action
slipping off
At a glance
In short
Shemittah is releasing: loosening one's grip so that a thing slips out of one's control, which may be why the same word covers letting a field lie and letting a debt go. For Rabbi Shlomo Pappenheim, chalitzah is extracting something from what encloses it, and shalaf is drawing a thing quickly out of a loose holder, most often a sword from its sheath. Shoresh Yesha sorts the three verbs for taking off a shoe by how the shoe is fastened: shal is a shoe slipped off with no hands at all, shalaf is taking it off by hand, and chalitzah is removing one that must first be untied. Targum Yonasan, though, renders the chalitzah of Devarim 25:9 with a cognate of shalaf, and Rashi links the two verbs as though they were synonyms.
Distinctions
Shemittah (שמיטה)
Root ש-מ-ט. Devarim names the Sabbatical year Shemittah five times (15:1-2, 15:9, 31:10), and the same root supplies its verbs in both halves of the mitzvah: the land, "and in the seventh you shall release it (tishmitenah) and abandon it" (Shemos 23:10-11), which Rashi takes as the ban on working it, and the loans a lender lets go (shamot, tashmet, Devarim 15:2-3). The literal sense comes out of the narrative uses. When the oxen shamat the Aron and Uzza put out his hand (Shmuel II 6:6, Divrei HaYamim I 13:9), Rabbi Yonah Ibn Janach (Sefer HaShorashim) explains that the weight was bursting the animals' joints and the Aron would have slipped off had they collapsed. When Yehu had Izevel thrown from the window (Melachim II 9:33), the verb is a cognate, and Radak there with Ibn Ezra (to Devarim 15:1) gloss it as letting something go so that it falls. So, it seems, the root denotes leaving a thing to itself and the falling that results, which Rabbi Reuven Chaim Klein suggests is what a man does to his field and to his debts in the seventh year.
Two further uses seem to be extensions rather than forsaking. The woodchopper whose hand slips, killing a man, so that he flees to a city of refuge (Devarim 19:5): Rashi uses a cognate, following the Mishnah (Makkos 2:1), and himself links it (to Shmuel II 6:6) to Uzza. And a dislocated shoulder or thigh in an animal, whether it is a tereifah, is shmutas (Chullin 57a), the bone having slipped out of place. Rashi widens the root further to escaping danger or fleeing trouble (Bereishis 19:17, Iyov 1:15), and rabbinic usage has hishmit for skipping a letter in writing a sefer Torah or a pasuk in reading it (Megillah 18b), whence the hashmatos, the omissions, at the back of many sefarim. Despite its currency in speech, Shemittah is fairly rare in the Bavli outside quotations of these pesukim (Nazir 8b, Sotah 41a, Gittin 36a, Bava Metzia 30b and 48b, Sanhedrin 32a, Shevuos 44b, and several other places).
Chalitzah (חליצה)
Root ח-ל-ץ.
- The Midrash (Vayikra Rabbah 34:15) gives four senses: slipping, as in the yevamah drawing the shoe off her brother-in-law's foot (Devarim 25:9); arming, since the soldiers of Israel are chalutzim (Devarim 3:18); saving, from "chaltzeini from an evil man" (Tehillim 140:2); and letting rest, from the Shabbos tefillah retzei v'hachalitzeinu. Three of these run parallel to senses of shemittah, and the Gemara itself uses a cognate of shemittah for the chalitzah act: the yevamah becomes permitted to others with the shemittah of most of the heel (Yevamos 102a).
- Pappenheim's unifying sense is extraction from within: the foot out of the shoe, the tzaraas-stricken stones out of the wall (Vayikra 14:40, 14:43), the soldiers drawn out from the nation for the war with Midian (Bamidbar 31:3), who are then the chalutzim (Bamidbar 32:30, Devarim 3:18).
