אֵין מְבָרְכִין לֹא עַל הַנֵּר וְלֹא עַל הַבְּשָׂמִים שֶׁל נָכְרִים, וְלֹא עַל הַנֵּר וְלֹא עַל הַבְּשָׂמִים שֶׁל מֵתִים, וְלֹא עַל הַנֵּר וְלֹא עַל הַבְּשָׂמִים שֶׁלִּפְנֵי עֲבוֹדָה זָרָה. אֵין מְבָרְכִין עַל הַנֵּר עַד שֶׁיֵּאוֹתוּ לְאוֹרוֹ

They may not recite a blessing over a lamp or spices of gentiles, nor over a lamp or spices of the dead, nor over a lamp or spices [which have been placed] before [objects pertaining to] idolatry. And they do not recite a blessing over a lamp until they make use of its light (אורו).

כָּל הַקֲּדָשִׁים שֶׁאֵרַע בָּהֶם פְּסוּל קֹדֶם לְהֶפְשֵׁטָן, אֵין עוֹרוֹתֵיהֶם לַכֹּהֲנִים. לְאַחַר הֶפְשֵׁטָן, עוֹרוֹתֵיהֶם לַכֹּהֲנִים. אָמַר רַבִּי חֲנִינָא סְגַן הַכֹּהֲנִים, מִיָּמַי לֹא רָאִיתִי עוֹר יוֹצֵא לְבֵית הַשְּׂרֵפָה. אָמַר רַבִּי עֲקִיבָא, מִדְּבָרָיו לָמַדְנוּ, שֶׁהַמַּפְשִׁיט אֶת הַבְּכוֹר וְנִמְצָא טְרֵפָה, שֶׁיֵּאוֹתוּ הַכֹּהֲנִים בְּעוֹרוֹ. וַחֲכָמִים אוֹמְרִים, אֵין לֹא רָאִינוּ רְאָיָה, אֶלָּא יוֹצֵא לְבֵית הַשְּׂרֵפָה

A. All Holy Things [burnt offering, sin offering, guilt offering] which suffered an invalidity before they were flayed—their hides do not belong to the priests. [If an invalidity was incurred] after they were flayed, their hides belong to the priests. Said R. Hananiah, Prefect of the Priests, “In all my days I never saw a hide taken out to the place of burning.” Said R. Aqiba, “From his statement we learn that: “He who flays the firstling [which was blemished and slaughtered] [that is, it was disqualified even before flaying] and it turns out to be terefah—“the priests make use of its hide (עורו).” And sages say, “’We have not seen’ is no proof. But: “It goes forth to the place of burning.”

It’s very likely that somebody has already written about this somewhere, so hopefully I’m in good company.

Photos: IAA

Shlomo Naeh has a new interpretation of what was thought to be a seal certifying purity that was used in the Temple. According to Naeh, it is actually a token for a sacrifice.

Thus, the object was used in Temple worship, but not how Reich and Shukron believe it was, says Naeh. To ensure the purity of animal sacrifices offered in the Temple – and to maintain an economic monoply, Naeh believes – pilgrims had to buy their offerings in the Temple courts. They gave money to a treasurer who would exchange it for a token inscribed with the type of sacrifice they had purchased and the date.

I liked this quote from Naeh:

“People have been saying the ancient sages fantasized everything about the Temple. But … they knew what they were talking about. For me, this is uplifting. The sages of the Mishna, my guys, win out,” Naeh said.

The Hebrew version of the article has a fuller quote from Naeh:

“התגלית הארכיאולוגית היא עדות חיה למנהל המקדשי כפי שהוא מתואר במשנה”, מוסיף פרופ’ נאה. “פירוש זה מסביר גם את נדירותו של הממצא הארכיאולוגי, שכן החותמות הנזכרים במשנה שימשו רק בתוך תחום בית המקדש אמצעי חליפין פנימי, ואפשר להניח שרק פריטים בודדים מצאו את דרכם אל מחוץ לבית המקדש”.”אין לנו משהו דומה לזה. פתאום השטח והספרות מדברים באותה השפה”, אומר נאה, “דווקא בדור האחרון עולה גישה שאומרת שחז”ל פינטזו על מה שקרה בבית המקדש (המשנה נערכה כ-130 שנה לאחר החורבן, נ”ח), אבל המשנה הזו לא יכולה להיות תוצאה של פנטזיה – הם ידעו על מה הם מדברים. בשבילי זה משהו מרומם. חכמי המשנה,
החבר’ה שלי, מנצחים”.

