“One mention of remembrance counts for both this and that.”

The new moon, like Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, is a time for both looking forward at the promise of a new beginning, and backwards through remembrance of how we have lived our lives. And like the new moon, Rosh Hashanah is very much a time of remembrance and hope. It is when we review our past year’s page in the Book of Life and open a new one for the months ahead.

“Whether Rosh HaShana is today or yesterday.”

Today’s Daf Yomi reading converged nicely with the approaching onset of Rosh Hashanah. I learned that because I grew up in the diaspora – i.e., New Jersey – I celebrated Rosh Hashanah for two days instead of one. In the time before there were calendars and clocks and a Greenwich Mean Time, there were travelers who went from town to town announcing that they had seen the new moon and the holiday could commence.

”Such a split is impossible.”

Buried within the text of today’s Daf Yomi reading is a message that anyone who has lived a life knows too well: you can’t have it all. Life is about choices. Some people seemingly do have it all, and using the language of today’s Daf, can set up two eruvs in different directions and bounce between them on subsequent days.

“One may rely on the principle of retroactive designation.”

Today’s Daf Yomi continues the discussion from the prior day on contradictions, with a deep dive into the concept of retroactive designation. I have been fascinated with the concept since I first read about it in the previous day’s text. It is a path for making amends in one’s life. Sometimes, it is best to not look back and be consumed with regret for decisions one made.

“Sometimes one learns more from his peers than from his teachers.”

Reading the Talmud each day often requires a certain comfort level with ambiguity. One Rabbi will say something, and another Rabbi will offer a contradictory opinion. The mysterious voice of the Gemara will attempt to explain the differing opinions through an explanation of the intended nuances of the discussion, but sometimes it requests that we just allow the disagreement to stand. This is not a text for those who want to be told the “one way” but rather a text that requires comfort in allowing for contradictory perspectives.

“The doubt here does not result from the facts of the case themselves, but from conflicting testimonies and an inability to decide between them.”

Today’s Daf Yomi takes us on a treasure hunt for a lost key. It is an outing we can join while keeping proper social distance. Wear your mask throughout the exercise and wash your hands along the way. We have provided access to hand sanitizer stations in order to keep you safe.

“This pit, where is it situated?”

Today’s continued arcane and almost inscrutable discussion of eruvs takes us on the path of a deep, dark pit. It is difficult to read about these pits on the nineteenth anniversary of the destruction of the World Trade Center towers in New York City, which left a pit of another kind in downtown Manhattan. It was a pit in the earth of such unfathomable size that there are almost no words that can express how catastrophic the event was at the time, and still is for all of us who lived through it.

“A private domain rises to the sky.”

Today’s reading continues the discussion of an eruv that extends the boundaries of a space where one can carry objects on Shabbat through the perspective of a tree. The discussion is very technical, and at this point in the Daf Yomi cycle I am wondering why I have signed myself up for this journey. In the spirit of finding just one thing that I can glean onto each day, I am intrigued with the function of a sturdy, dignified tree in the creation of an eruv.

“We rely on the presumption that an agent fulfills his agency.”

What is so interesting about reading the Talmud each day is how it extends one concept to another and then another. One moment we are reading about tithing and then the next about elephants that carry food on their back and then by extension we find ourselves discussing human agency and the trust that comes from carrying out actions on behalf of another. Today’s Daf Yomi continues the discussion on agency from the previous day and if we should trust without verification that an agent fulfills his duty

“It is immaterial how the eiruv arrives there.” 

Buried in today’s Daf Yomi portion about eruvs and extending boundaries through the carrying of food on the back of monkeys and elephants is a message about what constitutes a home and a safe space and also, a side journey into a discussion on human agency. But it takes a lot of digging through a difficult circuitous text to get there.

“The law is determined by the measure of each particular person and not by some general measure.”

Today’s Daf Yomi continues the discussion on foodstuffs that are used to create an eruv that allows someone to walk 2,000 cubits beyond what would normally be allowable on Shabbat. Today’s discussion, however, makes allowances that accommodate individual differences.