Chalatzayim, the loins, appears either of a soldier girding himself (Yeshayahu 5:27, 11:5, 32:11; Iyov 38:3, 40:7) or of birth (Bereishis 35:11; Melachim I 5:19; Divrei HaYamim II 6:9; Yirmiyahu 30:6); Shoresh Yesha takes both from the senses above, the place weapons were typically worn, or the place a child slips out from. The Aramaic charatz (Daniel 5:6) seems to be the same word derived through the interchange of lamed and reish. Aramaic also uses a cognate of chalitzah for removing clothing (Targum to Shmuel I 31:8-9, Divrei HaYamim I 10:8), possibly because stripping off one's clothes is extracting the body from within its garments, and this Aramaic usage may be the etymological basis for the Modern Hebrew chultzah, a shirt. Against that, Rabbi Dr. Ernest Klein (1899-1983) writes in his etymological dictionary that chultzah was originally coined by Prof. Joseph Klausner (1874-1958) to mean "blouse," and derived it from the hips-and-thighs sense of chalatzayim, a blouse typically covering the loins.
Shalaf (שלף) and shal (של)
Shalaf appears twenty-five times, most commonly of drawing a sword (Bamidbar 22:23, 22:31; Yehoshua 5:13; Shoftim 3:22, 8:10, 8:20, 9:54, 20:2, 20:15, 20:17, 20:25, 20:35, 20:46; Shmuel I 17:51, 31:4; Shmuel II 24:9; Melachim II 3:26; Divrei HaYamim I 10:4, 21:16, 21:25), and less commonly of slipping off a shoe for symbolic deal-making, the ancient equivalent of a handshake (Rus 4:7-8). Pappenheim parses it as a portmanteau of ש-ל, removing, with א-ף, face, taking something out in a confrontational, in-your-face way. Yoktan, son of Ever, had a son named Shalaf (Bereishis 10:26), and Targum Yonasan there with Targum Rav Yosef (to Divrei HaYamim I 1:20) say he was the first to draw water off rivers into channels, so his name seems to allude to that innovation. Shal is the verb of "remove your shoes from your feet" at the burning bush and to Yehoshua (Shemos 3:5, Yehoshua 5:15).
Where the authorities disagree
How the three shoe verbs differ.
- Shoresh Yesha: Tanach has three verbs for taking off a shoe, and they answer to three ways a shoe can be fastened. Shal (Shemos 3:5, Yehoshua 5:15) is slipping a sandal off without even using the hands; shalaf is taking a shoe off by hand; chalitzah is removing a shoe fastened to the foot, which must first be untied.
- Rabbi Shlomo Pappenheim (1740-1814) runs in a similar vein: chalitzah is extraction from something that engulfs, while shalaf is used wherever the two items were only loosely attached and could easily be separated, which is why it fits both the sword a warrior needs readily at his disposal and the shoe handed over to close a deal before the other party backs out; since both must come away swiftly, we would not expect either to be fastened too strongly.
Rabbi Reuven Chaim Klein raises a difficulty of his own here and leaves it open. He finds it perplexing that the Gemara names a load mounted on an animal a shlif (Bava Kamma 3a; see Rashi to Bava Kamma 17b, Shabbos 154b, Eruvin 16a, Kiddushin 22b), a word seemingly derived from ש-ל-ף, and says outright that he does not understand why a word for a parcel one hopes will not slip off the animal's back should derive from the act of slipping off. He offers two possibilities: perhaps shlif names precisely that hope, or perhaps shalaf in fact denotes the same untying that chalitzah denotes, against Shoresh Yesha, so that shlif is what one does to the package once it reaches its destination (Rashi to Bava Basra 75b notes the shlif was tied to the animal).
Are chalitzah and shalaf the same act?
- Targum Yonasan renders the verb of the chalitzah ceremony (Devarim 25:9) with a cognate of shalaf, and Rashi (to Chullin 53a, Gittin 33b) links the two verbs as though they were synonyms.
- Pappenheim, as above, keeps them apart.
- Radak (to Yeshayahu 58:11 and in Sefer HaShorashim) seems to have had an alternate version of the Midrash below that used shalaf where ours uses a cognate of shemittah.
What alatz means. Delilah "pressed" (alatz) Shimshon to give up the secret of his super-human strength (Shoftim 16:16).
- Ramban (to Bereishis 32:25) reads the aleph of alatz as interchangeable with the ches of chalatz, which he understands as a metathesized permutation of lachatz, pressure.
