My learning partner thinks conversion to Torah is mainly dependent on the will of the person..
And Rav Shach [Elazar Menachem Shach] says it is mainly dependent on the will of the court. Just that they can't do it if the convert objects. This subject comes up in Reb Chaim of Brisk [Chidushei HaRambam] where my partner  and I spent some time.

[1] I did not realize it before, but now I understand  that Tosphot  [Sanhedrin 63a] is not concerned with explaining what is not right about Rabbi Zakai. That was already explained on page 62a. Rather Tosphot wants to explain what is right about Rabbi Ami. [Because we see R. Yochanan  did not ask on Rabbi Ami.]
[2] R. Yochanan says to R. Ami, "I can understand you because you are basing yourself on the drasha 'Don't serve.' If not for that, you would have used 'bowing' to divide everything. But now you use it only for itself. That is fine. But Rabbi Zakai is not basing himself on that drasha [explanation]. He would say 'bowing' comes for a mere prohibition even if we did not have 'Don't serve' --that is even if the services were in fact divided for some other reason."
[3] The Maharsha understands that the reasoning of R. Ami is that there is one verse to tell us serving idols is prohibited. So why is there another verse? [There are three verses total.] It is to limit something. That is it limits the three services [inner services that were done in the Temple]that if one does them in one span of forgetting he is liable only one sin offering.
[4] The basic reason why the opinion of R Zakai was rejected was explained on pg 62. R Aba thought it was a parallel case to Rabbi Yose. But it turned out that it was not because R. Yose would have used fire to teach about the whole category if he was able. But there was nothing to teach so he used fire for  a prohibition. [work on Shabat was already divided by  אחת מהנה]
But R Ami uses "Don't serve" for something, so "Don't bow" comes to teach on what is left-- which is just itself and perhaps also service according to its way.
[5] The question I have here is why is it in fact so clear that R. Zakai is not using "Dont serve?"  Could he use it to put the three together maybe and "Don't bow" for a mere prohibition?
It seems the answer is that if was doing that it would violate the principle whatever was in a category and came out to be mentioned by itself has to teach something about the whole category.
But does this seem all that different from R Ami to you? To R. Ami also bowing is coming out for itself alone. Just what it is saying about itself is what it would have said about the whole category if it had been able. So maybe the same goes for if it comes for a mere prohibition? Maybe I could say bowing wanted to tell you the whole category was only a prohibition but it could not do that because the verse already tells us idolatry brings a sin offering. so then it teaches about itself alone.!!! In other words I am not so sure that there is all that much difference between R. Ami and Rabbi Zakai.
Of course this last suggestion does seem ridiculous after all the Torah itself tells us there is a sin offering one must bring for idolatry. Maybe after all that is what Rabbi Yochanan thought was not right about the opinion of R. Zakai.


[6] The braita on 61b said that bowing comes to teach about itself  which is different from Abyee who is explaining r  ami and says it comes to divide. There might not be any question here.

My learning partner thinks that the braita on page 61 is no contradiction to our "sugia" [subject] here on page 63a. It is just dealing with a different subject--that is how to derive the different services. Not if they are divided.


[7] Anyway at this point we seem to have gotten the idea of what Tosphot is saying--more or less. There might be now a thousand unanswered questions but so what. We are not trying to answer all the questions. we are trying sipy to understand what tsophot is saying which means how do we understand the verse of the Bible "Don't bow and don't serve idols."

