dear rabbi kornfeld shlita
in your insights to baba kama 39b you mentioned a VILNA GA'ON about the meaning of chesuri mechsera v'hachi ketani i would appreciate if you would elaborate on this and perhaps give the origins of the GA'ON in light of two recent gemaras we have learnt in baba metzia 82a kulah rabi yehuda hee and 78b kulah rabi shimon ben elazar hee in both gemaras, after words are inserted into the beginning, then the mishna justifies, attributes and repeats the statement with the prefix sh'rabi ......
if we would say that that the words chesuri mechsera v'hachi ketani do not mean to physically insert the words, rather learn it as if it said them perhaps we would understand the sh'rabi ......more easily
thanks for everything,
elozer kanner
Yes, I agree with your analysis. Every time the Gemara makes the Reisha and Seifa the same Tana, we do not actually have to add words to the Beraisa. We can just read the Beraisa as though there were extra words, even without adding the words.
The Vilna Gaon is printed at the end of Divrei Eliyahu, section titled "Kelalim." The idea itself can be found in an even more explicit form in Rabeinu Bachye (a Talmid of the Rashba), Parshat Ki Sisa 34:27.
Other suggestions for why the Mishnah is missing words are that during the period before the Mishnah was recorded in writing, some words were forgotten. Rather than filling them in, Rebbi just recorded the Mishnah as it was repeated, expecting those who learned it to fill it in on their own. (So writes the BEIS YOSEF in his "Kelalei d'Gemara," Halichos Olam 2:14). The TIFERES YISRAEL (Erchin 2) writes that before the Mishnayos were written, they were "sung" to a certain tune. When words did not fit into the tune, they were omitted. Personally, I have always favored Rabeinu Bachye's approach, and found it to be consistently applicable.
Regards to the rest of the Shiur in the white shul.
Take care,
Mordecai Kornfeld