Nedarim 16a (טז.) — the Talmud in English

Gemara:

We learned in the Mishna: “Korban, I will not eat from you; korban, what I eat from you; ‘for a korban, I will not eat from you’—he is permitted”:

Earlier, in the Mishna on 10b, Rabbi Meir and the Sages disagreed. According to the first tanna, who is Rabbi Meir, one who says, “Jerusalem, what I eat from you,” is prohibited, even though he did not say “like Jerusalem,” with the kaf of comparison. Whereas Rabbi Yehuda holds: One who says “Jerusalem”—or any other expression to which he did not add the kaf of comparison—has said nothing.

The Gemara infers from what we learned, “Korban, I will not eat from you—he is permitted,” that if he had said, “Korban, I will eat from you”—meaning, “What I eat of yours shall be upon me like a korban”—he would indeed have been prohibited, even though he did not say “like a korban”—

And if so, it must be that

who is the author of our Mishna?

It is Rabbi Meir, for he makes no distinction between ‘korban’ and ‘like a korban’,

that is, he does not require the kaf of comparison—

And if so,

say in the latter clause: “

‘For a korban, I will not eat from you’”—

he is permitted.

But

since our Mishna is Rabbi Meir’s, this is difficult:

did we not learn

in the Mishna above, on 13a:

One who says: “

‘For a korban, I will not eat from you’”—

Rabbi Meir prohibits it, and Rabbi Abba said

above, on 13b, in explaining Rabbi Meir’s reasoning: Because he

is considered as one who says “

‘For a korban shall be

what I eat of yours]

therefore I will not eat from you.’”

How, then, can we have learned, “For a korban, I will not eat from you—he is permitted,” in our Mishna, which follows Rabbi Meir!?

And we answer:

This is not difficult:

This—

the earlier Mishna—

is where he said “

for a korban”

with the lamed prefixed by a sheva, which can be interpreted: “For a korban shall it be; therefore I will not eat from you,” and so he is prohibited from eating his fellow’s food.

This—

our Mishna—

is where he said “

for a korban”

with the lamed bearing a patah,

for “

it is not a korban”

he is saying,

and therefore it is no longer possible to say: “For a korban shall it be; therefore I will not eat from you.”

Mishna:

One who says “

‘An oath: I will not eat from you’,”

which means: “By an oath! I will not eat from you.”

Or if he said: “

‘This is an oath that I will eat from you’,”

which likewise implies that he will not eat from you. Or: “

‘For an oath

with the lamed bearing a patah ]

I will not eat from you,’”

which means: What I will not eat of yours shall not be prohibited to me by an oath; but what I will eat of yours shall be prohibited to me by an oath, because “from a negative statement you infer a positive one”—

Therefore, in all these cases he is

prohibited.

Gemara:

We learned in the Mishna: “This is an oath that I will eat from you,” and so on—he is prohibited:

This implies that

if he says, “

‘This is an oath that I will eat from you,’”

his words are not interpreted as “an oath that I will eat,” but

that “

I will not eat”

is implied,

as though he had said: “By an oath, it shall be upon me if I eat of yours,” and therefore he is prohibited from eating.

And we raise a contradiction

from a Mishna in Shevuot:

“Oaths: two that are four,”

that is, two oaths explicitly stated in the verse, “Or if a person takes an oath, expressing with his lips to do evil or to do good,” and the Sages derived two additional oaths—

Two oaths concerning the future that are explicit in the verse: “An oath

that I will eat”

that is, “to do good”

and “

an oath

that I will not eat”

that is, “to do evil.”

Two additional oaths concerning the past, derived by the Sages: “An oath

that I ate”

and “

an oath

that I did not eat.”

And we infer:

From the fact that

the tanna said: “

that I will eat and that I will not eat,”

and “

that I ate and that I did not eat,”

it follows that just as “I ate and I did not eat” means “yes and no,” so too “that I will eat and that I will not eat” means “yes and no”—

This implies that “

that I will eat from you” “

I will eat”

is implied,

for if “that I will eat” is interpreted as “By an oath, what I eat shall be upon me,” as in our Mishna, then “I will eat and I will not eat” are both negative statements, and not “yes and no”!?

Said

he answered

Abaye: “

That I will eat”

has two possible meanings,

depending on the circumstances:

If

they were urging

him

to eat, and he said “

I will eat, I will eat,”

and then

he added,

“

I swear that I will eat,” then

‘I will eat’

But if he said “

is implied.