 סנהדרין סג.תוספות בראש הדף. ר. אמי אמר שמי שזבח קיטר וניסך בהעלם אחד חייב אחת. אביי פירשו שטעמו בא מן הפסוק "לא תעבדם". הכתוב עשה כולן עבודה אחת. בדף סב. רבי זכי אמר אותו דבר אלא שהוסיף השתטחות. רבינו תם אמר שמילת השתטחות מופיע במשפטו של רבי זכי לא במשפטו של רבי אמי. הסיבה לכך היא שיש פסוק בעשרת הדברות "לא תשתחווה להם ולא תעבדם."  הפסוק אסר כל מין עבודה  והוציא השתטחות להיזכר בפני עצמה. ולכן כל עבודות פנימיות נחשבות עבודה אחת, והשתטחות נחשבת בפני עצמה ואם עשה כולן בהעלם אחד חייב שתיים. אחת בשביל השלש, ואחת בשביל השתטחות. ועכשיו למה ר' יוחנן אמר לר' זכאי "פוק תני לברא" שיש סברה לומר שלשת עבודות הפנימיות נחשבות אחת אבל לא השתטחות.לא מעניין לתוספות להסביר מה שאינו נכון בשיטת ר' זכאי בגלל שזה כבר מוסבר למעלה בדף סב.. מעניין לתוספות להסביר מה נכון בשיטת רבי אמי. צריך להיות חילוק בגלל שרבי יוחנן שאל על ר' זכאי ולא על רבי אמי. הסיבה ששיטת ר' זכאי נדחה לעיל היא מוסברת בדף סב. רבי אבא רצה להשוות בין רבי יוסי ורבי זכאי. והתברר שזה אינו יכול להיות בגלל שרבי יוסי היה משתמש בפסוק לא תבערו אש בכל מושבותיכם ביום השבת לחלק את המלאכות אם היה יכול. אבל לא היה יכול בגלל שהמלאכות כבר מוחלקות על ידי הפסוק אחת מהנה. ולכן הוא משתמש עם אש בשביל "ללאו יצאה". אבל רבי אמי משתמש עם לא תעבוד הכתוב עשה כולן עבודה אחת ולכן לא תשתחווה לא יכולה לחלק את כולן אלא באה לחלק על עצמה.רבי יוחנן  הוא בסדר עם רבי אמי בגלל שר' אמי היה משתמש עם השתחוייה לחלק את כל העבודות אם היה יכול, אבל אינו יכול בגלל לא תעבדם עשה כולן עבודה אחת. ולכן נשאר רק להשתמש אתו לחלק על עצמה (ואולי גם עבודה כדרכה). אבל ר' זכאי אינו דורש לא תעבדם לעשות כולן עבודה אחת. והמהר''ם הסביר שאינו צריך לא תעבדם לזה שאין סיבה מראש לחלק אותן.אבל איך יודעים שר' זכאי אינו משתמש עם לא תעבדם? הלא אפשר שיגיד לא תעבדם עשה כולן עבודה אחת ולא תשתחווה ללאו אצאה?תירוץ: אם זה הוא מה שהוא עושה  זה הולך כנגד הכלל כל מה שהוא בכלל ויצא מן הכלל ללמד לא על עצמו בא ללמד אלא על בכלל כולו יצא ללמד
אגב המברש''א סובר שלא תעבדם הוא מיעוט בגלל שיש שלשה פסוקים  לא תעבדם, ולכן אחד הוא הכלל ואחד בא למעט.
עוד הערה: הברייתא בדף סא: אומרת שהשתחוויה באה ללמד על עצמה באופון אחר מן אביי שאמר שהיא באה לחלק על עצמה. יכול להיות שאין כאן סתירה משום שהברייתא דנה בשאלה אחרת--איך ללמוד את העבודות האסורות. ואביי דן בשאלה אם לחלק את העבודות

I am skipping here the fact that the Maharsha thinks it is Ok to use "bowing" for itself alone and that is still called teaching on the whole category and my idea that bowing also teaches on service according to its way.-which just makes things better.

The thing that I don't understand in the Maharsha is this: Why does he need don't serve to be a מיעוט  and exclusionary principle? I am not arguing that it is not possible. There is another verse for the general principle dont serve idols. So clearly the next verse has to be telling us something different and it has nothing it can expand into so it must contract. Clear. But why does the Maharsha need this?
I thought everything was hunky dory before that. We had "Don't serve" for a principle that puts all three services [inner services that were done in the Temple]. And then we have bowing to come out to divide for itself [that if done with the others still requires its own sin offering]. I mean to say that it is still teaching about the whole category--whatever was left in it after you excluded the big three. Or is it possible that the Maharsha is just saying what  I am saying? After all it does occur to me I just used the idea that don't serve does exclude the big three. David thought the words "the exclusionary principle of 'Don't serve'"was the key to the Maharsha.

The thing about Israel is it very much group based. It is almost impossible to make it there unless one is part of some group. I am not sure why this is but experience shows it to be the case. My own experience was such that the first time I went there I was part of a group. Rav Ernster was staring the place in Safed called Meor Chaim and he invited me from the Mirrer Yeshiva in NY to be part of his Kollel. So in fact without my being aware of its importance I was in fact part of a group. Later on I tried to go there on my own and it always ended in failure.


It is easy to ignore what you have when you don't realize how important it is. My first trip to Israel the road was paved by the State of Israel itself and the community in Meor Chaim. Later on I made several attempts at just showing up and paying rent in any old place and someone found that it was impossible to survive.
So I do think living in Israel is a Mitzvah, but it must be done in the context of some "misgeret" group.
I should mention that it is a positive command [one of the 613 mitzvot] according to the Ramban (Nachmanides). But not to the Rambam [Maimonides]. But it still is a mitzvah to the opinion of the Rambam.

