Beraira TB Eruvin 36

Today’s daf TB Eruvin 36 introduces us to the concept of beraira-ברירה. It literally means a choice of two or more possibilities. In the case of our Mishna, can one retroactively choose one of his two eruvin (plural of eruv)? The Mishna gives an example. A scholar is coming to town and you want to greet him, but you don’t know from which direction he’s approaching the town. So you make an erev tekhumim in both directions. Obviously, a person can only have one makom shevita. The question arises once he knows on Shabbat which direction the scholar is coming, can he retroactively choose the correct eruv?

“If a Sage comes from the east and he is spending Shabbat beyond the boundaries of my town, my eiruv is in the east, so that I may go out to greet him there; and if he comes from the west, my eiruv is in the west. If one Sage comes from here, and another Sage comes from there, I will go wherever I wish; and if no Sage comes, neither from here nor from there, I will be like the rest of the inhabitants of my town. Rabbi Yehuda says: If one of the Sages coming from opposite directions was his teacher, he may go only to his teacher, as it is assumed that was his original intention. And if they were both his teachers, so that there is no reason to suppose that he preferred one over the other, he may go wherever he wishes.” (Sefari.org Translation)

Interestingly Rabbi Yitzḥak has a different version of our mishna “The Gemara relates that when Rabbi Yitzḥak came from Eretz Yisrael to Babylonia, he taught all of the laws in the mishna in the opposite manner. That is to say, according to him, … if the Sage came from the east, his eiruv would be to the west. …and similarly there is a contradiction between the ruling concerning a Sage in the mishna and the ruling concerning a Sage in the baraita.” (Sefari.org Translation). Why in the world would somebody avoid a scholar and an opportunity to learn Torah?

The Gemara provides two answers. “Similarly, the apparent contradiction between the ruling concerning a Sage in the mishna and the ruling concerning a Sage in the baraita is not difficult: This case in the mishna is referring to a scholar who sits and delivers public Torah lectures, and one wishes to come and learn Torah from him; whereas that case in the baraita is referring to one who teaches children how to recite the Shema, i.e., one who teaches young children how to pray, of whom he has no need. The baraita teaches that if a scholar came from one direction to deliver a public lecture and the school teacher came from the opposite direction, his eiruv is in the direction of the scholar.

“We learned in the mishna that Rabbi Yehuda says: If one of the Sages was his teacher, he may go only to his teacher, as we can assume that this was his original intention. The Gemara asks: And what is the reason that the Rabbis do not accept this straightforward argument? The Gemara answers: The Rabbis maintain that sometimes one prefers to meet the Sage who is his colleague rather than the Sage who is his teacher, as sometimes one learns more from his peers than from his teachers.” (Sefari.org Translation)

 Perhaps the schoolteacher has nothing to teach him and attending his class would be a waste of time, but the person didn’t want to embarrass the teacher or himself by remaining in place and not attending his class. I can attest to the fact that I learned a lot from my teachers and continue to do so to this very day. But I have learned much more from my peers when it comes to being a good rabbi than my teachers back at JTS. I must humbly add whatever deficits as a rabbi I have are mine alone and nobody else is to blame.