SHABBOS - 118b – כל כתבי – פרק ששה עשר – שבת, קיח ע”ב

The inheritance of Yaakov your father, etc.

נחלת יעקב - and not the inheritance of Avraham and Yitzchak:

Not like Avraham,^[1] of whom it is written (Bereishis 13:17): Arise, walk through the land, through its length, etc.,

לארכה ולרחבה - this land, and no more:

and not like Yitzchak, of whom it is written (Bereishis 26:3): For to you and to your descendants I will give all these lands,

הארצות האל - and no further:

but like Yaakov, of whom it is written (Bereishis 28:14): And you shall spread out to the west and to the east, to the north and to the south.

Rav Nachman bar Yitzchak said: He is saved from the subjugation of the kingdoms.^[2]

It is written here: And I will make you ride upon the high places of the earth, and it is written there (Devarim 33:29): And you shall tread upon their high places.

Rav Yehudah said in the name of Rav: Whoever delights in Shabbos is given the desires of his heart.

As it is said (Tehillim 37:4): Delight in Hashem, and He will give you the desires of your heart.

This "delight" — I do not know what it is.

When it says: And you shall call Shabbos a delight,^[3] you must say: this is the delight of Shabbos.

With what does one delight in it?

Rav Yehudah the son of Rav Shmuel bar Shilas said in the name of Rav: With a dish of beets, large fish, and heads of garlic.

תבשיל של תרדין - it is an important dish:

ראשי שומין - these were important to them:

Rav Chiya bar Ashi said in the name of Rav: Even something small, if one made it in honor of Shabbos, is a delight.

What is it?

Rav Papa said: A dish of small fried fish.

כסא דהרסנא - small fish fried in the oil of their innards, with flour:

Rav Chiya bar Abba said in the name of Rabbi Yochanan: Whoever keeps Shabbos according to its laws, even if he worships idols like [the generation of] Enosh, is forgiven.

דור אנוש - they began to worship idols, as it is written (Bereishis 4:26): Then it became profane to call, etc.:

As it is said (Yeshayahu 56:2): Fortunate is the man [enosh] who does this, etc., [guarding Shabbos] from profaning it.

Do not read מחללו ("from profaning it"), but מחול לו ("he is forgiven").^[4]

[On the son of the Egyptian man and the wood-gatherer]

Rav Yehudah said in the name of Rav: Had Israel kept the first Shabbos, no nation or tongue would have ruled over them.^[5]

As it is said (Shemos 16:27): And it came to pass on the seventh day, that some of the people went out to gather.

And it is written after it: And Amalek came (Shemos 17:8).

בתריה - after that passage:

Rabbi Yochanan said in the name of Rabbi Shimon ben Yochai: Were Israel to keep two Shabbosos according to their laws, they would be redeemed at once.

As it is said (Yeshayahu 56:4): Thus says Hashem to the eunuchs who keep My Shabbosos, and it is written after it: I will bring them to My holy mountain, etc.

Rabbi Yosei said: May my portion be among those who eat three meals on Shabbos.

Rabbi Yosei said: May my portion be among those who complete Hallel every day.

Is that so? But the Master said: One who reads Hallel every day blasphemes and reviles!^[6]

הרי זה מחרף ומגדף - for the early prophets instituted that it be said at set times, as praise and thanksgiving, as we say in Arvei Pesachim (Pesachim 117a); and one who reads it constantly, not in its time, is only like one who sings a song in jest:

When we say it, we mean Pesukei d'Zimra.

פסוקי דזמרא - the two psalms of praise, Praise Hashem from the heavens and Praise G‑d in His holiness:

Rabbi Yosei said: May my portion be among those who pray at the reddening of the sun.^[7]

דמדומי חמה - when it is red: in the morning, right after sunrise, it is red; and in the evening, close to its setting:

Rabbi Chiya bar Abba said in the name of Rabbi Yochanan: It is a mitzvah to pray at the reddening of the sun.

Rabbi Zeira said: What is the verse?

(Tehillim 72:5) They shall fear You with the sun, and before the moon, for all generations.

עם שמש - with its rising:

ולפני ירח - before the light of the moon, while the sun has not yet set:

And Rabbi Yosei said: May my portion be among those who die of intestinal illness.

