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Text Excerpt
מתני׳ כיצד העדים נעשים זוממין? ״מעידין אנו באיש פלוני שהוא בן גרושה או בן חלוצה״, אין אומרים: יעשה זה בן גרושה או בן חלוצה תחתיו, אלא לוקה ארבעים.
Mishnah: How are witnesses rendered conspiring witnesses? This applies in a case where two witnesses came before the court and said: We testify with regard to so-and-so, who is a priest, that he is the son of a divorced woman or the son of a ḥalutza, a yevama who performed the rite of ḥalitza to free herself from the levirate bond. Those testimonies render him a ḥalal (see Leviticus 21:6–7), one disqualified from the priesthood due to flawed lineage. If a second set of witnesses testifies in court and renders the first set conspiring witnesses, one does not say with regard to each of the conspiring witnesses: This witness should be rendered the son of a divorced woman or the son of a ḥalutza in his stead. Rather, he receives 40 lashes as punishment for his false testimony.
״מעידין אנו באיש פלוני שהוא חייב לגלות״, אין אומרים: יגלה זה תחתיו, אלא לוקה ארבעים.
Likewise, in a case where two witnesses came before the court and said: We testify with regard to so-and-so that he is liable to be exiled to a city of refuge for unwittingly killing another (see Numbers 35:11), and a second set of witnesses testifies in court and renders the first set conspiring witnesses, one does not say with regard to each of the conspiring witnesses: This witness should be exiled in his stead. Rather, he receives 40 lashes.
גמ׳ הא ״כיצד אין העדים נעשים זוממין״ מיבעי ליה! ועוד, מדקתני לקמן: אבל אמרו להם: ״היאך אתם מעידין, הרי באותו היום אתם הייתם עמנו במקום פלוני״ – הרי אלו זוממין, מכלל דאלו אין זוממין!
Talmud: The Talmud analyzes the opening question of the Mishnah: But based on the cases discussed in the Mishnah, the tanna should have asked: How are witnesses not rendered conspiring witnesses? The standard punishment for conspiring witnesses is the punishment that they conspired to have inflicted upon the subject of their testimony. The Mishnah cites anomalous cases where their punishment does not correspond to the punishment they sought to have inflicted. The Talmud asks: And furthermore, from the fact that the tanna teaches in a Mishnah cited later (5a): But if the second set of witnesses attempting to render the first set conspiring witnesses said to them: How can you testify to that incident when on that day you were with us in such and such place, these first witnesses are conspiring witnesses. One learns by inference from the final phrase in the cited passage: These are conspiring witnesses, that those enumerated in the Mishnah here are not conspiring witnesses.