What's the answer?

The subtitle is a hint.

Why should I assume that just because his son and daughter are standing next to each other, the son is a mamzer?

LOL Don't make too much out of the wording in English.

His wife cheated on him so his daughter isn't really his?

Yet Grandson Isn't A Mamzer?

A ger?

9

Ben Sira, but what does that have to do with 18th century Italy?

Excuse my ignorance or inability to understand the riddle,
If it's not a play on words - can you kindly rephrase it?

There's a guy who was made from an egg contributed by the daughter of the guy who contributed the sperm.

You got it.



and the story of Ben Sira from אלפא ביתא דבן סירא, a synopsis of which you can read here.

Pachad Yitzchak, os אות ב pg. ל

According to the story Ben Sira's father was Yirmiyahu, who was forced to ejaculate into a bath and then his own daughter, Ben Sira's mother, bathed in the water and became impregnated.

This particular phenomenon, if you want to call it that, might actually have halakhic implications vis a vis IVF.

Doodlehead's scenario is assur midrabbanan, but the kid isn't a mamzer either, btw.

He uses his time machine to go into the future, meets a girl and impregnates her. Only later does he learn that she is actually his daughter as the result of his future self’s marriage. Since his “daughter” isn’t actually his, the son is not a mamzer. Am I close?

Is this the book with the scenario of a melachah which if you do on Shabbos is muttar lechatchila but a lav on YT?

Although it is cheating a little bit...

9

We won't tell

Lot was perfectly righteous?!?

Could be. It's also the book which posits that it should be assur to kill lice on shabbos because they don't spontaneously generate.

I am still not seeing an answer to what Gabbe asked:

http://snopes.com/pregnant/bath.asp

They never said it was false.

Anyway, don't knock it. If it weren't for this story, there would be serious problems with IVF.

Oh, sorry. The Pahad Yitzhaq was written by R. Yitzhat Lampronti, an 18th century Italian rabbi.

http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp...37&letter=L

Thus, this riddle and its answer is by an 18th century Italian rabbi. I thought if I mentioned the hint it might help someone guess it, but Gabbe guessed independently of its source (or the hint).

I think we realize that this would not seem to be physiologically possible. But that doesn't mean that the ancient work Alphabet of Ben Sira doesn't contain this story, the Talmud doesn't discuss a related case, or that the Pahad Yitzhaq doesn't use it to answer his question of a very unusual circumstance.

Interestingly, as I said, the PY itself suggests that the halakhah as recorded in the Talmud and never disputed ought not be followed, but we should be strict upon ourselves, because the physical reality does not agree with the basis for the halakhah.

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