If you grew up in a time in the USA when individuality was the primary principle, and to shoot straight from the hip (speak your mind straight), then this idea of the need to be part of a group is almost impossible to accept. But in a practical sense it is impossible to avoid if one wants to succeed in making Aliyah.
 Israel however even as a short stop over is an amazing place. Though it is hard there , still ever time I went there I had some kind of breakthrough in different subjects. Torah Music, Math etc.

Before going to Israel I recommend getting an appreciation for the place perhaps from the books of Avraham Kook or the books of the Gra like the Kol HaTor

I have been dealing with the Tosphot on the top of the page in Sanhedrin 63a.

I wrote about this in a blog entry a few days ago but now I want to add.

The way Tosphot is looking at this according to the Maharsha is that "Don't serve" is a exclusionary principle. [It comes to exclude something] We had before that all kinds of services were forbidden and then "Don't serve"  puts the three inner services into one and comes to exclude the three from the normal category.
And then what is left for "Don't bow" to tell us? Only what is left in the larger category--that is- itself.
That is how the Maharsha is explaining Tosphot. [This is the view of R Ami. And this is good because it allows bowing to tell us about the whole category. And this shows why R Yochanan did not accept R Zakai's approach since it has bowing to teach about itself alone. And that is no good. It goes against the principle what ever was in a category and is mentioned separately goes out to teach about the whole category.]
The Maharam adds an important observation  that R. Zakai never needed "Don't serve" to make  any kinds of idolatry into one category. There was no reason in the first place to divide them.[Not like in Shabat where we have אחת מהנה to divide.] [That is: that bowing did not leave the category of "Don't serve" because don't serve was not a general category.]
But to the Maharsha everyone agrees with Abyee that  "bowing" comes to divide. Only  the fact that "Don't serve" took the three inner services out of the larger category means that they don't get divided.
In any case, both the Maharsha and Maharam explain Tosphot well and differently than I was doing. Because I thought that R. Zakai was in fact using "Don't serve" to include all four services. This is clearly not what Tosphot was saying, and it was a mistake on my part.

In the long run, however, it looks like the fact is that R. Zakai is considering R. Ami's idea that "bowing" can be refering to the whole category when it is in fact only referring to itself as wrong.
But the way I was putting this idea was sloppy and I apologize for that.

In summary:

What is happening is Tosphot says that R Zakai is not using the "drasha" on  "Don't serve." The way the Maharsha explains that is to say "Don't serve" came out of the general category of service, not the opposite in which bowing comes out. So bowing is in the category and never left it and so does not need to teach anything about the general category. The Maharam deals with it by saying R. Zakai never needed "Don't serve."

[I am not saying everything here is fine. This obviously still needs a lot of work. But right now all I am doing is to try and get how the Maharsha and Maharam understand Tosphot. If we can get that down pat, then we can then go and try to figure out the many obvious questions here. ]

Torah has two things neat about it. One is its luminous, numinous aspect that you get to when you learn in a Lithuanian yeshiva. [Other places or synagogues are worthless when it comes to this aspect of Torah. It has to be someplace on the path of the Gra. ] The other neat thing about Torah is it opens a window to the realm of Light and Holiness. And this last function is what I think it was made for. The first aspect I think is secondary. [My reasoning is based on a commentary on the Rambam that was mentioned in the Musar book Or Israel. That is a foundational text about the Musar Movement of Israel Salanter.]

What I suggest is to learn Torah at home.  For beginners that means the Old Testament, and the Soncino Talmud in English and just plow through them.  

The Rambam thinks people are not inherently moral. Even the level of natural law before Mount Sinai had to be revealed in some way.

 When reading the Guide  for the Perplexed of the Rambam straight it is easy to miss this. This is why Reform Jews are right for making a study of the Rambam's Guide. If you don't make it into a serious subject of study, it is easy to miss important points.
Or what often happens is people come up with their own ideas of what Torah ought to say, and then think that that is what is actually says even though their ideas contradict the Rambam. As if they think they understand the Torah better than the Rambam. Now sometimes they depend on Nachmanides, and that is OK.

There is no prohibition baking a cake for sinners.
But if there is a possibility they will listen you should tell them that what they are doing is a sin.
According to the Gra you should tell them even if you are sure they will not listen. At least I think that is what the Gra holds. And I think I saw something like that in the Shelah once.
  any case baking cakes for them is the best possible thing. White flour and vegetable oil and all the other stuff they put into cakes is like feeding them poison.  Delete the "like." It is feeding them poison. The question is are you allowed to bake a cake for hetrosexuals? I doubt it.

