Observation: We find that the Mishnah (while saying that there "are a certain amount" of a certain category) always ends with the word "Hen" - "there are."

Proof: This is evident here, and from the Mishnah in Shevuos (49a) that says, "There are four Shomrim." This is evident from the Mishnah in Chulin (17b) that says, "There are three types of nicks," and from the Mishnah in Avodah Zarah (30a) that says, "There are three types of wines." This is also evident from the Mishnah in Avodah Zarah (47b) that says, "There are three types of houses...three types of stones...three types of trees."

Implied Question: However, in Bava Kama (2a) the Mishnah says, "There are four Avos of Nezikin" and it does not conclude "Hen." (Why?)

Answer: This is because it is referring to the next part of the Mishnah which says, "These four are not like each other" (and it is not concluding the list).

Proof: This is clearly correct, as when the Gemara in Bava Kama (2b) lists the amount of Avos Nezikin according to Rebbi Chiya and Rebbi Oshiya, it indeed says "Hen."

Explanation: This is due to maintaining peace with the king of the land.

Question: This is incorrect, as our Mishnah is referring to Jewish kings. We only say this regarding Gitin, as stated in Gitin (80a) that Ula says, "Why did they institute writing the year of the king in Gitin? This is due to maintaining peace with the king of the land. Gitin are invalid even when written for a kingdom that is no longer a proper kingdom, like that of Madai and Yavan.

Question (cont.): However, our Mishnah is referring to legal documents. In Avodah Zarah (10a) we say that in the exile we only count based on the years of the kings of Yavan. The Gemara there (10a) indeed concludes that our Mishnah in Rosh Hashanah is referring to Jewish kings.

Question (cont.): Our Gemara also concludes later (3a) that it is only referring to Jewish kings. We count from Tishrei when citing the years of gentile kings.

Observation: It must be that we only require peace with the kings in a Get of a woman, since it is a significant document that permits her to remarry. It is therefore more important than other legal documents.

Explanation #1: Rashi explains that if they did not set a date for the beginning of the king's year, and the date was dependent on whenever the person would become king, sometimes it would be difficult to know the year.

Explanation #1 (cont.): For example, if the documents states, "in Kislev in the third year" and the witnesses said that when they signed they did not see that he lent him money. Rather, the borrower told us to sign, since the law is that one is allowed to write a loan document for a borrower even though the lender is not with him. We do not know if he lent him money beforehand or not. However, we did see that he lent him money in Tamuz in the third year of a certain king.

Explanation #1 (cont.): If the judges do not know when the king became king, one will not be able to tell if this Tamuz is before Kislev or after Kislev. If the year of the king started between Tamuz and Kislev, Kislev is before Tamuz in every year of his reign. If he became king between Kislev and Tamuz, Tamuz ended up being before Tamuz in the years of his reign. Now that Nisan is always Rosh Hashanah, Tamuz is always before Kislev.

Explanation #1 (cont.): One must explain that (Rashi's case is that) the lender and borrower admitted that it was the same loan. Otherwise, how would the witnesses know that it was the same loan?

Observation: It appears from Rashi's explanation that because we would be unsure about the date, we would consider it early were it not for the fact that Nisan is Rosh Hashanah. Due to this we know that it was dated after the transaction occurred.

Question: It is impossible to say this, as we would not invalidate any document because we are unsure of its date.

Proof #1: This is apparent from the Gemara in Sanhedrin (32a) that says that if a document is dated as being written on the first of Nisan during Shemitah, and witnesses say, "How can the witnesses on this document have testified? On this day they were with us in a different place (then where the document was written)!" The document is valid and the witnesses are valid, as we suspect that the document was dated and written later. This shows that we say a document is valid when we are unsure of its true date.

Proof #2: Similarly, in Bava Basra (171a) the Gemara says that if a document is dated on Shabbos or Yom Kippur it is valid, as we presume that they wrote it after the transaction took place (not on the accurate date).

Answer: However, Rashi could give his explanation in the opposite manner. The borrower wrote in the document, "Tamuz of the third year (of a king)," and the witnesses say that the loan happened in Kislev of the third year (of that king). I would say that the document is valid due to a doubt. Since they instituted that Nisan is the Rosh Hashanah for the king's years, we know that the document is invalid as Tamuz is always before Kislev.

Question #1: However, the body of his explanation is extremely difficult. He is saying that they made a decree because the entire world might forget when the king became king!

Question #2: Similarly, how will a scribe who writes documents all day forget the year?

Question #3: Additionally, if so, we could say that the difference is regarding all documents that we do not know what year to write in the document, as we do not know when the king started his rule!

Question #4: Additionally, this type of document is not even deemed early according to Abaye who says in Bava Metzia (13a) that the signature of witnesses cause a document to take effect.

Question #4 (cont.): According to Rav Asi who argues on him, why would they have to make this decree? Don't we say that we do not write a document for a borrower unless a lender is with him unless it is a document that gives the right to collect from his property?

Explanation #2: It appears that the difference regarding early loan documents is as follows. If a king became king on the first of Nisan, when the next first of Nisan arrives the scribe might mistakenly think that he actually became king on the second of Nisan last year. People commonly make a mistake that an event happened a day earlier or a day later.

Explanation #2 (cont.): He will write that the date is the first of Nisan in the first year of the king. This mistake would make this document an entire year early, as it is really the second year of his reign. This would cause people to take away property from people who bought property from the borrower within the previous year, when in fact they would have no right to do so (as the property that the borrower sold before the loan was made does not have a lien on it).

