תלמוד על ברכות 4:1

HALAKHAH: Mishnah: “A person should not sit before the barber,”¹⁷⁷Here starts the discussion of Mishnah 5. etc. We have stated “close to the afternoon prayers.” Rebbi Ḥiyya stated, close to darkness. Our Mishnah needs Rebbi Ḥiyya’s baraita and Rebbi Ḥiyya’s baraita needs our Mishnah. If Rebbi Ḥiyya had stated rather than we, we would have said that he means exactly darkness but not the afternoon prayers. Therefore our Mishnah is necessary. But if Rebbi Ḥiyya had stated rather than we¹⁷⁸Clearly this must read: “If we had stated but R. Ḥiyya did not.” This is Rav Nissim of Kairuan’s reading [י.נ. אפשטין, שני קטעים מספרי רב נסים בר יעקב, קובץ על יד ג (1939).], we would have said that everywhere “afternoon prayers” is stated it means afternoon prayers, and everywhere “darkness” is stated it means darkness. Since we stated “afternoon prayers” and Rebbi Ḥiyya stated “darkness”, this implies that “darkness” stated later refers to the time of afternoon prayers¹⁷⁹The times indicated in Mishnah 6 are no different from those in Mishnah 5 even though the terminology is different. In itself, the expression “the time of the afternoon prayers” is ambiguous. It may denote “the great Minḥah”, the time when afternoon prayers first become possible, half an hour after Noontime, or “the small Minḥah” when prayers become mandatory, one and a quarter hours before sundown. It is clear that the Yerushalmi identifies “Minḥah” as “the small Minḥah”. The Babli 9b seems to disagree..
Rebbi Ḥananiah the son of Rav Hoshaia’s brother¹⁸⁰A student of R. Zeˋira. said, our Mishnah refers to the vulgar, what Rebbi Ḥiyya stated to fellows¹⁸¹Cf. Introduction to Tractate Demay. The vulgar are persons following rabbinic rules in general; the fellows follow all detailed rules, in particular those of purity and tithing. As S. Liebermann has noted, the anonymous Yerushalmi as a matter of principle considers the Mishnah and R. Ḥiyya’s Tosephta (which is not the Tosephta in our hands) as complementary whereas named authors tend to consider them as competing systems.. The rabbis of Caesarea say our Mishnah is following Rebbi Jehudah¹⁸²In Mishnah Berakhot 4:1, R. Jehudah states that afternoon prayers are only permitted until “the small Minḥah” while the rabbis permit it until nightfall., what Rebbi Ḥiyya stated follows the rabbis.

Rebbi Ḥananiah the son of Rav Hoshaia’s brother¹⁸⁰A student of R. Zeˋira. said, our Mishnah refers to the vulgar, what Rebbi Ḥiyya stated to fellows¹⁸¹Cf. Introduction to Tractate Demay. The vulgar are persons following rabbinic rules in general; the fellows follow all detailed rules, in particular those of purity and tithing. As S. Liebermann has noted, the anonymous Yerushalmi as a matter of principle considers the Mishnah and R. Ḥiyya’s Tosephta (which is not the Tosephta in our hands) as complementary whereas named authors tend to consider them as competing systems.. The rabbis of Caesarea say our Mishnah is following Rebbi Jehudah¹⁸²In Mishnah Berakhot 4:1, R. Jehudah states that afternoon prayers are only permitted until “the small Minḥah” while the rabbis permit it until nightfall., what Rebbi Ḥiyya stated follows the rabbis.