I mainly hold from learning Torah. But I don't think doing this in a study hall or beit midrash or yeshiva makes much sense anymore.

One is supposed to learn Torah all the time. And there used to be places where you could go to learn. Like the Mirrer Yeshiva in Brooklyn. But no every place is fit because in some places the light of Torah does not enter into the learning. Even though the books are the same the light stays outside.
You can tell where the real Torah is by  signs. In any case, to be on the safe side I recommend learning Torah at home alone and never going near any religious synagogue.

In fact learning at that breslov place I sometimes feel a kind of "help from heaven"  סיעתא דשמיא in my learning. Like just today I walked in and I was already exhausted from running around, but i sat down with a Gemara and looked at a Maharam on a Tosphot in Sanhedrin 63 and it suddenly and instantaneously became clear to me what Tosphot is saying.


David, the fellow I learn with thinks that the best sign of a bad place is when then throw out people that are sincere.

The Ukraine I think has been unfairly treated by Russian Media. I have heard things that imply that Jews are not treated well. And yet this does not seem to me to be accurate. My impression is that Jews are treated like anyone else. And I have seen a lot of effort made to make Rosh Hashanah comfortable for people coming to visit .
In general what you see in Uman is that anyone that owns property anywhere within walking distance of the synagogue of  builds as large a building as they can in order to put in as many people he can for Rosh Hashanah.
And they make efforts to be nice.
The reality that I have seen on the ground does not resemble way Russia Today portrays it.
I could go on with examples but you get the idea.
The funny thing is that I have been treated much worse in places that have reputations for being nice to Jews. Sometime reality does not resemble what the the media portrays. And this seems to be a prime example.

Germany for example is supposed to be nice nowadays but when I was there the Turkish population was very nasty. I think Germany thought they could make up for WWII by being nice to immigrants. But it seems to me that they made a mistake in policy.

Rav Shach [author of the Avi Ezri].  To his way of thinking only Torah is Torah and nothing else. That means learning the Oral and Written Law and doing what the Law tells us. It is hard to argue with this. And he also seems to think learning books about the hashkafa (or world view) of Torah is a bad thing. He applies the verse in Ecclesiastes against making books to books about hashkafa. That is they are bad.
Now to a large degree it is true that most such books are amazingly stupid, and certainly take people away from Torah when they read that nonsense. [They make  obviously false presumptions or else have wolrd views opposed to Torah that they present as Torah and by that manage to pull naive people into things that are not Torah. ]

But what I am confused about is if it is possible to give Torah a slightly wider interpretation? And if so, how wide?

The first step for me is to look at my parents. What did they consider to be Torah? And also parents are the first place that the Torah itself give regarding orientation. Now starting from my own parents makes everything remarkably clear. They had a very definite idea of what constitutes Torah that is the exact same thing as Rav Shach. The Oral and Written Law. That means the Old Testament, the two Talmuds and the halakhic and aggadic midrashim;-- or collectively what is called "The Mesora."(Torat Kohanim, Sifra, Sifri, Tosephta, Midrash Raba, Tanchuma,  and the Mechilta.)
There still would be a wider idea of what Torah is about coming from the side of my parents than sitting in yeshiva and learning I think.
It is that grey area between Rav Shach and my parents that I find difficult to deal with. I think Rav Shach would have held that one should learn Torah all the time. My parents would have thought that a wide range of activities constitutes keeping the Torah like taking the family to the beach on weekends, learning Music, Math, Physics, Engineering. It is hard to know. Because the Torah itself puts parents first I would have to side with my parents, but I can see the importance of Rav Shach and of learning Torah --that is Gemara, Rashi, and Tosphot as much as possible,
[Looking at the Rambam and Saadia Geon it seems they were more towards the direction of my parents. The Rambam is famous [or infamous] for his approval of Aristotle and learning Physics and Metaphysics. The Rambam meant by "Metaphysics" not just the book of Aristotle by that name but also the works of Plato--as he calls it "what the Greeks called Metaphysics." That means a wider set of books than just Aristotle.]

I am being short on purpose. Today the world of Torah is not like it was in Rav Shach's time.  Nor is university like it was in my parent's time. The world has changed and so have the rules. In any case, we all need to learn Torah and also Math and Physics,-- and survival skills and an honest profession.
There is no difference of opinion about that. How we go about it will have to differ according to the person and situation.

