Makkos 3:14-15

Makkos 3:14

While the offender is being lashed, someone reads Deuteronomy 28:58-59 – “If you will not observe to do…then God will inflict great blows upon you….”  He repeats this section until the punishment has been completed. He also reads Deuteronomy 29:8 – “Therefore observe the words of this covenant…” – and he finishes with Psalms 78:38 – But He, being full of compassion, forgives sin…,” again repeating as necessary. [Different versions of the mishna vary as to where the part about repeating the reading properly belongs.] If the offender dies because of the lashes, the one who administered them is not culpable; if he added even one more lash than called for and the offender died, then the one who administered the lashes is exiled to a city of refuge (for manslaughter). If the one being lashed soiled himself, either with excrement or urine, then the rest of the lashes are suspended. Rabbi Yehuda says that a man’s punishment is only suspended if he soils himself with excrement but a woman’s is suspended even if she only soils herself with urine.

Makkos 3:15

Anyone liable to kareis (spiritual excision) who was lashed for his offense is then exempt from kareis as per Deuteronomy 25:3, “then your brother will be disgraced before your eyes,” i.e., once he has been lashed, he is again your brother. This is the opinion of Rabbi Chananiah ben Gamliel. Said Rabbi Chananiah ben Gamliel also said that if a person who commits a single sin can forfeit his soul (i.e., through kareis), then how much more one who performs a mitzvah should win it back. Rabbi Shimon says that this idea is learned from the same place (as kareis): Leviticus 18:29 says, “even the souls who do them shall be cut off…,” while verse 18:5 says (regarding mitzvos), “which, if a person performs, he shall live by them.” We see from this that one who refrains from committing a sin is rewarded just like one who performs a mitzvah. Rabbi Shimon the son of Rebbi directs our attention to Deuteronomy 12:23, which says, “Just remain steadfast not to eat blood because the blood is the life.” If a person is rewarded for refraining from blood, which he is averse to eating in the first place, how much will a person be rewarded for refraining from stealing and prohibited relationships, things for which a person’s soul lusts and covets. One who refrains from such things must surely earn merit not only for himself but for his descendants and their descendants, throughout the generations.