In Makkot 5a, Rava might be worried about a flying camel. He says: “If two witnesses say, ‘Ploni killed someone on Sunday morning in Sura,’ then two other witnesses say, “On Sunday evening, you were with us in Nehardea,” then we consider. If it’s possible to travel that distance from morning to evening, then the first set aren’t conspiring witnesses; otherwise, they are.” A separate author, the Talmudic narrator, asks about the obviousness of this ruling, and explains: “Perhaps, we would worry about a flying camel, גַמְלָא פָּרָחָא, which would afford them with much faster transportation.” Therefore, Rava’s purpose is to inform us that we don’t need to worry about such farfetched transportation.
My alternative explanation is that Rava is not concerned about what we might consider פשיטא, obvious, despite the narrator’s repeated objection. Rather, Rava statements are intended to explore and clarify the borders and edge cases of straightforward rule in the mishna. The mishna’s canonical rule is that hazama is that the second set of witnesses says, “How could you, A, testify such occurred at place J at time X, for we were with you, A, in the different place K at the same time X?” And further, that the A must be the first set of witnesses, rather than the murderer or his victim.
Rava explores the limitations of place J. If it is the same birah/citadel, but the west rather than the east, at time X, then perhaps no travel is needed. Consider if there was a line of sight. Rava next explores the limitations of time X interacting with place J (see first paragraph above). The first implication is a stringency—the second set of witnesses needn’t target the identical time X, so long as it’s not possible to travel from J to K in that time interval.
Rava next explores, at length, cases where the second set concurs that the perpetrator is guilty, for they themselves witnessed it—just that the first set couldn’t have seen it. He explores where the actual act was at day X – 1 or at day X + 1 with a potential difference of whether the perpetrator was as of yet guilty. Next, Rava explores the same factors, but where they witnessed the court’s sentencing. Next, Rava explores the same factors, for fines for someone who stole and slaughtered an animal—first, where they witnessed the theft and second, where they witnessed the verdict.
Collected together, Rava’s purpose was to explore the contours of the law in one place. It shouldn’t be a “problem” that we’d agree logically with Rava’s statements, or that we can find confirmation in Tannaitic statements. On a peshat level, I don’t agree that he’s coming to teach some novel yet unstated aspect of the law, such as fast camels or keen eyesight.
From Sura to Nehardea
Rava does not mean literal Sura and Nehardea. These are placeholder names for two distant cities/academies. Mere “Place Ploni” would be inelegant, as there are two Plonis. Indeed, if it were these fixed places, this is something that could be measured once and encoded in Rava’s statement. Yet, there’s a parallel case where these precise places were intended.
A certain get (bill of divorce) was found in Sura, in which was written, “In the city of Sura, I, Anan bar Chiya the Nehardean (נְהַרְדָּעָא) excused and divorced my wife, Plonit.” (Yevamot 116a) The rabbis searched from Sura to Nehardea and couldn’t find another man named Anan bar Chiya, except for another Anan bar Chiya of Chagra who was in Nehardea. (There is the general concern of two Yosef ben Shimons, plus here there’s the question or ambiguity of whether נְהַרְדָּעָא is current place of residence versus identity, that is, place of origin.) Witnesses came and testified that on the same day the get was written, Anan bar Chiya of Chagra was with them in Nehardea, rather than Sura.
Abaye and Rava, fourth-generation Amoraim who are colleagues in Pumbedita, yet a third academy, discuss the case. Abaye notes that he’s usually concerned about someone with the same name, but not here. Witnesses place the other fellow in Nehardea, so what would he be doing in Sura, where the get was written? Rava notes that he’s usually not concerned about the possibility of someone with the same name, but is concerned here. (I’d add that Rava is concerned because they actually found such a person—see Tosafot Rid’s actual Talmudic text and Vatican 110’s text or gloss, in the margins, הואיל והוחזקו). There are three potential explanations given to allow the possibility. Perhaps he went by flying camel; perhaps via kefitzat haderech, a shortening of the way; or perhaps (and most rationally), via prior verbal instructions to write the get, such that he did not need to be present in Sura. This is written as a continuation of Rava’s statement, so Rava may have proffered these reasons. On the other hand, giving multiple possibilities is characteristic of the Talmudic narrator.