Rav Shach [Elazar Menachem  Shach, author of the Avi Ezri] asked what is really an obvious question but one that you don't hear much. That is the fact that there is a verse in Ecclesiastes that put down the making of books.  You know the verse so I dont need to quote it. Mainly it says there is no end to the making of books and they are worthless effort and a joke.
The obvious thing is that in the Torah world, we do have books and a lot of them are valuable.
I would think that there is a difference between the oral law and the written law. But that is not the answer he gives. He says the difference is between books that deal with understanding how to keep the commandments of God as explained in the Gemara according to the foundational principles of the Talmud which is OK and books on hashkafa [the world view and philosophy of Torah--e.g. understanding the reasons for the mitzvot.
And he has a point. I can see important value for books on orientation like the Guide for the Perplexed by the Rambam and the Horev from Shimshon Raphael Hirsch, and the books of Rav Avraham Kook. But mainly books on Hashkafa seem to me to be talking nonsense.
What is wrong with books of Torah hashkafa [world view]? One problem is the question who is qualified to write about what the Torah holds?  Who is qualified to even have an opinion about such a thing? Only someone who has read through the material and knows it well. Someone like for instance Moshe Ben Maimon (Maimonides). If anyone is qualified to have an opinion about what the Torah hold surely he must be at the top of the list. And to our great happiness he actually wrote a book explaining what the world view of the Torah is. You would think that people would be overjoyed. But no. People don't want to hear what he has to say because they have their own opinions about what they think the Torah ought to be saying. And they write they own books of nonsense and tell you not to learn the Rambam's book because it might confuse you and take you away from their own views which are contrary to those of the Rambam.

There is an area in the Ukraine which the separatists are seeking. The whole area they call "New Russia" [Novoi-Russia] is larger than just the two provinces that they have taken control of. Part of the reason I think they are seeking this new area is that the actual areas they already control have little strategic value to Russia. But the new area the rebels are seeking has immense value to Russia because it contains the backbone of the Russian space program and manufacturing of military hardware.
That whole strip of land starting at Kharkiv and all the way down to the sea is one vast military industrial complex of immense strategic value to Russia.
[I am not saying Russia does not produce its own stuff. Rather that industry was purposely divided by Stalin so that one part of a plane would be produced in one region and another part in another region--so that all of the USSR would be dependent on every other region. This means that a significant part of Russia replacement parts and rocket parts is still being produced in the Ukraine. So the fact that business is down in the Ukraine is a good thing. It means they are no longer supplying the Russian military. I can imagine the reason is they don't like being shot at. You won't see this information about Russian weapons because anything made in the USSR proper they won't tell you where it is made. Only if it is made in satellites of the USSR do they name the country of origin.]



Just to give one example to build the kind of aircraft carrier that Russia wants to build is not possible in any existing Russian facilities. The building of Russian rockets and aircraft is largely done on Ukrainian soil. This was never a problem  because the work was simply done in the Ukraine an sent to Russia. Nowadays this arrangement has become strained. It is hard for me to imagine that separatists will see this gold mine of a preexisting military industrial area right across its border and not want to take it.
That is to say that they are probably hoping to expand and take that area. But it also seems clear to me that the Ukrainian people in those areas will not hand over that territory peacefully. So if the separatists want that area they will have to take it by force.
And the separatist are definitely getting Russian military hardware like the anti tank PTRS-41. 

The Torah forbids things that people desire. Lots of things. And it assumes people have free will.
The idea that people have free will is a basic axiom of Torah. And we know the Torah forbids lots of stuff that people desire intensely. For example, "Thou shalt not murder." "Thou shalt not steal." Etc. "Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor." Lot of people lie. All Democrats use their power to steal (to vote for themselves other people's money). The fact that they can steal does not give them the right to. So we see people desire things the Torah tells them not to do.

So what to do if you desire things the Torah says not to do? My main idea is to learn Torah. That is especially Musar and the laws about the area you think you might be acting wrong.
[Musar here means books on Fear of God and ethics written during the Middle Ages or early Renaissance. ]
And I realize that not everyone can do what is right. But one thing you can do--you can refrain from recommending evil. Even if you can't refrain from sin, you can at least hold yourself back from trying to convince others to sin.
This is relevant to lots of issues. For example homosexuals desire something the Torah forbids. That does not give them the right to act on their desires. But even if they can't help themselves they should at lets refrain from trying to convince everyone else to be homosexuals. Even if they can't be decent people, they can at least want that others should be.
Now the actual law of homosexuality is this Females are allowed to play with each other. Males get the death penalty if there is penetration into the anus. If the males think the act is permitted then they bring a sin offering to the Temple in Jerusalem, [a goat or sheep]. If there are no witnesses they don't get the death penalty but they also can't bring a sin offering for an act done on purpose.

