Bava Batra 3: Walls, Rebuilding Synagogues, and Herod's Ascendency

What is a mechitza?  It is a division, but does a division have to be a wall?  Our daf begins with a conversation about two neighbours who are deciding about marking their separate domains.  What is actually done when one forces the other to build this wall?  Might the division be made of pegs or something else more 'porous' than a wall of bricks or cement?  Is the shared courtyard even subject to the halacha of division?*

The Gemara discusses our Mishna's statements regarding the different matter that is used to build a wall.  Interestingly, the rabbis ask how we understand the definition of each word describing material used to build.  The rabbis walk through the large and small bricks; the chiseled stone, even the mortar and gravel used to build these structures.  Part of their determination of which material is which is based on the guidelines given around building - measurements of height and width of walls depending on the materials used to build.  

We then learn about the taking down and building of synagogues.  Rav Chisda teaches that a synagogue cannot be demolished until another one is built to replace it.  But perhaps if the synagogue is showing signs of wear, like cracks, it can be taken down without the new synagogue yet built.  What if the money for the new shul has not been collected?  We are told that the rabbis suggest there could be a fear that an opportunity could come up to redeem captives and people would spend their money on that instead of on the new synagogue.  It is necessary to have a place to gather for communal prayer.  

We are told the story of Rav Ash who found cracks in his synagogue and had it demolished immediately.  To ensure that the new structure would be built immediately, he kept his bed in the demolished shul, knowing that people would run to build the shul around him to keep him sheltered.  

How could Bava ben Buta have instructed King Herod to raze the Temple and build the second Temple in that place?  It is suggested that perhaps that first Temple had cracks in it.  Alternatively, King Herod had the means and the will to rebuild immediately and so there was no fear that the people would go without a Temple for long.

We then learn the story of Herod's ascendancy: a slave, he fell in love with a daughter of the Chashmonia house.  He heard a Divine voice telling him that any person who rebels that day will succeed.  Harod murdered the entire ruling family except for the daughter, who threw herself from a roof after publicly sharing Herod's past to escape marriage to this man.  In a disturbing twist, we learn that he kept her body in honey for years.  Some said that he did this to engage in necrophilia.  Others say that he preserved her body to ensure that people would think he had legally and officially married a daughter of the ruling Chashmonia house.

The sickening next chapter of this story is Herod's killing of all of the sages except for Bava ben Batra whom he kept as his council.  He did this because he saw that the sages had interpreted "One from among your brothers you shall set as king over you" (Deuteronomy 17:15) as meaning that an emancipated slave was not eligible to be king.  Herod seems to have been obsessed with his power and killed his own sons for fear that they might usurp him.

There are some difficult questions arising from this story.  We are learning that the sages only permitted Jews by birth to ascend to any sort of power, not just royalty.  The segmentation of ancient Jewish culture by role - Kohan, Levi, Yisrael - by status - slave, convert, Gentile, Jew, man, woman, child, person with disabilities - was as divisive in ancient times at it is today.  So much sorrow has come from these somewhat arbitrary divisions between us.  Perhaps it is time that a new Torah commentary is created and explored; one which interprets the word of Torah and our great sages with a very different lens.

* These word sound quite ominous in the context of January 2017, when this commentary is being written.  Trump has been elected president of the US and he promises to build divisions - in the form of large walls, economic policies, and hate-motivated laws.