ממתי מחולי בני מעיים - for they are afflicted with suffering, and their sins are cleansed:

For the Master said: Most of the righteous die of intestinal illness.

And Rabbi Yosei said: May my portion be among those who die on the way to a mitzvah.

And Rabbi Yosei said: May my portion be among those who bring in Shabbos in Teverya and take out Shabbos in Tzippori.

ממכניסי שבת בטבריא - because it lies low and grows dark while it is still day, and they think night has fallen; and those who take out Shabbos in Tzippori, which sits on a mountaintop, and even as the sun sets a great light is still seen there, so they are late to end it:

And Rabbi Yosei said: May my portion be among those who seat [students in] the study hall, and not among those who make them rise from the study hall.

ממושיבי בית המדרש - attendants who gather the students to come each day:

ממעמידי - those appointed at mealtime to say, "The time has come to rise and eat":

And Rabbi Yosei said: May my portion be among the collectors of tzedakah, and not among the distributors of tzedakah.

ממחלקי - tzedakah to the poor; as we say in the first perek of Bava Basra (Bava Basra 8b): Tzedakah is collected by two and distributed by three. Those who distribute it must assess what each one needs, and sometimes they are inclined to have mercy on one and give him more than he needs, assessing him generously and his fellow sparingly:

And Rabbi Yosei said: May my portion be among those who are suspected of something that is not in them.

Rav Papa said: They suspected me, and it was not in me.

Rabbi Yosei said: Five times I had relations, and I planted five cedars in Israel.

And who are they?

Rabbi Yishmael son of Rabbi Yosei, Rabbi Elazar son of Rabbi Yosei, Rabbi Chalafta son of Rabbi Yosei, Rabbi Avtilas son of Rabbi Yosei, and Rabbi Menachem son of Rabbi Yosei.

But there is Vardimas?

Vardimas is the same as Menachem.

And why is he called Vardimas?

Because his face resembled a rose.

Does that mean Rabbi Yosei did not fulfill the mitzvah of onah?!^[8]

Rather, say: five times I had relations and repeated.

בעלתי ושניתי - so that they would be sons, as the Master said: One who wishes his children to be sons should have relations and repeat (Eruvin 100b):

Rabbi Yosei said: In all my days I never called my wife "my wife," nor my ox "my ox,"

לא קריתי לאשתי אשתי - for even my ordinary conversation has wisdom to be learned from it:

but my wife "my home," and my ox "my field."

אשתי ביתי - for she is the essence of the home:

ולשורי שדי - for it is the essence of the field, as it is written: Abundant produce comes by the strength of the ox (Mishlei 14:4):

Rabbi Yosei said: In all my days I never looked at my circumcision.

לא נסתכלתי כו' - out of great modesty:

Is that so? But they said to Rebbi: Why did they call you "our holy teacher"?^[9] He said to them: In all my days I never looked at my circumcision!

והא אמרו לו כו' - and if so, Rabbi Yosei too should have been called "our holy teacher":

With Rebbi there was something more: he never put his hand beneath his belt.

תחת אבנטו - from the belt downward:

And Rabbi Yosei said: In all my days the beams of my house never saw the seams of my shirt.

לא ראו קורות כו' - when he took off his shirt he took it off the way he put it on, over his head, having first covered himself, out of modesty, with his sheet beneath, sitting on his bed:

And Rabbi Yosei said: In all my days I never went against the words of my colleagues.

I know of myself that I am not a kohen; yet if my colleagues tell me: Go up to the duchan, I go up.^[10]

And Rabbi Yosei said: In all my days I never said something and then went back on it.

לא אמרתי דבר וחזרתי לאחורי - if the person I had said something about came and asked whether I had said it of him, I did not retract and say it was not as he claimed, for I had spoken the truth in the first place. He holds that anything said in the presence of its subject carries no prohibition of lashon hara, and so it is explained in Maseches Arachin (Arachin 15b):

Rav Nachman said: Let it be credited to me that I kept three meals on Shabbos.

Rav Yehudah said: Let it be credited to me that I kept concentration in prayer.