Explanation #2 (cont.): However, now that they made Nisan the Rosh Hashanah for kings there will no longer be a problem. Even if the king would become king on the second of Nisan, everyone knows that when the next first of Nisan arrives he starts the second year of his reign.

Question: There is still a problem (with this explanation). If he became king on the twenty ninth of Adar in the first year, when the twenty ninth of Adar arrives next year the scribe will mistakenly think that he became king on Rosh Chodesh Nisan of last year. He will write on the (second) twenty ninth of Adar that this is the first year of the king's reign, causing the document to be dated a year early!

Answer: This is not a question, as when he becomes king on the twenty ninth of Adar, on the first of Nisan (the very next day) he starts his second year. The scribe clearly knows this, as the entire year he has been writing documents stating that this is the second year of this king. It is therefore clear that he will not make such a mistake.

Observation: There is another answer to this question given in the Yerushalmi. The Yerushalmi asks, what is the difference between the opinion that we count from Nisan and the opinion that we count from Tishrei? Rebbi Yitzchak answers that it is for the documents that are written in the interim.

Observation (cont.): If he borrowed in Iyar and he wrote in a document that this is the second year of the king's rule, and then he proceeded to make a sale in Marcheshvan and write in the document that it was in the second year of the king's rule, according to the opinion that we start counting from Nisan the first document is deemed to have happened first. According to the opinion that it starts from Tishrei, the sale is deemed to have happened first,

Observation: The Yerushalmi is not discussing our question (regarding an early document), and is not coming to explain why Nisan is the Rosh Hashanah for these documents.

Explanation: In Bava Metzia (72a), Rashi explains that "invalid" refers to collecting property with a lien from this document. However, one could still use the document to collect from property currently owned by the lender.

Question: This cannot be, as we explained there (DH "Shtar").

Question: Isn't this a Kal v'Chomer? This is as we state later (10a): "If the beginning of a Nidah's clean day does not contribute at the end of her count (to allow her to immerse on the seventh day), but the end of her day contributes to her starting to count (if she sees before sunset she can already count one day towards becoming clean), certainly a year that we consider a year based on one day at the end of the year should prove that a day at the beginning of the year should also be a year!"

Answer: This is not a question. On the contrary, the law is when someone else becomes king in Adar that we count a year for the one day that is at the beginning of his rule. This is like a Nidah, for whom the end of the day helps start her count. However, if he dies in Nisan we should not count a year for the one day that he ruled, since this is the end of his rule. This is just like a Nidah who is not helped by the beginning of the day.

Implied Question: Even though it was sufficient for the Gemara earlier to say that they had decided to make him king in Adar (even though he only officially became the king in Nisan), this answer is not sufficient here. (Why not?)

Answer: We already know this teaching from the previous case. This was the teaching of the first part of this very Mishnah! Even if the cases would not be mentioned one after the other, we would still not want to say that they share the same essential teaching.

Proof: This is as the Gemara says in Bava Basra (166a) regarding the Beraisa that states that if it says in a document, "Silver in Dinarim" means not less than the worth of two golden Dinarim paid out in silver. Another Beraisa states, "Gold in Dinarim" means not less than the equivalent of two Dinar of silver paid out in gold.

Proof (cont.): The Gemara asks afterwards, perhaps this means he is giving pieces of gold worth two Dinar of silver? Abaye answers that the owner of the document has the lower hand. The Gemara asks, if so, why don't we say this regarding the first case? In other words, regarding the case, "Silver in Dinarim" the Beraisa should also say that the owner of the document has the lower hand, and he means to pay him in silver pieces.

Proof: The Gemara asks that we should say this "in the first case" despite the fact that these are two different Beraisos. This is because the Gemara knows they were stated at the same time.

Observation: Rabeinu Shmuel there forced a different explanation of that Gemara.

Explanation: The Gemara currently implies that this refers to Iyar, since we count the years of kings from Nisan.

Implied Question: Later (11a), the Gemara implies that Nisan is Ziv as the Avos were born during this month and they were the "lights of the world." (Is it Iyar or Nisan?)

Answer #1: However, Rashi explains later that this means that when Iyar arrived, the "lights of the world" had already been born in Nisan.

Answer #2: Alternatively, sometimes the Tekufah of Nisan (based on the sun) goes into the time when the moon is out during Iyar.

Implied Question: The simple explanation of the Pasuk does not lend itself to derive that the "lights of the world" were born then. (Why not?)

Answer: Perhaps we count from Adar, and Nisan is called the month of Ziv!

Implied Question: Even if Iyar is the month of Ziv because of the shine (i.e. blooming) of the trees, one cannot prove that we count from Nisan due to Shlomo's calling it the second month. (Why not?)

Answer: This is because it happened to be Shlomo's second month (perhaps it was personal, not in general).

Implied Question: Deriving leaving from Egypt from the Pasuk "And Aharon went up" is not enough to teach us that the first of Nisan is Rosh Hshanah. (Why not?)

Answer: Perhaps it is the fifteenth of Nisan. However, from the continuation of this derivation from, "And it was in the first month etc." we do (successfully derive that the first of Nisan is Rosh Hashanah for Jewish kings).

Explanation: It must be that this refers to the month of Av. Since the Pasuk says regarding Nisan, "it is the first for you," this implies that all of the other months that are hinted at by saying they are the "fifth, sixth, seventh" is relative to the first month of Nisan.

Explanation: The Gemara is referring to the Pasuk, "And Aharon went up etc." not the Pasuk of "And it was" as this (the number of the month stated in the Pasuk) is not certainly referring back to leaving Egypt.