Sanhedrin 63. See in the top Tosphot the part where Rabbainu Tam explains this Gemara.

The question I am dealing with here is that R. Ami says one does the three inner services in one span of forgetting is liable one sin offering. This seems to be fine even with people that disagree with it. But Rabbi Zakai said one who does all four services is liable one sin offering and this seems to get everyone especially R Yochanan upset. What is the difference?
We have one verse to put the three services together "Don't serve idols." Another verse which van be used to separate the services "Don't bow to idols."
To Rabbi Ami it seems "bowing" is coming to teach on itself [doing it with the other three means one would have to bring two sin offerings.] And R Yochanan seems to be OK with this. But why?


 If it is teaching about itself alone, then it is not teaching about the whole category of "service." You can say two things here. You can say what would it have taught us if it could? To divide. But it can't do that because of "Dont serve" so all that is left for it to do is to  divide itself from the others.

Another thing you could say is that it tells us to divide service according to its way from the others.

Now let's look at R. Zakai. "Don't serve" includes all kinds of service--inner and outer. But then why does "bowing" get mentioned separately? To tell us it is a mere prohibition. That is he thinks that since there is nothing it can tell us about the whole category of service it can only tell us about itself. This made R.Yochanan upset. If used to divide itself --that would be OK. But to be used to tell us it is a mere prohibition that is not OK. What is the difference?
One we say is teaching about the whole category and the other we say is not. The later is true. But the first claim? Perhaps that is the difference. R Zakei thinks bowing to divide only teaches about itself so it is equal to what he says. R Ami says it teaches about service according to its way and so can be considered to be teaching about the whole category.


 סנהדרין סג. תוספות בראש הדף. ר. אמי אמר שמי שזיבח קיטר וניסך בהעלם אחד חייב אחת. אביי פירש שטעמו בא מן הפסוק "לא תעבדם". הכתוב עשה כולן עבודה אחת. בדף סב. רבי זכי אמר אותו דבר אלא שהוסיף השתטחות. רבינו תם אמר שמילת השתטחות מופיע במשפטו של רבי זכי לא במשפטו של רבי אמי. הסיבה לכך היא שיש פסוק בעשרת הדברות "לא תשתחווה להם ולא תעבדם."  הפסוק אסר כל מין עבודה  והוציא השתטחות להיזכר בפני עצמה. ולכן כל עבודות פנימיות נחשבות עבודה אחת, והשתטחות נחשבת בפני עצמה ואם עשה כולן בהעלם אחד חייב שתיים. אחת בשביל השלש, ואחת בשביל השתטחות. ועכשיו למה ר' יוחנן אמר לר' זכאי "פוק תני לברא" שיש סברה לומר שלשת עבודות הפנימיות נחשבות אחת אבל לא השתטחות. למה? אם השתחוויה בא ללמד על עצמה, אם כן אינו בא ללמד על הכלל כולו. אפשר לומר פה שני דברים. אפשר לומר אם היתה באה ללמד על הכלל כולו מה היתה מלמדת? לחלק. אבל אינה יכולה לעשות את זה בגלל לא תעבדם עשה כולן עבודה אחת. ולכן כל מה שנשאר הוא לחלק על עצמה. דבר שני שאפשר לומר הוא שהיא באה גם לחלק עבודה כדרכה.עכשיו נסתכל ברבי זכאי. לפי ר' תם שיטתו היא שהשתחווייה ללאו יצאה. זאת אומרת שהיתה בכלל לא תעבדם ויצאה מן הכלל. אי אפשר שהיא תלמד מה שהוא על הכלל כולו בגלל שלא נשאר מה ללמוד. כבר לא תעבדם עשה כולן עבודה אחת. ר' יוחנן אינו מסכים עם זה. זאת אומרת שאם השתחווייה היתה באה ללמד על עצמה זה בסדר, אבל אם היא באה לאו גרידה לא. מה החילוק?אם היא באה ללאו ברור שהיא לא מלמדת על הכלל כולו. אבל אם היא באה לחלק למה כן? אפשר לומר החילוק הוא זה. רבי זכאי סובר שאם השתטחות באה לחלק זב גם נחשב להיות שהיא מלמדת רק על עצמה. ולכן יש לו ברירה לומר באיזה אופן היא באה ללמד על עצמה. אבל ר' אמי סובר שהשתטחות באה גם ללמד על עבודה כדרכה, ולכן אפשר שהיא נחשבת להיות מלמדת על הכלל כולו.









