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Text Excerpt
לאחותו שהיא בת אביו ובת אמו, לומר שאין עונשין מן הדין.
to teach the halakha in the case of his sister who is both his father’s daughter and his mother’s daughter, and this serves to say that one does not administer punishment based on an a fortiori inference. Although the verses state a punishment both for one who has sex with his half sister who is his father’s daughter and for his half sister who is his mother’s daughter, one cannot learn via an a fortiori inference that he should also be punished for having sex with his sister from both parents, as punishments are applied only when the Torah expressly imposes them.
The Talmud notes: And R' Yitzḥak, who does not interpret the verses in this manner, maintains that one administers punishment based on an a fortiori inference. And if you wish, say instead a different reason why R' Yitzḥak does not require this exposition: He derives the punishment of karet for having sex with a sister from both parents from the warning, i.e., the prohibition that is stated with regard to her. Just as the verse explicitly prohibited having sex with a sister from both parents, so too, the same punishment of karet applies to having sex with her as it does to having sex with other forbidden relatives.
אמר רבי אלעזר אמר רבי הושעיא: כל מקום שאתה מוצא שני לאוין וכרת אחד – חלק חטאת ביניהן. ומאי היא? מפטם וסך, דכתיב: ״על בשר אדם לא ייסך ובמתכנתו וגו׳״, כרת אחד, דכתיב: ״אשר ירקח כמהו ואשר יתן ממנו על זר ונכרת מעמיו״.
§ R' Elazar says that R' Hoshaya says: Anywhere you find two different prohibitions, and only one punishment of karet is stated for both of them, you should divide the sin offering between them, i.e., if one transgressed both prohibitions unwittingly he is liable to bring a sin offering for each. And what is this case? One who blends the anointing oil according to the specifications of the oil prepared by Moses in the wilderness, for purposes other than use in the Temple, and one who applies this anointing oil to the skin of a person, as it is written: “Upon the flesh of man it should not be applied, neither should you make any like it according to its composition” (Exodus 30:32). These are two prohibitions, one for applying the oil and the other for blending it, and one karet is stated with regard to both, as it is written: “Whoever compounds any like it, or whoever puts any of it upon a stranger, he should be cut off from his people” (Exodus 30:33).