Chulin 63
Summary
- The שיעור begins מסכת חולין דף ס"ג עמוד א' with the גמרא’s identifications of specific עופות טמאים and the פסוקים רבי יוחנן recites upon seeing certain creatures, then moves into halachic reliance on מנהג and מסורת for identifying permitted species, and then develops the סוגיא of the repeated Torah lists of non-kosher birds in פרשת שמיני and פרשת ראה to reconcile names, counts, and variants. The דברי ישראל (מודז'יצר רבי) interprets “שלך זה השולה דגים מן הים” as a מוסר about people who try to pull Jews away from the “ים” of תורה, while later מפרשים and the רד"ק derive principles of השגחה פרטית and שכר ועונש even for animals, with limits. The sugya continues through detailed דרשות on bird-names like תנשמת, רחם/שרקרק, עורב and its subtypes, and culminates in the principle that עוף טהור נאכל במסורת, including the scope of trusting a hunter’s tradition and the Rosh–Rashba–ש"ך framework for communities relying on each other’s מסורות.
- A The גמרא says the פסוק in פרשת שמיני mentions the שלך and identifies it as “השולה דגים מן הים,” a bird that draws fish from the sea.
- A The דברי ישראל (מודז'יצר רבי) explains that the “ים” represents תורה and the non-kosher “שלך” represents someone who convinces people from כלל ישראל to leave learning Torah for other pursuits, and הקדוש ברוך הוא relates to such persuaders as עופות טמאים.
- A The גמרא records that רבי יוחנן, upon seeing a שלך, says “משפטיך תהום רבה,” and רש"י explains either that Hashem’s judgment reaches even fish in the depths through the שלך, or that the שלך itself is judged by being forced to descend to the depths for sustenance.
- A The רד"ק and other מפרשים infer from רש"י’s first approach that השגחה פרטית and שכר ועונש extend even to animals and fish, while the רד"ק limits fish-related שכר ועונש to how they relate to human beings and not “for what they do for themselves.”
- A The גמרא identifies דוכיפת as “שהודו כפות,” and a ברייתא confirms the same definition.
- A The גמרא states that this is the bird that brought the שמיר לבית המקדש, and the account from מסכת גיטין is applied: שלמה המלך avoids metal tools, sends בניהו בן יהוידע, and בניהו places clear glass over the דוכיפת nest so the bird summons the שמיר to pierce the barrier, allowing בניהו to capture it and bring it to שלמה for construction of the בית המקדש.
- A The גמרא says that when רבי יוחנן sees a נמלה he recites “צדקתך כהררי קל.”
- A Rashi explains that Hashem provides sustenance both to the large שלך and to the tiny ant, and also that Hashem grants the ant intelligence to gather food for its yearly needs.
- A Another explanation presented says that although the ant is small and weak, Hashem gives it strength to carry and obtain what it needs to survive.
- A The גמרא cites אמימר that לביני ובטני are permitted fish, while שקנאי ותנאי are eaten only where the local מנהג is to eat them and are not eaten where the מנהג is not to eat them.
- A The גמרא answers “אטו במנהגא תליא מילתא?” with “אין,” and רש"י explains that where פרס ועזניה are common there is a concern of confusion with similar-looking forbidden birds, so שקנאי ובטני are not eaten there, while where פרס ועזניה are not common that concern does not apply.
- A תוספות challenges רש"י by arguing that a confusion concern should create a universal prohibition, and therefore frames the concern as localized to places where the confusing species are commonly present, leaving other places permitted.
- A A further question is raised about whether the concern requires certainty that פרס ועזניה are present, or certainty that they are absent to remove concern, and this is suggested as potentially tied to the רש"י–תוספות dispute.
- A אביי states that כוי וקקוי are אסור while קוקוזא is מותר.
- A In מערבא the אסור birds are called תחפסא, and the גמרא states they are certainly non-kosher and one who eats them במזיד receives מלקות for violating the לאו.
- A The text notes that תנשמת appears both in the Torah’s list of non-kosher birds and among the שמונה שרצים that convey טומאה when dead, and this shared name is attributed to visual similarity between a bird form and a שרץ form.