The Mishnaic word for seal is חותמות and it occurs in a number of mishnahs. The following is Shekalim 5:3 (trans. Neusner):

אַרְבָּעָה חוֹתָמוֹת הָיוּ בַּמִּקְדָּשׁ, וְכָתוּב עֲלֵיהֶן, עֵגֶל, זָכָר, גְּדִי, חוֹטֵא. בֶּן עַזַּאי אוֹמֵר, חֲמִשָּׁה הָיוּ, וַאֲרָמִית כָּתוּב עֲלֵיהֶן, עֵגֶל, זָכָר, גְּדִי, חוֹטֵא דַּל, וְחוֹטֵא עָשִׁיר. עֵגֶל מְשַׁמֵּשׁ עִם נִסְכֵּי בָּקָר גְּדוֹלִים וּקְטַנִּים, זְכָרִים וּנְקֵבוֹת. גְּדִי מְשַׁמֵּשׁ עִם נִסְכֵּי צֹאן גְּדוֹלִים וּקְטַנִּים, זְכָרִים וּנְקֵבוֹת, חוּץ מִשֶּׁל אֵילִים. זָכָר מְשַׁמֵּשׁ עִם נִסְכֵּי אֵילִים בִּלְבָד. חוֹטֵא מְשַׁמֵּשׁ עִם נִסְכֵּי שָׁלֹשׁ בְּהֵמוֹת שֶׁל מְצוֹרָעִין

Four seals were in the Temple. And on them was inscribed the following: “Calf,” “ram” (male), “kid,” “sinner.” Ben Azzai says, “There were five, and they were written in Aramaic: “Calf,” “ram,” “kid,” “poor sinner” [Lev. 14:21], and “rich sinner” [Lev. 14:10]. “Calf” signifies drink offerings for [offerings from] the herd, large or small, male or female. “Kid” signifies drink offerings of the flock, whether large or small, male or female, except for those which accompany rams. “Ram” signifies drink offerings which come with rams alone, “Sinner” signifies drink offerings which come with the three beasts of those afflicted by metzora.

The name Yehoyariv occurs in Baba Kamma 9:12:

נָתַן הַכֶּסֶף לְאַנְשֵׁי מִשְׁמָר, וָמֵת, אֵין הַיּוֹרְשִׁים יְכוֹלִין לְהוֹצִיא מִיָּדָם, שֶׁנֶּאֱמַר אִישׁ אֲשֶׁר יִתֵּן לַכֹּהֵן לוֹ יִהְיֶה. נָתַן הַכֶּסֶף לִ יהוֹיָרִיב וְאָשָׁם לִידַעְיָה, יָצָא, אָשָׁם לִיהוֹיָרִיב וְכֶסֶף לִידַעְיָה, אִם קַיָּם הָאָשָׁם, יַקְרִיבוּהוּ בְנֵי יְדַעְיָה, וְאִם לָאו, יַחֲזֹר וְיָבִיא אָשָׁם אַחֵר. שֶׁהַמֵּבִיא גְזֵלוֹ עַד שֶׁלֹּא הֵבִיא אֲשָׁמוֹ, יָצָא, הֵבִיא אֲשָׁמוֹ עַד שֶׁלֹּא הֵבִיא גְזֵלוֹ, לֹא יָצָא. נָתַן אֶת הַקֶּרֶן וְלֹא נָתַן אֶת הַחֹמֶשׁ, אֵין הַחֹמֶשׁ מְעַכֵּב

A. If he [who had stolen from a proselyte] had paid over the money to the men of the priestly watch on duty, and then [the thief] died, the heirs cannot retrieve the funds from their possession, since it is said, Whatsoever any man gives to the priest shall be his (Num. 5:10). [If] he gave the money to the priestly watch of Jehoyarib [which is prior], and the guilt offering to the priestly watch of Jedaiah [which is later], he has carried out his obligation. [If he gave] the guilt offering to the priestly watch of Jehoyarib and the money to the priestly watch of Jedaiah, if the guilt offering is yet available, the family of Jedaiah should offer it up. And if not, he should go and bring another guilt offering. For he who brings back what he had stolen before he brought his guilt offering has fulfilled his obligation. But if he brought his guilt offering before he brought back what he had stolen, he has not fulfilled his obligation. [If] he handed over the principal but did not hand over the added fifth, the added fifth does not stand in the way [of offering the guilt offering and so completing his obligation].

