Welcome to Nazir!

A look back at Nedarim. Also, the daled / resh in עבירה

We begin Nazir today. The first thing I’d point out is just how familiar the opening sugyot looks to us. The question of where Nazir belongs, relative to Sotah, is quite parallel to the opening sugya in Sotah (though reversed). Similarly, the objection that the opening Mishnah speaks of kinuyim (nicknames) and yet immediately addresses yadot (handles) is exactly parallel to the objection in Nedarim, the masechet that we just finished yesterday.

Indeed, here is a choice quote from Yerushalmi Nedarim (Leiden manuscript):

It tells us to essentially transfer the beginning of Nedarim until reaching “ashkach tenei Rabbi Yishmael”, because of the parallel.

Because the opening Mishnah is parallel, it is natural for the opening Gemara to match pretty closely as well. However, IMHO, the question of the gemara, that the Mishnah listed kinuyim and then listed yadot works a whole lot better here in Nazir than there in Nedarim.

As I argued at the time in Nedarim, an examination of the purported yadot in the Mishnah makes them much more like nicknames, alternate ways of referring to the item, synonyms, rather than literal yadot, handles, which are part of the overall phrase. Thus, I wrote:

I’d argue that the first Mishna isn’t concerned with yadot, perhaps aligning with Shmuel. Rather, taking kinuy in its expansive form, it encompasses synonyms. So מוּדְּרַנִי מִמָּךְ literally has the word neder as its root, which synonyms include מוּפְרְשַׁנִי מִמָּךְ מְרוּחֲקַנִי מִמָּךְ. And שֶׁאֲנִי אוֹכֵל לָךְ is what he’s literally vowing against, while שֶׁאֲנִי טוֹעֵם לָךְ doesn’t mean literal tasting, but is a synonym for eating.

In constrast, ehei as part of ehei nazir seems like a handle. What could one say in response? That yad is defined by its level of ambiguity, and either partial speech, or alternative phrasing are both yadot. Thus, ehei na’eh is a synonym, and is ambiguous.

Regardless, I’d like to imagine that the sugya started in Nazir (where it makes more sense) and was transferred to Nedarim.

The article in the Jewish Link Expanded Edition, which I wrote the above quote, preceded this Substack, so here it is.

In that article, I also pointed out some differences between Bavli and Yerushalmi about kinuyim. That Resh Lakish and Rabbi Yochanan’s attributed positions are reversed. Also, that is a language שבררו, that the Sages selected for themselves (possibly from a range of otherwise also Biblically valid language), as opposed to שבדו, that they fabricated.

And one final big chiddush was suggesting that לשון אומות was to be vocalized omot rather than umot, and that it was “imprecation language”. Just like Gosh Darn it and Dagnabbit. Thus, וַיַּשְׁבַּע יוֹסֵף is translated in Onkelos as וְאוֹמִי יוֹסֵף. However, I’ll also note some feedback from Dr. Moshe Bernstein who wrote “Oaths and Vows in the Pentateuchal Targumim: Semantics and Exegesis” in Sha’arei Lashon: Studies in Hebrew, Aramaic and Jewish Languages, which concerned how such language appears. His analysis is that such an interpretation is highly implausible. Oh, well. כשם שקבלתי שכר על הדרישה, כך אני מקבל שכר על הפרישה.

I also suggested that the example in Shir Hashirim, השבעתי אתכם בנות ירושלם בצבאות או באילות השדה אם־תעירו ׀ ואם־תעוררו את־האהבה עד שתחפץ, uses Tzevaot (rather than as we would have interpreted it, Tzevakot) and Eylot HaSadeh (instead of Kel Shakkai) as imprecation language, like saying Gosh. Dr. Bernstein pointed out that it can be well understood as a garden path sentence.

To explain garden path sentences — they are sentences constructed in such a way that you start interpreting it one way, and then at some point realize that you chose the wrong interpretation and have to go back and reinterpret. For instance: The horse raced past the barn fell.” You would think that the horse raced past something called a “barn fell”, but obviously that isn’t correct. Instead, think of this. Mary raced her horse past the barn. Sheila raced her horse past the well. The horse, (which was) raced past the barn, fell. So too, we think that the Biblical oath refers to swearing by God, and only when we reach באילות השדה do we realize that we should have interpreted בצבאות it as deer.

Let us end with fun textual variants. The gemara asks how one could employ נאה to refer to the state of nazir-hood, when it is a bad thing to accept upon oneself. Thus, Nazir 2b:

נְזִירָא מִילְּתָא דַעֲבֵירָה, וְאָמְרִינַן לֵיהּ ״נָאֶה״?

The Gemara asks: Since naziriteship is a matter of transgression, can we say about a nazirite that he is beautiful?

While Vilna and Venice printing have דעבירה with resh, and it appears that Pseudo-Rashi and Tosafot have with a resh, some texts have a daled (as Tosafot d”h ואמאי point out). Yes, it is a rhetorical question, but at play is how much of it is rhetorical. Are we saying: Nazirship is a matter of transgression! And yet you say it is beautiful?! Or, are we saying: Is nazirship indeed something that is done, that we would say about it that it is beautiful?

Munich 95 has it with a daled. Thus: ואי' אי נאה נזירו' מילת' עביד' ואמרי' ליה נאה

So too Regensberg:

Vatican 110 is interesting, as it has a resh / daled alternation by way of a scribal insertion over the word. Thus, as they encode it in their transcription at Hachi Garsinan, ואמ' אי נאה וכי נזיר $[2]$[[ד]]עבי((ד)){ר'} $[1]$מילתא דאמ' ל' נאה.

One final girsological issue. Munich 95, above, had ואמרי' ליה נאה. Tosafot, in the dibur hamatchil, has something similar, but with duplicative language in the beginning:

ואמאי נאה הא מילתא דעבירה היא ואמרי' ליה נאה

Rashash writes about this Tosafot as follows: תד"ה ואמאי נאה. ט"ס וצ"ל ואמר אינאה:

That is, we need to redivide the words, and it is ve-am’ (shorted ve’amar, perhaps with an apostrophe over the mem). Then, a space. Then אי and no space, and then נאה.