But if he said “

I will not eat, I will not eat”

and then

he added and

said: “

I swear that I will eat,” then

‘I will not eat’

is what he said,

meaning, what I eat of yours shall be prohibited to me by an oath.

Rav Ashi said

Rav Ashi said

to offer another resolution:

‘That I will eat’ in the case of an oath means that he said ‘that I will not eat.’

In Shevuot 20a we read:

Rav Ashi said: Teach, ‘An oath that I will not eat from you.’

That is, the phrase we learned in our Mishna, “This is an oath that I will eat from you,” should not be taught that way, but rather, “This is an oath that I will not eat from you,” which certainly means “I will not eat”; but the ordinary expression “that I will eat” means “I will eat.”

And we ask:

If so, it is obvious

and

what is the point

what novelty is there in this!?

And we answer: There is a novelty here, because

it might have entered your mind to say: It is merely a distorted expression that happened to trip him up,

that is, it is a distorted expression, and his speech merely became confused; and in Shevuot 19a: “It might have entered your mind to say that his tongue became confused.”

That is, one might have said that the expression “that I will not eat” is merely a verbal distortion, since people do not ordinarily use the expression “that I will not eat,” but rather “that I will not eat”; his speech became confused, and he prolonged the vowel of the shin, producing “that I will eat,” which is similar to someone saying “that I will not eat,” but in fact he intended only “that I will eat.”

It teaches us

that our Mishna interprets his words according to their plain meaning, and he is prohibited from eating.

And the Gemara explains:

Abaye did not state Rav Ashi’s reasoning,

who said, “Teach, ‘that I will not eat,’” because

it was not taught “

that I will not eat.”

And Rav Ashi withdrew

from that interpretation

of Abaye’s reasoning,

which interprets the expression “that I will eat” in two ways, according to the circumstances.

Because

he held

that Rav Ashi reasoned as follows: Just as you say that the expression “that I will eat” has two meanings, so too you can say that

“that I will not eat”

also has two possible meanings.

For if

they were urging him to eat, and he said: “

I will eat, I will eat,”

and he also said: ‘An oath,’ both “

that I will eat”

and “

you can interpret it as follows:

that I will not eat”

meaning that he swore both “an oath that I will eat” and “an oath that I will not eat”—

you can interpret it as follows:

the expression ‘I will eat’ is implied by what he said

“I will eat this”—that is the meaning of his words.

That is, even when he used the expression “that I will not eat,” if they had first urged him to eat, his words are not necessarily interpreted as “I will not eat.” Rather, you can interpret them as: “Did I swear to you that I will not eat? But I already told you that I will eat.” He would therefore not be prohibited by an oath from eating.

And one can also resolve the wording

as its plain meaning: “

‘An oath that I will not eat’”—

he is saying: ‘An oath that I will not eat.’

But if this is so, why does the tanna use the expression “that I will eat” once with one meaning and once with the other, whereas with “that I will not eat” the tanna uses only one meaning, namely, “I will not eat”!?

It must be that the interpretation of the expressions does not change,

but the tanna stated decisively

: “

‘That I will eat’”

always means ‘I will eat’

in every case;

and “

‘that I will not eat’”

‘I will not eat’”

is implied

in every case.

Mishna:

In the preceding mishnayot, two distinctions between vows and oaths were taught:

The first: A matter that has no substance, such as one who prohibits sleep. In a vow, he is prohibited only by rabbinic law, since it has no substance, whereas with an oath he is prohibited by Torah law.

The second: The three expressions, “korban, I will not eat from you”; “This is a korban, what I eat from you”; and “For a korban, I will not eat from you,” do not take effect to prohibit him from eating with his fellow when he says them in this form, which is the language of a vow. But if he says those same expressions in the language of an oath, they do take effect.

And the Mishna summarizes:

This—

these distinctions that we learned between vows and oaths—

is a stringency

in

oaths more than in vows,

for they take effect with an oath but not with a vow.

And there is a stringency in vows over oaths—

how so?

If he said: ‘Konam, the sukka that I will make,’

‘the lulav that I will take, the phylacteries that I will put on’—with vows,

he is

prohibited

from fulfilling the mitzva.

Whereas

with oaths,

he is

permitted, for one does not take an oath to violate the mitzvot,

and the Gemara will explain the reason for the distinction between a vow and an oath.