Chullin

‘I will see him’. He went and placed the Emperor facing the sun during the summer solstice and said to him, ‘Look up at it’. He replied: ‘I cannot’. Said R. Joshua, ‘If at the sun which is but one of the ministers that attend the Holy One, blessed be He, you cannot look, how then can you presume to look upon the divine presence’! On another occasion the Emperor said to R. Joshua b. Hananiah, ‘I wish to prepare a banquet for your God’. He replied: ‘You could not undertake it’. ‘Why’? ‘Because his attendants are too numerous’. ‘Indeed, I will do it’. ‘Then go and prepare it on the spacious banks of Rebitha’.1 He [the Emperor] spent the six months of summer in making preparations when a tempest arose and swept everything into the sea. He then spent the six months of winter in making preparations when rain fell and washed everything into the sea. ‘What is [the meaning of] this’? asked the Emperor. ‘They are but the sweepers and sprinklers that march before him’! ‘In that case’, said the Emperor, ‘I cannot do it’. The Emperor's daughter once said to R. Joshua b. Hananiah, ‘Your God is a carpenter, for it is written: Who layeth the beams of His upper chambers in the waters.2 Ask him to make for me a spool!’ He replied: ‘Very well’. He prayed for her and she was smitten with leprosy. She was then removed to the open square of Rome and was given a spool. (For so it was the custom in Rome, whoever was smitten with leprosy was given a spool and removed to the open square, and was given skeins to wind, so that people may see them and pray for their recovery). One day as R. Joshua was passing he saw her sitting in the open square of Rome and winding the skeins on to the spool. He remarked: ‘My God has given you a beautiful spool’! She said: ‘I pray you, ask your God to take back what He has given me’. He replied: ‘Our God grants a request, but [when granted] never takes it back’. Rab Judah said: An ox has a large belly, large hoofs, a large head and a long tail; an ass has just the reverse. What is the point of this? — For commercial transactions. 3 Rab Judah further said: The bullock which Adam sacrificed had but one horn in its forehead, as it is said: And it shall please the Lord better than a bullock that hath horns [makrin] and hoofs’.4 But does not makrin imply two horns? — R. Nahman said: Mkrn is written.5 Rab Judah further said: The bullock which Adam sacrificed had fully developed horns before it had hoofs,6 as it is said: ‘And it shall please the Lord better than a bullock that hath horns and hoofs’; the verse first says: ‘that hath horns’ and then ‘hoofs’. This supports R. Joshua b. Levi, who said: All the animals of the creation were created in their full-grown stature, with their consent, and according to the shape of their own choice, for it is written: And the heaven and the earth were finished, and all the host of them7 read not zeba'am8 but zibyonam.9 R. Hanina b. Papa expounded: May the glory of the Lord endure for ever; let the Lord rejoice in His works!10 This verse was said by the Angel of the Universe.11 For when the Holy One, blessed be He, enjoined after its kind12 upon the trees, the plants applied unto themselves an a fortiori argument, saying: ‘If the Holy One, blessed be He, desired a motley growth, why did He enjoin "after its kind" upon the trees? Moreover, is there not here an a fortiori argument? If upon trees which by nature do not grow up in a motley growth the Holy One, blessed be He, enjoined "after its kind", how much more so does it apply to us’! Immediately each plant came forth after its kind. Thereupon the Angel of the Universe declared: ‘May the glory of the Lord endure for ever: let the Lord rejoice in His works!’ Rabina propounded the question: If a man grafted one plant on to another, the Great Sea’. V. D.S. in the ass. word may be read iren from the ground (Gen. I 24) in an upright stature (v. infra) its horns obviously appeared first and then its hoofs. word otcm: (i) from the root cmb, meaning upstanding, full-grown; (ii) from hcm, meaning desire, consent; and (iii) from iuhcm meaning pleasure, choice. V. R.H. 11a.