- Chazal (Sotah 9b, Bereishis Rabbah 52:12) explain alatz differently, and concretely, as Delilah slipping away (nishmatah) from under Shimshon in the throes of intimacy as a way of pressing him. Rabbi Reuven Chaim Klein infers from that that perhaps Chazal took alatz as directly related to chalatz, slipping, rather than to lachatz, and reports finding that contention stated explicitly by Rabbi Moshe ben HaNessiah Britannico (13th-century England) in Sefer HaShoham and by Rabbi Yosef Chaim of Baghdad (1832-1909) in Ben Yehoyada to Sotah 9b.
Also discussed in
Radak on these roots
Sefer HaShorashim
א-ל-ץ
To press: וַתְּאַֽלֲצֵהוּ he explains as ותלחצהו, and she pressed him.
The whole entry
One line, on כָּל־הַיָּמִים וַתְּאַֽלֲצֵהוּ (Shoftim 16:16), all the days, and she pressed him, which he glosses ותלחצהו, she pressed him, noting that by rights the lamed takes a dagesh.
כָּל־הַיָּמִים וַתְּאַֽלֲצֵהוּ (שופטים טז, טז), עקר הלמ"ד להדגש ופירושו ותלחצהו.
ח-ל-ץ
To part and withdraw; to draw off, as a shoe; to be drawn out of trouble; changes of clothing; the loins, and one girded for war; and, of the bones, to make fat.
Drawing off
חָלַץ מֵהֶם (Hoshea 5:6) is חלק ונפרד וסר מהם, he parted and separated and turned away from them. In the transitive, גַּם־תַּנִּין [תַּנִּים] חָלְצוּ (Eichah 4:3), even the tannim drew out: they brought out their breasts and uncovered them to nurse their young. וְחָֽלְצָה נַֽעֲלוֹ (Devarim 25:9), she shall draw off his shoe and take it away, and where the verb is strengthened, וְחִלְּצוּ אֶת־הָאֲבָנִים (Vayikra 14:40), they shall take the stones out and pull them from their place.
Changes of clothing
Because a man puts these on by taking those off, changes of clothing carry the name: וְהַלְבֵּשׁ אֹֽתְךָ מַֽחֲלָצֽוֹת (Zecharyah 3:4), and clothing you in changes of garments; הַמַּֽחֲלָצוֹת וְהַמַּֽעֲטָפוֹת (Yeshayahu 3:22), the changes of garments and the wraps; וְקַח־לְךָ אֶת־ חֲלִֽצָתוֹ (Shmuel II 2:21), and take for yourself his garments; and וַיִּקַּח אֶת־ חֲלִיצוֹתָם (Shoftim 14:19), and he took their garments.
Drawn out of trouble
In this same sense, rescue: צַדִּיק מִצָּרָה נֶחֱלָץ (Mishlei 11:8), the righteous is drawn out of trouble, that is, parted and removed from the trouble, and לְמַעַן יֵחָלְצוּן יְדִידֶיךָ (Tehillim 60:7), that Your beloved may be delivered. So חַלְּצָה נַפְשִׁי (Tehillim 6:5), deliver my soul, and יְחַלְּצֵנִי כִּֽי־חָפֵֽץ בִּֽי (Tehillim 18:20), He delivers me, for He delights in me. וָֽאֲחַלְּצָה צוֹרְרִי רֵיקָֽם (Tehillim 7:5) is: rather, I delivered him who is my enemy without cause; as if to say, have I repaid evil to one at peace with me? On the contrary, I would deliver him, though he is my enemy without cause.
The loins, and the armed man
חֲלָצֶיךָ in אֱזָר־נָא כְגֶבֶר חֲלָצֶיךָ (Iyov 38:3), gird your loins like a man, and in מֵֽחֲלָצֶיךָ יֵצֵֽאוּ (Bereishis 35:11), they shall come out of your loins, are the מתנים, the loins. The passive participle is חָלוּץ: וְעָבַר לָכֶם כָּל־ חָלוּץ (Bamidbar 32:21), and every armed man of you shall cross, one girded with weapons of war at the loins. So נֵֽחָלֵץ חֻשִׁים (Bamidbar 32:17), we will be armed quickly, and הֵחָֽלְצוּ מֵֽאִתְּכֶם (Bamidbar 31:3), be armed from among you. Rabbi Yonah wrote that this last is transitive; Radak says it is not, and that it is as though it said: let some of you be armed, the men and the mighty among you, and let them be against Midian. It may be that וקח לך את חליצתו, take for yourself his arms, is of this sense too: take yourself one of the lads who walk with me, that he may go back with you, and if you fear him, take his weapons of war, and you too will not kill him.
