[Avodah] Farfetched Ukimtas

[Ben Bradley via Avodah]

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> The question is when the Gemara offers these ukimtas does the Gemara really think that this is what the Tanna meant? Or is the Gemara just offering logical possibilities to avoid it looking like an Amora is arguing on a Tanna (this may depend on the reason why Amoraim don't argue on Tannaim)? How are we supposed to approach these kinds of ukimtas when learning a daf gemara?
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The following is a summary of a private letter I've seen from a talmid chacham, which I don't have permission to attribute by name, only to utilise his sources:

There is a machlokes in the rishonim and onwards as to the reason for the gemara saying chasorei machsra on occasion and seeming to correct the mishna.
Reason 1: The mishna is very abbreviated and the correction is really just an explanation , eg Rabbeinu Bachya on Shemos 34:27)
Reason 2: The mishna actually was corrupted over time and the gemara is recovering the original version, eg Klalei HaShas of the Beis Yosef
Reason 3: The mishna is 'shlogging up' the gemara but the amoraim don't have reshus to argue on a tanna, so they use ukimtas or say chasorei machsra instead.
Examples of this approach are in the Meiri (Seder Hakabala in Beis Habechira, where he writes that it is derech stira v'tikkun), ). Also R Shlomo Fisher (The Itry Rav) in the sefer Beis Yishai, and in the Dor Revi'i of R Moshe Shmuel Glasner, introduction to mesechta chulin,. They both explicitly include ukimtas as well as chasorei machsra.  Also the Sefer Pe'as HaShulchan of R, Yisroel m'shklov says in the name of the Gra that chasorei machsra is used when the amoraim hold like a tanna other than the tanna of the mishna. The difference in this last approach is that the amoraim are not arguing on the tanna just holding by a different tanna.

As I said, not my learning, someone else's.

Ben Bradley

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