mishpatim

In case you were wondering how chumash is going, mishpatim has been a verrrrrrry loooooooong parsha for me.  we just finished shishi.  i personally found the pshat of many of the pesukim difficult.  not the words per se (though some of them were complicated), but understanding what the plain meaning of the text is.  chana would often ask, "but what does that mean?!" and i would have no idea.  example: if the sun shines on the robber, then his blood is not on him.  or something like that.  you know, that probably would have been a good opportunity to talk about torah sheba'al peh.

since we've dropped rashi, we've more than halved the time spent on chumash.  i figure she's about 10-15 min a day, between chazara and new pesukim.
i thought chana would estimate more, but she figures new pesukim take 3 min (that's good news, because it felt longer to me) and chazara between 5 and 7 minutes.
during the days when we were doing rashi intensive work, she has done 15-20 min chazara, 10-20 min new pesukim, and 30-40min rashi.

today we did the section that there won't be miscarriers or barren people in the land.  so she said, "i'm pretty sure there are those in israel."  so we did the rashi (outside) that it means if you keep the mitzvos.  she said, "so if you keep the mitzvos, but not everybody does, you get punished?"  i explained that the regular way is that there are miscarriages.  so it's not like a punishment, it's just regular.  but if we keep the torah, then hashem makes a miracle to stop these things.  she said, "EVERYONE needs to keep the torah?"  i said i think most people need to.

then we talked about "filling the number of days" meaning that you get "full" days instead of "part" of your days.  i gave the example of opa, who had full days, as he lived into his 90s.  chana asked if 80s is considered full days.  i said yes.  i think anyone after 60.  because before 60 is "cut off."

then we talked about the phrase in 23:27 hashem giving your enemies to you neck.  yes, that's the literal translation.  which brings me back to mishpatim having odd pshat.  and which, as i just caught a glimpse of rashi, i interpreted differently.  now i have to check the other rishonim if anyone explains it how i explained it.