Making the bones fat
But וְעַצְמֹתֶיךָ יַֽחֲלִיץ (Yeshayahu 58:11), and He will make your bones fat, has the sense ידשן, will make fat, in the way of שְׁמוּעָה טוֹבָה תְּדַשֶּׁן ־עָֽצֶם (Mishlei 15:30), good tidings make the bone fat. In this sense Chazal said (Eruvin 39a) that one who goes before the teivah on Yom Tov of Rosh Hashanah says והחליצנו י"י אלהינו, which Radak explains as: satisfy us and make us fat with Your mitzvos, Hashem our God; or give us rest, for so they explained it, a term of rest.
Four senses in the Midrash
Chazal said (Vayikra Rabbah 34) that the word is used in four senses: ישלוף, to draw off, as וְחָֽלְצָה נַֽעֲלוֹ, she shall draw off his shoe; ישזיב, to rescue, as חַלְּצֵנִי (Tehillim 140:2), deliver me; יזיין, to arm, as חֲלוּצִים תַּֽעַבְרוּ (Devarim 3:18), you shall cross over armed; and יניח, to give rest, as וְעַצְמֹתֶיךָ יַֽחֲלִיץ, He will give your bones rest, as one says רצה והחליצנו, be pleased and give us rest.
חָלַץ מֵהֶֽם (הושע ה, ו), חלק ונפרד וסר מהם. והפעל העובר גַּם־תַּנִּין [תַּנִּים] חָלְצוּ (איכה ד, ג), הוציאו שדיהן וגלו אותן להניק גוריהן. וְחָֽלְצָה נַֽעֲלוֹ (דברים כה, ט), תשלוף נעלו ותסירהו. והכבד [פִּעֵל] וְחִלְּצוּ אֶת־הָאֲבָנִים (ויקרא יד, מ), יסירום וינתקום ממקומם. וכן נקראו חליפות הבגדים לפי שלובש אלו בהסרת אלו, וְהַלְבֵּשׁ אֹֽתְךָ מַֽחֲלָצֽוֹת (זכריה ג, ד), הַמַּֽחֲלָצוֹת וְהַמַּֽעֲטָפוֹת (ישעיה ג, כב), וְקַח־לְךָ אֶת־חֲלִֽצָתוֹ (שמואל ב' ב, כא), וַיִּקַּח אֶת־חֲלִיצוֹתָם (שופטים יד, יט). ובענין הזה כמו כן בענין ההצלה [נִפְעַל] צַדִּיק מִצָּרָה נֶחֱלָץ (משלי יא, ח), כלומר נפרד וסר מהצרה, לְמַעַן יֵחָלְצוּן יְדִידֶיךָ (תהלים ס, ז). והפעל הכבד [פִּעֵל] וָֽאֲחַלְּצָה צוֹרְרִי רֵיקָֽם (תהלים ז, ה), חַלְּצָה נַפְשִׁי (תהלים ו, ה), יְחַלְּצֵנִי כִּֽי־חָפֵֽץ בִּֽי (תהלים יח, כ). ופירוש ואחלצה צוררי אבל אחלצה צוררי, כלומר אם הייתי גומל שולמי רע אבל הייתי מציל אותו אף על פי שהוא צוררי בחנם. אֱזָר־נָא כְגֶבֶר חֲלָצֶיךָ (איוב לח, ג), מֵֽחֲלָצֶיךָ יֵצֵֽאוּ (בראשית לה, יא), הם המתנים. והפעול ממנו וְעָבַר לָכֶם כָּל־חָלוּץ (במדבר לב, כא), חגור כלי מלחמרת בחלצים. והנפעל נֵֽחָלֵץ חֻשִׁים (במדבר לב, יז), הֵחָֽלְצוּ מֵֽאִתְּכֶם (במדבר לא, ג). ואין החלצו יוצא כאשר כתב רבי יונה אבל הוא כאילו אמר החלצו מקצתכם האנשים והגבורים בכם ויהיו על מדין. ויתכן לפרש מזה וקח לך את חליצתו, אמר קח לך אחד מהנערים