The other commixture is called combining of cookery, which will be treated at length in Tract Yom Tob. The combining of courts deals with the regulations by the observance of which various houses standing in one court are joined together into one common ground, thus enabling the householders to carry and convey articles to and from one another. The combining of limits treats of the regulations through which the distance of two thousand ells, beyond which no Israelite is allowed to travel on the Sabbath, may be legally extended.
The combining of streets treats of the rules to be observed in the case of narrow streets and public places which can be turned into private ground under certain conditions.
Finally, it may be well to add that, of all the difficult and complicated treatises in the Talmud, the Tract Erubin is by far the most difficult, and in a great many places almost incomprehensible to other than the most careful students.
THE EDITOR.
NEW YORK, September, 1897.
SYNOPSIS OF SUBJECTS OF VOLUME III.--TRACT ERUBIN 1
CHAPTER I.
MISHNA I. treats: If an entry be higher than twenty ells. The size of the height is based upon the door and the porch of the pillars of the temple, or palaces of kings. If the cross-beam was partly above twenty ells, and partly below. The ell used at a booth and an entry measures five spans, but the ell used at Kilaim is six spans. The several prescribed quantities, the intervention of articles, and the ordinances concerning the walls of entries and booths were given by Moses at the Mount Sinai, and also Gud, Lavud, and crooked walls. About Kal Vochomer (à fortiori), which comes very often in the Talmud. The people there were ignorant, and had to be given a liberal interpretation of the ordinance. How must entries facing public around be combined by an Erub? May the rigorous ordinances of two Tanaim be applied to one case? What was decided about a village of a shepherd, where was an entry which opened into a vacant yard. May the space underneath the cross-beam be used? The law about an entry which was provided with a number of side-beams (with the illustration). The law about a missing portion of the wall, perceptible from the inside or from the outside (with their illustrations). Whether an entry measuring twenty ells could be reduced to thirteen and a third if built as illustrated? What R. Jehudah taught to R. Hyya, the son of Rabh, and how Rabh corrected. How an apparent door is to be made, 1-22
MISHNA II. What is required to legalize the carrying within an entry. Flow the sages were very lenient with all things pertaining to water. Whether water may be taken from an arm of the sea which enters a court yard. There is a tradition about an entry that can be legalized by a side or cross beam. Why was Rabbi, or Rabh, more sagacious than his colleagues? Wily were the school of Hillel favored? Because modest. Two years the schools of Shammai and Hillel disputed whether it were better that man had not been created as he was, 22-28
MISHNA III. The cross-beam must be wide enough to hold a half of a brick. About a cross-beam put up over an entry but not reaching the opposite wall. Anything measuring three spans in circumference is one hand in width, 28-31
MISHNAS IV., V., VI., and VII. The height and thickness of the side beam. How much is meant by thickness "whatever it may"? About a side-beam standing of itself. There was a pillar about which Abayi and Rabha differed all their lives. Side-beams may be made out of anything. Every open space ten spans wide may be used as an entry. The open space must not exceed in extent the fence proper. How can it be that there should be a contradiction and still the Halakha should prevail according to it? A fence may also be constructed with three ropes, or with cane-laths. Any partition not constructed on the principle of warp and shoot, whether it is a partition? I swear by the law of Moses, and by the prophets, and by the Hagiographa, that Rabh said this. It makes absolutely no difference, be it a caravan or an individual, in an inhabited place or in the desert. The four privileges granted to warriors in the camp, 31-39
CHAPTER II.
MISHNA I. How enclosures are to be made around wells (and illustrations.) To make an enclosure around a well of rain-water is permitted only to the pilgrims to Jerusalem. Adam, the first man, had a dual face. The Lord was sponsor to him. The fires of hell cannot gain access to the bodies of the sinners of Israel; Abraham the patriarch, seeing that they are circumcised, rescues them. How much in size must the larger part of a cow be reckoned? May things be carried from a courtyard opening into the enclosure around a well, and vice versa? I have heard that ye go to the Synagogue of Daniel on the Sabbath; upon what grounds do ye do this? In the time that Solomon the king ordained the law of Erubin, a heavenly voice was heard. Solomon said three thousand proverbs for every one of the biblical commandments. The commandments are to be fulfilled to-day, and the rewards will be in the world to come. If a public thoroughfare passes through an enclosure. The paths by which the mountains of Palestine are ascended do not come under the head of public ground, 40-55
MISHNAS II. and III. An enclosure of boards must be made only for a public well. The difference in the opinions of R. Jehudah b. Babah, R. Aqiba, R. Eliezer, and R. Jose, about a garden or woodshed over seventy ells square. How can one hundred ells in length by fifty by fifty in breadth (Ex. xxvii. 18) be understood? If a woodshed of more than two saahs' capacity was fenced in for a dwelling. In a bleaching-ground (behind a house) things must not be carried except for a distance of four ells. What was done by R. Huna bar Hinana, R. Papa, and R. Huna, the son of R. Joshua in reference to a garden on the estate of the Exilarch containing a pavilion, 55-61
CHAPTER III.
MISHNA I. With what kind of victuals may the Erub be effected? "The man who will explain to me the dictum of Ben Bagbag concerning the oxen, I will carry his clothes after him to the bath-house." The prescribed quantities of victuals for an Erub. R. Jeremiah went out into the villages and was asked whether an Erub may be made with bean-pods. "May the lord forgive R. Menashiah bar Shegublick. I said this to him in reference to a Mishna, and he said this in reference to a Boraitha." Abayi said: My mother told me that roasted cars are good for the heart, and drive away care, etc. An Erub must not be made with consecrated things. There are sages who hold that the prescribed quantities which are dependent upon the size of man should be measured accordingly, 62-70
MISHNAS II., III., IV., and V. Whether an Erub may be made of things consecrated, or from which heave-offering, etc., has not been separated. When a man sends his Erub by the hand of a deaf and dumb person, an idiot, or a minor. The difference of opinion between R. Na'hman and R. Shesheth, whether the established rule that a messenger will perform his errand holds good in rabbinical things only, or also in biblical. If he had put it into a pit, where is the pit supposed to be situated? If the man should put the Erub on top of a cane or pole, into a cupboard which he locked and then lost the key, the Erub is nevertheless valid, providing it was a festival. On Sabbath, however, it is not valid. If the Erub rolls (or is moved) out of the limit of the Sabbath distance? If the time when it took place is doubtful? If a clean and unclean loaf were before a man, and he was told to make an Erub with the clean one, but did not know which was which? Said R. Na'hman to Rabha: If thou wilt measure a whole kur of salt and present me with it, I shall tell thee the answer. A man may make his Erub conditional. If one of the two sages had been the man's teacher, he must go to meet his teacher. It frequently happens that a man has a greater fondness for his colleague than for his teacher. Why can he not make it conditional upon the arrival of sages from opposite directions? R. Jehudah does not admit of the theory of premeditated choice. Who is the Tana who holds that the sages also discountenance the theory of premeditated choice? 71-82
MISHNAS
