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Keritot 18 for kids: Doubt After Doubt

כריתות י״ח

🔁 This daf asks when someone brings an offering after a possible mistake. The sages also ask whether learning about one uncertainty separates it from the next.

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Stories from Keritot 18

Words to know

Rashi and Tosafot on Keritot 18 in simple English

Rashi on Keritot 18a, in English Tab translation (15)
  1. According to Rabbi Zeira, its prohibition cannot be identified — because both pieces have been eaten.
  2. According to Rav Naḥman, the prohibition was established — from the outset, so he is liable.
  3. Rabbi Meir holds him liable — for slaughtering an offering outside the Temple, even though the owner may not have eaten forbidden fat and this provisional guilt offering may be unconsecrated. Rabbi Meir does not require the prohibition to have been established.
  4. The Rabbis exempt him — because the prohibition was not established; the animal may be unconsecrated.
  5. Why — did Rav Naḥman regret not saying that the ruling followed Rabbi Meir? He could have answered his objection by saying that it followed Rabbi Eliezer.
  6. He stated it according to Rabbi Eliezer’s approach — so he holds the person liable without requiring an established prohibition. He did not mind failing to mention Rabbi Eliezer, since Rava could have worked that out himself.
  7. Rava said, and so on — although we said above that he is exempt because two pieces are required, that was not everyone’s view. Rabbi Eliezer holds him liable: since he permits a person to volunteer a provisional guilt offering, bringing one here would not mean bringing an unconsecrated animal into the Temple courtyard. Having faced a genuine doubt, the person is certainly liable.
  8. A person may volunteer, and so on — the Gemara explains Rabbi Eliezer’s reasoning in the final chapter, below, Keritot 25a.
  9. Rav Ashi said — the requirement of some possibility of wrongdoing, even according to Rabbi Eliezer, follows the view of Bava ben Buta. The final chapter says that he brought a provisional guilt offering every day except the day after Yom Kippur. He said, ‘By the Temple, if they let me, I would bring one then too, but they tell me: Wait until you face uncertainty’—that is, until the next day, when there is some possibility that you sinned that day. Immediately after Yom Kippur, there is no such concern, since Yom Kippur has atoned for his uncertain sins. As the final chapter says, those liable for provisional guilt offerings are exempt once Yom Kippur has passed. On this view, even Rabbi Eliezer requires some possibility of wrongdoing, such as an uncertain single piece. But the Rabbis who disagree with Rabbi Eliezer in the final chapter say that a provisional guilt offering is brought only for an act punishable, if deliberate, by excision. Otherwise, bringing it would mean bringing an unconsecrated animal into the Temple courtyard. They exempt him here too, requiring two pieces, as they interpret the word ‘commandments.’
  10. Likewise, if a dog ate the second piece — or a raven did, the Jew who ate the first piece is liable, since at the time he ate, it was one of two pieces.
  11. He is exempt — because there were not two pieces.
  12. But Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi holds him liable — because he does not require two pieces.
  13. And the second piece deliberately — knowing that it might be forbidden.
  14. He is liable — to bring a provisional guilt offering for the first piece, which he ate inadvertently while it was one of two pieces.
  15. He is exempt — because when he ate inadvertently, there were not two pieces.
Tosafot on Keritot 18a, in English Tab translation (3)
  1. One who slaughters a provisional guilt offering outside the Temple—Rabbi Meir holds him liable — Although Rabbi Meir says later, in the chapter HaMevi (Keritot 23b), that if the owner’s uncertainty is resolved, the animal may go out to graze with the herd because it loses its sacred status, this case concerns the time before the uncertainty is resolved, while it still has the status of a guilt offering.
  2. And the Rabbis exempt him — These are not the Rabbis who disagree with Rabbi Meir later, in the chapter HaMevi (Keritot 23b). They say the animal must graze until it develops a blemish, then be sold and its proceeds used for voluntary offerings. On their view it remains fully consecrated, so slaughtering it outside the Temple would incur liability. Rather, these Rabbis agree with Rabbi Meir and go further: they exempt the person even before the owner’s uncertainty is resolved.
  3. We have arrived at the dispute between Rabbi Eliezer and the Rabbis … Why specify that he ate it? Even if he did not eat it, too, for we learned that Rabbi Eliezer says one may offer a provisional guilt offering voluntarily — One might ask: Why is this an objection? He may indeed offer one voluntarily, but here Rabbi Eliezer obligates him to bring one for his possible sin, teaching that a single uncertain piece suffices; two pieces are not required. Also, why was this objection not raised earlier, when Rabbi Eliezer said one is liable to bring a provisional guilt offering for eating the fat of a koy? The answer is that the objection assumes the Rabbi Eliezer here cannot be the sage named in the case of the koy; otherwise, what new point would Rav Naḥman be making? Rather, the earlier passage reads ‘Rabbi Elazar,’ while this one reads ‘Rabbi Eliezer,’ Rabbi Yehoshua’s disputant. The course of the discussion supports this, for the reasons I explained. The objection is therefore: What is your source that Rabbi Eliezer makes an offering obligatory for eating one uncertain piece? The only basis for saying he does not require two pieces is his view that a person may offer a provisional guilt offering voluntarily every day. On that basis, an offering brought for one piece is voluntary, not obligatory—and he could bring it even without eating. The answer places Rabbi Eliezer’s ruling in accordance with Bava ben Buta, on the evening after Yom Kippur, as Rashi explains. It teaches that Rabbi Eliezer follows the written form of the verse: ‘mitzvat’ is written, allowing liability for one piece. Although Rabbi Eliezer follows the written form elsewhere, in Kiddushin 18b, regarding ‘be-vigdo vah,’ and one could therefore distinguish between eating, which obligates an offering, and not eating, which permits a voluntary one, that earlier ruling alone cannot be the basis for citing him here. Many other sages also follow the written form; moreover, someone who generally follows it might follow the traditional reading here for the reason I explained above.
