Applying the Findings of the Halakhic Anecdote Study to Three Bavli Sugyot

For several years, I have been studying halakhic anecdotes in the two Talmuds--those brief passages that describe how one amora carried out a halakhah that was formulated by another, earlier amora. The key conclusion I arrived at is that the halakhic action of the second amora in some way modifies the halakhic statement of the first. This is true in sugyot where the anecdote is introduced by the phrase “one rabbi visited another (R X iqla l’vei R Y)” or “I, a student of R X, was standing before him (hava qa’imna)” or “he encountered him” (R X ashkeheih l’R Y). These anecdotes do not show, as some have argued, how pious the amora was, but just the opposite: how he altered the law as he was implementing it, on occasion to meet his own needs.

These observations have led me to interpret many sugyot anew. I will present and analyze in detail three sugyot: one sugya about men and women being transported in a sedan chair on a festival (bBesah 25b), another about sharpening knives on a festival (bBesah 28b), and a third about rabbis’ perception of the value of their own teachings (bBerakhot 11a). These sugyot gain new contextual meaning when the general conclusions of the halakhic anecdote study are applied to them.