- A A ברייתא says “תנשמת is באוש שבעופות” and resolves whether “באוש” applies to birds or to שרצים by applying one of the י"ג מידות, “דבר הלמד מעניינו,” reading it as a bird in the context of the bird-parsha.
- A A parallel ברייתא about שרצים reads “תנשמת is the באוש שבשרצים” using the same contextual method to conclude it refers there to a שרץ.
- A אביי identifies the באוש שבעופות as קיפוף and the באוש שבשרצים as כרפדוי, with רש"י identifying כרפדוי as a mole and with views cited that קיפוף is either an owl or a bat.
- A The word באוש is presented with interpretations that it means the ugliest or that it means the loudest yeller.
- A רב יהודה says כוס is קוק, and מפרשים explain the name by its regurgitating behavior.
- A The גמרא identifies רחם as שרקרק, and רבי יוחנן explains the name רחם by “כיון שבא רחם בא רחמים לעולם,” meaning rain and sustenance come when it appears.
- A ביבי בר אביי limits the rain-sign to when it sits on something, while a separate tradition says “גמירי” that if it sits on the ground and whistles it signals משיח, supported by “אשרקה להם ואקבצם.”
- A The מהרש"א distinguishes the language by saying the משיח sign is stated as “גמירי” because משיח has not been seen to come and the claim rests on מסורה.
- A The בן יהוידע interprets the sign as teaching that humility and being “low” brings גאולה, and another explanation links משיח’s arrival to כלל ישראל being downtrodden, “התנערי מעפר קומי.”
- A The מהרש"א further ties the theme to “מה נאוו על ההרים רגלי מבשר,” reading the “על ההרים” resting as the sign described.
- A רב שפרן (chief rabbi of Romania) reads “שרקרק” as letters moving backward in the אלף בית, symbolizing movement back toward אחדות, and states that משיח comes through working toward אחדות.
- A רב אדא בר סימי challenges a case where it whistled on the ground and משיח did not come, and the response “ההוא בדאי הוה” is explained either as the true bird being punished for improper behavior or as a different bird imitating the שרקרק.
- A The text observes that the Torah calls the bird רחם בלשון זכר in פרשת שמיני and רחמה בלשון נקבה in פרשת ראה.
- A One explanation says the bird bears two messages, rain tied to ארץ (נקבה) and גאולה tied to ישראל (זכר), accounting for the grammatical shift.
- A Another explanation ties נקבה to greater רחמנות, mapping the two forms to different “levels” of message, with משיח’s message framed as the higher and more significant ישועה.
- A A ברייתא interprets עורב as the raven and expands “את כל עורב” and “למינהו” to include specific variants.
- A The גמרא challenges the phrase “זה עורב” because “זה” implies visual presence, and this becomes the basis for the באר היטב and דעת תורה that “וזאת התורה אשר שם משה” should be said at הגבהה only by those who actually see the writing in the ספר תורה.
- A The גמרא re-reads the ברייתא to mean that “עורב” refers to the black raven, supported by “שחורות כעורב,” and links the term עורב to ערב meaning night.
- A The עורב העמקי is defined as having a white patch, aligned with “ומראהו עמוק מן העור” and the illusion that light areas appear recessed against dark.
- A The “עורב הבא בראשי יונים” is defined not as leading pigeons in flight but as a raven whose head resembles a יונה.
- A The ברייתא reads “הנץ” as the נץ and “למינהו” to include בר חירייא, which אביי identifies as שורינקה.
- A תוספות explains why the גמרא does not challenge “זה” here as it did by עורב, because the earlier case implied multiple birds called עורב requiring comparative identification, unlike the straightforward identification of נץ.
- A רב יהודה identifies חסידה as דיא לבנה and explains the name as “שעושה חסידות עם חברותיה.”
- A Explanations are given for why it remains non-kosher: one says חסד alone as the only virtue is not an ideal to emulate, and the חידושי הרי"ם says its חסד is limited “עם חברותיה” rather than with everyone, making it deficient חסד.
