Just a quick note:
I always understood that Karres was "ones soul get cut off [from Olam Habah]" and Misa B'Dei Shamayim was early death. From Tosfos it seemed not like that. I don't have the sugia open in front of me but did you or the Kollel write anything about this?
Yashar Kochachem Rabbi David Kapenstein, Torah Day School of Atlanta, Tucker, GA
Dear Rabbi Kapenstein,
TOSFOS (25a, DH Kares) says that Kares also includes early death, and that Misah B'Dei Shamayim is death for committing a particular sin. Tosfos does not seem to learn that Misah B'Dei Shamayim is always an early death. (This makes sense according to the opinion (55a) that "there is no death without sin," since a person would otherwise live forever if not for the sin that he did and the Misah from Shamayim that he gets for that sin. Tosfos says that according to the opinion later on 55a that "there is death without sin," Misah B'Dei Shamayim would manifest itself in an earlier death).
As far as Kares being "one's soul gets cut off," whenever the Pasuk says "Hi'kares Ti'kares," that refers to a Kares where "one's soul gets cut off" (Sanhedrin 64b, 90b).
In the Insights section here in Shabbos, we addressed a different question in the Gemara, but I'm including below what we wrote in the Background section to Kerisus 2b, as well as what we wrote in the Background section to Shabbos here (25a).
Please give my regards to my father when you see him. Thanks!
All the best,
Yisrael Shaw
9) [line 13] MISAH (MISAH B'YEDEI SHAMAYIM)
(a) Some sins are so severe that they are punished with untimely death. There are two types of untimely death that are used as heavenly punishments: Kares and Misah b'Yedei Shamayim. Kares means "being severed" from the world and dying before one's time. Misah b'Yedei Shamayim means "death at the hands of heaven." These punishments are not administered by the courts, but through divinely administered justice.
(b) One who deliberately transgresses a commandment that is punishable with either Kares or Misah b'Yedei Shamayim is punished even if there are no witnesses to his act, and even if he was not warned at that time of his transgression that his violation will result in his untimely death.
(c) The commentaries explain that there are two major differences between Kares and Misah b'Yedei Shamayim (see TOSFOS to Yevamos 2a DH Eshes Achiv; RABEINU YONAH in Sha'arei Teshuvah, 3:6; TIFERES YISRAEL to Sanhedrin 9:6):
1. One who is punished with Kares will die before age 60 (according to Moed Katan 28a, or before the age of 50, according to the Yerushalmi Bikurim 2:1). One punished with Misah b'Yedei Shamayim will die after the age of 60 but before his time has come (according to Moed Katan ibid., or before the age of 60, according to the Yerushalmi ibid.)
2. When one is punished with Kares, even his children (who are minors at the time of his sin) die, and he bears no further children. When one is punished with Misah b'Yedei Shamayim, only he is punished and not his children (Yevamos 55a and RASHI there). (See, however, RIVA in Tosfos to Yevamos 2a DH Eshes, who maintains that Kares only involves the death of one's children in the two cases where the Torah adds the word "Ariri." However, he might be referring to the death of children who are not minors.)
3. Some add that when punished with Kares, the sinner's cattle and possessions slowly expire until he is left destitute - see Insights to Yevamos 73:2.
(d) For a number of specific sins, the Torah assigns a form of Kares in which the sinner not only dies before his time but is not granted a portion in the World to Come (Sanhedrin 64b).