Tosefot’s radical interpretation of “אָֽהַבְתָּ֥ לְרֵֽעֲךָ֖ כָּמ֑וֹךָ-You shall love your neighbor as yourself ”

When we contemplate how to fulfill the commandment “אָֽהַבְתָּ֥ לְרֵֽעֲךָ֖ כָּמ֑וֹךָ-You shall love your neighbor as yourself ” (Leviticus 19:18), we most likely think about how we should treat our neighbor as Moses Maimonides writes: “We are obligated to love every single fellow person as ourselves, as the Torah states, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ Therefore, we must praise others, and we must care about their money just as we care about our own money in her own dignity. Whoever derives honor from humiliating someone else, loses his share in the world to come.” (Hilhkot Da’ot 6:3)

Twice on today’s daf TB Sanhedrin 45 Rav Naḥman teaches that we have to balance the condemned person’s dignity and the most compassionate i.e. the fastest and the most painless way of execution by quoting our verse. A woman is not stoned naked because “Rav Naḥman says that Rabba bar Avuh says: The verse states: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18), teaching that even with regard to a condemned prisoner, select a good, i.e., a compassionate, death for him. Therefore, when putting a woman to death by stoning, she should not be humiliated in the process.” (Sefaria.org translation)

The height of the cliff that the condemn person is pushed off of has to be three times they height of an average person even though a smaller height would suffice because “Rav Naḥman says that Rabba bar Avuh says: The verse states: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18), teaching that even with regard to a condemned man, select a good, i.e., a compassionate, death for him. Therefore, even though the one being executed is likely to die from a fall from a lesser height, a platform is built that is twice the height of an ordinary person in order to ensure a quick and relatively painless death. The Gemara challenges: If so, they should raise the platform even higher. The Gemara answers: This is not done, because if the condemned man were pushed from a higher platform, he would become seriously disfigured, and this would no longer be considered a compassionate form of death.” (Sefaria.org translation)

Tosefot ד"ה בְּרוֹר לוֹ מִיתָה יָפָה presents a radical reinterpretation of our verse. They say that this verse “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” doesn’t apply to life situations because a person’s life takes precedence over another person’s life. The most famous example is two people wandering the desert with only enough water for one person. If they split it, they will both die. Consequently, the person who owns the canteen of water keeps it for himself for his life takes precedence over the other. Our verse therefore must be talking only about the death penalty. We are commanded to choose the best possible death to fulfill our verse. Radical interpretation indeed.

The blog Talmudolgy which analyzes sugiyot from the Talmud based on modern science and medicine writes on the topic Stoning and the Height of a Lethal Fall. The question he analyzes is the height taught in our massekhet fulfilling Rav Naḥman understanding of “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” I recommend reading the entire blog for his very interesting, but here is his conclusion:

 “In conclusion, the first part of the penalty of stoning - that push of a twelve foot platform - would only very rarely result in the instant death of the criminal.  This meant that the execution would proceed to the second step - in which a heavy stone was placed on the chest to cause suffocation. The details are horrific, and thankfully have not been practiced in our legal system for nearly two thousand years. ” (https://www.talmudology.com/)