ההולכים עמי שישוב עמך ואם תירא ממנו קח לך את כלי מלחמתו וגם אתה לא תהרגנו. אבל וְעַצְמֹתֶיךָ יַֽחֲלִיץ (ישעיה נח, יא), ענינו ידשן על דרך שְׁמוּעָה טוֹבָה תְּדַשֶּׁן־עָֽצֶם (משלי טו, ל). ובענין הזה אמרו רבותינו ז"ל (עירובין לט, ע"א), העובר לפני התיבה ביום טוב של ראש השנה אומר והחליצנו י"י אלהינו, כלומר השביענו ודשננו במצותיך או הניחנו כי כן פירשוהו לשון מנוחה. ואמרו (ויקרא רבה פרשה לד, ר"ו) כי בארבע לשונות נשתמשו בלשון הזה ישלוף, ישזיב, יניח, יזיין, ישלוף וְחָֽלְצָה נַֽעֲלוֹ (דברים כה, ט), ישזיב חַלְּצֵנִי י"י (תהלים קמ, ב), יזיין חֲלוּצִים תַּֽעַבְרוּ (דברים ג, יח), יניח וְעַצְמֹתֶיךָ יַֽחֲלִיץ (ישעיה נח, יא), היך מה דאת אמר רצה והחליצנו.
נ-ש-ל
To slip off and drop, of itself; and with an object, to take off or drive out, which he gives as removal and overthrow: the shoe from the foot, nations from before you.
Slipping off by itself
וְנָשַׁל הַבַּרְזֶל מִן־הָעֵץ (Devarim 19:5), and the iron slips off the wood; כִּי יִשַּׁל זֵיתֶֽךָ (Devarim 28:40), for your olives will drop off. These, he says, take no object.
Taking off and driving out
With an object: וְנָשַׁל גּֽוֹיִם־רַבִּים מִפָּנֶיךָ (Devarim 7:1), and He will cast out many nations before you; שַֽׁל ־נְעָלֶיךָ (Shemos 3:5), take your shoes off; וַיְנַשֵּׁל אֶת־הַיְהוּדִים מֵֽאֵילוֹת (Melachim II 16:6), and he drove the Yehudim out of Eilos. Their sense is ההסרה והסתירה, removal and overthrow.
The form at Iyov 27:8
כִּי יֵשֶׁל אֱלוֹהַּ נַפְשֽׁוֹ (Iyov 27:8), when Hashem takes away his soul: the form should be יָשֵּׁל with a dagesh, and the quiescent letter came in its place, as at וַיָּזֶד יַֽעֲקֹב נָזִיד (Bereishis 25:29), and Yaakov cooked a stew. He says he will write more of it under the root שָׁלָה.
וְנָשַׁל הַבַּרְזֶל מִן־הָעֵץ (דברים יט, ה), כִּי יִשַּׁל זֵיתֶֽךָ (דברים כח, מ), אלה הם עומדים. והיוצאים וְנָשַׁל גּֽוֹיִם־רַבִּים מִפָּנֶיךָ (דברים ז, א). כִּי יֵשֶׁל אֱלוֹהַּ נַפְשֽׁוֹ (איוב כז, ח). משפטו יָשֵּׁל בדגש ובא הנח תמורתו כמו וַיָּזֶד יַֽעֲקֹב נָזִיד (בראשית כה, כט). ועוד נכתבנו בשרש שָׁלָה. שַֽׁל־נְעָלֶיךָ (שמות ג, ה), בפלס גַּשׁ פְּגַע־בּוֹ (שמואל ב' א, טו), והכבד [פִּעֵל] וַיְנַשֵּׁל אֶת־הַיְהוּדִים מֵֽאֵילוֹת (מלכים ב' טז, ו), ענינם ההסרה והסתירה.
ש-ל-ף
To draw out, a sword from its sheath or a shoe from the foot; and, as a verb that takes no object, to come out.