I am sure that a few articles will be written about this find, but it is interesting that the original press release from the IAA quotes Shekalim 5:4, a source that I think seems to lend support to Naeh’s interpretation of this being a token that was given in exchange for something and not a seal certifying purity.

מִי שֶׁהוּא מְבַקֵּשׁ נְסָכִים הוֹלֵךְ לוֹ אֵצֶל יוֹחָנָן שֶׁהוּא מְמֻנֶּה עַל הַחוֹתָמוֹת, נוֹתֵן לוֹ מָעוֹת וּמְקַבֵּל מִמֶּנּוּ חוֹתָם. בָּא לוֹ אֵצֶל אֲחִיָּה שֶׁהוּא מְמֻנֶּה עַל הַנְּסָכִים, וְנוֹתֵן לוֹ חוֹתָם וּמְקַבֵּל מִמֶּנּוּ נְסָכִים. וְלָעֶרֶב בָּאִין זֶה אֵצֶל זֶה, וַאֲחִיָּה מוֹצִיא אֶת החוֹתָמוֹת וּמְקַבֵּל כְּנֶגְדָּן מָעוֹת. וְאִם הוֹתִירוּ הוֹתִירוּ לַהֶקְדֵּשׁ. וְאִם פָּחֲתוּ, הָיָה מְשַׁלֵּם יוֹחָנָן מִבֵּיתוֹ, שֶׁיַּד הֶקְדֵּשׁ עַל הָעֶלְיוֹנָה

He who wanted [to purchase] drink offerings goes over to Yohanan, who is appointed to be in charge of the seals. He pays him the fee and receives a seal from him. He goes over to Ahiah, who is appointed to be in charge of the drink offerings. He hands over the seal to him and receives the drink offerings from him. Then in the evening the two come together, and Ahiah brings out the seals and receives money for them. If there was an excess [of funds over seals], the excess belongs to the sanctuary. And if there was too little money, Yohanan paid out of his own pocket. For the claim of the sanctuary is always paramount.

Update:  See this update from Paleojudaica.

Here’s an example of a recent post:

Berakhot, Chapter Two, Mishnah One

Introduction

The first section of this mishnah deals with having proper intention when reciting the Shema. The second section deals with interrupting reciting the Shema to greet someone.

Mishnah One

1) If one was reading in the Torah [the section of the Shema] and the time for its recital arrived, if he directed his heart [to fulfill the mitzvah] he has fulfilled his obligation.

2) In the breaks [between sections] one may give greeting out of respect and return greeting; in the middle [of a section] one may give greeting out of fear and return it, the words of Rabbi Meir.

3) RabbiJudah says: in the middle one may give greeting out of fear and return it out of respect, in the breaks one may give greeting out of respect and return greeting to anyone.

Explanation

Section one: Someone is reading the Torah and he just happens to read the portions of the Shema at the time in the morning or evening when he is supposed to recite the Shema. While this may seem extremely unlikely since the Shema’s three portions are not found consecutively in the Torah the mishnah is teaching a lesson. Merely reading the Shema as if one is simply reading from the Torah is not sufficient to fulfill one’s ritual duty to recite the Shema in the morning and in the evening. One must recite the Shema with the intention in mind of fulfilling one’s obligation to perform this mitzvah. Only if one has such an intention in mind, has he fulfilled his mitzvah.

Section two: This section deals with being forced to interrupt someone to offer a greeting. It seems that in ancient times people took greetings far more seriously than we take them today. Not greeting someone properly was considered a serious insult. Therefore, both Rabbi Meir and Rabbi Judah allow certain interruptions in the recitation of the Shema in order to greet people. Rabbi Meir rules more strictly. In between the paragraphs one can greet and respond to someone to whom one owes respect. In the middle of a paragraph one can interrupt but only to greet or respond to someone whom one fears, such as a king or other powerful official. But one should never interrupt just to greet an ordinary person and in the middle of a paragraph one may interrupt only out of fear and not out of respect.

Rabbi Judah is more lenient on each count. In the middle of a paragraph he may initiate a greeting out of fear (Rabbi Meir agrees with this) and he may respond to one even out of respect (Rabbi Meir says only out of fear). In between paragraphs he may initiate a greeting out of respect (this agrees with Rabbi Meir) and he may respond to anyone (Rabbi Meir disagrees).