Rav Huna the son of Rav Yehoshua said: Let it be credited to me that I never walked four amos with my head uncovered.

Rav Sheshes said: Let it be credited to me that I kept the mitzvah of tefillin.

דקיימתי מצות תפילין - that he never walked four amos without tefillin; and the same with tzitzis:

And Rav Nachman said: Let it be credited to me that I kept the mitzvah of tzitzis.

Rav Yosef said to Rav Yosef the son of Rabbah: In what was your father most careful?

He said to him: In tzitzis.

One day he was going up a staircase, and a thread tore; he did not go down and come on as long as he had not attached it.

עד דרמיה - until he repaired it; and this is the term used for hanging tzitzis, as we say elsewhere (Taanis 22a): he did not attach threads:

And Abaye said: Let it be credited to me that when I saw a young Torah scholar who had completed his masechta^[11]

דשלים מסכתיה - that he had learned it through:

Tosafos

רובם של צדיקים מתים בחולי מעיים - Rashi explains: to cleanse their sins. The Ri says there is a Midrash: to purge the food from the intestines, so that they will be clean and pure like the ministering angels:

אימא ה' בעילות בעלתי ושניתי - and in the Yerushalmi it answers that they were yevamos, and he did not wish to fulfill the mitzvah of onah with them, only the mitzvah of yibum, that is, the first union:

אילו היו אומרים לי חברי עלה לדוכן - the Ri did not know what prohibition there is in a non-kohen going up to the duchan, unless it is because of a blessing in vain, since the Torah told kohanim to bless Israel:

עיון תפלה - this means concentration of the heart. So too in the passage of the things whose fruits one eats in this world (Shabbos 127a), which counts concentration in prayer. But what is said in Berachos (Berachos 32b and 55a), one who dwells on his prayer will end in heartache, refers to a dwelling in which he waits for when Hashem will grant his request, thinking his prayer is accepted, as the Gemara brings there: Hope deferred makes the heart sick. So too what Rabbi Yitzchak said: Three things bring a person's sins to mind: a leaning wall, dwelling on prayer, [and handing one's fellow over to Heaven for judgment]. And what is said in Perek Get Pashut (Bava Basra 164b), three things no person escapes each day: lashon hara, sinful thoughts, and iyun tefillah, cannot mean waiting for one's request to be granted, since many people are free of that; rather it is as in our sugya — not concentrating in prayer, which is impossible to guard against fully, as the Yerushalmi says: I am grateful to my head, that when it reaches Modim it bows on its own:

Notes

1. 1. Rashi on Bereishis 49:26 explains Yaakov's blessing the same way: it was a blessing without bounds, reaching to all four directions, which was not said to Avraham or Yitzchak. [רש"י בראשית מט, כו]
2. 2. The kingdoms are the foreign empires that ruled Israel in exile. The proof turns on a shared word: Yeshayahu promises the one who delights in Shabbos, I will make you ride upon the high places of the earth [ישעיהו נח, יד], and Moshe's blessing uses the same word for Israel treading on the high places of its enemies.
3. 3. Yeshayahu 58:13 [ישעיהו נח, יג]. The verse in Tehillim speaks of a delight it does not define; this verse identifies it as the delight of Shabbos.
4. 4. By reading the word differently, the verse becomes a promise: through keeping Shabbos a person's sins are forgiven — even idol worship like that of the generation of Enosh, to which the same verse alludes with the word enosh.
5. 5. The first Shabbos after the mann began to fall, when some of the people went out to gather it; the very next passage in the Torah is Amalek's attack.
6. 6. Hallel here is the set of psalms (Tehillim 113–118) instituted for specific festive days; Pesukei d'Zimra are the psalms of praise said every morning, which is what Rabbi Yosei meant.
7. 7. In the morning this is praying at sunrise, the practice of the vasikin; in the afternoon, Minchah just before sunset.
8. 8. Onah is a husband's obligation to his wife, so it cannot be that Rabbi Yosei was with his wife only five times.
9. 9. Rebbi is Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi, the compiler of the Mishnah.
10. 10. The duchan is the platform from which the kohanim give Birkas Kohanim to the people.
11. 11. The sentence continues at the head of the next amud [שבת קיט, א].