We continue watching the rabbis prove that “an eye for an eye” refers to monetary payment and not any other sort of restitution. They consider the meaning of the word yitten, and whether it refers to money, giving, or something else regarding a blemish given to another person.
One important argument is that the monetary payment represents the value of the person who inflicted the injury as well as the person injured. Thus a wealthy, older man’s leg would be worth more than a poor child’s damaged leg. Any system of compensation must follow the directives of Leviticus (24:22), where we shall have only one manner of law. This creates further difficulties for the rabbis.
Another more obvious argument asks what should be done if a blind person blinds another person. Or if a person missing a leg severs the leg of another. Clearly the “eye for an eye” command cannot be meant to be taken literally!
The rabbis also consider damages. What should be done in Babylonia or in other places where the court is not made up of three ordained judges? Only these judges are permitted to determine damages. The rabbis conoider the differences between the rulings of judges when a person is killed by another person and when a person is injured or killed by an animal. How much agency do our judges have, particularly in cases where both humiliation and degradation (rape) should be assessed?
Our daf ends with conversations about damages for pain. Was a burn or a bruise or an injury with no bruise mentioned first in our Mishna? What difference with this make?
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