Shevu’ot – “Oaths” – The Mind of Dan Perlman

Shevu’ot – “Oaths” – Swear to God!

What exactly is an oath and how does it differ from, say, a promise, pledge, vow, word of honor, or guarantee, to give a few similar examples? At it’s simplest, and the reason it garners its own tractate, is that an oath is a promise made invoking a covenant with a higher authority, usually a deity. This tractate explores the details of making and breaking of oaths, and the various types of oaths, including those made frivolously.

5/3/25, Chapter 1, Page 2 – The Torah specifies that there are two types of oaths; those where someone swears to do something and those where someone swears to not do something. That’s it. Simple and direct. But, as usual, our rabbinical council feels the need to jazz it up a bit, and in the Talmud, further divides each of these into current/future actions and past actions. Because, you know, if you swear to God to do or not do something that you already did or didn’t do, they feel like they have the right to judge you for it.
5/4/25, Page 3 – We are, of course, back to flogging, because flogging is what these guys know. Having established that there are oaths to do something and to not do something, either past or present, the violation of that oath is subject to a “sliding scale” of number of lashes. But, the rabbis are not without heart here. They realize that there may be mitigating circumstances, such as that the person was unaware of their violation (perhaps thinking a certain food was kosher but it wasn’t), or they didn’t realize that violating their oath had an effect on the Temple (sacrificing an animal that turned out to be non-consecrated, but they thought it was). So many things to consider.
5/5/25, Page 4 – If you swear an oath to do or not do something and then swear a second oath to do or not do something, be careful of your phrasing. If the second oath does not materially change the first, then it is simply considered a repetition and if you violate it, you are only subject to one set of lashes. If, however, your phrasing the second time could be interpreted as different from the first, and you violate both, you are subject to lashes for each oath. Take notes, make a recording, or, I’m thinking, don’t swear oaths!
5/6/25, Page 5 – While most of today’s page is dedicated to justifying why the rabbis have taken various Torah rules and added to, and often doubled, their reach, I’m drawn into an extended conversation about the differences between snow white, wool white, lime white, and egg membrane white (from brightest to least), which takes up probably the last third of the conversation. Fancying themselves interior designers, they argue over which of those can be combined with which other ones without clashing.
5/7/25, Page 6 – The argument over the shades of white that started yesterday continues. Finally, however, we get to learn that the argument is over the shade of white of spots on someone’s skin, and whether that shade indicates leprosy or another skin condition that makes the person ritually impure. Shades of white that have any sort of pinkish tinge are assumed to be tainted with the person’s blood, and therefore suspect. Of the shades shown yesterday, only the egg membrane color, the one on the far right, is considered pure, and not suspect.
5/8/25, Page 7 – There are sins we knowingly commit, there are sins we unknowingly commit. But the rabbis say there is a third category, things that we ostensibly know are sins, but in moments of strong emotion – passion, rage, despair, that knowledge in essence disappears from our consciousness – a moment of sexual transgression, a moment of violence, a moment of crying out to another god. Understanding that people make errors in judgment in such situations, the rabbis treat the punishment as if it was a case of unknowing sin – reduced and in keeping with the person’s means.
5/9/25, Page 8 – Most of today’s page is an elaboration on yesterday. Certain violations of the laws that happen in moments of strong emotion are given lesser punishments – i.e., sacrificing a goat versus being stoned to death – mostly based on intention and awareness, things that have popped up many a time before in the Talmud. There’s also some attention paid to the goat, and what its sacrifice symbolizes, which gets a bit esoteric, considering the possibilities of “original sin” and/or sudden awakening to the power of God. Regardless, the goat is barbecued, and you’re not crushed to death.
5/10/25, Page 9 – I’m just throwing it out there. I’m tired of reading about throwing goats on the fires of the altar in sacrifice for every real or imagined wrong committed by virtually everyone, every day. First off, I doubt there were that many goats around, and sacrificing one, for I’d guess, the majority of people, is a costly endeavor, so a whole lot of people are not owning up to their transgressions. Is it simply a threat that’s intended to be a deterrent to wrongdoing? If so, based on historical writings, it wasn’t very effective.
