The Hidden Rabbinic Idea: Temporary and Timeless
Dorot Misha'ah: The rabbit hole of its implications.
Hidden in the Talmud is an idea that has had a tremendous potential impact on Judaism as a whole, but it is almost never mentioned.
ושמואל דורות משעה לא ילפינן
And Shmuel teaches we do not derive generational halakhot/Jewish laws from temporary circumstances. (Menachot 19b)
This bombshell of an idea is never utilized in the Talmud again. Check out this search in Sefaria for the phrasing.
So what is this all about?
Where does this come from?
What does this mean?
Here’s what we learn:
Even when experiencing an “exception,” there is possibly a bigger lesson to be learned.
Our choices today matter, for they have immense consequences.
Tradition matters, but don’t be held back by it.
Let’s pull the thread through the sources together.
For context, on Menachot 19b, the Talmud discusses whether or not the multiple references of Aaron using his hands to measure grain for the meal offering proves that we should not use utensils to measure the grain.
The meal offering, one of many offerings in the Torah and is mentioned in this week’s Torah portion, Shemini, is known as the Mincha offering. Yes, that Mincha, as in afternoon prayer services. The rabbis quote this verse as an example:
וַיַּקְרֵב֮ אֶת־הַמִּנְחָה֒ וַיְמַלֵּ֤א כַפּוֹ֙ מִמֶּ֔נָּה וַיַּקְטֵ֖ר עַל־הַמִּזְבֵּ֑חַ מִלְּבַ֖ד עֹלַ֥ת הַבֹּֽקֶר׃
He [Aaron] then brought forward the meal offering and, taking a handful of it, he turned it into smoke on the altar—in addition to the burnt offering of the morning. (Leviticus 9:17)
It is in this context that Shmuel makes his teaching.
The Tosafot, rabbinic commentators from the 12th and 13th century France and Germany, who are generally focused on resolving Talmudic contradictions, reference this idea a few times in trying to unpack this rare concept.
As a side note, I’d strongly recommend
's Substack on the individuals from this time period. Her posts are fantastic.They explore several different circumstances in which offerings may or not have been applicable once, temporarily, or generally done a particular way, generational. They often use a more narrow version of the concept קדשי דורות, generational offerings, and קדשי שעה, temporary offerings.
The Tosafot references our concept again on Yevamot 40a, which also mentions our Torah portion. The Talmud says:
The Gemara asks: With regard to this possibility of eating the meal-offering boiled, what are the circumstances?
I’m sure everyone was wondering such a thing.
The text explores a few options but concludes with this phrase:
If it is considered to be unleavened because it is presumed that the flour never managed to rise before it was cooked, then it is unleavened and there is no reason to prohibit its use; and if it is not… then it is certainly disqualified from use because the Merciful One states that the offering must be “unleavened” (Leviticus 10:12).
The key part is the last phrase, and the Tosafot say this about the last line:
מצות אמר רחמנא - פי' בקונט' ואכלוה מצות אצל המזבח וגו' ובשמיני של מלואים כתיב ואפילו לשמואל דאמר…(מנחות דף יט:) דלא ילפינן דורות משעה שמא הכא איכא שום יתור
Matzot, The Merciful One said - Look at the Rashi on “And they ate Matzot upon the Altar…” during the days of Miluim that are written [about in the Torah.] And even Shmuel who said, on Menachot 19b, we do not derive generational [laws] from momentary [circumstances], perhaps there is something more [to be derived] here.
Here is the first thing we learn from our exploration of this idea:
Even when experiencing an “exception,” there is possibly a bigger lesson to be learned.
The whole premise of this concept is that something that happens once or due to circumstances is not much to rely on when making long-term decisions or plans. We have to be careful not to focus on the wrong thing.
The Tosafot remind us that “perhaps there is something more here.”
How can we interrogate our unique circumstances to draw out larger lessons? Is there something universal in my experience?
We should be encouraged to spend more time reflecting, ensuring that we have learned something substantial from an encounter. It is like trying out new food and not liking it. Do I not like that food in every context, or did I just not like how it was prepared this time?
While there are certain foods we each dislike, we might not want to make that a rule for everyone everywhere. For me, that food is bananas, which are weird and squishy and don’t smell right. Basically, bananas are banned now.
We have to remember to step back and see the bigger picture.
We don’t really see this concept utilized, or at least I haven’t seen it, until about five hundred years later, when a Hasidic rabbi, the Bnei Yissaschar, picks up this idea by asking the question: Does the Passover offering override the laws of Shabbat?
This is all based on a question asked in the Talmud (Pesachim 66a):
The Sages taught a baraita with regard to the basic halakha governing the eve of Passover that occurs on Shabbat:
This law was forgotten by the sons of Beteira, who were the leaders of their generation. The fourteenth of Nisan once occurred on Shabbat, and they forgot and did not know whether the Paschal lamb overrides Shabbat or not. They said: Is there any person who knows whether the Paschal lamb overrides Shabbat or not?
What happens when Passover falls on Friday night? Do we offer the Paschal lamb?
The folks in charge at the time, the Bnei Beteira, had no idea. Yes, this leadership said, “I don’t know.” How revolutionary! So, what do they do? They ask around.
They said to them: There is a certain man in Jerusalem who came up from Babylonia, and Hillel the Babylonian is his name…They said to him: Do you know whether the Paschal lamb overrides Shabbat or not?
He said to them: Have we but one Paschal lamb during the year that overrides Shabbat? Do we not have many more than two hundred Paschal lambs, i.e., sacrifices, during the year that override Shabbat?
