On Hey amud Beis their is a machlokes Rav Yehuda and Rav Meir on the conversion of Amos to Tefachim. Rebbi Meir says that all amos convert to 6 tefachim but Rebbi Yehudah argues and says only a binyan is an amah 6 tefachim but by kalim an amah is 5 tefachim. Therefore according to Rebbi Yehudah a succah has to be 11.5 tefachim since the gemarah made the calculation that the aron and the cruvim are 20 tefachim and with the new measurements of Rebbi Yehuda the aron is only 8.5 tefachim (since the torah says 1.5 amah x 1.5 amah= 1.5*5=7.5 + 1 tefach for the capores=8.5) subtract that from the 20 tefachim and you get 11.5 tefachim for the minimum height of the succah. My question is if according to Rebbi Yehudah, Kalim are 5 tefachim per every amah wouldn't the original measurements, which the gemarah calculated from the beis hamikdash, change? Meaning the gemarah says that the cruvim in the beis hamikdash were 10 amos according to Rebbi Meir this is 60 tefachim which is one !
third of the height of the beis Hamkidash which is 30 amos=180 tefachim but according to Rebbi Yehudah the cruvim should only be 50 tefachim and that is not a third of the height. That should then affect the calculation mades to the mishkan!
Daniel Nagel, Los Angeles, CA
I found that the Sefas Emes discusses this point. He cites the Sefer Mayim Amukim who discussed it even earlier, and answered that here it is different, because the verse reveals that the Keruvim of Shlomo ha'Melech were measured with the Amah of Binyan, which is 6 Tefachim, as is inferred from the Gemara in Bava Basra (91a, as cited by Tosfos here), and thus they reached a third of the height of the Beis ha'Mikdash.
The reason for this, writes the Sefas Emes, is because the Keruvim were not considered Kelim, since they were attached to the floor of the Kodesh Kadoshim, and their height was 10 Amos, and they were made of wood (and only covered with gold), similar to the Mizbe'ach ha'Olah which was measured with the Amah of Binyan of 6 Tefachim according to everyone, as we find in Menachos (97b). (Even though I did not find an explicit reference that says that the Keruvim of Shlomo were attached to the floor, nevertheless it appears as such from the Derashah of the Gemara in Bava Basra there, which considers them as part of the floor of the Kodesh Kadoshim.)
The Sefas Emes, though, points out that from the words of Rashi here it seems that Rashi answered the question differently. In truth, the Kelim which were measured with a 5-Tefach Amah refer to the Kelim of the Mishkan . Hence, it could be that the Kelim of the Beis ha'Mikdash were not necessarily measured with this Amah. The Sefas Emes, however, questions this approach from the Gemara in Menachos (97b) which clearly implies that the Mizbe'ach of Shlomo was measured with an Amah of 6 Tefachim, while all of the other Kelim in the Beis ha'Mikdash were measured with an Amah of 5 Tefachim.
However, it seems that Rashi holds that the other Kelim in the Beis ha'Mikdash were measured with an Amah of 5 Tefachim because they were used with the Menorah, the Shulchan, and the Aron of Moshe . The new Kelim, such as the Keruvim, perhaps indeed were measured with the Amah of 6 Tefachim.
Moreover, I found that even though Rashi in Menachos there explains that Rebbi Meir and Rebbi Yehudah are referring to the Kelim of the Beis ha'Mikdash, like the Sefas Emes asserts, nevertheless Rashi in Eruvin (5b) explains that they are referring to the Kelim of the Mishkan, as he writes here. Therefore, he mentions that the Amah of Binyan refers to "the Yeri'os and Kela'im," and likewise he writes that the two Mizbechos were measured with the Amah of 5 Tefachim. This is an apparent perplexity, and it conflicts with the Gemara in Menachos (I found no one who addresses this question). However, according to what we have written above, there is no question, because Rashi is referring to the Mizbe'ach of Moshe, and the Gemara in Menachos is referring to that of Shlomo (as the Gemara there clearly says). According to Rashi here and in Eruvin, there is no question, for the Keruvim of the Beis ha'Mikdash were measured with an Amah of 6 Tefachim like the other Kelim. (This is also implied by the Gemara in Eruvin 14b regarding the pool made by Shlomo, that they measured it with the Amah of 6 Tefachim; see there.)
M. Kornfeld