Shalom,
So, Tosafos wants to say that the mishnah brings a case in which the aidim zommemim don't get galus (the punishment they are trying to inflict on the nedon, they gets lashes.
But Tosefos answers, you're assuming that he won't say 'b'shogeg', he could say I did it b'mazid, even though I got warned.
My question is that here Tosefos is changing the focus of the discussion from the punishment to the aidim zommemim to the punushment of the nedon.
But, our mishnah started with the question- What's the case where eidim become zommemim? Our focus is what happens to conspiring eidim, so why take the discussion further off the track and consider what the nedon said and what his consequences are. Our mishnah isn't interested in the impact on the nedon.
Thanks,
Scott Spiegler, Framingham, MA, USA
Tosfos is relating to an earlier stage necessary for the understanding of the Mishnah.
The Mishnah states, "We testify that Ploni is liable for Galus." The Mishnah will continue and tell us what happens to witnesses who say such a thing and it transpires that they are Zomemim, but before we reach that stage we must understand how it is meaningful for witnesses to say "Ploni is liable for Galus"; they could never condemn him to Galus because he could always say he killed deliberately!
So Tosfos is helping us understand how they could give such testimony. Afterwards, we will learn what would be the result of such testimony.
All the best,
Dovid Bloom
Dear Dovid,
Thank you for your prompt response. You've hit on my point exactly. Since ploni could always say I did it b'mazid, so how could the aidim ever say he did it b'shogeg? So a. Tosefos doesn't say ploni will always say b'mazid. From my understanding, he is saying 'what if'. And, if he says 'what if', then he won't get galus., but also b. If ploni does cry b'mazid, then the zommemin have no way to send him to galus. But, we're not worried about what happens to ploni, we are thinking in our Mishnah about what happens to the aidim. And, here, the aidim don't get galus, they get lashes. So, the aidim are not getting ka'asher zommemin anyway. I don't really see what Tosefos is adding to the discussion.
Can you help me chop this better?
Thanks, Scott
Scott, what is bothering you is exactly the same as what is bothering Tosfos. Tosfos asks that the case mentioned in the Mishnah, "We testify that Ploni is liable for Galus," simply does not exist because the witnesses could never sentence Ploni for Galus. This is because the accused has such a clear way out of the punishment -- simply by saying that he did it deliberately. This means that Galus is not an indictable offense because the accused can always avoid the punishment that the witnesses say he is liable to receive.
So the question of Tosfos is that what the Edim testified has no legal force. If they do not have the power in the first place to be believed about what they say, then they would not receive a punishment if it transpired that they were Edim Zomemim, since what they said could never have achieved what they were trying to achieve. Therefore, Tosfos asks that not only would they not get Galus, they would not get lashes either.
Kol Tuv,
Dovid Bloom