Rosh Hashanah 34a — the Talmud in English

which need not be stated—

for there is no need to say

“in the seventh month”

, since “on the Day of Atonement” has already been stated, and everyone knows that the Day of Atonement is in the seventh month!

And what does it teach—

and for what purpose was

“in the seventh month” stated?

To tell you

that all the blasts of the seventh month—

are alike.

And just as with the blast of the Day of Atonement, one blows a plain blast before it and after it, so too on Rosh HaShana one does so.

And from where [do we derive] three—

that one blows three series of blasts [for kingships, remembrances, and shofarot], each series consisting of

three

blasts, namely, in each series one blows a plain blast, a terua, and a plain blast [as was explained above]?

The verse teaches:

A. In the matter of the Jubilee it is stated [there]:

“And you shall sound a shofar blast.”

B. In the matter of Rosh HaShana it is stated [Leviticus 23:24]:

“A rest day, a remembrance of a blast.”

C. It is further stated concerning Rosh HaShana [Numbers 29]:

“It shall be a day of blasting for you.”

And when we combine the verses stated concerning Rosh HaShana and the Jubilee, we find that blasts are mentioned three times in the verses, teaching that they blew three series, both on Rosh HaShana and on the Jubilee.

But one must ask: these three blasts were not stated in one matter.

And from where [do we derive] to apply what is stated—

the blast stated in the verse—

of this

concerning Rosh HaShana

to that

concerning the Jubilee,

and

the blast

of this

concerning the Jubilee

to that

concerning Rosh HaShana?

As though “blast” had been written three times, both concerning Rosh HaShana and concerning the Jubilee.

The verse teaches—

for this reason

“seventh”

[“in the seventh month”] was stated concerning Rosh HaShana, and

“seventh”

concerning the Jubilee.

To

teach a

gzera shava.

And everything stated concerning this is likewise stated concerning its counterpart.

How so?

How many blasts are blown in total?

Three

series [each of which contains three blasts],

which

are in total

nine

blasts.

And

the measure of a plain blast is like a terua.

And

the measure of a terua is like three broken blasts.

And we raise an objection against the words of the beraita:

this tanna, initially, derives it by means of a comparison.

At the beginning of the beraita, the tanna learns that Rosh HaShana is equivalent to the Day of Atonement by means of a comparison, as it is stated concerning the Jubilee, “in the seventh month” [and these words are superfluous, and were included] to teach that all the blasts of the seventh month should be alike.

And

if

now,

at the end of the beraita, he

derives it by means of a gzera shava.

The tanna learned by means of a gzera shava that all the blasts stated concerning this are as those stated concerning its counterpart, as “seventh” was stated concerning Rosh HaShana and “seventh” concerning the Day of Atonement.

It follows that the statements of the tanna contradict one another! For once all the blasts of the seventh month have been compared to one another, necessarily all the blasts stated concerning this were also stated concerning its counterpart. Otherwise there is a difficulty: two blasts were stated concerning Rosh HaShana, whereas one was stated concerning the Day of Atonement, and they are not equivalent! Rather, necessarily you must apply what is stated concerning this to that!

And we answer:

this is what he is saying—

this is what the tanna intended to say:

if not for the gzera shava,

if it had not been told to Moses at Sinai to derive “seventh” and “seventh” by means of a gzera shava, a person would not derive a gzera shava on his own.

And then

I would have derived it by means of the comparison,

I would have learned this on my own by means of a comparison.

For it is stated concerning the Jubilee, “in the seventh month,” to say that all the blasts of the seventh month should be alike, since a person may derive a comparison on his own even regarding something that he did not receive from his teachers.

But

now, since a gzera shava has come

[a law given to Moses at Sinai] and taught us that the laws of the blast on Rosh HaShana and on the Jubilee are equivalent, consequently

the comparison is unnecessary.

The Gemara brings a beraita that learns from another source that one blows a plain blast before the terua and after it:

And this tanna

of the beraita before us

derives it

learns this

by means of a gzera shava

from the blasts that they blew in the

wilderness

as follows:

As it was taught:

It is stated [Numbers 10]: “And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: Make for yourself two silver trumpets. And they shall be for you for summoning the assembly [to call the Sanhedrin and the people by means of the trumpets] and for the journeying of the camps.”