5/11/25, Page 10 – More goats. Now we have internal goats and external goats, and goats lining up, apparently willingly, to be sacrificed for sins of which they are asserted to be aware of, or not, but are happily marching to their death in order to atone for “their” crime. Lost in all this seems to be that there’s a person who committed the crime – killed someone in a fit of anger, slept with someone he shouldn’t have in a moment of passion, worshipped an idol in a moment of weakness, and he’s getting a pass, because all agency is being dumped on the head of a goat, while he goes back to his daily life.
5/12/25, Page 11 – In a truly enlightened statement, the rabbis declare that one cannot compare the burning of incense with the burning of goats or the simple offering of prepared food, as the sacrificing of a goat apparently takes more of a financial and emotional commitment. Thank you for that. None of us would have figured that out without this declaration.
5/13/25, Page 12 – When it is suggested that white figs be brought as sacrifices, all hell breaks loose. After all, Leviticus forbids the burning of fruit on the Temple altar. Rav Hanina quickly comes to the rescue, asserting that it is a metaphor. Bringing white figs to a person is a treat, an extra, something unexpected, and metaphorically, of course, this means bringing a lamb to the altar for sacrifice, because lamb would be a treat for God. It seems a stretch to me, but now I’m thinking about a lamb dish with white figs….
5/14/25, Page 13 – Like most Jews, I grew up learning that on Yom Kippur, we basically get a blanket pass for all sins committed during the previous year, as long as we confess (generally, no specifics are asked for) and repent. Three things, however, according to today’s page, required the additional “and be forgiven”. Who is doing the forgiving is not clear, but the three things are: following another god and encouraging others to do so, intentionally misrepresenting and/or lying about what the Torah says, and nullifying one’s circumcision. I’m assuming the last means more like not performing circumcision as part of Jewish tradition, because I’m pretty sure the Talmudic rabbis weren’t predicting reconstructive surgery.
5/15/25, Chapter 2, Page 14 – In what is now becoming a repetitive presentation of the four situations of ritual impurity – yes or no, intentionally or not – most of which is focused on entering the Temple or other consecrated space, we have… yes, a tangent. Among the Levitical sex prohibitions is having sex while a woman is menstruating. But, what if you didn’t know she was, or, if she began to menstruate during intercourse? One can’t, we discover, simply withdraw, because withdrawal, for the man, is “just as pleasant as entry”. No, one must stop all movement and simply wait to go limp, so that withdrawal is no longer pleasurable. Rules are rules.
5/16/25, Page 15 – I am not sure how we got here, but it should be noted that it is prohibited to say a blessing in God’s name over a wound you’re trying to cure. It’s fine if you leave his name out of it. Why? Well because as anyone who’s gone to scout camp, or lived two thousand years ago, knows, saliva is a great wound healer. And saliva means spitting, and spitting at the same time you say God’s name is just not done. Unless you’re a Sicilian grandmother, than it’s required.
5/17/25, Page 16 – An interesting parallel moment to the daily Torah reading I do, as there, we’ve just completed the Book of Ezra and are on into Nehemiah. Today’s passage here refers to that time period, with the Temple having been rebuilt under Ezra’s leadership, what was needed to re-consecrate it. There was no Jewish king nor high priest – requirements of the original consecration centuries before, and Ezra performed the rites himself. The Talmudic rabbis argue over whether or not that actually was sufficient, and whether the second Temple, therefore, was really consecrated.
5/18/25, Page 17 – If a person discovers that they are in a state of impurity, or become impure, while in the Temple, they are to leave as quickly as possible so as not to cause impurity to those around them. Part of the discussion revolves around whether they should take time to bow before leaving, or if that is too much “tarrying” given their state of impurity. Rava, just to be his usual monkey wrench sort, throws out the question of whether a person is still tarrying if they suspend themselves in the air so that they are not touching the ground. This, of course, becomes the hot topic of conversation, without ever addressing how a person suspends themselves above the ground.
5/19/25, Page 18 – These guys really can’t stay away from their obsession with menstruating women and intercourse. While the standard punishment (no lashes, thank goodness) is to bring a “sin offering” for each, the offense of having intercourse with her and for withdrawing before flaccid (how do they know? is this based on self-reporting?), there is a discount if you’re ignorant. If you claim you didn’t know one or both prohibitions, you’re only liable for one sin offering total. Stupidity wins again.
