Temurah 4b — the Talmud in English

And we answer:

No

—it is not difficult. For Rabbi Yosei son of Rabbi Ḥanina did not say that one who advanced teruma before bikkurim “is flogged”; rather, on the contrary,

Rabbi Yosei son of Rabbi Ḥanina ![](pamud.bmp "

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is referring to the exemption,

his words refer to the “exemption,”

and this is what he is saying:

Concerning what Rabbi Yosei the Galilean said,

“For a prohibition in which there is no deed, one is not flogged for it,”

the amoraim said:

“In the name of Rabbi Yosei son of Rabbi Ḥanina they said: Even one who advances teruma before bikkurim

is not flogged!”

And the Gemara thought that he is not flogged because it is a prohibition in which there is no deed, and the Gemara discusses:

And what is different,

in what way is

one who declares

flogged because through his speech he performs a deed,

for he makes consecrated property out of unconsecrated property, as explained above; therefore,

one who advances teruma before bikkurim should also be flogged,

because of that same reason,

that through his speech he performed a deed,

for he assigns a designation to it and brings it into the sanctity of teruma—and why is this considered a prohibition in which there is no deed?

And we answer:

Rabbi Avin said:

The exemption from flogging is not because there is no deed, but

the case there is different,

the law of one who advances teruma before bikkurim is different, for the exemption is because

it is “a prohibition that is rectified by a positive commandment” [it will be explained below], for the prohibition “You shall not delay your fullness and your flowing” is rectified by a

positive commandment,

as it is written

[Numbers 18]:

“From all your gifts

you shall raise,”

and we expound [below, 5b] that even though he advanced the tithe before the teruma, he still returns and separates teruma. And once the positive commandment applies to him, the prohibition is detached from the obligation of flogging for transgressing the prohibition.

And in summary: Rabbi Yosei son of Rabbi Ḥanina holds that one who advances teruma before bikkurim transgresses a prohibition in which there is a deed, because through his speech he performed a deed. And despite all this, he is not flogged, because it is “a prohibition that is rectified by a positive commandment.”

The discussion of a prohibition that is rectified by a positive commandment

Rav Dimi sat [ sitting] and was stating this teaching, of Rabbi Avin, who explained the reasoning of Rabbi Yosei bar Rabbi Ḥanina that one who gives teruma before the first fruits is not flogged because it is “a prohibition whose correction is through a positive mitzva.”

Rav Dimi sat

[that is, he sat]

and was stating this teaching

of Rabbi Avin, explaining the reason of Rabbi Yosei son of Rabbi Ḥanina that one who advances teruma before bikkurim is not flogged, because it is “a prohibition that is rectified by a positive commandment.”

Abaye said to him:

And

what,

is everyone who violates a prohibition that is rectified by a positive commandment not flogged?!—

But

what of “one who declares,” which is a prohibition that is rectified by a positive commandment,

as it says: “He shall not exchange it and he shall not substitute it, and if he does substitute it, then it and its substitute shall be holy,”

and in

all

this, he is flogged?

For we learned

as we learned in our Mishna:

It is not that a person is permitted to make a substitution; rather, if he made a substitution, the substitute is [consecrated], and he receives forty lashes.

And we answer:

He said to him,

Rav Dimi to Abaye:

The case of

[the law of]

one who declares is different, because there are

two prohibitions,

for concerning one who declares the Torah stated two prohibitions, “He shall not exchange it” and “he shall not substitute it,”

and one positive commandment. And one positive commandment does not come and uproot two prohibitions,

one positive commandment does not uproot two prohibitions.

Abaye raises a difficulty against this answer from the law of “one who violates the prohibition against marrying a virgin whom he violated.”

One who violates a virgin is obligated to take her as a wife, and this is a positive commandment from the Torah [Deuteronomy 22]: “She shall be his wife all his days.” And it is forbidden for him to divorce her; and if he divorced her, he transgresses a negative commandment, as it is said: “He may not send her away.”

