Makkot – “Lashes” – Whip It, Whip It Good
- Originally, Makkot was simply the second part of Sanhedrin, the tractate we just finished. While the former focused on the design of the court system and its overall responsibilities for various types of crimes, Makkot focuses on the Bet Din, the Halakhic court, i.e., the rabbinical court that judges violations of religious law. More specifically, the tractate covers three subjects: false witnesses (thou shalt not lie/bear false witness); sanctuary cities (you thought those were a new, California based thing, right?); and punishment by flogging (lashes).
- 4/10/25, Chapter 1, Page 2 – In Sanhedrin we covered mostly crimes that were punishable by the death penalty. As an intro to “bearing false witness”, the rabbis note that in a case where one conspires to have someone put to death by the courts and is later found to have lied, he is punished with the same penalty he sought for his victim. In cases that involve a different punishment, the same is considered the standard – a similar monetary fine, or jail time as was sought. But, in some cases, that either isn’t possible, or would have adverse consequences on innocents, like the liar’s children, and instead, the court opts for public flogging as a deterrent.
- 4/11/25, Page 3 – Rav Yehuda, out of the blue in a discussion about loan repayment, announces that the act of cutting the fabric of a shirt to create the neck opening violates the Sabbath prohibitions on work. Rav Kahana objects, noting that one is allowed to remove the stopper from a wine barrel to create an opening. Rava says he’s full of it, after all, one isn’t drilling the opening, which would be prohibited, but just removing the stopper, which is a part of its purpose. My takeaway, wine corks exist to be removed!
- 4/12/25, Page 4 – Another tangent and a mildly deep dive into mikvahs, the ritual baths. The water in these must be naturally occurring, more or less stagnant, water and cannot be directly transported by human intervention. So, rainwater, seawater, lake water, but not river water, which is constantly moving. If you top up a ritual bath with non naturally collected water, like, say a barrel from a tap, there are limits on the ratio of that that affect the purity of the bath, but if you stay below that, it is assumed that the impure water becomes purified on contact with the purified. Not so for other substances, like spilled wine, which it is recommended you drink rather than bathe in.
- 4/13/25, Page 5 – A pair of witnesses swear that they overheard an accused murderer plotting to kill someone on, say, Tuesday, June 14th. But later, a second pair of witnesses comes forward to point out that on that Tuesday, the first witnesses were somewhere else. The first pair realize they’ve made a mistake, it was Wednesday, June 15th when they overheard the plot. No matter to the rabbinical court, clearly they were conspirators, and even though the murder actually took place, as they said, the court sentences them to death for the conspiracy. We all know that eyewitness testimony is unreliable when it comes to details. Clearly these rabbis didn’t watch enough cop shows.
- 4/14/25, Page 6 – I’m a bit confused trying to follow this particular passage. They’re talking about disqualifying witnesses because of their personal relationship to either a murderer or sodomizer, both acts seem to be equally repugnant to those involved in the discussion. First, the rabbis pretty much all agree that the murderer or sodomizer is disqualified as a witness because of his personal stake in the outcome of the trial, so no testifying on his own behalf. But then, the victim – a sodomized victim is disqualified as a witness if he saw who did it to him, he can only testify if he was “taken from behind”, and then only to things unrelated to the identity of the sodomizer. But then, the real twist… a murder victim is disqualified from testifying because of his personal stake in the matter… umm, isn’t a murder victim… dead?
- 4/15/25, Chapter 2, Page 7 – We’ve encountered the topic of “intent” numerous times over the last few years of exploring the Talmud. But I feel like this time perhaps they’ve stretched the definition a bit too far. The example used is someone fixing a roof, and either using a roller to spread tar, or raising/lowering a barrel of tar, or climbing on a ladder. If, the rabbis decide, your action is away from potential danger – i.e., pulling the roller away from the edge, raising the barrel, or climbing up the ladder, and a slip occurs, and you or the barrel/roller falls on someone and kills them, it is considered unintentional and accidental. However, if you are pushing the roller towards the edge, lowering the barrel, or descending the ladder, and the slip occurs, then it is considered intentional, because you should have been more careful, and you are exiled.
