New Edition of the Babylonian Talmud, Vol. 1

EXPLANATORY REMARKS.

In our translation, we have adopted these principles:

1. Tenan of the original—We have learned in a Mishna (the primary collection of oral laws); Tania—We have learned in a Boraitha (teachings external to the Mishna); Itemar—It was taught.

2. Questions are indicated by the interrogation point and are immediately followed by the answers, without being specifically marked as such.

3. When in the original there occur two statements separated by the phrase Lishna achrena or Waïbayith Aema or Ikha d'amri (literally, “otherwise interpreted”), we translate only the second.

4. As the pages of the original are indicated in our new Hebrew edition, it is not deemed necessary to mark them in the English edition, as this is only a translation of the former.

5. Words or passages enclosed in round parentheses ( ) denote the explanation rendered by Rashi (the primary medieval commentator on the Talmud) to the preceding sentence or word. Square parentheses [ ] contain commentaries by authorities from the final period of the construction of the Gemara (the part of the Talmud containing rabbinical analysis).