Rav Yirmeya miDifti (article summary)

It has been a few weeks since I’ve posted article summaries. These are somewhat useful as overviews of my articles, to see the forest as opposed to the trees. So I’m going back over the last three weeks. The first I’ll discuss is the one about Rav Yirmeya of Difti. You can read it on the Jewish Link website, on Substack (with hyperlinks), and on flipbooks.

The quick summary, slightly different perspective, and broader context follows.

1. Rav Yirmeyah of Difti appears in our sugya, Bava Kamma 72-73. This is the ayin of ya’al kegam, namely eidim zomemim, where we famously rule like Abaye over Rava.

2. Yet, I have written about ya’al kegam, and I’m not so convinced that this is an absolute rule. There may be other cases we rule like Abaye, and maybe we aren’t even so solid on these six cases. See my discussion / survey of the 6+ cases here:
   

   In particular, for each of these six+ cases, who is the one that concludes that we rule like Abaye. And when was that? Rava’s times? Amoraic? Savoraic? Geonic? Is the mnemonic of ya’al kegam a mere mnemonic, sort of like a Masoretic note to aid memory of the cases where there are explicit rulings in Abaye’s favor, or is it actually a binding rule of pesak halacha?
   
   One idea, which I reject as literally true, is a cute gematria, in which Rav Ada bar Ahava II says אַדִּמְגָרְמִיתוּ גַּרְמֵי בֵּי אַבָּיֵי תּוּ אִכְלוּ בִּישְׂרָא שַׁמִּינָא בֵּי רָבָא, “instead of gnawing dry bones in Abaye’s academy, eat juicy meat in Rava’s academy”. Garmi is the same, numerically, as ya’al kegam, so he’s saying “why stay in Abaye’s academy, where he only prevails in ya’al kegam”. That would place the decision as during Abaye’s lifetime. This will be a focus in the current article, since Rav Yirmiyah miDifti is later.
   

3. Develop a general picture of Rav Yirmeyah miDifti’s personality, approach in learning, and scholastic generation, through a comprehensive consideration of all the places he occurs.
   

4. Is he fifth-generation, as a student of Rava, because of a mishmei deRava citation? I’d allow such a citation to be even indirectly. And fourth-generation Rama bar Chama asking him a question is a scribal error. Speaking to fifth-generation Amoraim doesn’t establish him as such.
   
   Rather, I’d consider him to be sixth-generation, a contemporary of Rav Ashi. He often argues with Rav Ashi. And also often cites traditional from his teacher, Rav Pappi, not Rav Pappa.
   

5. Therefore, in our sugya in particular, where he have him discuss a practical ruling of Rav Pappa, we should ignore the printings that have that and instead follow the local manuscripts, and the printings / manuscripts of the parallel sugya, which have him discuss Rav Pappi’s practice. And, Rav Yirmeyah miDifti channeling Rav Pappi, arguing with Rav Ashi, is something we should be comfortable seeing.
   
   That also means that within Rava’s lifetime, even in the next generation with Rav Pappi, and even in Rav Ashi’s generation, it was not firmly established that we rule like Abaye over Rava. After all, Rav Yirmeyah miDifti was still telling us otherwise, in the name of Rav Pappi, Rava’s student.
   
   I am not sure we can really say hilcheta kebatrai, that the ruling is like the chronologically latest Amora, Rav Ashi, given that Rav Yirmeyah is a contemporary. Although he is perhaps only relating the act of fifth-generation Rav Pappa, who is of an earlier generation.
   
   Also, therefore, I would place this final summary conclusion or mnemonic (yaal kegam) either in Rav Ashi (as a redactor)’s days, or in the generations after.
   

6. Another thing I don’t mention in the article is that the continuation of the gemara seems to run with a pro-Abaye bias, asking how to resolve his position, or wondering if the Abaye / Rava dispute is actually a Tannaitic dispute. This, instead of the usual structure of ta shema as if Abaye and Rava are trying to prove to one another. Perhaps this is what led whatever scribe, Savora, or external author to conclude that this ayin of ya’al kegam is one where we rule like Abaye. Of course, along with Rav Ashi’s explicit position that hilchata keAbaye here.