We've been talking about halachot that apply to a large set or group of witnesses. Here, the Mishnah is going to tell us what is considered a single set of witnesses and when they are considered different groups.
The Mishnah says, “If a person was committing a murder, and there were two witnesses watching him from one window and two other witnesses watching him from another window, and the two sets did not see each other.” There was another person standing in the middle between the windows, warning the person not to commit the act of murder. A person can only be sentenced to death if he was properly warned about how forbidden the crime is and about the punishment for committing it. So one person warned him. He was in the middle. So there are five people involved here: two in window one, two in window two, and they don't see each other. And then there's a man warning the potential murderer.
When some of the people see each other, what we mean here is that if the person giving the warning saw the witnesses in the windows and they saw him, all of these people are considered to be one set of witnesses, even though they couldn't all see each other. Like we said, the people in the windows cannot see each other. The fact that they all could be seen by the person giving the warning, and that the person giving the warning saw them, means that they all joined together as one group.
But if the person giving the warning did not see the witnesses in the windows and they did not see him, then it's considered to be two sets of witnesses. The group in each window is considered to be its own set of witnesses. And how does it all play out?
Therefore, if you have both sets of witnesses testify and, according to the way we just concluded, let's say they didn't see each other, didn't have any contact, and didn't see the person giving the warning, then you have two sets of witnesses, separate groups. One of these two groups in the windows is found to be—meaning another set of witnesses came and said, “Ah, this group in window one, who claimed to be in window one and to have seen a murder, were with us. They couldn't have been there to see a murder.” So they were trying to give testimony about somebody who should be put to death. We say these two witnesses in window one are put to death because other witnesses testified about them. So they're put to death.
But not only are the Edim Zomemim—witnesses who were not really there because other witnesses claimed they weren't there at the time—killed; who else is? Who is this referring to? The person who committed the murder, the person who was on trial for murder. Why? Because even though the Edim Zomemim are now out, we don't take their testimony, and they're actually put to death for what they tried to do to the defendant. They tried to have him executed, so we kill them. We also kill the person who was on trial for murder. Why? Because the other set of witnesses in window two are not connected to the people in window one. They're giving testimony. Their testimony is clean. We don't have anyone claiming that they are Edim Zomemim. So their testimony works, and it ends up serving to kill the person on trial.
And that's what we say: vehashniyah peturah, the second set of witnesses who are not found to be Edim Zomemim are fully exempt from punishment. The two sets of witnesses are different groups. They're not connected. The second one is not affected by the fact that the first set was found to be Edim Zomemim. So their edut (testimony) works to kill the person on trial. And ironically, the Edim Zomemim, who were not really there because other witnesses claimed they weren't there at the time, are put to death as well because they tried to put somebody else to death, even though that person is being put to death as well by the testimony of window two. That's how it all plays out.
That's all according to the understanding that they didn't have any connection and were two separate groups. But if we go to the first way in the Mishnah, where they actually did have a connection through the person who was warning the potential murderer, then nobody is actually killed. How? In that case, all the witnesses are considered to be one set of people. Once some of them are found to be Edim Zomemim, the rest of the witnesses are disqualified as well. So even though only the people in window one are found to be Edim Zomemim, the people in window two are now automatically dragged along and disqualified from giving testimony. They're not Edim Zomemim, but they're not allowed to give testimony anymore. So the person on trial for murder is not put to death because there's no valid testimony against him.
Likewise, the people who are actually Edim Zomemim are not killed either. If there are Edim Zomemim, the only way we kill them, the way we bring punishment to them, is if all of the witnesses who are part of the group are found to be Edim Zomemim. So here, the people in window two are not Edim Zomemim, so we don't kill the people in group one who actually are Edim Zomemim. That's the halacha. So since in this case some of the witnesses were found to be Zomemim and some were not, we don't kill any of the witnesses, but their testimony is all thrown out. And therefore, in that version of how things play out, nobody would die.
According to the above, or really the beginning of the Mishnah, we sort of said that if the witnesses in the window and the person in the middle don't have any relationship, they don't even see each other, the person in the middle who's giving the warning is not considered to be part of either group. But the fact is, he can still give the warning. The people in the window could be the witnesses, and that's enough to have the person who's on trial executed.
But Rabbi Yosei is going to disagree. Rabbi Yosei omer, says Rabbi Yosei, a criminal is not executed unless the two witnesses who testify against him—the witnesses—also gave him the warning. But if a different person gave the warning, as in our case, and the other people were the witnesses, then the warning is not valid, and the criminal cannot be given the death penalty. How does he learn it out? He learns it out from the Pasuk (verse) that says, al pi shnayim edim (by the word of two witnesses). The continuation of that Pasuk is that the person is going to be put to death. So he learns from here that whatever is involved in putting this person to death, including the warning, has to happen through the same two witnesses. That's the opinion of Rabbi Yosei, arguing against the implied opinion of Tanna Kama (the first tanna).
Another interpretation we learn from this Pasuk—the Pasuk where it says, al pi shnayim edim, al pi shnayim edim—is that the judges, the shoftim (judges) of the Sanhedrin, are not allowed to hear the testimony through an interpreter. The word pi (mouth) over here: al pi shnayim edim is telling us that the judges have to hear the words of the witnesses. They have to understand the language of the witnesses and can only listen to testimony directly from those witnesses, not through an interpreter or somebody else.