Originally published 3/8/11, 11:03 am.
A Heireish, a Shoteh, and a Qatan may not read Mg'illah for others
Of course the usual p'shat meaning of Heireish is a deafmute, which makes this impossible!
Here are several approaches:
Pick your Parshanut Preference.
1. The Mishnah is using a formula only. A deaf person may read the m'gillah for others - even though he cannot hear it himself. The Mishnah really means to address ONLY shoteh v'qatan and it used Heireish ONLY due to shigrat halashon.
2. Since the deaf-mute case is not possible, the Mishnah must therefore default to the case of a deaf person only, and Heireish does apply. albeit not in its usual sense
Shalom,
RRW
2 comments:
The Y-mi gives #2 explicitly. Top of Vilna 21a (The same sugya is somewhere in Zera'im, but I don't recall where; it was easier to just check that it was repeated ad loc, and it was).
רב חסדא אמר: לית כאן "חרש", באשגרת לשון היא מתניתא
As for the other mitzvos in the mishnah, it's a machloqes Rabbanan and R' Yusa why a cheireish is excluded, ayin sham.
Sorry, while doing the research I forgot what your #2 was. Yes, somewhere in zera'im there is a discussion about whether a cheireish is always mute. But that's not here. Here they just say the word was dragged in because it just used the usual idiom. Besides, you need it for the other mitzvos listed in the seifa.
-micha
Post a Comment