Shabbat 99a (צט.) — the Talmud in English

And the clasps appear

And the clasps appeared

when they are placed

in the loops, like stars in the firmament,

because the clasps were made of copper and glittered like stars, while the loops were made of tekhelet, whose color resembled that of the firmament.

The Sages taught: The lower curtains

which were placed directly upon the Tabernacle were

of tekhelet [צמר צבוע בדם חלזון, וצבעו ירוק]wool dyed with the blood of the ḥilazon, and whose color was green,

[wool dyed with the blood of the chilazon, whose color was green],

and of purple [צמר צבוע ממין צבע ששמו ארגמן]wool dyed with a type of dye called purple,

[wool dyed with a type of dye called purple],

and of crimson wool and fine linen,

and these four types were together in each and every thread.

And

these

upper curtains [אותן יריעות שהיו שוכבות על היריעות התחתונות]those curtains that lay upon the lower curtains,

were

made of goat hair [עשויות מנוצה של עיזים]made from goat hair.

[made from the hair of goats].

And greater wisdom was stated with regard to the upper curtains than with regard to the lower curtains.

For with regard to the lower curtains,

which were made of tekhelet, purple, crimson wool, and fine linen,

it is written: “And every skilled woman spun with her hands.

And they brought [their contribution for the work of the Tabernacle], the spun material of the tekhelet, the purple, the crimson wool, and the fine linen.”

But with regard to the upper curtains,

which were made of goat hair,

it is written

in that same context concerning the contribution to the Tabernacle:

“And all the women whose hearts inspired them with wisdom spun the goat hair.”

The expression “whose hearts inspired them with wisdom” indicates that they possessed exceptional wisdom.

, And it was taught in the name of Rabbi Neḥemya,

what was the exceptional wisdom required for spinning the curtains of goat hair:

they spun it while it was still attached to the goats

themselves

and spun it from the goats

themselves, for they performed all this on the backs of the goats, as is implied by the expression, “They spun the goat hair.”

We learned in the Mishna:

Two balconies,

one who extends an object [from one to the other] is liable:

Rav said in the name of Rabbi Ḥiyya: The wagons,

on which the sons of Merari carried the boards of the Tabernacle, and which traveled as two wagons in front and two wagons behind,

beneath them

the wagons,

and between them

between the wheel of one wagon and the wheel of the wagon traveling alongside it,

and their sides [היינו: דפנות העגלה, אופניהן ובין הדפנות לאופנים]that is, the sides of the wagon, its wheels, and the space between the sides and the wheels,

[that is, the sides of the wagon, its wheels, and the spaces between the sides and the wheels,]

constitute a public domain

is.

Abaye said: Between

the wheel

of one wagon

one

and

the wheel

of a second wagon

that traveled alongside it, there is

a space equal to the length of a wagon. And how long is a wagon?

Five cubits.

And we ask:

Why do I need

the wagon to be five cubits long? For if he arranged the boards upon it with their width lying across the wagon, he could not place more than three boards there, since each was one and a half cubits wide. And even if he arranged them with the thickness of the boards, which was one cubit, lying across the wagon, he could not place more than four boards there, since the rings for the bars were set across the width of the boards, and they separated one board from the next. It follows that, either way,

four and a half

cubits

would suffice [די לנו בארבע וחצי אמות]four and a half cubits would suffice,

whether as the width of three boards, or as the thickness of four boards, which is four cubits; and the remaining half-cubit would certainly provide room for the rings that separated them!?

And we answer: He left space between one board and the next,

so that the boards would not be cramped [אי אפשר לדחוק את הקרשים, לצמצמן, ולהושיב חמשה קרשים בחמש אמות]it was impossible to press the boards together and fit five boards into five cubits.

That is, the wagon was long enough that, if he wished to lay the boards on their width, the boards would not be pressed against one another, and the wagon had an additional half-cubit beyond the space between the boards.

Rava said: The sides of a wagon [דפנותיה משני צידיה, ואופניה משני צידיה עם הריוח שבין הדפנות לאופנים]its walls on both sides, and its wheels on both sides together with the space between the walls and the wheels,

contain

a space equal to the width

the interior of the

wagon.

And what is the width

of the interior of the

wagon?

Two and a half cubits.

It follows that there was one and a quarter cubits on each side of the wagon.

And we ask:

Why do I need

two and a half cubits for the width of the wagon’s interior? If you say that this was so that, if he wished to place a board lengthwise in the wagon, he could fit it inside, then

one and a half cubits would suffice [די באמה וחצי]one and a half cubits would suffice.

Although in a width of one and a half cubits he could not force in a board whose width was one and a half cubits, nevertheless, when he wished to place a board lengthwise, he could lay it on its edge, which was only one cubit wide.