Drawing the sword
וְלֹֽא־ שָׁלַף הַנַּעַר חַרְבּוֹ (Shoftim 8:20), and the lad did not draw his sword; כִּי לֹא שָׁלַף הַחֶרֶב מִבִּטְנוֹ (Shoftim 3:22), for he did not draw the sword out of his belly; שֹׁלֵֽף חָרֶב (Shoftim 20:15), a drawer of the sword. They mean bringing the sword out of its sheath.
Drawing off the shoe
Likewise שָׁלַף אִישׁ נַֽעֲלוֹ (Rus 4:7), a man drew off his shoe, is like חלץ, to take off; and for וְחָֽלְצָה נַֽעֲלוֹ (Devarim 25:9), and she shall take off his shoe, the Targum Yerushalmi has שְׁלוּפֵי סַנְדְּלָא, the drawing off of the sandal, with this same word.
Coming out
As verbs that take no object: שָׁלַף וַיֵּצֵא מִגֵּוָה (Iyov 20:25), it came out and went forth from the body; שֶׁקַּדְמַת שָׁלַף יָבֵֽשׁ (Tehillim 129:6), which is dry before it comes out, that is, before it comes out and shows itself it is already dry.
וְלֹֽא־שָׁלַף הַנַּעַר חַרְבּוֹ (שופטים ח, כ), כִּי לֹא שָׁלַף הַחֶרֶב מִבִּטְנוֹ (שופטים ג, כב), שֹׁלֵֽף חָרֶב (שופטים כ, טו), ענינם הוצאת החרב מתערה. וכן שָׁלַף אִישׁ נַֽעֲלוֹ (רות ד, ז), כמו חלץ. וְחָֽלְצָה נַֽעֲלוֹ (דברים כה, ט) תרגום ירושלמי שְׁלוּפֵי סַנְדְּלָא. ואשר הם פעלים עומדים שָׁלַף וַיֵּצֵא מִגֵּוָה (איוב כ, כה), שֶׁקַּדְמַת שָׁלַף יָבֵֽשׁ (תהלים קכט, ו), כלומר קודם יציאתו והגלותו יבש.
ש-מ-ט
To leave a thing and abandon it, which he gives as the sense of all its forms: to release, to let drop; and of the oxen at the aron, to slip out from under it.
The oxen at the aron
כִּי שָֽׁמְטוּ הַבָּקָֽר (Shmuel II 6:6), for the oxen slipped: that is, the oxen slipped out from under the aron. He counts the verb intransitive here. The Targum's view is that it is transitive, from the way it renders the pasuk, and it renders וְנִדְּחָה יָדוֹ (Devarim 19:5), and his hand slips, with the same Aramaic word. Rabbi Yonah explained that the oxen's joints and limbs came apart before the greatness of the aron and its purity, and Radak's father wrote the same.
Releasing
תִּשְׁמְטֶנָּה וּנְטַשְׁתָּהּ (Shemos 23:11), you shall release the land and leave it; שָׁמוֹט כָּל־בַּעַל מַשֵּׁה יָדוֹ (Devarim 15:2), every creditor shall release what his hand holds. The heavy form: תַּשְׁמֵט יָדֶֽךָ (Devarim 15:3), your hand shall release, which Rabbi Yonah let drop and did not record. The noun is שְׁנַת הַשְּׁמִטָּה (Devarim 15:9), the year of release. Radak gives the sense of them all as leaving a thing and abandoning it.
Slipping from the inheritance
וְשָׁמַטְתָּה וּבְךָ מִנַּֽחֲלָֽתְךָ (Yirmiyahu 17:4), and you shall slip away, and in you, from your inheritance: the release will be in you, that you are released from your inheritance, since you did not release it while you were in it.
Let drop
וַיִּשְׁמְטוּהָ (Melachim II 9:33), and they let her drop; נִשְׁמְטוּ בִֽידֵי־סֶלַע שֹׁפְטֵיהֶם (Tehillim 141:6), their judges were let drop by the sides of the rock.
