This week, Daf Yomi readers began a new tractate, Megilla, which deals with the holiday of Purim—the day on which we read the Megilla or Scroll of Esther. And in Megillat 7a, we learned a surprising fact about that scroll: “Rav Yehuda said that Shmuel said: The book of Esther does not render the hands ritually impure.” All the other books of the Bible transmit tumah, ritual impurity, to those who touch them: As the Koren Talmud explains, the sages instituted this rule in order to discourage people from handling the biblical books too casually. Why doesn’t the Book of Esther follow this pattern? “Is this to say,” the Gemara asks, “that Shmuel maintains that the book of Esther was not stated with the inspiration of the Divine Spirit?”The rabbis went to quite a lot of effort to find God in the various lucky breaks in the book. The Book of Esther continues to get attention today, especially in international political contexts. See here and links. And yes, that link happens to be the post immediately after the one linked to in the post I just put up, and that's how I noticed it. Coincidence? Do you really think so?
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Earlier Daf Yomi columns are noted here and links.