And we answer:

so that the boards would not sway [כדי שלא יהיו הקרשים מדדים ונוטים לכאן ולכאן]so that the boards would not dangle and lean from side to side.

That is, since the boards were ten cubits long, it was impossible to lay them lengthwise on a wagon whose width was less than two and a half cubits, for otherwise the boards would not be balanced and would tend to fall as the wagon moved.

And we ask:

But we maintain that every public domain

is

sixteen cubits—

we, who derive it from the Tabernacle,

that is, we derive this from the wagons of the Tabernacle, and yet

the public domain of the Tabernacle was fifteen cubits [רשות הרבים שבמשכן חמש עשרה אמה היתה]the public domain in the Tabernacle was fifteen cubits,

for each wagon together with its sides was five cubits, and between each wagon and the wagon alongside it there were another five cubits, totaling only fifteen cubits!? And we answer:

There was an additional cubit [אמה נוספת היתה שם]there was an additional cubit,

[there was another cubit there],

in which stood

who stood there

a Levite, who, when the boards slipped, held them.

That is, sometimes one of the boards fell, and the Levite would set it right while standing in that additional cubit.

Tosafot’s view of the structure of the wagons: Rabbeinu Tam maintains that two wagons were joined together. There was a fifteen-cubit-long beam, with four wheels, as for two wagons [the wording requires clarification, and apparently they mean that there were eight wheels], and two sets of side walls, as for two wagons. “And between one wagon and the next there was a space equal to the length of a wagon”—that is, five cubits between the wall of one wagon and the wall of the other. “And the sides of the wagon were equal to the width of the wagon”—on each side [that is, at the two outer sides of the two wagons], the distance between the wagon wall and the wheel was two and a half cubits, unlike Rashi’s interpretation, which explained that there was one and a quarter cubits on each side [and also unlike Rashi’s interpretation that the wall itself was included among the “sides of the wagon,” as explained by the Maharsha]. The width of the two wagons together with their sides was fifteen cubits. From the outer wall of one wagon [including the wall] to the outer wall of the other wagon [including the wall] was ten cubits, the length of a board, and the board was laid upon the two walls of the wagons. [Each doubled wagon carried twenty-four boards: four boards lay on their thickness at the bottom of the wagon, and six layers of boards were arranged one upon another, unlike Rashi, who maintains that there were only three layers one upon another.] And see the Maharsh a and Rash i. Mishna:

, the surrounding wall of a pit,

that is, a pit surrounded by its embankment [the earth removed from the pit],

and

likewise

a rock,

which are ten high and four wide,

that is, if the walls of a pit were ten handbreadths high and the interior of the pit was four by four handbreadths, and likewise if the rock was ten handbreadths high and its top was four by four handbreadths wide:

One who takes from them

and places [an object] in the public domain surrounding them,

and one who places [או הנותן]or one who places

from the public domain

upon them

that is, on top of the rock or into the depth of the pit, is

liable,

because they constitute a private domain. But if it was

less than this,

in height or width, he is

exempt,

for a private domain exists only where there is a height of ten handbreadths, whether the place has partitions ten handbreadths high or is ten handbreadths deep, provided that it is four by four handbreadths wide.

Gemara:

We ask: The phrase we learned in the Mishna, “the surrounding wall of a pit,” cannot necessarily mean that if the embankment of a pit was ten high and four wide, it was a private domain, since that is the law of a rock, which the Mishna itself stated. Rather, the intent of the Mishna must be to teach that the depth of a pit constitutes a private domain [as explained in the Mishna]. If so,

why do I need the Mishna to teach “the surrounding wall of the pit and the rock”,

why mention the embankment of the pit here,

let it teach [תשנה המשנה]the Mishna:

[let the Mishna teach]:

“The pit and the rock”!?

And we answer:

Our Mishna supports

our Mishna

Rabbi Yoḥanan!

For Rabbi Yoḥanan said: The pit and its embankment combine to reach ten.

That is, even if the pit is not ten handbreadths deep below the public domain, but only five handbreadths deep, while the embankment surrounding the pit is five handbreadths high, they combine to reach a height of ten handbreadths. Our Mishna also comes to teach that the interior of the pit is a private domain even though its depth is not ten handbreadths on its own, but only together with the embankment surrounding it.

It was taught likewise [

and we likewise learned in a beraita in accordance with Rabbi Yohanan’s statement]:

A pit in the public domain, ten deep and four wide

handbreadths by four handbreadths,

one may not draw

water

from it on Shabbat,

since it follows that he is taking the water from a private domain into the public domain surrounding the pit.