5/20/25, Page 19 – Today’s passage, in some ways, sums up a lot about organized religion. You have on one hand a group of Talmudic rabbis who state that a person should not be held liable for making a sin offering if they were unaware of the sin, or did not properly understand it, and another group who say that’s all irrelevant, ignorance of the rule isn’t an excuse, and we don’t even need to teach them the rules or the reasons for them, they just have to do what we, their betters, tell them to.
5/21/25, Chapter 3, Page 20 – This new chapter launches directly into the topic of oaths, and begins with a momentary pass by Yom Kippur, reminding us that part of the holiday is not just confessing ones sins for the year and receiving forgiveness, but it also dissolves all oaths (momentarily, and then you renew them with a new promise). It then dives into Yom Gedaliah, a little known, and even less observed, holiday between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur that commemorates the assassination of an ancient leader of Jerusalem, who was killed over political disagreements. A part of the day’s ritual is to heal your own rift(s) with those whom you most disagree with in life.
5/22/25, Page 21 – What is the difference between an oath taken in vain and a false oath? The former is when someone swears they did or didn’t do something where we already know that isn’t true, and is punished by… yes, lashes! The latter is when someone swears to do or not do something and then contradicts that with his actions. In this case, he only receives lashes if he does something he swore not to do, i.e., takes an actual action. But if he doesn’t do something he swore to do, he doesn’t receive lashes because, the rabbis say, he didn’t actually do anything. That’s an age-old philosophical debate – is the choice not to act an action in and of itself?
5/23/25, Page 22 – If a person gives their oath that they won’t eat, but then they ingest something like, say, dirt, which is considered inedible, are they liable for violating their oath? If a person gives their oath that they won’t eat a… grape seed… but then they eat one, are they liable, since the Torah defined definition of eating something requires that one eat an “olive-bulk’s size portion”? These are the weighty questions of the moment. Obviously the discussion veers into whether someone trying to use a loophole to get around their oath is liable for violating it.
5/24/25, Page 23 – The rabbis go into a long, detailed analysis of the language of the Torah over eating and drinking, poring over passages that refer, in repeated single phrases, to bread, wine, and olive oil. They render a verdict that the two are inseparable – if one eats, one drinks. All this leads up to that if one takes an oath not to eat, it includes not to drink, and then they go off on the punishments about having a glass of wine during a sworn fast. Interestingly, they don’t analyze the reverse oath – swearing to eat, and therefore drink. Is one even allowed to have a meal without a glass of wine without being subject to discipline?
5/25/25, Page 24 – If you violate two oaths, but they are both violated by a single act, you are only liable for the more serious of the two. The example given is eating something non-kosher, say, a bacon cheeseburger, on Yom Kippur, when you are supposed to be fasting. Since eating kosher is an overarching tenet of Judaism, you are liable for violating that one, as not-eating on Yom Kippur is, in the rabbis’ minds, secondary to that.
5/26/25, Page 25 – What if someone takes an oath that is simply impossible to do or not do? One example used to highlight this is someone swearing not to sleep for three days, which the rabbis assert is impossible (maybe, maybe not). Instead of waiting three days to see if the person fulfills his oath, they declare it an oath in vain, give him a few lashes as punishment, and send him to bed. In these modern days of “promise big and go for it”, there’d be a whole lot of flogging going on.
5/27/25, Page 26 – An interesting debate on intentionality. If a person made an oath, and then didn’t keep it because if he did, he discovered he would be violating a mitzvah or commandment from the Torah, is he liable for punishment for breaking his oath? If he did keep it, does it merit punishment for having violated a Torah precept? Arguments abound, most lean towards some sort of mitigation of part or all of the punishments, though not all agree.
5/28/25, Page 27 – Yesterday’s conversation continues as the sages look at whether taking an oath to not to a positive positive mitzvah, i.e., taking an optional action to do something good; or to do something prohibited by a negative mitzvah, i.e., choosing to act on something you shouldn’t. In these cases, they opine, good always outweighs evil, and if you violate an oath that would have taken you down the evil path and do good instead, you are not liable for having violated your oath.
