Monday, January 08, 2007

Rosh Hashana 34b - Blowing or Blessing

MAZAL TOV ON MASECHES ROSH HASHANA!!!
If faced with a choice of one or the other, one should choose a place where they may blow shofar, rather than a place where they definitely have a shliach tzibur to daven, bec. shofar is d'eoraysa (gemara). The Sefas Emes asks that according to the Rambam that a safek d'oraysa is only derabonon l'chumrah, it comes out that either way it is only derabonon. He is mechadesh that even though the chiyuv is the same one way or the other, one is still required to choose the side where you may walk away fulfilling a mitzvah d'oraysa rather than a mitzvah derabonon.
A second point: The Nishmas Adam (68:3) proves from this gemara that one is not responsible to travel to another city to perform a mitzvah since the city where they have a shliach tzibbur are not traveling to hear shofar in the other city. Based on this, why would the individual have a chiyuv to travel to the city where they are blowing, he should also not be required to travel for a mitzvah!
Perhaps we can slightly modify the sefas emes's peshat and say that on the level of chiyuv there is no difference between the 2 cities since the chiyuv to go to either one is only d'rabonon. Nevertheless, the chiyuv d'rabonon requires this person to travel to one of them, therefore the gemara says there is an advantage in choosing a city where he may fulfill a d'oraysa mitzvah. But, the people of the city where they are blowing do not have chiyuv to travel because on the level of chiyuv, it is derabonon either way (at least acc. to Rambam).

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