Shevuot 2: When Two Oaths Are Four Oaths; Comparing and Contrasting

Shavuot are oaths.  Our first Mishna begins with the statement: regarding oaths (uttered through the lips), there are two types that are actually four types.  We learn from commentary that the two types are promising to take on a certain action and promising to refrain from acting in some way.  The reason that the Mishna tells us that these are actually four types is because we are not just liable regarding our future behaviour but also our past behaviour.

The next three paragraphs outline other situations where two types are four types.  These regarding the halachot of defiling the Temple, carrying on Shabbat, and identifying leprous marks.  This last example takes into consideration awareness of one's wrongdoing.  The Mishna goes on to explore the notion of awareness.  At what point might one become aware?  Should it matter whether that awareness was at the beginning or the end of the time before and/or after the transgression?  The rabbis consider whether or not such awareness would always or only sometimes result in a sliding-scale offering.

The Mishna considers the offerings brought by goats who might have defiled the Temple by entering in a state of ritual impurity or by consuming something ritually impure.  What if a Yom Kippur offering was intentionally ritually impure?  Interestingly, we learn that both the sacrifice and Yom Kippur atone for it themselves.  

In fact, we are reminded that the scapegoat that is sacrificed at Azazel atones for intentional and unintentional transgressions, for those that are major or minor, positive mitzvot or prohibitions, and transgressions punishable by karet (excision from the World-to-Come) or by a court-imposed death penalty.  The rabbis remind us that priests are atoned for by the bull and Israelites by the goats in the Yom Kippur offering.  This is connected both to the blood of these animals and the confessions said over these animals.

At the very end of today's daf, we begin our Gemara.  We learn that there must be a reason for beginning Masechet Shevuot after Masechet Makkot.  The rabbis suggest that the connection is the last teaching in Makkot which outlined the specific hair cutting which is permitted.  Perhaps liability for transgression involving haircutting is linked to the start of Shevuot, which discusses two types which are actually four types.