Tractate Chullin
ends with the following words:
אמר רב יוסף אלמלא דרשיה אחר להאי קרא כרבי יעקב בר ברתיה לא חטא מאי חזא איכא דאמרי כי האי מעשה חזא ואיכא דאמרי לישנא דרבי חוצפית המתורגמן חזא דהוה מוטלת באשפה אמר פה שהפיק מרגליות ילחוך עפר והוא לא ידע למען ייטב לך בעולם שכלו טוב ולמען יאריכון ימיך בעולם שכולו ארוך:
Rav Yosef said:
Had Aḥer, literally Other, the appellation of the former Sage Elisha ben Avuya,
interpreted homiletically this
aforementioned verse: “That it may
go well with you” (Deuteronomy
5:16), as referring to the World-to-Come, as did Rabbi Ya’akov, the son of his daughter, he would not have sinned. The Gemara asks: What did Aḥer see that led him to
heresy? Some say that he saw an incident like this one
witnessed by Rabbi Ya’akov, and some say
that he saw the tongue of Rabbi Ḥutzpit the
disseminator, which was cast in a garbage dump after he was executed by the government.
Aḥer said: Will a
mouth that produced pearls of wisdom lick
the dust? But he did not know that the phrase “that it may be well with you” means in the world where all is well, and that the phrase “that your days may be long” is
referring to the world that is entirely
long.
As I have mentioned in previous siyumim,
the end of the Mesechet is often a reflection on everything before it. So how
does this final piece reflect back on Tractate Chullin?
The entirety of Chullin is focused on
proper slaughter, on how to take the life of an animal in an ethical, spiritual,
dignified way.
The last words of Chullin wonder if those
very rules apply to God and celestial retinue when they take the lives of
mankind. Elisha ben Avuyah, the famed Rabbi, is turned to heresy because of two
tragic incidents.
One is the tongue of Huzpit the
interpreter, which is found in the garbage dump. This of course is itself
impossible to comprehend; the very interpreter, who can explicate so much to so
many, suffers a demise that is inexplicable. Yet this indignity signals
something larger: the Talmud (12a) says only a non-kosher animal would be
tossed into the garbage dump. In metaphorical sense, it tells us the death of
Hutzpit was not done in a kosher manner. (the other version of this story, in
Kiddushin, has a pig dragging the tongue; again, only a non-kosher carcass was
tossed to the animals, and here, to make the association stronger, it is
specifically the ultimate non-kosher
animal carrying Hutzpit’s tongue)
The other case mentioned is found earlier
in the passage:
“there
was one whose father said to him:
Climb to the top of the building and
bring me fledglings; and he climbed to the top of the building and sent away the
mother bird and took the offspring,thereby
simultaneously fulfilling the mitzva to send away the mother bird from the nest
and the mitzva to honor one’s parents, but
as he returned he fell and died.”
Here too, the rules of Halacha are not
observed by the Angel of Death. The mother bird must be sent before taking the
child; but here, just within his father’s reach, the son’s life is taken away.
Clearly, the Talmud ends with the
discomfiting reminder that the laws of ethical slaughter aren’t observed by the
Angel of Death. And this puzzle has led Acher to leave the fold.
Despite this puzzle, the Talmud ends on a
positive note: in the future, there will be a reckoning, and the accounts will
be properly balanced. And to do this, they offer a powerful exhibit: Acher’s
own grandson. Acher saw no future for a Jewish people that was pulverized by
the brutal tortures of the Romans; yet his own grandson, Acher's very future,
can explain the inexplicable, and maintain a sense of optimism about the
future. But this salvation has nothing to do with death, ethical or otherwise,
but rather comes from those who courageously hold on to life and faith.
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