Zevachim 5

One of the pleasant consequences of studying Daf Yomi is the way we come to know the personages that show up on the pages of the Talmud. Whether it’s Rabbi Akiva’s entry into study as a 40-year-old or Rabban Gamliel’s iron-fisted approach with his colleagues, our time with the rabbis makes them familiar personalities, almost as if their frequent appearances make them more present in our lives. 
So when I saw this on today’s daf, my first reaction was worry. 

Reish Lakish raised a difficulty while lying on his stomach in the study hall.

Imagine walking into a classroom and seeing one of your favorite teachers lying face down on the floor. Might our former gladiator (Reish Lakish was a gladiator and a bandit before he became a Torah scholar) be in pain? Is he having lower back issues? More pertinently, why does the Talmud see fit to tell us this? Is it relevant? 

I might have been able to lay this aside if it hadn’t been for another mention of positioning further down the daf:

Rav Nahman and Rav Sheshet were sitting, and Rav Adda bar Mattana was sitting with them. And they were sitting and speaking.

Again, this seems like a peculiar thing to bring up. In the course of a dozen or so words, the Gemara repeats three times that this trio is sitting. Is that significant? Is it related to the mention of Reish Lakish’s prone position? Is it better to lie face down or sit when studying?

How people hold themselves while studying has received more attention in Jewish texts than you might think. In the Sifrei and the Tosefta, we learn that Rabbi Ishmael likes to study lying on his side, while Rabbi Elazar ben Azariah prefers to stand up. The second-century midrash Alphabet of Rabbi Akiva holds that “anyone who seeks to study Torah must bend his legs and busy himself with it” as a sign of humility. The modern commentary Tosefta Kifshuta interprets this to mean that “a student must sit on the ground cross-legged, as was customary in those days.”

Avot d’Rabbi Natan goes into more detail on how a student should approach a visiting Torah scholar: “Go to him. And do not sit next to him on a bed, or on a chair, or on a bench. Rather, sit before him on the ground, and accept upon yourself every word that comes from his mouth with fear and reverence, trembling and sweating, just as our forefathers accepted what they heard at Mount Sinai with fear and reverence, trembling and sweating.”

This seems like a tall order, one that I failed to live up to in Hebrew school. But according to Moed Katan 16b, King David studied Torah sitting on the ground and eschewed blankets and pillows to show how humble he was, so there’s that.

Sitting while learning isn’t the only school of thought. Recalling that we stood to receive the Torah at Mount Sinai, Megillah 21a tells us that Jews would always stand while studying Torah “from the days of Moses until the time of Rabban Gamliel,” but that honor for Torah ended with the latter’s death, and people now sit while studying. Meanwhile, the Shulchan Aruch takes a more egalitarian approach, instructing that “the rabbi should not sit on a chair with his students on the ground; rather, either everyone is on the ground or everyone is on chairs.”

As for Reish Lakish, he seems to be something of an outlier in choosing to lay on his stomach. And while there’s no evidence that he studied in this manner because of illness or injury, the episode — and my reaction to it — is an indication of how getting to know these figures over the last five years has prompted me to worry for their well being now and again.

Read all of Zevachim 5 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on September 19, 2025. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.