Siman - Megillah Daf 3
- When Yonasan ben Uziel composed the Targum of Neviim, the earth shook
Rebbe Yirmiyah said, and some say it was Rebbe Chiya bar Abba: The Targum of the Torah was composed by Onkelos the Ger, who learned it from Rebbe Eliezer and Rebbe Yehoshua. The Targum of the Neviim was composed by Yonasan ben Uziel, who learned it from Chaggai, Zacharyah, and Malachi, and when he composed it, נזדעזעה ארץ ישראל – Eretz Yisroel shook over an area that is four hundred parsah by four hundred parsah, and a Bas Kol called out: מי הוא זה שגילה סתריי לבני אדם – Who is this that has revealed My secrets to bnei Adam? Yonasan ben Uziel stood up and said: I was the one who revealed Your secrets. גלוי וידוע לפניך – It is revealed and known to You, שלא לכבודי עשיתי – that I did not do it for my honor, nor for the honor of my father’s house, אלא לכבודך עשיתי שלא ירבו מחלוקת בישראל – rather I did it for Your honor, that machlokes should not increase in Yisroel. Rashi explains that since many of the pesukim are difficult to understand, he explained them to avoid machlokes in their interpretation. He then wanted to reveal the Targum of Kesuvim but a Bas Kol called out: דייך – You have done enough. Why was he stopped from revealing the Targum? משום דאית ביה קץ משיח – Because it has within it a reference to the end of days when Moshiach will come.
- Leaving the avodah and talmud Torah to hear the reading of the Megillah
It was taught in a Baraisa: כהנים בעבודתן ולוים בדוכנן וישראל במעמדן כולן מבטלין עבודתן ובאין לשמוע מקרא מגילה – Kohanim involved in the avodah, and Leviim while on the duchan, and Yisroelim in their maamad, all of them must leave their avodah and come to listen to the reading of the Megillah. The talmidei chachomim from the yeshiva of Rebbe relied on this din here to teach, שמבטלין תלמוד תורה ובאין לשמוע מקרא מגילה – that one must abandon one’s Torah learning and go to hear the reading of the Megillah, as It is a kal v’chomer from avodah. מה עבודה שהיא חמורה מבטלינן תלמוד תורה לא כל שכן – Just as avodah, which is a very strict case, must be stopped to hear the Megillah, then all the more so Talmud Torah, which is not as strict must be stopped to hear the Megillah. When the Gemara challenges this notion, given that the Malach came to rebuke Yehoshua during the siege of Yericho for bitul Torah, even though he had also neglected in bringing the afternoon tamid, indicating that Talmud Torah is more חמור, the Gemara answers הא דרבים והא דיחיד – this case of Yehoshua involved bitul Torah of many, as Rashi explains that the whole nation did not study, whereas the ruling from the yeshiva of Rebbe was referring to the Torah learning of an individual.
- Open towns that get the same status as a walled city
Rebbe Yehoshua ben Levi said: כרך וכל הסמוך לו וכל הנראה עמו נדון ככרך – A walled city and all that is near it, and everything that can be seen with it, is judged as a walled city. A Tanna taught that all that is required is one of these conditions to be judged as a walled city. The Gemara asks, that while it is understandable that there can be a town seen from the city even though it is not close, such as in the case of a town on top of a mountain, how can there be a case of an open town that is near the city but cannot be seen with it? Rebbe Yirmiyah answered: שיושבת בנחל – It can happen when the town is located in a valley. In such a case, the city cannot see the town.