In a blog post (here) that brings a wide variety of artistic representations of the Last Supper, David Assaf wrote that some people either don’t know, or forget, that the Last Supper was a Passover Seder.

לפעמים אנו שוכחים – או שמא פשוט לא יודעים – שהסעודה האחרונה של ישו היתה סעודת ליל הסדר.

The claim that the Last Supper was a Passover Seder is repeated by many and rarely doubted, but the problem is that this claim is probably incorrect.

Assaf brings the following text from Matthew 14:12-26:

12 And on the first day of Unleavened Bread, when they sacrificed the Passover lamb, his disciples said to him, “Where will you have us go and prepare for you to eat the Passover?” 13 And he sent two of his disciples and said to them, “Go into the city, and a man carrying a jar of water will meet you. Follow him, 14 and wherever he enters, say to the master of the house, ‘The Teacher says, Where is my guest room, where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?’ 15 And he will show you a large upper room furnished and ready; there prepare for us.” 16 And the disciples set out and went to the city and found it just as he had told them, and they prepared the Passover. 17 And when it was evening, he came with the twelve. 18 And as they were reclining at table and eating, Jesus said, “Truly, I say to you, one of you will betray me, one who is eating with me.” 19 They began to be sorrowful and to say to him one after another, “Is it I?” 20 He said to them, “It is one of the twelve, one who is dipping bread into the dish with me. 21 For the Son of Man goes as it is written of him, but woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed! It would have been better for that man if he had not been born.” 22 And as they were eating, he took bread, and after blessing it broke it and gave it to them, and said, “Take; this is my body.” 23 And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks he gave it to them, and they all drank of it. 24 And he said to them, “This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many. 25 Truly, I say to you, I will not drink again of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.”

In one of the most important articles on the possible relationship between the Last Supper and the Passover Seder, Jonathan Klawans wrote:

While three of the four canonical Gospels strongly suggest that the Last Supper did occur on Passover, we should not get too comfortable based on that. The three Gospels that support this view are the three synoptic Gospels—Matthew, Mark and Luke. As anyone who has studied these three Gospels knows, they are closely related. In fact, the name synoptic refers to the fact that these three texts can be studied most effectively when “seen together” (as implied in the Greek etymology of synoptic). Thus, in fact we don’t really have three independent sources here at all. What we have, rather, is one testimony (probably Mark), which was then copied twice (by Matthew and Luke).

Klawans continued and wrote:

Against the “single” testimony of the synoptics that the Last Supper was a Passover meal stands the lone Gospel of John, which dates the crucifixion to the “day of Preparation for the Passover” (John 19:14). According to John, Jesus died just when the Passover sacrifice was being offered and before the festival began at sundown (see the sidebar to this article). Any last meal—which John does not record—would have taken place the night before, or even earlier than that. But it certainly could not have been a Passover meal, for Jesus died before the holiday had formally begun.

Klawans admitted that the description found in John is not without problems, but for a number of reasons he finds it to be more reliable than the synoptic version. You can read here and here for reactions to Klawans’s article.

And what about the seder itself? Again, from Klawans:

How much of the Haggadah goes back to ancient times? In the 1930s and 1940s, the American Talmud scholar Louis Finkelstein (1895–1991) famously claimed that various parts of the Passover Haggadah were very early, stemming in part from the third century B.C.E. In 1960, Israeli scholar Daniel Goldschmidt (1895–1972) effectively rebutted practically all of Finkelstein’s claims. It is unfortunate that Goldschmidt’s Hebrew article has not been translated, because it remains, to my mind, the classic work on the early history of the Passover Haggadah. Fortunately, a number of brief and up-to-date treatments of the history of the Haggadah are now available. A full generation later, the Goldschmidt-Finkelstein debate seems to have been settled, and in Goldschmidt’s favor. Almost everyone doing serious work on the early history of Passover traditions, including Joseph Tabory, Israel Yuval, Lawrence Hoffman, and the father-son team of Shmuel and Ze’ev Safrai, has rejected Finkelstein’s claims for the great antiquity of the bulk of the Passover Haggadah. What is particularly significant about this consensus is that these scholars are not radical skeptics. These scholars believe that, generally speaking, we can extract historically reliable information from rabbinic sources. But as demonstrated by the late Baruch Bokser in his book The Origins of the Seder, practically everything preserved in the early rabbinic traditions concerning the Passover Seder brings us back to the time immediately following the Roman destruction of the Temple in 70 C.E. It’s not that rabbinic literature cannot be trusted to tell us about history in the first century of the Common Era. It’s that rabbinic literature—in the case of the Seder—does not even claim to be telling us how the Seder was performed before the destruction of the Temple.

