Our Gemara on Amud Beis discusses an interesting halachic process. Ordinarily, one who is ritually impure due to a seminal emission is forbidden to enter the Temple courtyard until after he immerses in the mikvah and nightfall arrives. However, if he is a metzora, he is permitted to partially enter prior to the evening.
How does this work? After the purification rituals, the metzora is still forbidden to enter the Temple courtyard until after his atonement sacrifices are brought. Yet part of the sacrificial ritual involves having his thumb and big toe inside the Temple courtyard and having blood from the sacrifice placed upon them. This, by necessity, permits the partial entry of his toe and thumb into the courtyard. The Gemara reasons that if he also happened to be impure from a seminal emission and waiting for nightfall, even though this would ordinarily be forbidden, since the Torah is permitting the metzora to partially enter, it does not matter if there is an additional prohibition riding on top of that—it is permitted as well.
This is a genuine logical argument, so much so that the Gemara Yevamos (7b) seriously considers that just as yibbum permits one to marry a brother’s wife (eishes ach), which is ordinarily forbidden, perhaps it would also permit yibbum to his brother’s wife even if she also is his wife’s sister, which is another prohibition. In the end, the Gemara over there rejects this. Rav Soloveitchik (Reshimos Shiurim, Yevamos ibid.) explains that the idea is that if the Torah sees the mitzvah as important enough to override one prohibition, it can override two. The reason why, in the case of levirate marriage, it does not override is because of a special scriptural derivation.
In any case, this fascinating halachic reasoning has two modern-day applications:
In Shulchan Aruch (OC 112:13), the laws and order of blessing on bread are discussed. There is a general principle that the higher-quality bread should be chosen for the blessing. There also is a principle that the host should lead in the blessing on behalf of the entire group (which we now only do on Shabbos). There were also some who had the extra stringency of not eating commercially baked bread of a gentile, even when the ingredients were kosher (a stringency usually followed only during the Ten Days of Repentance).
That brings us to our scenario: The host has two kinds of bread on his table—gentile bread that is superior in quality and Jewish bread that is of lesser quality. Additionally, though the host has a personal custom to abstain from the gentile bread, his guest does not. If the host makes a blessing on the inferior bread, he may cause quarrel, as it could appear to the guest that he is unimportant and that the host is only offering him inferior bread (Taz and Shach). Therefore, the host is permitted to bless over and eat the gentile bread, overriding his custom of stringency. Not only that, but even after the initial blessing—where at least the host could now eat the lesser bread without danger of quarrel—since the guest has been freely offered the high-quality bread, the host may still eat the gentile bread for the entire meal. The Gr”a (ibid.) quotes our Gemara as the rationale: once the bread became permitted for the blessing, it remains permitted for the entire meal.
(We must understand, according to the Gr”a, what additional mitzvah is fulfilled by continuing to eat from the bread for the rest of the meal. If there is no additional mitzvah, what is the comparison to our Gemara? Unless the Gr”a holds there still is a smaller concern of quarrel or some residual, but lesser, honor to the blessing to continue to eat from the higher-quality gentile bread. This remains unclear to me.)
Another application of this principle is found in Aruch HaShulchan (OC 66:8): Once it is permitted to interrupt part of your prayers—such as the blessings of Shema—to answer “Borchu,” one may also answer “Amen” to the subsequent blessing on the Torah. Aruch HaShulchan cites our Gemara as support.
Really, this is a difficult concept, and in everyday life we conduct ourselves in the opposite manner. We don’t say, “Since my friend loaned me his car, I’ll borrow his lawnmower.” We don’t say, “Since my rabbi allowed me to eat on Yom Kippur, I’ll also wear leather shoes.” Of course, there are differences, but so too we can find differences in the explicitly permitted item and the other matter being allowed in the earlier cases we saw.
It requires further analysis and study to understand how and when this principle is applied.
Translations Courtesy of Sefaria, except when, sometimes, I disagree with the translation
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Rabbi Simcha Feuerman, Rabbi Simcha Feuerman, LCSW-R, LMFT, DHL is a psychotherapist who works with high conflict couples and families. He can be reached via email at simchafeuerman@gmail.com