כִּי שָֽׁמְטוּ הַבָּקָֽר (שמואל ב' ו, ו) כלומר נשמטו הבקר מתחת הארון. ודעת התרגום כי הוא יוצא שאמר מְרַגוֹהִי תּוֹרַיָא. ותרגום וְנִדְּחָה יָדוֹ (דברים יט, ה) וְתִתְמְרֵג יְדֵהּ. וְשָׁמַטְתָּה וּבְךָ מִנַּֽחֲלָֽתְךָ (ירמיה יז, ד), פירוש ושמטתה והשמטה תהיה בך שתשמט מנחלתך לפי שלא שמטתה אותה בהיותך בה. אלו עומדים. ואשר יוצאים תִּשְׁמְטֶנָּה וּנְטַשְׁתָּהּ (שמות כג, יא), וַיֹּאמֶר שִׁמְטֻהָו [שִׁמְטוּהָ] וַיִּשְׁמְטוּהָ (מלכים ב' ט, לג), שָׁמוֹט כָּל־בַּעַל מַשֵּׁה יָדוֹ (דברים טו, ב). והנפעל נִשְׁמְטוּ בִֽידֵי־סֶלַע שֹׁפְטֵיהֶם (תהלים קמא, ו). והכבד [הִפְעִיל] תַּשְׁמֵט יָדֶֽךָ (דברים טו, ג). ורבי יונה שמטו ולא זכרו. והשם שְׁנַת הַשְּׁמִטָּה (שם ט). כלם ענין עזיבת הדבר ונטישתו. ורבי יונה פירש כִּי שָֽׁמְטוּ הַבָּקָֽר, שנתפרקו פרקיהן ואיבריהם מגדולת הארון וטהרתו. וכן כתב אדוני אבי ז"ל.
Radak, Sefer HaShorashim, Berlin 1847. Public domain, digitised by Sefaria from the National Library of Israel.
Sources
Rabbi Reuven Chaim Klein, "The Year of Slipping Away (Part 1 of 2)," What's in a Word?, Ohr Somayach, 14 May 2022.
Cited in the essay: Bereishis 10:26 with Targum Yonasan, 19:17 with Rashi, 32:25 with Ramban, 35:11; Shemos 3:5, and 23:10-11 with Rashi; Vayikra 14:40, 14:43; Bamidbar 22:23, 22:31, 31:3, 32:30; Devarim 3:18, 15:1 with Ibn Ezra, 15:2-3, 15:9, 19:5 with Rashi, 25:9 with Targum Yonasan, 31:10; Yehoshua 5:13, 5:15; Shoftim 3:22, 8:10, 8:20, 9:54, 16:16, 20:2, 20:15, 20:17, 20:25, 20:35, 20:46; Rus 4:7-8; Shmuel I 17:51, 31:4, and 31:8-9 with Targum; Shmuel II 6:6 with Ibn Janach and Rashi, and 24:9; Melachim I 5:19; Melachim II 3:26, and 9:33 with Radak; Yeshayahu 5:27, 11:5, 32:11, and 58:11 with Radak; Yirmiyahu 30:6; Tehillim 140:2; Iyov 1:15 with Rashi, 38:3, 40:7; Daniel 5:6; Divrei HaYamim I 1:20 with Targum Rav Yosef, 10:4, 10:8 with Targum, 13:9, 21:16, 21:25; Divrei HaYamim II 6:9; Mishnah Makkos 2:1; Yevamos 102a; Sotah 9b with Ben Yehoyada, and 41a; Chullin 53a with Rashi, and 57a; Gittin 33b with Rashi, and 36a; Megillah 18b; Nazir 8b; Bava Kamma 3a, and 17b with Rashi; Bava Metzia 30b, 48b; Bava Basra 75b with Rashi; Rashi to Shabbos 154b, Eruvin 16a and Kiddushin 22b; Sanhedrin 32a; Shevuos 44b; Vayikra Rabbah 34:15; Bereishis Rabbah 52:12; Ibn Janach and Radak, Sefer HaShorashim; Rabbi Shlomo Pappenheim; Shoresh Yesha; Rabbi Moshe ben HaNessiah Britannico, Sefer HaShoham; Rabbi Yosef Chaim of Baghdad, Ben Yehoyada; Rabbi Dr. Ernest Klein; Prof. Joseph Klausner.