[Avodah] Nedarim - bilshon benei adam

[Micha Berger]

On Wed, Jan 09, 2013 at 2:48pm EST, I wrote:
: I just started Nedarim pereq 6, and something about this pereq and the
: next one eludes me.
: 
: According to R' Yochanan and the Bavli takes this is the default, nedarim
: are bilshon benei adam (LBA). R' Yoshiyah argues and says that nedarim
: are in leshon haTorah (LHT), which the Y-mi takes to mean in addiiton to
: benei adam....

: But here's what I don't get... Why is Rebbe spending two peraqim spelling
: out examples of this principle? After all, he knew that different regions
: have different idioms, and that LHT differs from LBA. So, he knew that
: all these mishnayos wouldn't remain true over time.
: 
: E.g. if someone in EY today is "noder min hamevushal" (6:1), the mishnah's
: list -- "mutar betzeli ubeshaluq" would not be necessarily true. We would
: have to check out modern Israeli idiom and see whether most people would
: include fried and stewed food when they say "mevushal"....

Still in this general sugyah (Y-mi Nedarim 7:1, vilna daf 24a). Stam
mishnah says that someone who swears off yereq may eat dilo'im (some
breed of squach). R' Aqiva oseir. They ask RA: But when a person asks
his messenger to go pick up "yereq", he is likely to come back and say
"I didn't find but dilo'im".

I would usually translate "lo ... ela" as "only", but here I think that
the specific words "lo matzasi ela", including "I didn't find", could
be relevant. R' Aqiva takes the reply in the opposite sense. After all,
the messenger wouldn't come back and say "I didn't find but beans". So
you see that yereq implies dilu'im.

Kind of like a fuzzy set -- a messenger would feel compelled to check
if dilo'im are close enough, but would actually think to check.

So the machloqes is in substance -- does yereq including dilo'im in
such a tenuous way mean that they're intended when someone makes a
neder off yereq or not?

Which made me realize the contrast.

Last week I asked on the grounds that we're nitpicking over things that
are subject to change.

I realized I missed phrasing my question in terms of the primary issue
-- this are peraqim of machloqesin in metzi'us! All these mishnayos are
examples of "What do most people think when they say X?"

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             The thought of happiness that comes from outside
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