Pirkei Avos : The Rama MiPano's Bombshell Revelation

This Torah class is brought to you by torahanytime.com. Okay, good morning everyone. Shalom aleikhem. The plan for this morning, we're going to have three shiurim to on pirkei avot. And one continuing in birkat hamazon. If I may I was remiss that I didn't uh wasn't able to to access it on Wednesday. But I want to take the opportunity to just to reiterate that today's learning should be lilui nishmas Rabbi Irwin Nathan, who was the one of the leaders of our khabura for many many years. For at least a decade that I was involved with the learning. And I see that we have the uh zchus to have with us in today's shiur. Um we'll have the Mrs. Nathan's wife. So we wish on this occasion I remember Mr. Nathan very fondly. As Joe mentioned very involved in the learning. Actually, if you look if you go back and listen to some of the many of the recordings of the shiurim so you could still hear his insights and his additions to our shiurim. And he was really went out of his way to help people especially I remember how he was master of his to help his nephew. And we wish the gan eden to him and his whole family. So I want to speak today about one interesting custom that is widespread in all of klal Yisrael. And the Ramah mi Pano interestingly takes issue with it. Uncovers its source and points out that it's not correct. All of klal Yisrael come out they begin pirkei avot. All of Israel share in the world to come. And your nation they're all righteous. You Forever they will inherit the land. Nitzer matai the branch of my planting masai yada lishbar. My handiwork to be glorified with. Very interestingly why do we mention this in connection to pirkei avot? What does it have to do with pirkei avot? It's not part of pirkei avot. It's the end of Sanhedrin. Now according to some girsos it's not even the end of Sanhedrin. So the Ramah mi Pano says that this custom before every perek of pirkei avot is absolutely incorrect. Many commentaries say, "Well, we're about to learn pirkei avot and we're being held to a very high standard and the character and the personality traits and the middos that we're expected to develop and engender are very challenging. So you might you know throw in the towel and say nah, it's impossible. I can't it's not for me. I can't hack this. This is not this is not going to work. So we calm you down we say don't worry. This is recommended but at the end of the day even if you don't live up to your at the expectations of pirkei avot don't worry. Let them know about Says the Ramah mi Pano, "Now let me tell you how this custom developed and actually the way we do it is not right." The Ramah mi Pano writes in the Maimonides pirkei test that he says it's reasonable to say in the doros rishonim only the bnei Eretz Yisrael would say let them know about And they would say the whole perek chelek the whole last perek of Sanhedrin. You know when? When in a year like this year where Isru Chag Pesach comes out on Shabbos. So we're not start starting pirkei avot until this week. So what do the bnei Eretz Yisrael do? They have seven weeks in between seven shabbos in between Pesach and Shavuos. So what do the bnei Eretz Yisrael do? So the same way the bnei chutz la'aretz where there really five perakim of pirkei avot but they add one perek of braysa at the end perek vov which is not really part of pirkei avot in order to get you till Shavuos. So the bnei Eretz Yisrael actually added a seventh perek. The Shabbos what's Yom Tov with the eighth day of Pesach with the acharon shel chag for the bnei chutz la'aretz is a Shabbos for the bnei Eretz Yisrael. So what do they do? They say the whole perek chelek until the end. Until the end. Now why do they do that? He says because the end of perek chelek is machlokes Rav Eliezer and Rabbi Akiva by the aseres hashvatim. And it's a collection of braysos similar to perek kinyan ha'Torah. And it talks about the resurrection of the dead. And why do we read about it on on Pesach? The same way the haftorah on Shabbos chol hamoed is we read about techiyas hameisim because we have a tradition the resurrection of the dead occurs in techiyas hameisim. So they read perek chelek that the end of it talks about whether the aseres hashvatim will be resurrected or won't they be resurrected because this is the month of resurrection. And they begin pirkei avot the next week together with the bnei chutz la'aretz. It never happened legitimately that you read and Moshiach came in the same week. Even though none of the later authorities ever figured this out says the Ramah mi Pano, "Well, they didn't get it right. But this is the correct and original practice of learning pirkei avot. All of Israel is for the bnei Eretz Yisrael only in a year like this that Isru Chag comes out on Shabbos. They needed they had an empty week so they learned perek chelek. And the ikar wasn't for the ikar was for the end. So this is the very unusual discovery of the Ramah mi Pano. Um The Yad Yehuda which is a commentary on the Ramah mi Pano says that in the Ramah mi Pano's opinion it's mistaber in the early generations the custom that we have today was not the custom. Only when Pesach came out on the last day of Shabbos and there were seven weeks they would read chelek which is perek yud of Sanhedrin on that first week. And for us we skip it and we never said ever ever ever. Now what was so special about we have the because at the end of that perek we have the mishnayos about Eranei Dakhos. Which talks about machlokes Rav Eliezer and Rabbi Akiva by the aseres hashvatim. And the Yad Yehuda says the same way on Shabbos chol hamoed we read about the resurrection in Yechezkel. That's the haftorah of Shabbos chol hamoed Pesach. And the Tur brings from Rav Hai Gaon why do we read that? Because we have a tradition techiyas hameisim comes in chodesh Nisan. So that's the minhag on Pesach as well on the final day for the bnei Eretz Yisrael. So interestingly according to the Ramah mi Pano um the custom to say is misplaced and it should not be done. There's nothing wrong with it. If you want to say it you could say it but it's just interesting what the source of this minhag is. Okay? So that's part one. You've just experienced another Torah class brought to you by torahanytime.com.