Hilcheta Kebatrai / Kelishna Kamma (article summary)
My article from last Shabbos is available online (flipdocs, HTML, free Substack). Or, as an image (the title should be The Latter Version and the Later Amora, but I guess it got cut off).
A brief summary, though the details are important.
Hilcheta kelishna batra is a decisive principle whereby, when faced with two Talmudic variants incorporated into the text of the gemara itself, designated by the words ikka de’amrei, we take the latter version as authoritative. Rav Ashi placed it last for that reason.
However, only some posekim adopt that approach. Alternatives include deeming the first version as authoritative; finding other sugyot to determine which one the Talmudic itself rules like; ruling stringently or leniently depending on whether the law is Biblical or Rabbinic.
Contrary to how some have recently taken it, this decisive principle only applies to Talmudic variants, rather than the last person / position listed in a sugya.
I explain some of what they mistakenly cite as evidence to the contrary.
Hilcheta kevatrai is another decisive principle in which later scholastic generations — in particular, from Rava and on — are granted authority. One possible explanation of this: After all, they had a chance to review what the prior generations said. If they have the temerity to argue — or to take one position of several earlier positions — then they must really know what they are talking about, and have good reasons to disagree.
Again, this is the latest chronologically, not textually. And it doesn’t extend to disputants within the same generation, even if one outlived the other.
See how Rosh cites Rav Hai Gaon in applying these to our sugya. He adopts the lishna batra. Yet despite Rav Pappa being later than Rava, Rav Pappa is like a student before his teacher, and uses the language of perhaps. (I’m focused on the dynamics here. In the article, I also discuss the content.) So we rule like Rava in the second version.
I nitpick a little with this. There is a ve’iteima here, where it is Rav Pappa or else Rav Shimi bar Ashi. While this other figure studied from Abaye and Rava and engaged in discussion with their students, he isn’t himself reckoned among their students. Maybe his objection is then a stronger objection. And “perhaps” is perfect language since his goal is to undermine the inevitability of Rava’s inference, not to convincingly prove the opposite conclusion. Without the inference, we are still in a doubtful state.