- 4/16/25, Page 8 – We continue in the vein of intention, and a curious dive into unintended consequences of a mitzvah. Examples given are a father disciplining his son, a teacher disciplining a student, an agent of the court disciplining a prisoner. If those things are being performed as a mitzvah, the first two centering around Torah instruction, the last around a court’s sentence, and the victim dies, the perpetrator is found not liable for exile. If, on the other hand, they are disciplining the victim for something unrelated to Torah learning or a court sentence, then they are liable, and punished by exile. Pay attention in Torah class kids!
- 4/17/25, Page 9 – Exile as a punishment for unintentional murder appears to have been relatively common in the culture back then. There were restrictions on who could take advantage of exile, but the key parts, basically, were that the person had to be a Jew or a ger toshav, a non-Jew, living in Israel, who had accepted the Noahide laws, i.e., the Ten Commandments, basically. Exile was to one of six designated sanctuary cities, three on each side of the Jordan River (noting that both modern day Israel and Jordan were both predominately Jewish lands at the time). The person accepting exile was accompanied, at a run, by two Torah scholars whose job it was to talk down any avenging relatives of the victim should they approach.
- 4/18/25, Page 10 – The relationship between teacher and student was considered so sacred that if a Torah teacher was exiled for unintentionally killing someone, his entire school, students and all, are exiled with him so that he can continue to teach them. This feels like a very different relationship from the one I and my fellow students had with Mr. Ryan in 9th grade English Lit class.
- 4/19/25, Page 11 – The sages are off on another of their tangents as they discuss the grammar of various words used for God’s speech or instructions. Sometimes the Torah specifies dibbur, harsh speech, sometimes amira, neutral speech, at other times nidberu, gentle, calming speech, and also, at times, yadber, firm, but subduing speech. Most of the discussion is over why the first, harsh speech, is commanded for any conversations about exile. We also, in a side note, find out that Joshua wrote the final verses of the Torah, not Moses.
- 4/20/25, Page 12 – Samael, the Angel of Rome, archangel or fallen angel? Condemner of sins or bringer of destruction? Heavenly host or demonic cohort? One of the most controversial figures in biblical literature, he pops up again and again, in various guises and for various reasons. On today’s page he seeks to enter a sanctuary city after killing a Roman citizen. But he is turned away because a) it was an intentional killing, b) he went to a non-sanctuary city to claim sanctuary, and c) exile only applies to humans, not to angels. Besides, he’s trying to avoid being nabbed by God, and I’m not sure that hiding in a sanctuary city would work for that anyway.
- 4/21/25, Chapter 3, Page 13 – People often cherry-pick the things they are against out of biblical prohibitions – be it justification for homophobia, racism, or misogyny. But as has been pointed out by many, better versed than I, in doing so they always leave out the prohibitions that involve things that they’re not against. On this page, the rabbis enumerate some of the actions that are punishable by forty lashes — incest, adultery, intercourse during menstruation, intermarriage, marrying a bastard, marrying a widow, marrying a divorcee, eating impure food, eating or working on Yom Kippur, eating food from produce that wasn’t tithed, and more. All receive equal punishment, not just the ones you agree with.
- 4/22/25, Page 14 – When it comes to multiple violations of the sexual prohibitions listed yesterday – incest, adultery, intercourse during menstruation – there’s a brief, if long winded, argument over whether the man “serves” consecutive or concurrent sentences. That’s to say, does he get forty lashes for each act, and/or woman, who he violated, one after the other, which could amount to hundreds of lashes, or does one session of forty handle it all? The vast majority of the rabbis, perhaps surprisingly given what we’ve seen in past writings, come down on the side of consecutive. Each violation of a woman counts, and is punished separately.
- 4/23/25, Page 15 – This is one of those pages that offends, egregiously, modern sensibilities. We start with a man who defames an unmarried, presumably virgin, woman. What the defamation is isn’t specified, but the implication is that he implies she’s not the virgin she claims to be. If proved wrong, he is flogged and must pay restitution for damaging her reputation. We move on to a man who rapes an unmarried, presumably virgin, woman. He is “punished” by being forced to marry her (no mention is made of the fact that she is forced to marry him) because… her value on the marriage market is decreased, and therefore he must marry and support her in perpetuity. No divorce allowed.
- 4/24/25, Page 16 – If a particular violation of a Torah prohibition has the specified punishment of flogging, that seems pretty clear-cut. However, it’s not. Flogging is only administered if the violation involves having taken a specific action, but is not administered if it involves not taking a specific action (with a couple of spelled out exceptions). This seems odd to me in that we’re talking about prohibitions against doing something in particular, though the example given makes a certain logical sense – if you swear an oath to do something and then don’t do it, then you’ve violated the prohibition against swearing a false oath, but you haven’t taken an action. Unless, as I would, you consider the choice of inaction to be an action in and of itself.