5/29/25, Page 28 – What happens if you change your mind about your oath? Say you swore you wouldn’t eat a loaf of bread, but then you nibble a little and decide you’d like to eat it after all? If you haven’t eaten “an olive bulk’s worth”, you can request to dissolve your oath. However, if you’ve eaten the entire loaf, it’s considered to late to request that, except when it’s not, in which case it’s only too late if you’re already tied to the stake and ready for your lashes, except when you wriggle free and run away, at which point it’s considered like you were already flogged. Okay then.
5/30/25, Page 29 – Two topics today. First, a legal loophole. If you swear an oath not to do something, say, ten times, and you realize that you’re likely to do it, swear a new oath not to do it five times, break that, pay the fine on the lesser amount, and those five can’t be counted towards the ten you first swore about. Second, oaths that are impossible are not accepted. Two examples given – swearing that you’re seeing a flying camel or a snake as big as an olive press. I’ll give the rabbis that flying camels are unlikely, but clearly they’ve never seen an Amazon anaconda.
5/31/25, Chapter 4, Page 30 – We’re now in the courtroom and basically, laying out the procedure for interaction of the various parties. Litigants must stand when speaking (in modern times, that would be the lawyer standing up to question a witness), witnesses must be sworn in (there’s some controversy over whether women make reliable witnesses, you know how they are), the judge remains seated, the defendant stands when being sentenced, decorum must be maintained. All pretty routine stuff for anyone who watches courtroom dramas.
6/1/25, Page 31 – We’ve all watched courtroom dramas where lawyers advise their clients to dress up, or dress in a certain way, to influence the jury, or judge. The Talmudic rabbis recognized this, and instituted a policy where both the plaintiff and defendant must be dressed equivalently so that neither is judged more or less truthful than the other based purely on their manner of dress. Interestingly, living in Argentina, we have something similar for public school kids – they all wear plain white lab coats over their own clothing so that labels and conditions and style of their clothing don’t influence how the other kids, or the teachers, unconsciously perceive them.
6/2/25, Page 32 – An interesting conundrum is proposed today. Normally, two witnesses to a crime or forbidden act, are required as evidence that the act occurred. If there is only one witness, the accused typically denies the accusation, and there’s a stalemate. But what if the accused is a witness – that is, they admit to the act, but claim it has been misinterpreted… the example given, person X says person Y took something from person Z. Person Y says, yes, I did, but it wasn’t a theft, it was my property, not Z’s. Two witnesses to the act agree, but is it really a crime? Oddly, the rabbis seem stumped as to what to do next.
6/3/25, Page 33 – Sometimes, witnesses to an action don’t want to testify in court about it. They may feel they don’t understand what actually happened, they may not remember it well, they may feel it’s not in their best interests to testify, due to potential consequences for themselves or their families – financial or danger. The Talmudic court doesn’t care. If they think you’re holding back on information, they can fine you, hold you in contempt, even if they can’t prove it, and it’s just too bad for you. But only in cases that are financial in nature. If they are criminal in nature, you get a pass, because… maybe the danger is real.
6/4/25, Page 34 – Circumstantial evidence is, well, just circumstantial evidence. While the rabbis argue over cases, financial, civil, and capital, where it is painfully obvious to anyone the superficial facts of a crime, in the end, they come to the decision that without actual witnesses to the crime itself, any conclusions beyond those incontrovertible facts, are insufficient evidence to convict. They go beyond what in modern terms we think of as “reasonable doubt” in the commission of a crime to include unreasonable doubt where there are no actual witnesses – and, two of them.
6/5/25, Page 35 – Building on the commandment to not take God’s name in vain, the rabbinical folk rule that if, when you take an oath, you include his name in the oath, and it’s either a false oath or you break the oath, you’re liable, rather than for a fine or sacrifice, to be stoned to death. They also decide that they want to make sure that people don’t fudge on this, so most of the page is an exploration of the various names of God from different parts of the Torah or other sacred writings. Just to make sure they’re all covered under this edict.