At the time of the journeying of the camps, they blew them as a signal so that they would know that they needed to travel.

And it is stated [there, verse 5]: “And you shall blow a terua, and the camps that are encamped to the east shall journey.”

And they taught in a beraita: although it is stated

“And you shall blow a terua,”

the intention is not that you should blow only a terua, but rather the expression

“blowing”

[“and you shall blow”] is

in itself

a [separate act],

and the terua is in itself

a [separate act].

And this is the meaning of the verse:

“And you shall blow”—a plain blast.

And afterward they sounded the terua—“a terua.”

And the beraita asks:

Do you say that the blowing is in itself and the terua is in itself?! Or

perhaps what we said

is not

correct,

but rather the blowing and the terua are one,

and this is what the verse said: “They were blowing a terua”!

The beraita answers:

When it

[the verse]

says

[later in the passage, verse 10]:

“And when you gather the assembly, you shall blow, but you shall not sound a terua,”

you must say

that the expression

“blowing, in itself”

is [a separate act],

and

the expression

“terua, in itself”

is [a separate act]. For if it were possible to say “you shall blow” even regarding a terua, how shall we interpret the verse, “you shall blow but you shall not sound a terua”? The blowing would itself be the terua!

From here [we learn] that before the journeys they blew and also sounded a terua.

And this is what the verse said: “And you shall blow”—a plain blast. And they shall sound the terua—“a terua. And the camps that are encamped to the east shall journey.”

And from where [do we know] that it is a plain blast before it,

before the terua?

The verse teaches: “And you shall blow,”

and afterward it says

“a terua.”

And from where [do we know] that it is a plain blast after it?

The verse teaches

[there, verse 6]:

“A terua they shall blow

for their journeys.”

“A terua” is stated first, and afterward it says “they shall blow.”

Rabbi Yishmael, son of Rabbi Yohanan ben Beroka, says: It is not necessary

to learn this from the order of the verse, “a terua they shall blow.”

Rather,

it

the verse

says

there:

“And you shall blow a terua—and the camps that are encamped to the east shall journey [in the east].”

“And you shall blow a second [terua]—

and the camps that are encamped to the south shall journey [in the south].”

For it need not say “a second.”

There is no need to say “and you shall blow a second,” since the verse already said that they blew one blast before it, and the camps in the east journeyed. Even had “and you shall blow a second” not been stated here, it would have been self-evident that this was the second blast.

And one asks:

And what does it teach,

for what purpose was

“a second” stated?

Rather,

this establishes a principle—

this teaches

that wherever “terua” is stated—

a blast shall be second to it,

after it.

And this is what the verse said: “And you shall blow a second blast after the terua.”

And the beraita continues to ask:

I have

no source to say that one blows a plain blast before the terua and after it

except in the wilderness

alone.

But

on Rosh HaShana—

from where?

The verse teaches,

for this reason

“terua”

was stated in the matter of Rosh HaShana, and

“terua”

in the wilderness,

to

learn this from that by means of a

gzera shava.

And the beraita continues:

And three teruot were stated concerning Rosh HaShana:

A.

“A rest day, a remembrance of a terua”

[Leviticus 23].

B.

“A day of terua”

[Numbers 29].

C.

“And you shall sound a shofar blast”

[Leviticus 25]. This verse was stated concerning the Day of Atonement of the Jubilee. But Rosh HaShana is learned from the Day of Atonement by means of a gzera shava.

And two blasts for each and every one,

a blast before each terua and a blast after it.

We find

[we have found]

learning

that in total

three teruot and six blasts were stated concerning Rosh HaShana.

And although we expounded these three teruot to say that one blows three series, nevertheless, not all these blasts are from the Torah. Rather, some of them are from the Torah, and some of them are rabbinic, as they instituted blowing according to the order of kingships, remembrances, and shofarot, and expounded the verse in accordance with their words, in order to associate and reinforce their enactment. As follows:

Two,

two teruot are derived

from the words of the Torah.