“I, too, am ready to answer any question posed to me.”

We encountered a tired Rabbi in yesterday’s Daf Yomi text. Today we find a Rabbi who is in a good mood. We are told that Rava found himself in a good mood one day, and it must have been an unusual occurrence for it to be noted so prominently. He compared himself to the “intellectually sharp”  ben Azzai, who would “regularly expound in the markets of Tiberias.”  Rava appears to be in a playful mood and he says that he too can lecture standing on a soap box in a public market and he dares his cronies to ask him anything.

“The law is determined in accordance with the common custom of most of the world and not with the practice in one particular place.”

Rabbi Zeira, like many of us, is very tired. He has a portfolio of Rabbinic duties that he is responsible for in addition to publishing deadlines and his daily Torah study. There are a lot of demands of the Rabbi from his fellow faculty, students and his family. He has not been sleeping well lately and dreams of a good night sleep when he can close his eyes with the knowledge that all his chores are done.

“One may not learn from general statements, even in a place where it says except, because it is always possible that there are other exceptions to the rule.”

In order to keep up with the daily Daf Yomi readings, I am moving through each section very quickly in order to not fall behind. There was a story in the text the other day about a woman who attempted to claim a property; she was denied rights to the land and threw herself at the mercy of the Rabbis. I wasn’t able to fully take in the tragedy of this story because there was so much text to keep up with. I am just trying to move ahead and make sense of everything coming at me from my secular perspective. 

“What is a new town, and what is an old town?”

Today’s distinction between the boundaries of an old and new town brought me back to when I matriculated as a literature student at the University of Edinburgh for my junior year of college. I thought I understand what it meant to stand on a spot that resonated with the centuries of history until I found myself in Scotland.

“What can I do for you, as you did not take possession of the property in the manner that people take possession.”

Today’s Daf Yomi discussion of property and inheritance rights and claiming of land when someone dies without heirs brought me back to the East Village of the 1980s. It was a time when people took over abandoned buildings and put down roots and renovated their space through sweat equity and petitioned the landlords of these forsaken buildings to turn them over legally. It was a time of encroaching gentrification and a community that was on the verge, for better or worse, of being lost forever.

“This is not a human being; rather, he is an angel, as he is capable of resolving a problem that I struggle with.”

Today’s Talmud city tour takes us into a karpef, which is an outdoor area that is used for non-residential purposes such as storage. I envision a courtyard cut in the middle of an alleyway that is piled with discarded objects such as bicycles that are bereft of their wheels, a rain stained sofa, a steel file cabinet and some random plantings. I used to know of such a space where the East Village meets the Lower East Side.

“There is no need to be particular about a square shape.”

Today’s Daf Yomi reading has me thinking, as has this entire Tractate, about private and public spaces. When you live in a city, unless you are very wealthy, you live in small space, but you have the expense of the city before you. At least, that was the true before the pandemic forced upon us a lengthy quarantine, which severely limited the reach of city life. Suburbanites probably do not feel the force of isolation so acutely, because they have gardens and home offices and cars that can take them for socially distanced drives outside their neighborhood, but life is contained within small cubit spaces for city dwellers.

“It is possible to expound from each and every stroke of the letters in the Torah mounds upon mounds of laws.”

The introduction to today’s Daf Yomi portion expands the previous day’s discussion of the unlimited reach of the Torah by telling us that resident in each and every letter is “mounds and mounds” of laws. We are told that the truly righteous study from early morning through late evening. However, we are also told that one must not be cruel to his children (the text actually says “sons” but that is a matter for another day). 

“Its measure is longer than the earth and broader than the sea.” 

Water is essential for life. It assists with flushing waste from our bodies, absorbing nutrients, digesting food, and regulating body temperature. Wells were a critical source of water at the time the Talmud was written. Today’s Daf Yomi reading continues the discussion of permissible actions of retrieving and carrying water on Shabbat. And just as water is fundamental for our physical existence, the discussion today takes a turn in a different direction and considers the vast expense of the Torah and all the knowledge contained within it, which is equally critical to our survival.