And from what the Torah said, “She shall be his wife all his days,” the Sages expounded [Makkot 15a]: “All his days he stands under [the obligation to] return her,” meaning that if he transgressed this prohibition and divorced her, he is obligated to return and take her as a wife. It follows that the prohibition is rectified by a positive commandment, and according to Rav Avin one is not flogged for this prohibition. And Abaye brings a Mishna stating that one is flogged.

And we raise a difficulty:

But what of one who violates a virgin, where there is one prohibition and one positive commandment,

there is one prohibition that is rectified by a positive commandment, and nevertheless he is flogged,

and does a positive commandment not come and uproot one

prohibition?

For it was taught in a beraita: If one who violated a virgin divorced her, if he is an Israelite,

and there is nothing preventing him from returning and taking her—

he returns

her

and he is not flogged.

And if he is a priest,

since he is forbidden to return and take her because she is a divorcee,

he is flogged

forty lashes

and he does not return her.

her.

It follows that a priest is flogged. This is difficult for Rav Avin, who said that for one prohibition that is rectified by a positive commandment, one is not flogged ?

And Rav Dimi answers:

Are you saying priests?

The case of priests is different; priests have a different law,

for they have another reason,

there is another reason concerning them, since

the Merciful One increased additional sanctity in them ;

the Torah increased sanctity in them—more than the sanctity of Israelites—and prohibited to them what is not prohibited to Israelites, such as the prohibition against becoming impure through the dead. Therefore, it also treated them more stringently, so that they are flogged for “a prohibition that is rectified by a positive commandment,” even though an Israelite is not flogged.

Another formulation

[The method of Rambam.] Rav Dimi sat and was stating this teaching.

Abaye said to him: And is everyone who violates a prohibition that is rectified by a positive commandment not flogged?! But what of “one who declares,” which is a prohibition that is rectified by a positive commandment, and he is flogged?—

For we learned: It is not that a person is permitted to make a substitution, rather, if he made a substitution, the substitute is [consecrated], and he receives forty lashes.

And we answer:

He said to him,

Rav Dimi:

The case of one who declares is different,

the law of one who declares is different, and one is flogged for it even though it is rectified by a positive commandment,

because it is a prohibition that applies equally to all,

everyone is forbidden to make a substitution, and the prohibition applies also to the public and to partners, and if one of them made a substitution, he transgressed the prohibition,

whereas

the

positive commandment

of substitution

does not apply equally to all,

and does not apply to an offering of the public or of partners, and substitution does not take hold with respect to their offering, as will be explained below [13a]—

Since this is so, the positive commandment does not have the power to detach a prohibition that applies equally to all.

Abaye raises a difficulty from “one who violates a virgin.” The case of one who violates a virgin is the reverse: the “prohibition” does not apply equally to all, whereas the “positive commandment”

does apply equally to all.

How so? The Torah said: “She shall be his wife … he may not send her away all his days,” and we expound: she shall not remain in the state of having been sent away all his days, but stand and return her! That is, if the prohibition is the failure to return her, this matter applies only to an Israelite and not to a priest .

Whereas the positive commandment applies equally to all, even to priests .

It follows that the prohibition is not the stronger one; on the contrary, the positive commandment is the stronger one, and certainly the strong positive commandment detaches the prohibition that is not strong. If so, it is difficult: why are they flogged for this prohibition? After all, according to your words, one is not flogged for a prohibition that is rectified by a positive commandment?

Abaye raises a difficulty:

But what of one who violates a virgin, whose prohibition does not apply equally to all,

for it does not apply to priests,

whereas

the

positive commandment applies equally to all,

for it applies to priests—

and why is a priest who divorced her flogged?

As

it says

in the beraita: If one who violated a virgin divorced her, if he is an Israelite—

he returns her and is not flogged; and if he is a priest—

he is flogged and does not return her.

And we answer:

He said to him,

Rav Dimi to Abaye:

Are you saying priests? The reason concerning priests

[or:

the people]

is different ,

for the Merciful One increased additional sanctity in them,

and therefore the Torah treated them stringently , so that they are flogged even though it is not “a prohibition that applies equally to all” —

But regarding an Israelite who divorced her—the prohibition and the positive command are equal, and all Israelites are obligated to take her back if they divorced her—therefore we learned in the beraita: if he is an Israelite, he takes her back and is not flogged, because the prohibition is indeed followed by a positive command.

