talmud geeking

[cellio]

In the mishna discussion of the 39 melachot (forbidden labors on Shabbat), there are some paired opposites -- e.g. tying and untying knots, writing and erasing two letters, sewing and ripping stitches out, etc. In most, but not all, cases, the mishna casts this as follows: doing the destructive act in order to do the constructive act is forbidden. Erasing isn't inherently wrong; it's just wrong if you're doing that so you can write in that space.

I will be interested to see how this plays out in the gemara. I'll also be interested in studying the cases where this isn't the case more closely, to see what distinguishes them.

And I'll be especially interested in seeing how the discussion of extinguishing a flame plays out, as the mishna qualifies it as "so you can make charcoal" (i.e. a destructive act leading to a constructive act). I think extinguishing a flame is prohibited regardless of intent, but either it's elsewhere or the gemara is going to expound on this.

Comments

[katanah.livejournal.com]

Grunfeld outlined a lot of this in his book "The Sabbath," which is partly based on Rabbi Hirsch's work. I'm only halfway through the book, but it seems to be pretty useful, despite not being primary source material. :)

[cellio]

Hey, most of what's out there isn't primary source material -- but that's fine! You need that to understand the sources much of the time (and certainly to put things into context). And, well, there've been a lot of innovations since the Talmud was written, and there are questions that the Talmud can't directly answer because (e.g.) electricity hadn't been invented yet, and you need other sources to guide you through the reasoning.

Or at least I do; I'm a beginner. :-)