And one, from the words of the Scribes:

A.

“A rest day, a remembrance of a terua”; B.

; b.

“And you shall sound a shofar blast”—

These verses are expounded

from the words of the Torah,

corresponding to two teruot.

But the third verse,

“It shall be a day of blasting for you” \-

comes for its own teaching,

for it comes for the purpose of the gzera shava, “terua, terua,” from the wilderness, to teach us that one blows a blast before it and a blast after it. And it cannot be counted among the teruot of Rosh HaShana.

Rabbi Shmuel bar Naḥmani said

in the name of

Rabbi Yonatan:

One terua is

from the words of the Torah, and two are from the words of the Scribes:

The verse

“And you shall sound a shofar blast,”

is expounded

from the words of the Torah

for the obligation of one terua. Whereas the verses: A.

“A rest day, a remembrance of a terua,” B.

b.

and “It shall be a day of blasting for you”—

come for their own teaching,

they were written in order to learn a halakhic matter from them, as follows.

And we consider it: indeed, it is understandable that one verse comes for its own teaching, since the verse is needed to learn “terua, terua” by means of a gzera shava from the wilderness [that one blows a blast before the terua and a blast after it].

But concerning Rabbi Yonatan, who said that two verses come for their own teaching, one must ask:

What does

[the second verse]

“come for its own teaching” mean?

And we answer:

It is needed—

one of them [“a day of blasting”] is needed to teach that one blows

during the day and not at night.

And the other [verse is needed] for the gzera shava.

And we raise an objection:

And the other one,

the first tanna, who derived two teruot from the words of the Torah,

from where does he know “during the day and not at night”,

from where did he learn that one blows during the day and not at night? [For according to him, the verse “a day of blasting” was not written for this teaching!]

And we answer:

He derives it

this law from the verse

“On the Day of Atonement

[of the Jubilee] you shall sound a shofar.”

And he expounds: on the Day of Atonement, but not at night of the Day of Atonement. And the laws of blowing on Rosh HaShana are learned from the blowing of the Jubilee by means of the gzera shava, “seventh,” “seventh,” as above.

And we wonder:

If he learns it from “on the Day of Atonement,”

if this tanna, who taught this beraita, also learns the laws of blowing on Rosh HaShana by means of a gzera shava from the blowing on the Day of Atonement, then one must ask:

Why did the tanna need to learn by means of a gzera shava from the wilderness [“terua, terua”] that one blows a plain blast before the terua and a plain blast after it?

Let us also conclude it from there.

Let us learn by means of a gzera shava from the Day of Atonement also

to

the matter that one blows

a plain blast before it and a plain blast after it!

For concerning the Day of Atonement of the Jubilee it is stated, “And you shall sound a shofar blast,” and it is stated, “You shall sound a shofar,” and this sounding means a plain blast [as the Gemara said above, 33b].

And we answer: the tannaim who taught this beraita [the first tanna, Rabbi Yishmael, son of Rabbi Yohanan ben Beroka, and the others]

do not understand “and you shall sound” and “you shall sound”

as referring to a plain blast. They do not interpret the words “and you shall sound” and “you shall sound” as referring to a plain blast.

And we raise an objection:

Rather, what do they expound from them?

What do they expound from the fact that the verse said:

A. “And you shall sound”

B. “You shall sound”

And we answer:

A.

“And you shall sound”—

they expound it

in accordance with Rav Matנה.

For Rav Matנה said: “And you shall sound,”

teaches that one must blow the shofar

in the manner of its passage,

in the manner in which the shofar “passes,” growing on the head of the ram.

From here [we learn] that if he reversed the shofar—that is, he widened its narrow part and narrowed its wide part—and blew with it, he has not fulfilled [his obligation]. [As above, 27b.]

B.

“You shall sound”—

it was written a second time, because if the expression “sounding” had been stated only once, we might err and interpret it as

the Merciful One says: pass it by hand.