Rava’s assumption is thus that one could not naturally travel from Sura to Nehardea in a day. This is fine in Makkot because these were placeholders. Still, Rava may have chosen them to indicate a long distance that isn’t quickly traversable, to say that distance relates to time, so for any two places one must measure.
Several Rishonim grapple with an inconsistent Rava. In Makkot, he dismisses concern for a flying camel, while in Yevamot, he is concerned. I’d endorse the answer of Raavad et al., that the primary answer in Yevamot is that he had sent his words, while the supernatural flying camel or wormhole are secondary reasons which only bolster the primary concern.
Furthermore, this matchup between sugyot isn’t coincidental. The Talmudic narrator is bold but humble. Rather than create concepts from scratch, he’ll draw from named Amoraim expressing the principle. It is because Rava (or a narrator on Rava’s behalf) in Yevamot discusses a flying camel that Makkot’s narrator invokes the camel concern. Either Rava/the Talmudic narrator had a reason we, indeed, shouldn’t be concerned, or we could revert to my disagreement with the Talmudic narrator, to say that peshat in Rava’s intent here is simply to explore the edge cases of place and time.
Actual Distance
Don’t trust Wikipedia, especially for political matters, but Hebrew Wikipedia places Nehardea at GPS coordinates 33°22′43″N 43°42′57″E, English Wikipedia close to it, stating, “Nehardea was adjacent or identical to Anbar, a short distance from the modern city of Fallujah (formerly the site of Pumbedita).” Sura, meanwhile, is at coordinates 31°53′N 44°27′E, near Najaf. This is about 180 kilometres. Consulting with ChatGPT—which one also shouldn’t trust—this is about a 2.5 hour drive or nearly two day walk, assuming breaks. I also explored traveling by boat, but this would be even longer, as we’d have to walk to the Euphrates and then take a boat upstream (to Nehardea) or downstream (to Sura).
However, there’s a rational alternative to flying camels. As Dr. Elman, zt”l, wrote in his JSIS article, “Up to the Ears” in Horses’ Necks (B.M. 108a): On Sasanian Agricultural Policy and Private “Eminent Domain,” the Sasanian government diverted the paths of both the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, and also constructed a network of large canals connecting the rivers. Indeed, the Talmudic narrator in Brachot 59b how the changed reality impacts halacha, regarding whether to recite a blessing when seeing the Euphrates. Depending on how we understand the sugya, Dr. Elman suggests that this was in the time of third-generation Amora Rav Yosef.
Again via ChatGPT, there’s a river and canal path from Sura to Nehardea, traveling from Sura via the Euphrates, then shifted to the Nehar Malka canal and disembarking at Nehardea, taking about 30.8 hours at about 6.5 kilometre/hour. With strong rowers, a strong downstream current, favorable tailwind and a well-built narrow boat, perhaps this could be done in 18.2 hours at 11 kilometre/hour. However, the other direction—from Nehardea to Sura—is upstream and therefore slower, about 44 hours normally, or 23.5 hours. I’ll add that canal travel, this might also be a rationalist but unrealistic explanation of the shev shmayta, the seven rulings pronounced by Rav Chisda in Sura, one Shabbat morning, and heard by Rava in Pumbedita towards the conclusion of Shabbat (Eruvin 43a), though that seems a longer trip.
Makkot had the event in the morning, in Sura, and the four witnesses together in the evening, in Nehardea. The longest daylight in Iraq is during the summer solstice, about 14 hours and 20 minutes. Yevamot doesn’t specify when the get was given, and a get may be written during the day or night (Gittin 17a). Yevamot also don’t have the Nehardean witnesses say what time of day or night Anan bar Chiya of Chagra was with them. We could, therefore, also imagine the faster direction. Though I still maintain these are fundamentally placeholders, perhaps, this is what Rava meant by finding out if one can accomplish such speedy travel. No one had attempted this race, and the river/canal conditions were shifting.
A highly trained, light-loaded Arabian racing camel might have a sustained speed of 16 kilometre/hour, or even 40 kilometre/hour for one hour. Perhaps switching steeds and they get tired, one could make this Sura Nehardea trip much faster. Next week, we hope to explore the identity of the flying camel, and whether the flying was literal.
Rabbi Dr. Joshua Waxman teaches computer science at Stern College for Women, and his research includes programmatically finding scholars and scholastic relationships in the Babylonian Talmud.
