הגדה ברורה

Haggadot and essays for Pesah and all year round

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The solution to the shiurim problem – but you won’t like it

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It will probably not be a big chiddush to anyone reading this that eggs didn't halve in size. What many people, including myself until recently, however, do not sufficiently appreciate is that the textual arguments for doubling of volume shiurim in the modern era are actually very strong, indeed, from a certain perspective, irrefutable. What is also underappreciated is that apologetic arguments made by defenders of the premodern shiurim are weak and belied by archaeological evidence. So I set …

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רבותינו אמרו שהמזה טהור ‘Knowing’ Torah (Parshat Parah)

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The Parah Adumah is famous as the quintessential example of paradox in Judaism. Its entire function is to render people tahor and yet everyone associated with it becomes tamei. The priest who slaughters it becomes tamei, the priest who burns it becomes tamei, the priest who gathers up the ashes becomes tamei, and the priest who sprinkles the mixture of ash and water becomes tamei. Except the last one on that list is wrong. On verse 21 of the chapter, Rashi writes as follows: רַבּוֹתֵינוּ …

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עדים זוממים (iii): A response to Prof. Shamma Friedman

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Around a year ago, I wrote an article (and a short follow up) arguing that the famous d'rasha of הרגו אין נהרגין, widely believed to be an unimpeachable teaching of Hazal, is, in fact, a דעת יחיד found only in one late, and highly dubious, source recorded in the Talmud Bavli and tacitly ignored by codifiers until the advent of a revolution in the way the Bavli was conceptualized, spearheaded by the scholars of France. I happened upon this analysis while working on one of my unfinished projects, …

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עדים זוממים (ii) The source of Rashi’s d’rasha

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In a previous article, I discussed at some length the genesis of the claim that עדים זוממים can only be punished for an intermediate period between the moment when their perjury results in the conviction of their victim (גמר דין) and the actual execution of the sentence. If, so the claim goes, the unfortunate object of their false testimony has already been executed then they may not be punished. Guilty as sin, free as a bird, what a country! As I demonstrated there at length, the story of …

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עדים זוממים and publication bias

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The mitzvah of עדים זוממים is both intuitive and logical. False witnesses who pervert the legal system for their own ends are punished in direct proportion to the intended effect of their actions. If their false testimony was liable to cause someone to incur a financial penalty, they get a financial penalty; if lashes, they get lashes; if the death penalty, it's curtains. However, there is one aspect of עדים זוממים that is not intuitive at all, to say the very least. Devarim 19:19 commands us …

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