Halakhah к Ийова 5:31

And in tractate Yoma, in the chapter “The Appointee,”¹²⁴B. Yoma 30a. they said: “It is halakhah at a meal, that a person who leaves the dining room to urinate washes one of his hands and re-enters. But if he spoke with his companion [while he was out],¹²⁵That is, he didn’t just relieve himself and come right back, but socialized for a bit while he was out. he washes both hands and returns, he does not wash outside, but rather inside, returns to and sits down at his place at the table, and turns his face back towards his fellow guests.¹²⁶I.e., to confirm through eye contact that his fellow guests saw that he properly rewashed before rejoining them at the table. Indeed, that’s precisely the intent of the sequence of most of these particular actions prescribed for a guest returning to the table after urinating, according to Chavel, p. 473. Rav Hisda said, ‘They meant this only for someone returning to drink, but in if he’s returning to eat, he washes outside and re-enters. It is known that he has a delicate sensitivity about such things.¹²⁷Because you can assume that everyone washes their hands after peeing before eating (with their hands) without having to see it, while you can’t assume this for drinking, since as long as it’s from a cup, some might not care how clean their hands are.

And thus one needs to say words of Torah over the table, because even though one has said all the blessings he is required to say, and will eventually conclude with birkat ha-mazon, saying birkat ha-mazon will not exempt him from his requirement unless he speaks words of Torah. And so our rabbis said: “Every table over which they ate and said words of Torah, it is as if they ate from the table of God [Makom], as it is said, ‘He said to me, This is the table before the Lord,’”¹³⁹M. Avot 3:3, quoting Ez 41:22. that is to say, when they spoke over it words of Torah, then “this table is before the Lord.”¹⁴⁰Ez. 41:22. “And every table over which they ate and did not say over it words of Torah, it is as if they ate from the sacrifices of the dead. As it is said, ‘For all tables were full of vomit, no place [bli Makom] without excrement,”¹⁴¹M. Avot 3:3, quoting Is 28:8. that is to say, the words of Makom, i.e., God, are not mentioned there.¹⁴²R. Bahya, following M. Avot’s midrashic interpretation, also creatively attributes the use of the later rabbinic term for God – Ha-Makom – “The Place” to Isaiah’s Biblical Hebrew “bli makom,” i.e., “without God.” And all this is to instruct you that humankind [adam] was not created for eating and drink, but rather to engage in Torah. For this is what Scripture meant when it said, “for man [adam] was born for toil [‘amal].”¹⁴³Job 5:7. Our sages interpreted this in a midrash:¹⁴⁴B. Sanhedrin 99b. “’For man was born for toil’ – I don’t know if this is toil by mouth, or if it’s toiling in the Torah. When Scripture says, “The appetite of a toiler [‘amel] toils [‘amlah] for him, because his mouth craves it,”¹⁴⁵Prov 16:26. toil by the mouth is being spoken about. But this is exactly how I fulfill “For man was born for toil” when it refers to toiling in Torah, so I say it means “for toiling in Torah he was born.”¹⁴⁶In other words, R. Bahya has it both ways, since you use your mouth to “toil in Torah,” that is, by speaking words of Torah. And so they said in another midrash: Just as in the Creation, He created domestic and wild animals, birds, reptiles and swarming things, and after that created Adam, as it is said, “And God created Adam in his image,”¹⁴⁷Gen 1:27. so it was written in the Torah “This you shall eat” and “this you shall not eat,”¹⁴⁸Lev 11:9,4. and after that Adam was born. This is why Scripture connects this parashah (“Shemini”) with the next one that begins “When a woman at childbirth bears a male,”¹⁴⁹Lev 12:2. to say it is for toil in Torah he was born. And thus right after that it is written, “On the eighth day the flesh of his foreskin shall be circumcised,”¹⁵⁰Ibid. 12:3. teaching that even before he was formed the Torah and commandments encircled him, and afterwards he was born. This is what it meant when it said, “When a woman at childbirth bears a male”¹⁵¹Lev 12:2. – that The Holy One Blessed be He imposed commandments before him and after him, and he is in the middle.¹⁵²In other words, even the syntax of the vv. 12:2-3 in Leviticus “sandwiches” the birth of a man between two commandments, one directed to his mother giving birth to him, the second, after he’s born, that he himself be circumcised. In other words, the man’s birth is literally surrounded by Torah and commandments. Circumscribed (and circumcised) by the Torah from his birth – of course that “proves” that’s what he was born for!This is what it meant when it said, “For man was born for toil”¹⁵³Job 5:7.– that for toil in Torah he was born.

The Sages commanded that the people of Israel to be zealous for their wives. and everyone who are not meticulous with his wife, with his children and children of his house and do not order their ways always to the point that they are full of wrongdoing and sin, indeed its like he is a sinner. As the verse says "and thou shalt visit thy habitation, and find nothing desirable" (Job 5:24). And in regard to everyone who takes a his wife, she comes to him [for relations/marriage?] in a spirit of purity. and he will not marry her from midst the market place, and not from the midst [inappropriate] conversation, and not in the midst of levity, and not in the midst of a quarrel, and impose fear on her. and if her transgresses any of these [but] he marries her before two witnesses, indeed this is a marriage.

To not ask a yidaaoni: That we not ask a yidaaoni. And this matter is that the sorcerer puts a bone from an animal, the name of which is yidoaa, into his mouth, and that bone speaks through magic. And [regarding] this animal, the name of which is yidoaa, I have seen in a book from the Geonim (early post-Talmudic authorities) that (see Rash on Mishnah Kilayim 8:5) it grows with a large cord that comes out of the ground, similar to the cord of squash and pumpkins, its form is like the form of a man in everything - in the face, the body, the hands and the feet - and it is connected to the cord from its navel. And no creature can approach for the cord's length, since it grazes around it like the length of the cord, and it devours all that it can reach. And when they come to hunt it, they shoot arrows into its cord, until it is separated, and [then] it dies immediately. And in Talmud Yerushalmi Kilayim 8:4, they, may their memory be blessed, said in explanation of "For your covenant will be with the rocks of the field" (Job 5:23), "It is a man of the mountain, and it lives from its navel. If its navel is separated, it does not live."