daf bit: Sanhedrin 37

[cellio]

The mishna discusses how witnesses are addressed (before testifying). Witnesses in capital cases were brought in and intimidated thus: perhaps what you say is based on conjecture or hearsay, or is something you were told to say by somebody else. Perhaps you are unaware that we are going to scrutinize your evidence by cross-examination and inquiry.

Know that capital cases are not like monetary ones; you can make monetary restitution (if you're lying) and effect atonement, but in a capital case you are liable for the blood of the accused and all the descendants he now won't have. We learn this from Kayin, where it says "the bloods of your brother cry out to Me" -- bloods, not blood, so it includes potential descendants. For this reason man was created alone, to teach that whoever destroys a single soul is guilty as if he destroyed an entire world, and whoever preserves a single soul has merit as if he preserved an entire world because all mankind originated from one man.

Man was created alone for the sake of peace among men, so that none can say "my father was greater than yours". And further, he was created alone to show the power of the Holy One blessed be He, for if a man strikes many coins from one mold they all resemble each other, but God fashioned every man in the stamp of the first man and yet they all look different. Therefore every person is obligated to say: the world was created for my sake. (37a)

(Today's daf is 39, but I wanted to cover this mishna because parts of this are famous but we don't always hear them in the original context.)

Comments

[magid]

We looked at that daf in my class at NHC this summer. There was an option to actually put the words into one's pockets, which I thought could be interesting, but my clothes generally lack pockets. One guy got around that by rolling up the papers and sticking them into opposite sides of his beard.

[cellio]

A (former) associate rabbi at my synagogue did that. We were studying something that led to this passage, and he pulled them out of his pockets.

I'm not sure I want to manage paper (or parchment or whatever) in pockets, but in a similar vein I would wear a ring inscribed גם זה יעבור.