פירוש על פאה 2:6

הלבלר – the scribe

Introduction This mishnah is a direct continuation of yesterday’s mishnah. Its halakhic content is exactly the same as that halakhah in clause three of yesterday’s mishnah. It does not add any new halakhic information. What it does add is something about the authority and antiquity of that tradition.

הזוגות – they are those mentioned two-by-two in the first chapter of Mishnah Avot (from Mishnah 4), where two [individuals] received [the tradition] from two [others] [until] from the mouth of Shimon HaTzaddik/the Righteous.

It happened that Rabbi Shimon of Mitzpah planted his field [with two different kinds] and came before Rabban Gamaliel. They both went up to the Chamber of Hewn Stone and asked [about the law]. Nahum the scribe said: I have a tradition from Rabbi Meyasha, who received it from Abba, who received it from the pairs [of sage], who received it from the prophets, a halakhah of Moses from Sinai, that one who plants his field with two species of wheat, if he makes up of it one threshing-floor, he gives only one peah, but if two threshing-floors, he gives two peahs. According to this mishnah, the halakhah at the end of yesterday’s mishnah was unknown to some sages who lived when the Second Temple still stood. Since they didn’t know what to do in this situation, whether to give two peahs or one peah, they went to the Temple and asked the scribe, who sat in the Chamber of Hewn Stone, the place in the Temple where the Sanhedrin sat and answered questions. Nahum the Scribe told them that this law had been passed down from generation to generation and goes all the way back to Moses at Sinai. What this means is that the law is of great antiquity and significant authority. This is one of the occasions in the Mishnah upon which the rabbis emphasize the antiquity of the oral law. On a few occasions they say that a law that seems to be of a minor detail within a veritable sea of halakhah, is so old that it goes all the way back to Moses. It is as if they are trying to say that just as this law of minor detail is of great antiquity all the more so the larger aspects of the system go all the way back to the giving of the Torah. The “pairs” refers to the pairs of sages who led the Sanhedrin and Israel in the late Second Temple period. They are listed in the beginning of Tractate Avot and in Hagigah 2:2.