Avraham was a Navi

The maggid shiur of today’s daf (Bava Kamma 92a) was bothered by the seeming contrast of Avraham being limmeid (teach) and Avimelech who should have learned. Note the translation, though, that Avraham already learned.

אָמַר רַבִּי שְׁמוּאֵל בַּר נַחְמָנִי אָמַר רַבִּי יוֹנָתָן: ״הָשֵׁב אֵשֶׁת הָאִישׁ״ – מִכׇּל מָקוֹם. וּדְקָא אָמְרַתְּ: ״הֲגוֹי גַּם צַדִּיק תַּהֲרֹג?! הֲלֹא הוּא אָמַר לִי אֲחֹתִי הִיא, וְהִיא גַּם הִיא אָמְרָה אָחִי הוּא!״ נָבִיא הוּא, וּכְבָר לִימֵּד: אַכְסְנַאי שֶׁבָּא לָעִיר – עַל עִסְקֵי אֲכִילָה וּשְׁתִיָּה שׁוֹאֲלִין אוֹתוֹ, אוֹ עַל עִסְקֵי אִשְׁתּוֹ שׁוֹאֲלִין אוֹתוֹ – ״אִשְׁתְּךָ הִיא?״ ״אֲחוֹתְךָ הִיא?״

The Gemara answers. Rabbi Shmuel bar Naḥmani says that Rabbi Yonatan says: This is how the verse should be understood: “Restore the wife of the man” in any case, since she is his wife. And with regard to that which you, Abimelech, said: “Will you slay even a righteous nation? Did he not say himself to me: She is my sister, and she, even she herself, said: He is my brother?” (Genesis 20:4–5), the answer is that you, Abimelech, are not so righteous, since the reason Abraham said that Sarah was his sister is that he is a prophet, and he already learned how to conduct himself based on your behavior. As with regard to a guest [akhsenai] who comes to town, does one ask him about matters concerning eating and drinking, or does one ask him about matters concerning his wife? Does one ask a guest: Is she your wife? Is she your sister? Abimelech was to be blamed, since Abraham thought that he intended to steal his wife.

מִכָּאן לְבֶן נֹחַ שֶׁנֶּהֱרָג, שֶׁהָיָה לוֹ לִלְמוֹד וְלֹא לָמַד.

The Gemara remarks: From here it can be derived that a gentile is executed for having transgressed a prohibition without awareness that the act was prohibited, since he should have learned and he did not learn.

I suppose that as a navi, he learned this idea. But what is still strange is that “should have learned” means that certain basic moral ideas - the sheva mitzvot benei Noach, should be intuitively obvious, or could come without explicit teaching, e.g. via prophecy.

I wanted to kvetch this that navi / נביא comes from the root of בא, to come, so נָבִיא הוּא means he is a visitor, who was then asked these inappropriate questions. Maybe.

In terms of girsaot, yes, the three printed texts on Hachi Garsinan have what I copy / pasted above. However, all their manuscripts have a different version. Not וכבר לימד but וממך למד. This is an orthographic error, so look for a כ and ב similar to the מ, and the ר similar to the ך. Thus:

He was a prophet, and thus he learned from the inappropriate line of questioning. How that works out with the last line about a Ben Noach is something to be further explored.

Another interesting thing on today’s daf, this time in the transition to amud bet, is the tamei tamei derasha.

אֲמַר לֵיהּ רָבָא לְרַבָּה בַּר מָרִי, מְנָא הָא מִילְּתָא דְּאָמְרִי אִינָשֵׁי: בָּתַר עַנְיָא אָזְלָא עַנְיוּתָא? אֲמַר לֵיהּ, דִּתְנַן: עֲשִׁירִים מְבִיאִין בִּכּוּרִים בִּקְלָתוֹת שֶׁל זָהָב וְשֶׁל כֶּסֶף, וַעֲנִיִּים בְּסַלֵּי נְצָרִים שֶׁל עֲרָבָה קְלוּפָה. הַסַּלִּים וְהַבִּכּוּרִים נְתוּנִים לַכֹּהֲנִים. אֲמַר לֵיהּ: אַתְּ אָמְרַתְּ מֵהָתָם, וַאֲנָא אָמֵינָא מֵהָכָא:

Rava said to Rabba bar Mari: From where is this matter derived whereby people say: Poverty follows the poor? Rabba bar Mari said to him: As we learned in a mishna (Bikkurim 3:8): Rich people would bring first fruits in baskets of gold and of silver, and poor people would bring first fruits in wicker baskets made of peeled willow, and they would give the baskets and the first fruits to the priests. The rich would have their baskets returned to them, while the poor would not. Rava said to him: You said the proof from there, from a mishna, and I say the proof from here, from a verse in the Torah:

״וְטָמֵא טָמֵא יִקְרָא״.

The verse states with regard to one diagnosed with leprosy: “And the leper in whom the plague is, his clothes shall be rent, and the hair of his head shall go loose, and he shall cover his upper lip, and he shall cry: Unclean, unclean” (Leviticus 13:45). Not only must the leper suffer from the leprosy itself; he must undergo further embarrassment by publicizing his condition. This is akin to the aphorism that poverty follows the poor.

Artscroll has the same explanation, and it comes from the top Rashi — וטמא טמא - לא די לו נגעו אלא שמבייש את עצמו על כרחו הטיל עליו הכתוב חובה —but it seems a bit forced to me. The idea should be perpetuating the state, not just (different) indignity upon indignity. So Rabba bar Mari’s derivation in better.

However, this calls to mind my interpretation of the other, more famous, tamei tamei yikra derasha. I wrote about it in this post, after the horizontal rule:

There, based on the way that derashot work, I argue that it means “the impure shall call out: Impure”, rather than “and ‘impure, impure’ he shall call out”. Factors involved are the doubled language, and that we don’t need a brayta to deduce a point make explicit in a pasuk in its peshat sense. Rather, if someone (impure) has a problem, he should call out his problem (impure) so that others can help him / pray for him.

Local to our sugya, I don’t know that there are indeed derashot, more than Biblical precedent for ideas expressed by the Sages or by the common folk. If so, we don’t need it to conform to the typical derasha. Still, there is a bit of awkwardness. How does tamei tamei yikra should that poverty follows the poor?

We might therefore suggest it is derasha-like, and tamei: one who is presently impure, tamei yikra: shall call out or be called “impure” in the future.