. Rabbi Yochanan told  Rabbi Zackai "go teach it on the street". It seems the reason is Zakai said something stupid. But what he said wrong seems to be a mystery. The one version has it he said "one who does all four services (sacrifice, burning, pouring , bowing) to an idol brings one sin offering."
Then Rabbi Ami says one who does the major three services (sacrifice, burning, pouring) to an idol brings a sin offering.
Rashi says the original statement of R Zakai is the same as Rabbi Ami.
Rabbainu Tam says the original statement did have "bowing" in it. And this idea makes some sense because "Don't serve idols" would have put all three services into one, and "Don't bow" would have come to teach on itself [bowing] that it also is liable.

NEXT DAY:

Let me first reiterate what Rabbainu Tam is saying. Rabbi Ami is fine. We have "Don't serve idols" to tell us the three inner services are all one.  And we have "Don't bow" to tell us bowing is also liable. That is fine. Then we have Rabbi Zakai saying if one does all four services he is liable once. And Rabbi Yochanan told him, "Teach it on the street". We know R. Zakai can't be saying like R. Ami because then of he would do all four he would be liable twice. [That is after all what comes out from R Ami.] So to R. Zakai, bowing has to be coming for a mere prohibition. And in essence that is fine. We have Rabbi Yose doing the same in Shabat with the verse "don't lite a fire on Shabat"
But this is where my learning partner noticed the crucial difference between Rabbi Yose and Rabbi Zakai.

Why was Rabbi Yose allowed to use fire for a mere prohibition? Don't we always have a principle, "Whatever was in a category and has come out of the category comes to teach about the whole category, not about itself alone." How did we deal with this problem in the case of Rabbi Yose? We said just one page back that since the acts of work on Shabbat are all separate anyway we have nothing we can do with fire so it has to be teaching about itself alone. This was fine with R Yose. But it can't work for Rabbi Zakai because he does not have the four services separated. To him they are all together, so he has no possible reason to use "bowing" for itself alone, and that is why Rabbi Yochanan  told him "Teach it on the street."

Now you could ask why did this question not bother Rabbi Yochanan when it comes to the law of R Ami? Simple. Rabbi Ami uses "Don't serve idols" to put all three services into one. And so bowing can't be used for the whole category. And so it can come out to teach about itself alone.

Tosphot definitely says that if Rabbi Zakai is using "bowing" for a mere prohibition, then he can't be using "service" to put all three services into one.
But that using "bowing" for itself would not have presented any problem in terms of using "service" to put all three together.

However this still needs hammering out. I am confused at this point about Rabbi Ami. Let me say what is bothering me. Is bowing in the category of service? If yes then why could it not be included in "Dont serve idols" and have that verse tell us all four are one category? And we could say it is mentioned separately because you might not have known it is a service. If it is not in the category of service then the whole question does not even start. Stay tuned.

Next Day:
I suggested today to my learning partner a problem with his idea of how to explain Tosphot. My idea is this: Is bowing in the category of service? Probably according to how we have been treating it up until now. That means it is in "don't serve idols." So since don't serve means to make all the services in the sense of the verse into one service that includes bowing. So now we have just what Rabbi Zakai wants--for all four serves to be counted as one. And then why is bowing mentioned separately? to tell us it is a mere prohibition.  So Rabbi Zakai makes perfect sense even according to the logic that we used to explain Rabbi Ami.
It is funny also the way Rabbainu Tam wants to explain Rabbi Ami --that "bowing" comes to teach that it is a separate prohibition. If it was in the category of "service" anyway it seems kind of arbitrary to pull out "bowing" just to add a prohibition.

I think it all depends on the direction of your logic. I think Rabbi Zakai started out thinking as the first step that we have bowing comes for a mere prohibition. then he asked what is serving for? And the answer is like Abyee said to put the other three into one category. And this makes perfect sense.
But we see Rabbi Yochanan did not like this and on page 62 also we see the Gemara wants to start out in Shabat that anything extra will come to divide. You have to look there to see this. It is only because we don't need fire to divide that we can use it for a mere prohibition. And this is how R Yochanan is thinking on pg 62 and 63. since even if we use "Don't serve" to put all three together we can still use "bowing" to come for its own prohibition. And that is what makes him think that Rabbi Zakai was not making sense.

