Last Shabbos Parshas Bo, Rashi explained that if brothers died from milah, it isn't performed on next son and that son cannot eat korban Pesach. 47b Tos (Shlishi) proves our gmara is going with shittah 2X (bros died) is catzakah. Why does Rashi explain that in the time period R Nassan waited for the blood to be absorbed into the flesh and the danger of milah would dissipate - that we don't do milah bc it's not one of 3 one gives up life for b/c let's say milah would generally be a mitzvah one is required to sacrafice life for, in case of two brothers previously dying from milah, that should already establish that there is no mitzvah of milah for the next son and not to do it. This question is predicated upon caes of chatzah brothers died, that there is no milah for next son b/c he will die and needn't forgo life for milah, but rather that such chazakkah establishes that the entire mitzvah of milah doesn't start or impose itself on that next son.
DANIEL GRAY, TORONTO Canada
1) Daniel, you seem to be grappling with the Chakirah: Is Milah "Dechuyah" when it endangers life or is it "Hutrah"?
If it is "Dechuyah," that means that when Milah represents a danger to a person's life, the person does have a Mitzvah to do Milah but he has a bigger Mitzvah to guard his own life, so he is not allowed to do Milah because it is forbidden to endanger a life, and that prohibition is more serious than the Mitzvah of doing Milah.
However, if Milah is "Hutrah" in a case of danger to life, this means that there is an absolute Heter not to do Milah; this person has no Mitzvah whatsoever to do Milah.
I would like to suggest, with great trepidation, that possibly the Rambam is of the opinion that Milah is Dechuyah in case of danger. My Diyuk is from the words of the Rambam in Hilchos Milah 1:17, who writes, "One may do Milah only on a baby who has no sickness, because danger to life overrides the entire Torah. It is possible to do Milah later on, but it is never possible to restore a Nefesh of Yisrael."
The question is, why does the Rambam write, "It is possible to do Milah later on"? What would be the Halachah with a person who has a life-long illness and one can expect that it will always be dangerous for him to do Milah?
It could be argued that it is possible to infer from the Rambam that such a person, who otherwise would never perform Milah in his life, is allowed to put himself in danger for Milah. (I found once (I cannot remember how I found this) another source that seems to suggest that if someone wants to put himself in danger to fulfill the Mitzvah of Milah (in a scenario where waiting will not lessen the danger and therefore there is no possible way of performing the Mitzvah without danger), he is permitted to do so. The source is the Seforno to Devarim 33:9. The Torah praises the Shevet of Levi, "For they guarded your word, and kept your Bris." The Seforno writes that Levi was not Makpid on the life of his sons, in order to keep the word of Hash-m, which is the Mitzvah of Milah of the sons, even though many of them died as a result, as the Gemara in Yevamos 72a states that it was dangerous to perform Milah in the wilderness because the northern wind did not blow.) If I am thinking along the right lines, the Rambam would hold "Dechuyah" because if he would hold "Hutrah," this person would be entirely removed from the obligation of Milah.
On the other hand, we may argue that Rashi holds that Milah is "Hutrah" when danger is involved, which is why Rashi writes that it is only for the three cardinal transgressions that there is ever any Heter to put one's life in danger.
I must stress that what I wrote above requires a lot of further thought, and I am certainly not making any Psak, but just proposing a theoretical discussion.
To be honest, Daniel, it is not clear to me what your original question was, but at any rate I am suggesting that the reason why Rashi writes here that there are only three things one has to sacrifice one's life for (and Milah is not one of them) is to reject the Pshat that I have written above. Rashi maintains that even if a person will never in his life be able to perform the Mitzvah of Milah because of danger, he is still not allowed to do Milah.
2) I later found, bs'd, that one of the Acharonim learns a similar Pshat in the Rambam to the one I suggested.
This is in Teshuvos Beis Yitzchak (by Rav Yitzchak Shmelkas zt'l), Yoreh Deah 2:90:8. He first cites the Teshuvos Chasam Sofer (Yoreh Deah #245) who learns in the Rambam that it would seem that if, afterwards, the baby will still be endangered by Milah, nevertheless one may do Milah. However, the Chasam Sofer writes that he does not understand this because it is only the three cardinal Aveiros for which one is allowed to endanger his life.
The Beis Yitzchak suggests a solution. He sends us to Yoma 85b and Rashi there. The Gemara there is looking for a source that Piku'ach Nefesh overrides all of the Mitzvos (with the exception of the big three). Rebbi Elazar learns this as a Kal v'Chomer from Milah. Milah is performed on just one of the 248 organs of the body, but it is performed on Shabbos. Kal va'Chomer that to save the entire body one may desecrate Shabbos. Rashi writes that one should desecrate Shabbos to do Milah because Milah carries with it the punishment of Kares later on if one does not do it.
The Beis Yitzchak writes that it appears from Rashi that the Mitzvah of Milah is in itself a Mitzvah of Piku'ach Nefesh. If one does not do Milah this leads to Kares, which is a sort of death. Therefore, in the same way that one should desecrate Shabbos to save a physical life, so may one desecrate Shabbos to save the baby from the spiritual death of Kares.
This is why the Rambam implies that one does Milah later on even if this involves danger. It is because being uncircumcised is also dangerous, and therefore one is allowed to put the baby into a state of physical danger in order to protect him from the Kares danger.
This is why Shevet Levi did Milah in the desert. Even though there was a physical danger since there was no north wind, they knew that there was also the danger of Kares if they did not do Milah.
Kol Tuv,
Dovid Bloom
Thank you very much. I bumped into R Tzvi Berkowitz Ram Ner YISROEL Baltimore who said he he recollects he has notes on this Rashi and also recollected there is a revelant Rambam (maybe it will turn out to be yours below) but needs to find his notes to recollect details.
According to Rambam, why did Moshe cheshbon that he cannot give milah to his son immediately before traveling as that would pose danger- he should have taken the risk!?
Daniel
There may be a few ways of answering this question.
1) The simplest way could be to say that even if one learns in the Rambam that one is allowed to put oneself into danger if Milah will not be possible safely at a later stage, nevertheless the Rambam never said that one is obligated to enter this danger; rather, it is merely permitted if one loves the Mitzvah of Milah so much that one is prepared to take the risk.
2) Second, if we say that the Rambam learns like Rashi's Pshat in Chumash, it is very understandable why Moshe Rabeinu did not perform Milah immediately before traveling. This is exactly what the Rambam writes: if you can wait, you must wait, because you could always do the Milah a little later, while one can never recover a lost life.
3) In addition, we may say that the Rambam holds like Rabeinu Chananel on Yoma 85b, who says that Hash-m wanted to kill the baby (not to kill Moshe, as Rashi writes on Chumash). Originally Moshe did not understand that the reason Hash-m wanted to kill the baby was because Milah had not been done. As soon as Moshe knew this, he performed Milah immediately.
Dovid Bloom