[Avodah] Tosafot d.h. Litekufot on RH 8a

[Motti Yarchinai]

The Tosafot comment d.h. Litekufot on Rosh Hashanah 8a can be a difficult one to understand unless one is familiar with the subject matter dealt with in it. I have written an article translating and explaining the whole of that Tosafot, prefaced by all the necessary background knowledge needed for a thorough understanding of it. The Chazon Ish tried to explain it and got it almost right, except for a slight flaw in his calculations, despite which he ends up with the correct result though his reasoning for it was slightly flawed. (That too is explained in my article.) 

However the author's reasoning in the last few sentences of that Tosafot seems to defy all understanding. Those sentences begin with the words, "it is a strange thing (davar temah) that Rabbi Eliezer and Rabbi Yehoshua were in dispute [as to whether the world was created in Tishrei or Nisan.] and the author goes on to say that they could have resolved the matter empirically. ... On page 10 of my article, I explain why that last paragraph of that Tosafot comment seems to defy understanding. I'd be very interested if anyone can offer an explanation of what was the thinking of the author of that Tosafot comment in that last paragraph.
My article on that Tosafot can be found at the following web-address, which is case-sensitive:

http://tiny.cc/jewishcalendar/downloads/Tosafot-RH8a.pdf
Note: it is item 3 in a trilogy of related articles. The other two are at the same address, but the filenames are: (1) BH-Myths-Maths.pdf  and (2) BH-Yonatan.pdf

Article 2 of that trilogy is relevant to the question I posted here yesterday asking if anyone knows who wrote the perush Yonatan on the Targum Yerusalmi on the Torah, which is erroneously headed Targum Yonatan. It also explains why the author of that Targum thought it was important to include the extra (non-biblical) material he added to his translation of Bereshit 1:16.



 
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