6/6/25, Page 36 – Yesterday our Talmudic folk focused on the various names of God that might be used in making a prohibited oath. Today they want to make sure that we know the various folk against whom those oaths might be taken. In particular, one’s parents, one’s self, and anyone who’s deaf. I find it curious that only the deaf are singled out in this passage instead of the usual litany of deaf, mute, deaf-mute, blind, minors, and imbeciles. I’m making an assumption, however, that they’re not cool with cursing those who are mute, blind, minor, or imbecilic.
6/7/25, Chapter 5, Page 37 – Now that the previous chapter has defined what false oaths are, this new one undertakes our rabbis’ favorite topic – punishments. For the most part, if things are financial in nature or create a financial loss, the person who swore the false oath has to repay what was lost, with a 20% fine, and bring a sacrifice to the Temple. A few additional ones – rape, which adds in a fine for humiliation and loss of dowry value; injuring one’s own slaves, which engenders having to emancipate them; and falsely claiming not to have someone’s money or items on deposit or in escrow, which brings on everyone’s go-to fave – flogging!
6/8/25, Page 38 – Phrasing of oaths is important. If you are accused of stealing three objects – A, B, and C – what you say next when asked to swear an oath is key. If you say “I didn’t steal anything of yours”, and you’re found to have lied, you are fined and have to bring a sacrifice for having sworn a false oath. If, however, you say “I didn’t steal A, I didn’t steal B, and I didn’t steal C”, and you are found to have lied, you are liable for three false oaths – a far more expensive punishment. Words matter.
6/9/25, Chapter 6, Page 39 – If someone is guilty of committing a serious offense, both he and his family are punished with excommunication, unless his family are the ones who turned him in, otherwise it is assumed they, at the least, covered for him if not actually abetted him. However, punishments, less severe, are also meted to his friends and neighbors, and, in spirit, to the rest of the world, in every decreasing increments of punishment as the circle ripples out from him as the center. Except the 36 righteous souls on the planet at any given time. They’re exempt. Interestingly, even if they, too, did nothing to stop him.
6/10/25, Page 40 – A plaintiff comes before the rabbinical court and claims that the defendant owes him X amount of money. The defendant claims there is no such debt. The rabbis rule that if X amount is over a certain minimum, they must both swear oaths, to God. But then they sort of lose the plot, as they muse that no plaintiff would make up such a debt out of whole cloth (and swear a sacred oath), so maybe it’s a debt but less than X; while at the same time musing that no defendant would deny a real debt completely, so maybe it’s some fraction of X (and similarly swear). And then they all seem to wander off, self-assured that they’ve had insights.
6/11/25, Page 41 – Oaths which are administered under Torah law, that is, they’re spelled out in the Torah, give the court the right to enforce violations of the oath by entering the person who swore a false oath’s property. Oaths administered under rabbinic law, the extensions of Torah law, do not confer that right to the court, it becomes a civil matter between the rabbi administering the oath and the oath swearer. The rabbi basically has to resort to coercion or some sort of repo guy to do things, which may or may not be legal according to the court.
6/12/25, Page 42 – Sometimes someone doesn’t have money to repay a loan, or product to repay something borrowed, and they repay in something of equal value that is accepted by both parties. But, beware, warn the rabbis, make sure there are witnesses to that agreement and transaction, as without the evidence of the return of the “in kind” money or item, you may have no proof you repaid, nor of the agreement on what that repayment was worth.
6/13/25, Page 43 – In order for a defendant to be required to swear an oath in regard to an item left for safekeeping, the item must be “moveable”, and therefore cannot be land, or a fixture on the land (which included slaves), or something which has no intrinsic value (a promissory document, for example, which in itself isn’t worth anything). It also must be describable in specific weight, size, and/or number. You know, like all those exacting Talmudic measurements we’ve explored, like “an olive bulk” or “a loaf of bread”. At least none of them were measuring distances in “school buses” or “blue whales”.
6/14/25, Page 44 – Throughout the past pages, the focus as been on a defendant swearing an oath against a claim. And, in fact, the Torah only specifies oaths for defendants. The rabbis, however, extend this to certain claimants, such as an employee who says he hasn’t been paid, or a debtor who says his collateral has not been returned after repaying a loan. The big argument is over where the oath can be accepted in two disparate situations – the defendant, in these examples the employer or loaner, admits that the debt ever existed versus one who admit it did but claims it has been repaid in full or part. Different sages rule differently, of course.

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