Resources for Megillah 9

Daf A Week

Rabbi Yitzchok Gutterman

  1. Our גמרא discusses the story of the translation of the חומש into Greek and how the חכמים made changes so Ptolemy would not make any mistakes or use anything as an excuse to attack the Jews. See the גמרא in בבא קמא דף ל"ח that tells the story of the Romans who sent two officers to demand they be taught the entire Torah. After hearing everything, the officers responded that everything is true except the הלכה of an ox owned by a Jew that gores an ox of a נכרי is פּטור, and if the reverse occurs he pays נזק שלם. See the ים של שלמה there in פּרק ד' סימן ט who asks why the חכמים didn’t just lie about the דין since they knew it would be controversial and dangerous for everyone? He answers an incredible יסוד: we see from here that lying about what the Torah says is a כפירה בתורה and is יהרג ואל יעבור! The obvious question is that our גמרא with Ptolemy seems to be in direct contradiction to this as the חכמים made many changes when submitting their translation to Ptolemy. The ים של שלמה answers that in our גמרא the חכמים never changed a הלכה but just said things in a way that would not be confusing and lead to כפירה. In addition, they had special רוח הקודש which told them what to write, so in a sense, what they did was על פּי הגבורה.
  2. The גמרא says according to רבי יהודה, when רשב"ג said that ספרים could be written in Greek, he was only referring to the חומש because of the story that happened with Ptolemy. This seems difficult to understand—if it was really a problem to write the Torah in Greek, why would it all of a sudden become מותר because some King forced the Jews to translate it? See the שו"ת אבני נזר in סימן תקנ"א who points out that one thing is clear: this דין must be a דין דרבנן, because if it was really forbidden to write ספרים in Greek until Ptolemy, then the חכמים could not have been עוקר דבר מן התורה בקום ועשה to permanently allow it. As to the question of why they did allow it, see the רמב"ם in the פּירוש המשנוית who says that since the Greek translation became very famous and well known to the חכמים, it was as if it was their own language. The זקנים appreciated this language and therefore decided to allow it. See the בניהו here who says that since a miracle happened through the translation, they allowed it to be written in that language as a זכר לנס.
  3. The גמרא says a כהן שעבר according to ר' יוסי cannot function as a כהן גדול because of איבה and cannot be a כהן הדיוט because of the principle of מעלין בקודש ולא מורידין. See תוספות in ד"ה ולא לכהן who asks that if the only reason the כהן שעבר doesn’t serve as a כהן גדול is because of איבה (potential fights) that means he really is still like a כהן גדול. As such, using less than the eight בגדים would be a problem of מחוסר בגדים! He answers that if not for מעלין בקודש, we wouldn’t worry about מחוסר בגדים since he is נתמנה ע"פּ בית דין. To understand what תוספות means, see תוספות in יומא דף י"ב: ד"ה כהן who is clearer and explains that since this כהן was נתמנה על פּה, he can be officially removed from office על פּה. The simple reading of תוספות is that the כהן שעבר is in fact not a כהן גדול anymore but that he just can’t work as a כהן הדיוט because of מעלין בקודש ולא מורידין. However, see the ריטב"א in יומא דף י"ב who explains that he really is still a כהן גדול, and the reason ב"ד never takes that status away from him is because of מעלין בקודש ולא מורידין. As to תוספות’s suggestion that ב"ד can completely remove the כהן שעבר from his status of כהן גדול, see the טורי אבן here who asks from a ירושלמי in הוריות that says explicitly a כהן גדול must always remain a כהן גדול for life and can never lose that status. However, see the שו"ת חתם סופר in יו"ד סימן ה’ ד"ה אמנם הרוב who says that the ירושלמי is only talking about a כהן שנמשח בשמן המשחה. According to that, there would be no question since a substitute כהן גדול on יום כיפּור does not get משיחה.

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