- A A story is brought about רב יהושע לייב דיסקין refusing to endorse a חסד group limited to one neighborhood, aligning with the חסידה critique that real חסד extends broadly.
- A The גמרא identifies הנופה as דיי רגזנות and explains the name as “שמנפה עם חברותיה,” meaning it expresses anger toward its group.
- A The text notes that the Torah lists the non-kosher birds twice, with differences including דאה in שמיני versus ראה in ראה, and “האיה למינה” in שמיני versus “האיה והדייה למינה” in ראה, producing counts of 20 and 21 respectively as initially tallied.
- A רב is cited through a chain as saying there are 24 non-kosher birds, and the גמרא challenges how to reach 24 from the two parshiyos.
- A A דרשה attributes four additional categories to four occurrences of “למינה/למינהו,” then the גמרא corrects the overcount by אביי’s identifications that דאה and ראה are one species and that איה and דייה are one species.
- A רבי explains that both names are written “כדי שלא תיתן פתחון פה לבעל דין לחלוק,” preventing confusion when different people use different names for the same bird, and the explanation is applied to both name-pairs.
- A A challenge from a ברייתא that the repetition in ראה is “מפני הראה” is resolved by reading the comparison to the בהמה case as not requiring a new species among birds but rather clarifying identities and names.
- A רב אבהו asserts “ראה זה איה” and explains it as a bird that sees exceptionally far, supported by “נתיב לא ידעו עיט ולא שזפתו עין איה” and a tradition that it stands in בבל and sees a נבלה in ארץ ישראל, and the בעל שם reads this as a מוסר that seeing only “נבלה” in ארץ ישראל marks a non-kosher perspective.
- A The sugya then concludes that consistency with משנה תורה requires collapsing names so that דאה, ראה, איה, and דייה are treated as one, creating a disagreement over whether the total is 24 or 23.
- A איסי בן יהודה says there are 100 non-kosher birds in the east and all are of the איה type.
- A אבימי בריה דרב אבהו states there are 700 types of fish and 800 types of חגבים and that birds are innumerable, and the גמרא clarifies this as “ולעופות טהורים אין מספר,” while the non-kosher birds remain a defined list.
- A תוספות explains that an expert who knows all prohibited species can identify an unknown bird or grasshopper as kosher if it is not among the known non-kosher types.
- A רבי teaches that it is known before “מי שאמר והיה העולם” that בהמה טמאה are more numerous than טהורה, so the Torah lists the kosher animals, while עופות טהורים are more numerous than טמאים, so the Torah lists the non-kosher birds.
- A The גמרא derives the principle “לעולם ישנה אדם לתלמידו דרך קצרה,” attributing this to רב הונא אמר רב or רב הונא אמר רב משום רבי אלעזר.
- A The text applies this to the phrasing “והבדלתם בין הבהמה הטהורה לטמאה ובין העוף הטמא לטהור,” explaining the order by choosing the shorter category first.
- A Explanations are offered that animals come from earth associated with גשמיות and טומאה while birds involve water associated with תורה and טהרה, and another teaching frames “דרך קצרה” as maintaining a דרך הטוב even when circumstances are tough.
- A רב יצחק states “עוף טהור נאכל במסורת,” and the גמרא says a hunter is believed to testify “עוף זה טהור מסר לי רבי.”
- A רבי יוחנן qualifies this by requiring that the רבי be “שבקי בהן ובשמותן,” and the גמרא concludes the רבי here is a hunter-expert rather than a תלמיד חכם, because expertise in species identification is the defining requirement.
- A The text infers from פוסקים that a תלמיד חכם need not be expert in bird species and that sometimes an expert can have greater נאמנות than a תלמיד חכם when the תלמיד חכם lacks a מסורה, while a תלמיד חכם with מסורה is followed.
- A The Rosh and Rashba are cited on whether a community without a מסורה can rely on another community’s מסורה, and the ש"ך distinguishes between lacking a מסורה due to absence of information versus refraining due to an adopted חומרא after doubt, permitting reliance only in the first case and not in the second.
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