Rashi on Keritot 18b, in English Tab translation (25)
  1. It is Rabbi Eliezer’s view — therefore, one cannot object that the offering is an unconsecrated animal brought into the Temple courtyard.
  2. And he stipulates: If the first person ate permitted fat — then the second certainly ate forbidden fat. If so, let this offering atone for him provisionally until he learns what happened and brings a sin offering. Otherwise, let it be a voluntary offering.
  3. And he was informed — that it was uncertain whether he had eaten forbidden fat.
  4. Just as — if he later learns that all the pieces were definitely forbidden fat, he brings a sin offering for each one: the intervening knowledge of uncertainty separates the acts, so they are not one lapse of awareness.
  5. So he brings a provisional guilt offering for each one — as long as he has not learned for certain what he ate.
  6. Here Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi taught — the principle explained above.
  7. Now, then, suppose he ate an olive-bulk of forbidden fat before Yom Kippur and another afterward — with both acts committed during one lapse of awareness.
  8. In place of a provisional guilt offering — as taught in the final chapter of Keritot: Yom Kippur atones for those liable for provisional guilt offerings. It would therefore be like knowledge of uncertainty.
  9. Perhaps — when we say Yom Kippur atones, that applies only if he had learned that he might have eaten forbidden fat.
  10. Whether he was informed or not, we learned — the Gemara in the first chapter of Shevuot explains that Yom Kippur atones whether or not he learned of his uncertainty beforehand. Thus it atones even without his becoming aware.
  11. Fool — a foolish person. Alternatively: a lazy person.
  12. He ate and drank during one lapse of awareness — on Yom Kippur.
  13. He is liable for only one offering — because drinking is included in eating.
  14. When he could have learned of it — that is, when enough time passed for him to have learned of it. Since there was that much time during Yom Kippur between the acts, that interval stands in place of knowledge of uncertainty for a provisional guilt offering.
  15. It is the Sages’ view — that of Rabbi Yosei and Rabbi Elazar.
  16. He ate today — food belonging to the Temple worth half a peruta.
  17. He benefited — from consecrated property that was not food.
  18. And from then until three years later — while remaining in one lapse of awareness.
  19. But Yom Kippur atoned for him — for the first half-measure. If knowledge of uncertainty separates acts, Yom Kippur should have the same effect. Why, then, are the half-measures combined?
  20. That is why he compares provisional guilt offerings to sin offerings — just as definite knowledge between acts separates them into distinct sin offerings, as the verse says, “or the sin he committed becomes known to him,” so knowledge of uncertainty separates them into distinct provisional guilt offerings. But according to Reish Lakish, he should have compared sin offerings to provisional guilt offerings: just as knowledge of uncertainty separates the latter, it should separate the former, requiring a sin offering for each act if he later learns what happened. After all, knowledge of uncertainty is primarily discussed in connection with provisional guilt offerings.
  21. One was impure and one was pure — and it is unknown which was which.
  22. And he did not enter — the Temple.
  23. On the second, and he entered — the Temple.
  24. He is liable — for entering the Temple while impure. He certainly acquired impurity, since he walked on both paths.
  25. On the second, and he entered — when he entered the Temple after the second path, he had forgotten his impurity. He is liable for the first entry.
Tosafot on Keritot 18b, in English Tab translation (4)
  1. But wasn’t it taught, ‘Whenever they are separated…’? — Although Rabbi Yehuda stated this rule earlier (Keritot 15b), Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi does not appear to disagree with him here. For Rabbi Yosei son of Rabbi Yehuda, it means that distinct prohibitions, such as forbidden fat and blood or piggul and notar, require separate provisional guilt offerings, just as they require separate sin offerings. It does not address what a person learned between acts. Rava also reads the rule this way: When definite knowledge separates acts for sin offerings, knowledge of uncertainty separates them for provisional guilt offerings.
  2. If so, suppose he ate an olive-sized amount of forbidden fat before Yom Kippur and another after Yom Kippur — There are now two provisional guilt offerings: Yom Kippur atoned in place of one for the earlier eating, and he brought one for the later eating. If he subsequently learns that both pieces were forbidden fat, must he also bring two sin offerings? He ate them during a single lapse of awareness, so he brings only one. Thus the rule ‘whenever they are separated…’ cannot always hold: here there are two provisional guilt offerings but only one sin offering.
  3. He said to him: Perhaps Yom Kippur atones only if he was informed — Then there would be two sin offerings, just as there are two provisional guilt offerings. ‘Rava bar Rav Hanan said to him: Fool’ — Rava bar Rav Hanan was Abaye’s colleague, as stated in Berakhot 46a.
  4. Why specify forbidden fat eaten on Yom Kippur morning? — Why not use otherwise permitted food, for which eating on Yom Kippur itself would require an offering? That would require specifying a date-sized amount, the minimum for prohibited eating on Yom Kippur. Instead, the text uses the smaller, olive-sized amount of forbidden fat.

Sources

Kid summary and story cards written by Tab from the William Davidson Edition English (Sefaria, CC BY-NC 4.0).

Tab translation (machine-assisted) of Rashi and Tosafot, from the Vilna Edition Hebrew (public domain) on Sefaria. May contain mistakes.

In the app, the Gemara text comes from Sefaria (William Davidson Edition, CC BY-NC 4.0; Hebrew/Aramaic Vilna Edition). Rashi and Tosafot Hebrew: Vilna Edition (public domain) via Sefaria.

Also spelled: Kerisus, Kritot, Kerithoth 18.