פֿאַרבונדענע פּסוקים אויף משלי 1:5

Rebbi Joḥanan said in the name of Rebbi Yannai: He who covers kilaim is whipped. Rebbi Joḥanan said to him: Is that not a Mishnah? “Kilaim in a vineyard.” How are kilaim possible by ploughing¹⁷Since a standard vineyard is planted with four cubits between vines and rows, there is no space for a plough which needs four cubits on each side. Hence, anything sown has to be sown on the unploughed earth and then covered; the verse calls covering seeds with earth “sowing”.? It must be by covering! Rebbi Yannai praised him (Is. 46:6:) “Those who pour out gold from the wallet, etc.” (Prov. 3:21) “My son, they should not be removed from your eyes,” (Prov. 9:9) “give to the wise that he shall become wiser,” let the wise listen¹⁸In the verse: “inform the just”. “that he increase in knowledge.” Rebbi Simeon ben Laqish said, after all these praises I can explain it following Rebbi Aqiba since Rebbi Aqiba said that he who keeps [kilaim] transgresses a prohibition. Rebbi Aqiba said only that he transgresses, did he say to whip? Here we are dealing with whipping. Further, from what we have stated “Sabbatical year¹⁹According to R. Eleazar, everybody agrees that ploughing in the Sabbatical year is a criminal offense, while according to R. Joḥanan everybody agrees that ploughing in the Sabbatical year is not a criminal offense. There is no way to single out R. Aqiba’s opinion..” Can you say that the Sabbatical year follows Rebbi Aqiba? Explain the Sabbatical year following Rebbi Eleazar, as Rebbi Eleazar said, one whips because of ploughing in the Sabbatical. Rebbi Joḥanan said, one does not whip because of ploughing in the Sabbatical. What is the reason of Rebbi Eleazar? (Lev. 25:2) “The Land should keep a Sabbath for the Eternal,” a general statement. (Lev. 25:4) “Your field you should not sow, your vineyard you should not prune,” detail. Sowing and trimming were in the general statement, why were they detailed? To trap with them and to tell you that just as sowing and pruning are particular as agricultural work on the earth or on a tree, so everything that is agricultural work on the earth or on a tree [is forbidden]²⁰The Babylonian version of this argument is in Babli Mo‘ed Qaṭan 3a, a tannaïtic version in Sifra Behar 1. [Cf. Sanhedrin 7:5, reference from Addenda and Corrigenda by Guggenehimer] A comparison with the Babli should use only manuscripts or early editions; the current versions have been corrupted by editors, cf. Diqduqe Sopherim ad loc. The relevant verses are Lev. 25:2–5: “(2) Speak to the Children of Israel and tell them, when you shall come to the Land which I am giving you, the Land shall rest for a Sabbath of the Eternal. (3) Six years you shall sow your field, six years you shall prune your vineyard and eat its yield. (4) But in the Seventh year, the Land shall have a Sabbath of rest; do not sow your field, do not prune your vineyard. (5) Your harvest’s aftergrowth you shall not harvest, the grapes of your wild growth you shall not gather, a year of rest shall be for the Land.” One’s first impulse would be to consider verses (4) and (5) as a unit, following the rule known as כלל ופרט וכלל (the seventh rule of R. Ismael, Sifra introduction) that details flanked by general statements have to be taken as examples, rather than for themselves, and that all activities forbidden are those described by the intersection of the intensional definitions of the examples. This interpretation led the later editors of the Babli astray. The problem is that verse 4 by itself seems to have the structure כלל ופרט, a general statement followed by a particular one, which would imply that the particular statement is to be taken literally; nothing is covered by the general statement that is not covered by the particular one. This forces the Babli to conclude that even R. Eleazar agrees with the principle [anonymous in the Yerushalmi, attributed to R. Ilaï (Hila, La) in the Babli] that a positive general statement and a negative particular one cannot form a unit. {The inverse statement, that a negative general statement and a positive particular one must be considered as unrelated, is an anonymous remark in Babli Yebamot7a.}
If the first and the second parts of verse 4 have no direct connection, the question arises (in the formulation of Sifra Behar) whether one could think that all work is forbidden in the Seventh Year, including building roads and repairing aqueducts. The second part of the verse describes what is really forbidden. The second rule invoked here by R. Eleazar is heqqēš“trapping”, meaning that a rule exemplified by different cases applies to all cases subsumed under the intersection of the intensional definitions of the examples. Everybody agrees that a rule exemplified by three different examples only applies to these three and nothing else, and a rule exemplified by one example applies to everything similar unless restricted, e. g., by the use of a definite article. A rule exemplified by two examples is problematic; some think these are examples only if they appear at different places and some hold that for illustration of a general rule the examples must appear in the same verse. This is the basis of the following disagreement between R. Eleazar and R. Joḥanan. (For the meaning of all these rules, cf. H. Guggenheimer, Logical Problems in Jewish Tradition, in: Ph. Longworth, ed., Confrontations with Judaism, London 1966.). How does Rebbi Joḥanan deal with this? They are two things and two things that are specified from a general notion divide²¹The examples are separate; they cannot be used in heqqēš.. Does Rebbi Eleazar not hold that they divide? He holds that they do not divide but instruct. Does Rebbi Joḥanan not hold that they instruct? It is different here because the general statement is a positive commandment and the details are prohibitions; no positive commandment implies anything for a prohibition and no prohibition implies anything for a positive commandment.