Megilah 003: City that is first walled then settled

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Megilah 003: City that is first walled then settled

Allen Schuldenfrei asked:

my understanding of this gemara is that to qualify as a walled city, the city 
had to have been walled first and then settled. But if the city was first 
settled and only afterwards they erected a wall around the city then that city 
does not have the halacha of a walled city and they read on the 14th.

1. Is my understanding of the gemara correct?

2. Have you ever heard of a city that a wall is built BEFORE houses are built 
and move in?

3. Today, other than Yerushalayim is there any city that reads the megillah on 
the 15th?

4. If you don't know for sure which happened first, is the megillah read twice? 
If yes, on what day do you recite the berachos?

Thank you,

Allen Schuldenfrei, Baltimore, Maryland USA
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The Kollel replies*:

1. Is my understanding of the gemara correct?

2. Have you ever heard of a city that a wall is built BEFORE houses are built 
and move in?

Your understanding of the Gemara is indeed correct, however it is not strange 
at all that in ancient times when a city was built that the walls would be 
built before the houses.  There were times that living outside the walls of a 
city was unthinkable because of bandits or conquering armies.  It could be that 
in certain times and places - for example the Roman Empire during the Pax 
Romana - there was enough political stability to build cities without walls as 
we are accustomed to today, but this was the exception to the rule in ancient 
times.

3. Today, other than Yerushalayim is there any city that reads the Megilah on 
the 15th?

There is only one other place in the world where the Jewish community reads the 
Megilah only on the 15th and that is the place where the story took place - 
Shushan ha'Birah.  I have been told that there is a debate as to the location 
of the ancient Shushan, but an old Persian Jew who grew up in the modern 
Iranian city of Shush which is supposedly built on the ancient site of Shushan 
told me that they read Megilah only on the 15th.

4. If you don't know for sure which happened first, is the Megilah read twice? 
If yes, on what day do you recite the berachos?

You don't need to know for sure what happened first because we assume that the 
walls were built first (Shulchan Aruch 688:1).  There are, however, places - 
like Yafo and Teveriyah - that read twice, but for a different reason.  In the 
case of Teveriyah the Safek is whether a wall that doesn't surround the whole 
city (one side is the Kineret) is considered a wall regarding this Halachah.  
In the case of Yafo, the Safek is whether there was a walled city there since 
the times of Yehoshua.  

The Berachos, in these places that read both days, are recited only on the 
fourteenth because this is when most of the Jewish world reads Megilah 
(Shulchan Aruch 688:4). 

Kol Tuv,

Yonasan Sigler


*This is not a Psak Halachah.  



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