Language Studies

Aramaic Thoughts

Aramaic Literature - Part 14 - The Mishnah

The seventh treatise in Qodashim is Kerithoth (cutting off). It has to do with those offenses for which an offender was to be cut off from his people. It specifies thirty-six particular transgressions for which a man may be cut off, including various sexual offenses, blasphemy, idolatry, profaning the Sabbath, and so forth. If he committed the transgression in error, he is not cut off, but must bring a sin-offering. In some cases, if he committed the transgression knowingly, in most cases it became a capital case, with execution by either stoning or burning.

One of the sexual transgressions specified is, in a bizarre way, a little humorous. If a man has relations with his daughter “who was his sister through incestuous connexion with his mother, and married first to his brother and then to his uncle” he becomes liable for six sin-offerings all at once (Danby, Mishnah, p. 566, fn. 9).

The next treatise is Meilah (sacrilege). This deals with misuse or misappropriation of temple property. The general rule of this law is that it “does not apply to whatsoever had at one time been permitted to the priests, and it applies to whatsoever had at no time been permitted to the priests” (Danby, 573). The curious thing about virtually this entire treatise is that it applied specifically to the temple, and the rituals, especially of sacrifice, connected with the temple. The question then becomes what the significance of these regulations was once the temple had been destroyed and the sacrificial ritual no longer pertained. That is unclear, except that perhaps to some extent the principles laid out guided not only synagogue practice, but the development of the post-temple Jewish community as well.

Following Meilah is the treatise Tamid (the daily offering). As the reader might suspect, this regulates the temple practices related to the regular daily morning and evening sacrifices (see Exodus 29:38-42 and Numbers 28:1-8). After Tamid is Middoth (measurements). This section has to do with the measurements of the temple before its destruction in AD 70. This is summarized in a very helpful footnote in Danby (fn 11, p. 589). The total areas was 550 cubits square. This square is subdivided into a number of rectangles which make up the Court of the Gentiles, the Court of the Women, and the Temple Court. The Temple Court was further subdivided into the Court of the Israelites, the Court of the Priests, and the area filled by the Temple itself. These several parts of the Temple area had differing degrees of sanctity, with the great sanctity attaching to those areas closest to the actual temple building. A reconstruction and drawing of the Jerusalem Temple may be found in the Zondervan Pictorial Encyclopedia of the Bible, vol. 5, pp. 647,649, though the various specifications given in Middoth are not indicated.

The final treatise of Qodashim is Kinnim (bird offerings). As might be expected, this lays down more precise regulations than are found in the Old Testament text regarding the birds used for sacrifice.

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