Who knows the answer? Our old pal Hillel, the one who studies under the preeminent Shemaya and Avtalyon. What does he say? “Don’t we have more than 200 paschal lambs?” he rhetorically asks.
Do we? No. He’s being snarky.
They said to him: From where do you know this?
He said to them: “Its appointed time” is stated with regard to the Paschal lamb and “its appointed time” is also stated with regard to the daily offering.
Just as the expression “its appointed time,” which is stated with regard to the daily offering, indicates that it overrides Shabbat, so too “its appointed time,” which is stated with regard to the Paschal lamb, indicates that it overrides Shabbat.
This rabbinic move is called a Gezera Shava. The rabbis quote one phrasing of a verse in one place and apply the context to another similar phrasing of a verse in another place. The rabbis were VERY concerned with this and decreed that this type of rabbinic move was no longer available to us.
So here, because there is a reference to “appointed time” regarding the Paschal lamb and another with the daily offering, therefore, they both override the Shabbat restrictions.
Ok, I know we’ve gone on a detour, but bear with me.
The Bnei Yissaschar brings this up because he brings up the following complication:
And this is the solution to all of this [referring to the whole Paschal lamb vs Shabbat situation]: The Passover offering (the Paschal lamb) that the Israelites offered in the desert, in the second year (after leaving Egypt) was a momentary teaching. And in truth, they were not obligated to the paschal offering upon entering the land [of Israel]. Only this Passover offering comes in the desert in a momentary teaching and we do not learn from it a generational ruling.
Meaning to say, the Passover offering, the one we represent on our Seder plates, was never meant to be forever. Or so it seems.
This is reasoning for the doubt of the Bnei Beteira, [because it isn’t clear] if we learn a generational ruling from a momentary one or not. And Hillel taught them the received Gezera Shava and since it was received, we definitely accept it, even if it is a generational ruling from a momentary ruling. Since one accepts a gezera shava [that are taught] from Sinai.
The reason why the leadership of the time didn’t know the answer to the question of Shabbat and the Paschal lamb is that there was a doubt if it would still be applicable in their day and age.
This is a monumental question to be raised. And the only reason it was accepted is that it was already accepted. Very circular. Then, an alternative view is presented:
Or, there are those who say that it is better that we don’t learn a generational ruling from a momentary ruling. This is because of what Aaron said to Moses on that day. If we accept this momentary sacrifice, it will not be possible to be lenient with generational sacrifices. Moses listened, and it was good, but it created the doubt of the Bnei Beteira.
Here’s the question of consequences being raised, if we accept a momentary exception as the rule, we may never be able to undo it. It will become generational. We will have excluded ourselves from the ability to be lenient again.
This is the second lesson learned:
Our choices today matter, for they have immense consequences.
The rabbis were afraid that if they accepted a stringency today, they might never be able to undo the limitation they created.
As individuals, we can find ourselves trapped by decisions we’ve made in the past, unable to give ourselves the space to change. At the same time, we know that change and, more importantly, growth requires us to review the decisions we’ve made and make different ones.
In addition, the Bnei Yissaschar is framing it in the context of stringency and leniency. The fear here is that being too stringent now risks an important leniency later.
Not exactly the same, but it makes me think of the custom of kitniyot and the centuries it has taken for many to unburden themselves from a stringency. There’s nothing wrong with it, I still avoid kitniyot, but it took centuries of Ashkenazi Jews to consider a leniency on a custom.
Imagine something of tremendous importance that we’ve avoided because of a decision we made in the past.
I think about how we’ve excluded women and others from the Tradition for millennia because it was in vogue to be exclusive at a particular time in history. What we’ve lost from that is immeasurable.
Ultimately, the Bnei Yissaschar says this:
If the Paschal offering that the Israelites sacrificed in the desert was considered a momentary offering since they were not yet in the land [of Israel] then the idea would be that the Israelites offered it only in the desert.
Or, let it be said that since, in any case, the mitzvot of the Paschal lamb is acted upon as if it were generational, even the Paschal lamb in the desert, it is considered as though it was generational. Behold, Hillel comes and teaches the gezara shava, which was received at Sinai. Therefore, there is no longer doubt.
He concludes, despite a real sense of doubt, that Hillel’s relatively dubious argument of daily obligation applying to the Passover offering is accepted, it is enough.
This hints at lesson three:
Tradition matters, but don’t be held back by it.
There is something to be said about tradition. Not everything makes sense by the time we receive it, but that doesn’t mean it is worthless. We do have to deal with it, wrestle with it, and navigate it.
It is one of the reasons why Positive-Historical Judaism, a concept popularized by Rabbi Zechariah Frankel is so meaningful for me:
“historical because it acknowledges that Judaism did not simply drop down from heaven ready-made, so to speak, but has had a history; positive, because, whatever the origins, this is what the religion has come to be under the guidance of God.”
Put another way:
Historical in this context means that Judaism has a history, it informs everything we do and is a part of how we understand it. It is a factor in how we make decisions. Judaism did not appear already made, it was created over time.
Positive in this context means this is what we’ve received, and we will consider that valuable. Tradition is meaningful, and we want to hold onto it.
The tension between what makes sense right now and how we apply these rules forever is embedded into the Jewish Tradition. It is how the rabbis function, although not always with this phrasing, דורות משעה, dorot misha’ah, generational rulings from momentary rulings. They attempt to be careful in how they make rulings.
Just as the footprint of this idea is everywhere, so too are the consequences of our decisions and thinking.
We must live in the tension with what we’ve received and the context in which it came to us, but we are not controlled by it. We can be informed and inspired by it.