Or as my friend Josh Kulp put it,

This overwhelming trend among historians and rabbinic text critics leads to the conclusion that Jesus’ last supper, even if it did occur on the eve of Passover, was not a ‘seder’, for there was no ‘seder’ in the Second Temple period.

Update: See some of my comments (Hebrew) to the original post by David Assaf.

Update II: See the following quotation from the Anchor Bible Dictionary’s entry on “Last Supper” for an example of how some scholarship presented the material in the Mishnah as an accurate portrayal of practice during the Second Temple period.

Although a number of scholars identify the Last Supper as a Passover meal, a description of which is given in the Mishnah (Pesaḥ10; cf. Str-B 4/1: 41-76), the majority are still not convinced of this interpretation. However, many would concede that Jesus ate his final meal in a Passover atmosphere; there was, after all, the proximity of the feast.

The first volume of Rabbi Benny Lau’s popular work on the sages of the Rabbinic period has been translated into English. The Sages: Character, Context, and Creativity is being published by Koren.

Corruption = Officials + Pockets: “Nepal’s prime minister was upset that officials at the country’s main airport had gained a reputation for bribe-taking. So the government is trying to put an end to corruption by putting an end to pockets, issuing pocket-less trousers to all its airport staff.”

The rabbis of the Mishnah already thought of this one (Shekalim 3:2)

“With three baskets, each holding three seahs, they take up the heave offering of the [coins collected in the] [sheqel] chamber, And written on them are the Hebrew letters alef, bet, gimel. R. Ishmael says, “Written on them were the Greek letters Alpha, Beta, Gamma.” He who takes up the heave offering went in wearing neither a sleeved cloak, nor shoes, sandals, phylacteries, nor an amulet—lest [in the coming year] he lose all his money and people say [about him], “Because of a transgression against the [sheqel] chamber did he lose his money” Or lest he get rich, and people say about him, “From the heave offering of the [sheqel] chamber did he get rich.” For a person must give no cause for suspicion to other people, just as he must give no cause for suspicion to the Omnipresent, as it is said, And be guiltless towards the Lord and towards Israel (Num. 32:22).”

The appearance in recent years of an impressive series of books, articles, and mainly dissertations on various aspects of the Mishnah, collectively signifies something greater then the sum of its parts. These works herald the emergence of a new wave of Mishnah research. While differing significantly in their themes and methods, all the works discussed below share some basic methodological assumptions which are not shared by more “traditional” studies. Among these are: a holistic attitude to the Mishnah as acomposition; interest in questions of variegation of genre and style (narratives, rituals, lists, etc.); sensitivity to literary devices and techniques; and the use of new interpretive paradigms from rhetoric, cultural and performative studies.

…

There is yet another, more fundamental, feature shared by many of these new studies: their return to the most basic questions regarding the nature and character of the Mishnah; questions which stood at the center of academic scholarship of rabbinic literature from its very inception, but have been largely abandoned gradually in favor of more local philological and interpretive studies.

…

What characterizes the Mishnah as a composition? What kind of project is it? What is the place of midrash within it? What kind of historical value does it hold? What are its relationships to older traditions? Or, in short: what is mishnah?

Hebrew was acquired in the Jewish school system, and schools were widespread in Jewish communities of Palestine from late Second Temple times into the Talmudic period. The elementary level was the Bet Sefer (ages 6 – 9) followed by the Bet Talmud (9-13). After this a student could continue to the Bet Midrash if his family could afford it. The sole purpose of the Bet Sefer was to teach the children to read Hebrew, with no ‘practical’ training at all. This includes learning to read the text, learning how to pronounce it properly, and probably learning the targum along with it to aid in understanding. In fact, Alexander suggests that the Bet Sefer may have been the original setting for the targum, and only later was it incorporated into the synagogue. This also fits the nature of the targum as a word for word translation. The student could line up the Aramaic word with its Hebrew counterpart as a learning aid.