- 4/25/25, Page 17 – In a long and involved discussion over the tithing of various grains and whether or not eating some of tithed produce is worthy of receiving lashes, we have, yes, a tangent. Eating an ant is an act that the rabbis considered worthy of being flogged. Not because it’s not kosher (for which one might also receive lashes), which it’s not, along with virtually all other insects, but because you are eating an intact creation of God in its entirety. Five lashes! Wasps, six! These guys were really into flogging, for just about anything.
- 4/26/25, Page 18 – Way, way back we spent some time on a tractate that covered all the rules of various types of sacrifices and burnt offerings, the rituals surrounding them, and the eating of certain types of them after the rituals were complete. Not covered then was what happens when either the priests jump in and have a bite before the rituals are complete, or a non-priest joins in for a nibble. You guessed it, lashes, flogging!
- 4/27/25, Page 19 – Today’s argument seems worthy of a court hearing over contraband entering a country’s borders. At issue, a person bringing tithed produce to Jerusalem – there are certain rules for what is to be done wiht it prior to entering the city, and what is to be done after. In the case being argued, the person has entered the city, but the tithed produce is still on wagons that are being cleared by the then equivalent of Customs, and haven’t physically passed the city gates. If irregularities are found in the rules for the produce’s presence in the city, is the person liable, or, because the produce hasn’t yet entered, is he not. After much argument, the council desides he is, that his presence and intent to enter with the produce constitutes its arrival there.
- 4/28/25, Page 20 – Shaving one’s head, particularly as an expression of mourning, is prohibited. Today’s argument is over how much hair removal constitutes a violation. It ranges from a single white hair removed from among black hairs (vanity), to a two hair wide patch, to a patch the size of a lentil, a bean, or a “scissors-ful”. Lashes are, of course, involved – ranging from a set number to “one for each hair removed”. I’ve been shaving my head since I was in my late 30s, I’d never make it in the Orthodox world.
- 4/29/25, Page 21 – It’s Lash-Fest! Planting mixed crops, wearing mixed linens, plowing your field with different animals teamed up, trimming your beard, cutting yourself in mourning, using ashes to heal a wound, tattoos… they’re all fair game for the lash-giving council. Funny, the last one provokes the most argument, tattoos. I grew up with the admonition that tattoos are absolutely forbidden in Jewish tradition. Some of the rabbis here, perhaps a bit edgier than the rest, argue that only tattoos that include one of God’s sacred names are taboo, while others argue that only tattoos that have the names or images of other gods, idolatry, are no-gos.
- 4/30/25, Page 22 – Those of us not of a kosher bent sometimes joke that if two wrongs make a right, a bacon cheeseburger ought to be kosher. But the rabbis are having none of that, adding up lashes for, metaphorically the same situation, the cheese and meat together, the bacon, topping it with a prawn, lighting a fire on the Sabbath, cooking it on the Sabbath, and using meat that wasn’t properly slaughtered. The lashes just keep piling on. Then they get into the flogging process, fairly gruesome, but we do learn that if the person being flogged “soils” himself, either #1 or #2, he is exempt from the rest of his lashes. Seems like an easy out if you plan carefully.
- 5/1/25, Page 23 – Just in case you’ve never had the apparent privilege of flogging someone, you should know the rules. First, you have to rip the prisoner’s upper garments off him, making sure it’s humiliating when you do it. Then you administer the lashes – 1/3 to his front side, 2/3 to his back. Three people are assigned as your coaches, more or less – one to continually read out biblical verses, one to count the lashes, and one to keep exhorting you to whip the guy again. It’s nice to have supportive teammates.
- 5/2/25, Page 24 – We’re off flogging for the final page of this tractate. We’re on to the 613 mitzvot of the Torah. While all are listed as the word of God, historical figures have decided at various times that certain ones are more important than others. David declares that 11 of them are the core principles of the faith. But Isaiah later says it’s just 6. Then Micah comes along and picks out his 3 favorites. Isaiah isn’t having it and whittles it down to 1. Habakkuk says, “hold my beer”, and puts the entire core of faith on just one principle. Competitive righteousness. Kind of the summation of most organized religions.