For the intention of the verse would be to say that one must pass the shofar by hand, and the intention is not that one must blow; therefore the expression “sounding” was stated twice, to teach from the superfluity of the verse that the intention is blowing in the manner of passage—that is, blowing with a shofar that has not been reversed.

And we raise an objection:

And the other one,

one must ask concerning the tanna who taught the earlier beraita above, who expounded “and you shall sound” and “you shall sound” as referring to a plain blast, and learned from here that one blows a plain blast before it and after it:

We have now learned two matters from the expression “sounding”:

A. In the manner of its passage and not reversed. B. That the intention of the verse is not passing by hand!

But according to the tanna in the earlier beraita, these expressions of sounding are not superfluous, so from where, according to him, will we learn these two matters?

And we answer:

A.

The

law of

Rav Matנה [that one must blow in the manner of its passage] was learned by the earlier tanna

[that one must sound it in the direction in which it naturally extends] was derived by the earlier tanna

from the fact that the verse changed its wording.

From the fact that the verse changed its wording and did not say “and you shall blow,” but rather “and you shall sound,” it follows that besides learning from here about a plain blast, we learn from the change of wording that one must blow in the manner of passage.

B. The second teaching that we learned—that the intention of the verse is not passing by hand—is superfluous according to the earlier tanna. For

“you shall pass it by hand”—

you cannot say this.

You cannot say that the intention of the verse is passing by hand,

since he derives “sounding” from “sounding” from Moses,

because the sounding stated here is learned from the sounding written concerning Moses our teacher, as follows:

It is written here

[here]:

“And you shall sound a shofar blast.”

And it is written there

[Exodus 36]:

“And Moses commanded, and they caused a voice to pass through the camp.”

Just as there, with a voice—

just as the sounding stated there was through a voice [and not passing by hand],

so too

the sounding stated

here,

on the Day of Atonement, is

with a voice

and not by hand.

And the Gemara raises a difficulty concerning the tanna who taught the last beraita, that the blast before it and after it are learned by means of a gzera shava from the wilderness:

And we raise an objection:

And according to this tanna, who derives it from the wilderness,

to this tanna who learned this by means of a gzera shava from the wilderness:

If

perhaps we should say,

just as there, trumpets,

just as the terua mentioned in the wilderness was through trumpets, so too

also

the terua mentioned

here,

on Rosh HaShana, is through

trumpets!

And from where do we know that the terua mentioned concerning Rosh HaShana is with a shofar?

And we answer:

The verse teaches

[Psalms 81]:

“Sound on the month

[at the new moon]

a shofar, at the covering, for the day of our festival”—

on the festival on which the moon is covered.

And

which festival is it on which the month

[the moon]

is covered?

You must say: this is Rosh HaShana!

For it is the only festival that occurs at the beginning of the month!

And the Merciful One said

in that same verse: “Sound

a shofar.”

From here [we learn] that the terua mentioned concerning Rosh HaShana was performed with a shofar.

The conclusion from the words of the Gemara is that by Torah law one blows on Rosh HaShana a plain blast, a terua, and a plain blast. And they disagree concerning this:

Some say that by Torah law one blows two series of a plain blast, a terua, and a plain blast.

And the Rabbis instituted blowing according to kingships, remembrances, and shofarot—that is, three series of a plain blast, a terua, and a plain blast.

There are those who say that by Torah law one sounds one series of a tekia, a terua, and a tekia בלבד, and the rest is rabbinic.

The sugya before us discusses how to sound the series of a tekia, a terua, and a tekia:

Atkin

—he instituted—

Rabbi Abahu in Caesarea

that they should sound in the following order:

tekia, three shevarim, terua, tekia.

And we raise a difficulty concerning Rabbi Abahu’s institution:

Ma nafshakh,

what does Rabbi Abahu hold?

I yelilei yelil,

if, in his view, the terua mentioned in the Torah is a wailing with short sounds [as in our Mishna]—

le-avad,

let them make

a tekia, a terua, and a tekia,

without shevarim!

Ve-i genukhei ganakh,

and if your view is like that of the beraita [above, 33b], that the terua is somewhat long groaning—

le-avad,

let them make

a tekia, three shevarim, and a tekia,

without a terua!

