Sukkah 3:12 — The takanos for the lulav and the day of the Omer

The Lived Mishnah·A Zeman Nakat Project
Tisha B'Av Series
Mishnah 37 of 41
אִם אֶשְׁכָּחֵךְ יְרוּשָׁלָיִם
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MoedSederסדרמוֹעֵד
SukkahMesechtaמסכתסוכה
3Perekפרקג׳
12Mishnahמשנהי״ב
נושא · Topicתַּקָּנוֹת הַלּוּלָב וְיוֹם הָנֵףThe takanos for the lulav and the day of the Omer
This Mishnah is:a rule · a takanawhat does that mean?
Mishnah סוכה ג׳:י״ב · Sukkah 3:12
בָּרִאשׁוֹנָה הָיָה הַלּוּלָב נִטָּל בַּמִּקְדָּשׁ שִׁבְעָה,
וּבַמְּדִינָה יוֹם אֶחָד.
מִשֶּׁחָרַב בֵּית הַמִּקְדָּשׁ,
הִתְקִין רַבָּן יוֹחָנָן בֶּן זַכַּאי
שֶׁיְהֵא לוּלָב נִטָּל בַּמְּדִינָה שִׁבְעָה זֵכֶר לַמִּקְדָּשׁ,
וְשֶׁיְּהֵא יוֹם הָנֵף כֻּלּוֹ אָסוּר.
Originally the lulav was taken in the Mikdash seven days,
and in the medinah one day.
After the Beis HaMikdash was destroyed,
Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai enacted
that the lulav be taken in the medinah seven days, as a remembrance of the Mikdash;
and that the day of the Omer-waving be entirely forbidden [for the new grain].
A reading aid, not an exact translation.

This English is a clause-by-clause rendering to help you follow the Hebrew. It is not word-for-word literal, and it is not a transcript of the recorded shiur — the audio carries explanation and context the translation deliberately leaves out.

case/objectrestrictive rulingpermissive rulingTannareason
Structure
The Mishnah's Structure
בָּרִאשׁוֹנָה
בַּמִּקְדָּשׁ שִׁבְעָה · בַּמְּדִינָה יוֹם אֶחָד
seven days in one place, one day everywhere else
מִשֶּׁחָרַב
the place that held the seven is gone — one day should be all that is left
and yet
בַּמְּדִינָה שִׁבְעָה
everywhere now keeps the seven
זֵכֶר לַמִּקְדָּשׁ
Not a return to what was — the seven is carried over precisely as a remembrance of what is gone.
Summary Chart
The takanos for the lulav and the day of the Omer
CaseRulingReason
For how long is the lulav taken?While the Beis HaMikdash stood: In the Mikdash, seven days; in the medinah, one day
After the Churban — Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai: Everywhere, seven daysA remembrance of the Mikdash
What of the day of the Omer-waving after the Churban?Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai: The entire day is forbidden for the new grain
Transcript
A machine transcript of the recorded shiur.

This is the shiur as spoken, transcribed automatically and left unedited — the wording is Ephraim's, and occasional transcription errors remain. It follows the audio word by word.

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Mishnah Insights
An amalgam of commentaries, including original insights.

These insights draw on the commentaries to this Mishnah and on the recorded shiur. Those commentaries often rest on earlier sources — the Gemara, the Yerushalmi, the Rishonim, and one another — without always saying so; where they do, we generally cite the one we read. Every commentary consulted is kept, verbatim, with this card.

Where the lulav's seven days come from — and why Shabbos still stops it

The seven days, and the Shabbos within them

At its home in hilchos lulav, the mishnah gives the source (the same mishnah is repeated at Rosh Hashanah 4:3, among Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai’s takanos): ‘u’smachtem lifnei Hashem… shivas yamim’ bound the seven-day lulav to the Mikdash, while ‘ba’yom harishon’ gave the rest of the land one day (Bartenura, Vayikra 23:40). Tosafos Yom Tov adds a limit to the later seven-day takanah: ‘seven’ means every day but the first is only mid’rabbanan, and the lulav is still not taken on the Shabbos that falls within Sukkos.

What the chadash clause assumes

The mishnah then pivots to the new grain. Bartenura sets the baseline the clause takes for granted: the Torah bars eating chadash — grain that took root before Pesach — until the Omer is offered on the sixteenth of Nisan. The question the mishnah answers, how chadash is permitted once there is no Omer, is worked out at Menachos 10:5.

Series Insights
Series context

Where this sits

This is the lulav mishnah in its native place, among the laws of the arba minim; the series meets it again at Rosh Hashanah 4:3, gathered with the post-Churban takanos. Read here, it marks the boundary the whole series traces — a practice the Mikdash had set apart, later stretched to all of Israel as a zecher once the Beis HaMikdash was gone.