And the Gemara continues:

ketanai,

this halakha—that one is not flogged for a prohibition followed by a positive command—is not agreed upon by everyone; rather, it is a dispute between tannaim .

We learned in the beraita: the Torah said in the section of the Passover sacrifice [Exodus 12

“You shall not leave any of it until morning, and what is left of it until morning you shall burn in fire.”

And we expound:

, the verse comes

“and what is left, you shall burn in fire,”

to place a positive command after a negative command,

in order

to say that one is not flogged for it,

if you leave it and transgress a prohibition—you shall burn it in fire! The verse severed it, through this positive command, from the obligation of flogging for the other prohibitions, to say: this is its punishment and the rectification of its transgression—that he burn it . These are

the words of Rabbi Yehuda.

Rabbi Yaakov says: This is not the reason,

this reason is not fundamental, and it is not because it is a prohibition followed by a positive command that he is not flogged.

Rather,

why is he not flogged?

Because it is a prohibition in which there is no action,

he sat and did not eat, and it became notar on its own.

And every prohibition in which there is no action—

one is not flogged for it .

It follows that Rabbi Yaakov does not hold that the exemption from flogging is for the reason of a prohibition followed by a positive command.

And the Gemara asks:

And Rabbi Yaakov, this,

that the Torah wrote

“and what is left of it until morning you shall burn in fire”—for what purpose does it come?

Since he does not need a special verse to exempt him from flogging, because the exemption is included among the other prohibitions in which there is no action, then for what exposition did the Torah write, “and what is left, you shall burn in fire”?

It is needed for

another exposition,

as

we

learn,

we learned in the Mishna in tractate Pesachim [83a:

the bones,

which he is not permitted to break and eat the marrow inside them, because the breaking of bones is forbidden in the Passover sacrifice,

and

likewise

the sinews,

which he did not eat,

and

the flesh

left over,

which they were negligent in eating and which became notar—all are notar and require burning . And what shall he do with them?

They shall be burned on the sixteenth

of Nisan, which is the first day of the intermediate days of the festival, and not on the Festival day, even though they had already become disqualified from the morning of the Festival day. And if

the sixteenth falls on Shabbat—

they shall be burned on the seventeenth, because neither Shabbat nor the Festival day is overridden

in order to fulfill the mitzva of burning.

And Hezekiah said, and so taught in the beit-midrash of

—and so we learned in the beit-midrash of—

Hezekiah: What is the reason,

what is the reason that the mitzva of burning them does not override Shabbat or the Festival day?

The verse says: “And what is left of it until morning you shall burn in fire.”

And “until morning” is superfluous, for the Torah had already written, “You shall not leave any of it until morning.” And the verse comes

to give it

a second morning for its burning.

And this is the meaning of the verse: “You shall not leave any of it until morning,” that is, until the morning of the fifteenth of Nisan, when it becomes notar and is disqualified from eating. But he should not yet burn it. Rather, “and what is left of it until morning”—and this is the second morning, on the sixteenth of Nisan—then “you shall burn it in fire.” But not on the Festival day itself.

And for this exposition the Torah wrote, “and what is left, you shall burn in fire,” and not to exempt him from flogging, because according to Rabbi Yaakov he is exempt from flogging for the reason that there is no action in the prohibition of notar.

The sugya of every matter concerning which the Merciful One said: “Do not do”

Abaye said: Every matter

every thing

that the Merciful One said

—that the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded in the Torah—

“Do not do it,”

do not do it!—

if he does it,

if he transgressed the Torah’s command and did it—

it is effective,

his actions are effective, and what he did is accomplished—

For if it enters your mind—

it is not effective,

it is difficult:

why is he flogged,

why is he flogged forty lashes, since his actions were not effective?

Rava said:

Every matter concerning which the Merciful One said, “Do not do,” if he does it—

it is not effective at all,

his actions did not accomplish anything.

And this reason that he is flogged

the reason that he is flogged

is because he transgressed the word of the Merciful One.

He transgressed the Torah’s command, even though his actions accomplished nothing.