Avodah Zarah, Daf Kaf Het, Part 2

 

Introduction

Yesterday we learned that R. Yohanan was healed by a non-Jew. Our sugya asks how he could do this.

ורבי יוחנן היכי עביד הכי? והאמר רבה בר בר חנה אמר רבי יוחנן כל מכה שמחללין עליה את השבת אין מתרפאין מהן!

אדם חשוב שאני

 

But how could R. Yohanan do this: Did not Rabbah b. Bar Hanah say in the name of R. Yohanan: Any sore for which Shabbat may be transgressed should not be healed by a non-Jew? It is different with an important man.

 

Generally speaking it is prohibited for a non-Jew to heal a Jew if the wound is serious enough that we could transgress Shabbat for it (such as scurvy). The fear is that the non-Jew will surreptitiously kill him. But if the person being healed is an important man like R. Yohanan, then we are not afraid that the non-Jew will kill him.

 

והא רבי אבהו דאדם חשוב הוה ורמא ליה יעקב מינאה סמא אשקיה ואי לא רבי אמי ורבי אסי דלחכוהו לשקיה פסקיה לשקיה דרבי יוחנן רופא מומחה הוה

 

What about R. Abahu, who too was a distinguished man, yet Jacob the heretic prepared for him a medicine for his leg, and were it not for R. Ammi and R. Asi who licked his leg, he would have cut his leg off?

The one [who attended] R. Yohanan was an expert physician.

 

R. Abahu was also a distinguished man, yet the Jacob the heretic tried to poison him. Had R. Ammi and R. Assi not licked his leg R. Abahu would have lost it. This proves that heretics (or non-Jews) will try to poison Jews.

The answer is that the woman who healed R. Yohanan was an expert, and thus would not risk her reputation by trying to harm an important man like R. Yohanan.

 

דרבי אבהו נמי רופא מומחה הוה !

שאני רבי אבהו דמוקמי ביה מיני בנפשייהו (שופטים טז, ל) תמות נפשי עם פלשתים

 

R. Abahu s [doctor] was also an expert physician!

It was different in the case of R. Abahu, for heretics establish within themselves the attitude of let me die with the Philistines (Judges 16:30).

 

R. Abahu s doctor tried to kill him even though he is an expert physician because he was not just a non-Jew, he was a heretic (he may have been a Christian). The enmity of this group against the Jews is sufficient that they would be willing to die in order to cause them harm, just as Samson was willing to kill himself in order to kill the Philistines.