And why did Rabbi Abahu institute that they should sound both shevarim and terua? And we answer:

Mistefa lei,

Rabbi Abahu was uncertain what the terua stated in the Torah is,

i genukhei ganakh, i yelilei yelil.

Whether it is long groans, namely shevarim, or short wails, namely terua.

And therefore he instituted that they should sound shevarim and terua.

Rav Avira raises an objection:

Since Rabbi Abahu was uncertain what the terua stated in the Torah is, then:

u-delama yelilei hava,

perhaps the terua is a short wail and not shevarim. And the Torah said to sound a plain tekia adjacent to the terua. But when a person sounds a tekia, shevarim, terua, as Rabbi Abahu instituted, he

is interrupting

by means of

three

shevarim

between

the

terua and

between the

tekia

before it!

And the tekia is not adjacent to the terua!

And we answer: In order to remove this concern, Rabbi Abahu instituted

that he again made,

that after the one sounding had sounded tashrat [tekia, shevarim, terua, tekia], he would again sound

a tekia, a terua, and a tekia.

And he would not interrupt between the tekia and the terua.

Ravina raises an objection: And perhaps

the terua stated in the Torah

was genukhei,

it is groans, namely shevarim, and not what is called by us terua.

And the Torah said to sound a plain tekia immediately after the shevarim.

And

if, when a person sounds a tekia, shevarim, terua, and a tekia [as Rabbi Abahu instituted], then

it interrupts,

the

terua interrupts between

the

shevarim and

between the

tekia

after them, and the tekia is not adjacent to the shevarim!

And we answer: In order to remove this concern, Rabbi Abahu instituted

that he again made tashat—

that after they had sounded tashrat [tekia, shevarim, terua, tekia], they would again sound tashat [tekia, shevarim, tekia].

And they would not interrupt between the shevarim and the tekia.

And likewise they would also sound tarat, as explained above.

And we raise a difficulty:

Rather,

since they had to sound tashat [tekia, shevarim, tekia] separately and tarat [tekia, terua, tekia] separately,

Rabbi Abahu—

what did he institute!?

What did Rabbi Abahu accomplish by instituting that they should also sound tashrat [tekia, shevarim, terua, tekia]?

Behold,

if,

if the terua stated in the Torah is

genukhei ganakh

[shevarim]—

this he already made,

for they did this separately in tashat.

And

if

it is

yelilei yelil—

this he already made,

for they did this separately in tarat!

And why did they need to sound tashrat as well?

And we answer:

Mistefa lei,

Rabbi Abahu was uncertain:

delama,

perhaps the terua stated in the Torah is both things together, namely

ganakh ve-yelil.

It begins with shevarim and ends with terua.

And therefore he instituted that they should sound a tekia, and after it shevarim-terua, for this is the “terua” stated in the Torah, and after it a tekia.

And we raise a difficulty:

If so,

if indeed Rabbi Abahu was uncertain whether the “terua” stated in the Torah is shevarim and terua together—

let him also make the reverse!

It would have been fitting to do the opposite as well:

tekia, terua, three shevarim, and tekia.

For

delama

perhaps the terua stated in the Torah is

yelil ve-ganakh,

that it begins with terua and ends with shevarim!

And we answer: Since terua is sobbing, namely crying [and as the Gemara learned above, 33b, from the verse “And the mother of Sisera wailed”], then

the presumption of the matter is: when something bad happens to a person—

at first he groans, and afterward he wails.

Ordinarily, when something bad happens to a person, at first he groans with long groans, and afterward the crying becomes rapid [and then he wails with short sounds, close to one another].

And therefore even the terua stated in the Torah, if it includes the shevarim and the terua, is only in the manner of those who cry—first shevarim, and afterward terua.

We learned in the Mishna:

If he sounded a

tekia, the

first

tekia, which precedes the terua, in the customary manner,

and he extended

and prolonged

the second

one, which follows the terua,

as two

in order to fulfill through half of it the obligation of the tekia at the end of the first series, and through its second half to fulfill the obligation of the tekia at the beginning of the second series—he has only one.