Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Shabbos 3b: Complete Immersion In Learning





Said R. Chiyya to Rav: Son of illustrious ancestors! Have I not told you that when Rebbi is engaged
on one Tractate you must not question him about another, lest he be not conversant with it. For if
Rebbi were not a great man, you would have put him to shame, for he might have answered you
incorrectly.

Maran HaRav Hutner explains [פחד יצחק שבועות מאמר ט] that the inability to answer a question in a mesechta that one is not presently learning is not an inadequacy. When we learn Torah our job is to simulate קבלת התורה at הר סיני. This is what Chazal call כנתינתה - just as the Torah was given at הר סיני we learn in our present environment. When the each of the עשרת הדברות was given we are taught that the entire world was filled with a pleasant fragrance [Shabbos 88b]. The gemara asks - If the world was filled with the fragrance of one דברה where was there room for the fragrance of the next one?

Good kasha:-).

The gemara answers that Hashem sent a special wind that removed the fragrance of the previous דברה in order to make room for the next one.

When we learn it should ממש ממש be the same thing. We are so areingetun, so heavily immersed in what we are learning, that there is no room for anything else.

Even other Torah.

And certainly not the havalim of olam hazeh. See previous post:-).

A delicious Torah about how delicious Torah is.

What I don't understand is that the gemara says that if Rebbi would not be such a great man he would not have been able to correctly answer you. The corollary is that since he was a great man he was able to answer you, which in the end he in fact did. According to Maran's explanation, a truly great man should not be able to answer a question from another mesechta due to his immersion in his present masechta. וצ"ע

וע"ע בס' זאב יטרף שבועות פרק כח, שו"ת הר צבי ח"ב סי' יא מהלך גאוני, ובקובץ נזר התורה יז עמ' קצז הרבה מראה מקומות בספר מאור ישראל על מסכת שבת לגר"ע יוסף שליט"א ודבריו משלימים לדברי מרן כאן
וכמובן ב'עין איה' כאן במקום