as his ox would not be held liable for the additional negligence, as the owner on a day when his ox was bad-tempered had not yet had time to place him under secure restraint.

שלשים שקלים, “thirty shekel.” This is an arbitrary amount determined by the Torah, as clearly the value in terms of ability to perform work varies from person to person. We already have a hint of this on the first occasion when the Torah ever mentions a “slave,” in Genesis 9,25, where the Torah writes, concerning Canaan, son of Cham that he is to be a slave to slaves, and the extra word יהיה, “he will be,” is added there. The numerical value of that word is 30, as if to tell us that this is a fixed amount regardless of the physical strength of that servant.

ונפל שמה שור, “and an ox falls into that pit;” (because it was not covered); Rashi explains that the Torah chose the ox as an example which applies to all other domestic animals also. Wherever the word שור occurs in the Torah, it serves as an example applicable to other domestic animals. When both שור and חמור, “ox and donkey” are mentioned, what is meant is “an ox as opposed to a human being,” and the word חמור, donkey, is meant to be contrasted with “inert vessels.” If you were to argue that the word שור at least once, is needed in order to establish its connection to the Sabbath laws where the Torah wrote in Exodus 23,12 that “your ox must rest on the Sabbath,” the answer is that unless we were to deduce from the repeated use of these types of animals and no others that they were meant to exclude human beings and inert vessels from the respective legislation under discussion, the Torah did not have to use either example, and simply write that something will fall into the pit, without listing any example. If this is so, i.e. that the word ונפל, “it falls,” includes both ox, donkey, etc.; just as these words do in connection with the Sabbath rest to be observed by the possessions of a Jew on the Sabbath, the words “ox” and “donkey” are available for teaching us additional rules. Nonetheless, it is still difficult to understand why the Torah chose as its examples animals and not human beings that would fall into the pit of which our verse speaks. This can be deduced from the words: והמת יהיה לו, “and the carcass will be his;" i.e. he who owned this animal while alive is permitted to make use of its carcass other than consuming it. This makes clear that the owner of the offending animal is not permitted to make any use of the animal or vessel his ox had killed or destroyed. This has been pointed out already in the Jerusalem Talmud in connection with a different problem, namely if an owner of a Canaanite slave who has not yet been circumcised and undergone immersion in a ritual bath, is permitted to start working for his owner. The reason why the dead animal is forbidden to be made any use of is derived from Deuteronomy 21,1 where the subject of the heifer that is killed as symbolic atonement for the people in whose vicinity an anonymous person had been murdered, their declaring that he had not been denied food or shelter in their town. In that verse the Torah uses the apparently unnecessary word שם, “there,” as it does in connection with the death of Miriam in Numbers 20,1. The rabbis conclude from these two unnecessary words, that just as a human carcass is forbidden to be made any use of, so it is forbidden to make any use of the carcass of the heifer discussed in Deuteronomy 21,4. [This editor does not understand why the author ever assumed that a human being could have served as the example in our verse, as when a human being falls into a pit the person who had failed to cover it is not responsible, as human beings have been given eyes to see with and a brain to use to watch where they are going.] (Compare Rashi, who contrasts שור with אדם, i.e. no compensation is payable for human beings who fall into the pit.] The Talmud in tractate Avodah zarah folio 29, quotes the school of Yannai as saying that the reason why such making use of the dead is prohibited, is that death is associated with atonement, i.e. כפר לעמך ישראל, “grant atonement for Your people of Israel,” [so that they will regain their status as being holy, Ed.] and just as something holy must not be used for a secular use, so also the dead who have achieved forgiveness through having died, and have recaptured their former status as innocent holy beings.