daf bit: Sukkah

[cellio]

Today's daf bit is a seasonal diversion into tractate Sukkah. During the week-long festival we are commanded to "dwell" in sukkot (booths), which the rabbis understand to mean eating and sleeping. But we learn in a mishna (Sukkah 25a) that casual eating is permitted outside the sukkah. What is casual eating? In the g'mara (26a) R' Yosef says the volume of two or three eggs, but Abaye says this sometimes suffices for a whole meal! Rather, Abaye says, it's only as much as a student eats before proceeding to the college assembly (a small breakfast, it sounds like). The g'mara continues: casual eating is permitted outside the sukkah, but not casual sleeping (a nap). Why not? Because you might sleep soundly and it turns out to be a real sleep, which you were required to do in the sukkah. Rami b. Ezekiel says a casual sleep means the time it takes to walk one hundred cubits.

Today's daf is Menachot 48.

Comments

[goljerp]

Wow, and here I was feeling proud of myself for having a meal in a sukkah every day so far. (Well, OK, on Tuesday it was just a hurried kiddush, but it was pouring nearly all day!)