Megillah, Daf Kaf Gimmel, Part 3
תנו רבנן: הכל עולין למנין שבעה, ואפילו קטן ואפילו אשה. אבל אמרו חכמים: אשה לא תקרא בתורה, מפני כבוד צבור.
Our Rabbis taught: All are qualified to be among the seven [who read], even a minor and a woman, only the Sages said that a woman should not read in the Torah out of respect for the congregation.
This baraita teaches that anyone can have an Aliyah, even a woman or child. However, the rabbis consider it to be disrespectful to the community for a woman or child to have an Aliyah because it suggests that the men could not read the Torah themselves. We hear of this in other areas as well birkat hamazon and Hallel. It is not respectful for it to seem that men cannot recite these texts.
This baraita was foundational among minyanim (Conservative and later on Orthodox) who wanted to allow women to read from the Torah and receive aliyot. To this day it is the source for the emergence of such minyanim in the Orthodox movement. The claim was that a community could waive its own honor. But since this is a Talmud shiur and not a halakhah one, I will refrain from expanding on the subject.
איבעיא להו: מפטיר מהו שיעלה למנין שבעה?
רב הונא ורבי ירמיה בר אבא, חד אמר: עולה, וחד אמר: אינו עולה. מאן דאמר עולה – דהא קרי, ומאן דאמר אינו עולה – כדעולא, דאמר עולא: מפני מה המפטיר בנביא צריך שיקרא בתורה תחלה – מפני כבוד תורה, וכיון דמשום כבוד תורה הוא – למנינא לא סליק.
The question was raised: Should the person who takes the Maftir Aliyah be counted among the seven?
R. Huna and R. Jeremiah b. Abba: One said that he does count and the other that he does not count.
The one who says he does count, for he too reads, while the one who says he does not count is like Ulla, who said: Why is it proper for the one who reads the haftarah from the Prophet to read in the Torah first? To show respect for the Torah. Since he reads [only] out of respect for the Torah, he should not be counted to make up the seven.
There is a dispute here about whether the person who reads the "Maftir" Aliyah counts as one of the seven readers. The Maftir reader reads from the Torah and then reads the Haftorah. According to one opinion, since he too reads from the Torah, he too counts as one of the readers. According to the second opinion he only reads from the Torah to show respect for it, so that he not read from the Prophets and not the Torah. Because it is not inherently crucial that he read from the Torah, he does not count as one of the seven.
מיתיבי: המפטיר בנביא לא יפחות מעשרים ואחד פסוקין כנגד שבעה שקראו בתורה. ואם איתא, עשרים וארבעה הויין! – כיון דמשום כבוד תורה הוא, כנגדו נמי לא בעי. –
They objected: He who says the haftarah from the Prophet should not read less than twenty-one verses, corresponding to [those read by] the seven who have read in the Torah.
Now if it is as you say, there are twenty-four?
Since it is only out of respect for the Torah [that he reads], no corresponding verses are required [in the haftorah].
The Talmud raises a difficulty. According to this baraita, the person who reads the haftorah should read at least 21 verses, to correspond to the 21 verses of Torah read by the seven readers. But if eight read, including the maftir, then he would have had to read 24.
The answer is that the three extra verses that the maftir reads are only because of the respect for the Torah. Since they are not quite essential, they do not need to read corresponding verses in the haftorah.
מתקיף לה רבא: והרי +ירמיהו ז’+ עלותיכם ספו, דלא הויין עשרין וחד, וקרינן! – שאני התם דסליק עניינא.
Rava raised a difficult: There is, he said, [the haftarah of] "Add your burnt-offerings" (Jeremiah 7:21) in which there are not twenty-one verses, and yet we read it!
The case is different there, because the subject is completed [before twenty-one verses].
Rava raises a difficulty against the baraita that states that every haftorah must have 21 verses. The haftorah of Parshat Tzav, taken from Jeremiah 7, has only seventeen verses.
The answer is that as long as the subject is completed, then less than 21 verses can be read. The 21 verse minimum did not mean that two subjects would have to be covered.
והיכא דלא סליק עניינא לא? והאמר רב שמואל בר אבא: זמנין סגיאין הוה קאימנא קמיה דרבי יוחנן, וכי הוה קרינן עשרה פסוקי אמר לן: אפסיקו! – מקום שיש תורגמן שאני. דתני רב תחליפא בר שמואל: לא שנו אלא במקום שאין תורגמן, אבל מקום שיש תורגמן – פוסק.
But where the subject is not completed, we do not [read less than twenty-one verses]? Didn’t R. Shmuel b. Abba say: Many times I stood before R. Yohanan, and when I had read ten verses he said, Stop!
In a place where there is a translator it is different, since R. Tahlifa b. Shmuel has taught: They only taught this in a place where there is no translator, but where there is a translator a stop may be made [earlier].
The Talmud now cites a case where R. Yohanan told R. Shmuel b. Abba to stop reading the haftorah, he had read enough after ten verses (don’t you wish you could do this at your shul!).
The Talmud resolves this by saying that if there is a translator, then they can read less than 21 verses, because using a translator takes longer. The custom to translate every verse was used in the Talmudic period, but most synagogues no longer do so.