April 12 it became clear to me what Tosphot is saying. There are only two "drashot." One is on "Don't serve" and the other is bowing comes to divide. Rabbi Yochanan said to Rabbi Zakai you don't hold from the later so you must hold from the former but if so then bowing comes to make its own prohibition  and so doing them all together would mean bring two sin offerings.

April 13 Today a landslide of questions on Tosphot fell on me. Mainly there are two major branches. One thing is this: R Ami is thinking what? That don't serve puts all three together so dont bow must come out to teach on the whole category. Since it can't teach on those three it teaches on what is left and that is itself. But there is one thing left and that is service according to its way.  So maybe that is what R Ami means. But R Zachai might disagree with that and say teaching on itself is not called teaching on the whole category. And just arbitrarily adding service according it it way is just ad hoc. That leaves him free to use bowing for a mere prohibition. But what is difficult here is the question where they place service according to its way. I am not sure if this is a question but it is a point my learning partner brought up.

The other area of question here is "Why can't R Zachai simply look at the explanation of Abyee 'service comes to comes to put all services together' and say that 'bowing' is included?"

Male homo-sexuals are obligated to bring a sin offering.

There really is little comparison between lesbians and male homo-sexuals. Mainly the difference is this: female playing with each other is permissible though not recommended. Male homo-sexuals are obligated to bring a sin offering (note 2) if they do the act of penetration into the anus by accident. If on purpose they can't bring a sin offering even if they want to because you can never bring a sin offering for what is done on purpose.

  If they do the act of penetration in front of two witnesses they get the death penalty if fair warning is given by two witnesses. That means this: the witnesses have to tell them the act they are doing is forbidden, and that if they do it they will get the death penalty. [If they admit it then you don't need  witnesses.]

Besides that there is a kind of spiritual penalty called Karet  כרת being cut off from ones people involved. And that applies to all the types of forbidden sexual relationships that are called עריות incest. Incest is actually only an approximate translation because it also refers to sex with a woman who has seen blood within seven days of her seeing blood. Also one can't have sex with her unless she has gone to a natural body of water (note 1) like a river or sea and dipped in completely from head to toe.
Actually, stoning is not the penalty for homosexuals. I think is is burning. But I am not sure. I would have to look it up. That means you take lead [It does not have  a high boiling point] and heat it up until it flows and then you pour it down their throats.

Appendix: If the two male homo-sexuals think the act is allowed, that counts as being accidental and they can bring a sin offering. [I mean to say that an accident can be either thinking something is permissible or in making a mistake about material facts.] That means they have to bring either a sheep or goat to the Temple in Jerusalem and have the priests sacrifice it as a sin offering. They can't eat any of it as a barbecue. The part of the animals that are not burned are eaten by the priests. This is always the rule for sin offerings. If you want a barbecue in Jerusalem together with the mitzvah of bringing a sacrifice, you have to bring a peace offering or a thanksgiving offering.

Bibliography.
Mishna  Zevachim chapter 5.
Rambam Laws of Sin Offerings. [That is located in the book on General Sacrifices.]
Tractate Macot concerning fair warning that must be given.

I should mention that there is no prohibition to bake cakes for homosexuals. On the contrary, it is a mitzvah to be nice to them and to tell them that what they are doing is terrible, horrific sin.
Now this seems to be a subject of a debate. Sometimes it seems like you are supposed to tell people that they are sinning even if you know they won't listen. And sometimes it seems not. I really can't tell. My own approach to this varies according to the situation.

(note 1) If no natural body of water is available, she can make her own mikvah. The mikvah has to be attached to the ground, and cannot be a vessel. And it can't be such that if lifted that it stays intact.
There has to be about 1^3 meters of water. [This amount I forget. I would have to look it up. I think it is about 1^1^1.33 meters.]
(note 2) If there is no Temple, they are still legally required to bring a sacrifice. They would have to build the Temple according to the proper specification in the Mishna Tractate Midot  and hire a few priests and find  red hefer. They can do it but it would be expensive. Besides all of that there is some doubt about the proper location of the Temple. Some archeologist have apparently discovered the remains of the First Temple in the area when you leave the Western Wall to go back to the New City you pass on the left. This whole project is so hard that it makes more sense not to sin in the first place.

But in essence this idea is not that different from the Gra that the only source of halacha is the gemara itself. דינא דגמרא the law of the gemara is what determines halacha not any posek even rishonim.



In fact most authorities thought little of books of halacha. The Maharsha said people that decide from the Shulchan Aruch are making a terrible mistake and it is proper to rebuke them.  Shlomo Luria [the author of the yam shel shelomo printed in every shas ]even went to far as to critique the Rambam for even writing a halacha book.