Yevamot II 96: Nine Years Old & A Day and a Yavam; Rabbi Elazar & Rabbi Yochanan in Conflict

Today's daf teaches three different Mishnayot.  All of them touch upon the details of yibum when the players are of different ages, when they die at different times, when rival wives are involved, and when multiple family members - sisters and brothers - are part of the equation.  The Gemara offers increasingly complex cases to elaborate upon the suggestions of the Mishnayot.

Though yibum was most often put aside in the times of the Talmud, the rabbis studied its sometimes contradictory, always confusing halachot in great detail.  Every day that I learn Yevamot, I wish I had the time to take notes and draw maps to better understand the laws and their applications in sometimes bizarre circumstances.  

Many of today's debates regard the actions of a minor boy who is nine years and one day.  If he is a yavam, what effect does intercourse have on his yevama (as he is a minor)?  How do things change if he has intercourse, or performs chalitza, etc., with his yevama before or after his brothers might do the same?  When does a woman's status change?  Whom does he disqualify with his actions, and who disqualifies him with their actions?  Which acts must be repeated?  And on and on and on...

I was surprised by the end of amud (b).  Rabbi Elazar repeated one of these rulings of Rabbi Yochanan, his teacher, without quoting Rabbi Yochanan as its source. Rabbi Yochanan learned of this and became very angry; how could his star pupil be so disrespectful?  Two other students tried to appease him, explaining that rabbis were in a similar argument in the past about a lock or handle for a door.  In that case, the Torah scroll was ripped due to their anger.  Rabbi Yochanan was appalled: the rabbis in that case were colleagues!  Were these students suggesting that Rabbi Elazar was Rabbi Yochanan's colleague?

Finally, another rabbi suggested that all of Rabbi Elazar's teachings came from Rabbi Yochanan and that would be assumed.  Just as Joshua's teachings came from Moshe Rabbeinu, yet Joshua would not need to mention Moshe's name.  Rabbi Yochanan became calm.

What pettiness, I think.  Where is his modesty?  One of the notes in Steinsaltz teaches that Rabbi Yochanan had not children, and his teachings were his progeny.  Thus it was far more important to Rabbi Yochanan than to most that his teachings carry his name on to future generations.  Still, the interpersonal conflict that we experience now certainly was present through all of these Talmudic discussions.  How amazing to remember such detail; to debate with such clarity, all in the face of family, monetary, health, and collegial stress.