My late father-in law, a man remembered for his generous support of the needy and of Torah scholars, would say, “you should give until it hurts.” Although this concept came from the goodness of his heart, its source is in the Torah. The Torah refers to a wealthy person who volunteers to offer an expensive animal as a sacrifice an adam – a man. The term “adam” conveys the meaning of power and wealth.
The Torah refers to a poor person who cannot afford an expensive animal and offers instead a Korban Minchah, a small measure of fine flour mixed with oil and spice, as a nefesh, a soul. The sacrifice of a poor person who takes his own bread out of his mouth is dearer to God than the sacrifice of a wealthy person who takes money out of his pocket. It is as if such a person has sacrificed his own very existence, his nefesh, to God.
The most common form of the korban Minchah, the meal offering, was the one volunteered by a poor person. It could be very basic or more elaborate in form. The basic form was known as minchat solet. This consisted of a minimum amount of flour, known as an issaron, or one tenth of an ephah, which is equivalent to 43.2 eggs (between 86.4 and 172.8 fluid ounces) of solet, fine flour, made from wheat. Like the animal sacrifice, which could be slaughtered by its owner and then handed over to the kohen to perform the sacrificial service, the minchat solet could be prepared by its owner before being handed over to the kohen to perform the sacrificial service.
The owner would prepare the minchat solet in the following way. A small amount of oil is poured into a kli sharet, a special sanctified vessel. Solet is then added, more oil is then poured onto the solet, and the oil and the solet are then mixed together into a solet mixture, in a mixing process known as belilah. The solet mixture is then transferred to another kli sharet and more oil is then poured onto it in a process known as yetzikah. A measure of frankincense, known as levonah, is then introduced into the vessel, to the side of but not on top of the solet mixture. The solet mixture with the levonah is then handed to the kohen. The kohen then carries the kli sharet containing the solet mixture and the levonah and touches the southwest corner of the outer altar with it.
With these preliminary preparations complete, the kohen now commences the avodat haminchah, the Minchah sacrificial service.
The avodat haminchah was performed in four stages corresponding to the four stages of the avodat hadam, the blood service performed in the case of an animal sacrifice.
The first stage of the avodat haminchah is kemitzah, in which the kohen separates the solet mixture that will be burned on the altar, known as the kometz, from the shirayim, the remainder of the solet mixture, which will be eaten by the kohanim.
The kohen performs the kemitzah by placing his right hand in the kli sharet and scooping up as much of the solet mixture as he can in the cavity he forms in his hand by bending his three middle fingers back over his palm. Separating the kometz from the solet mixture corresponds to the slaughtering of the animal in the avodat hadam ceremony, in that it isolates the essential component to be burned on the altar (the kometz in the case of the avodat haminchah and the blood in the case of the avodat hadam) from the body of the offering.
The kohen then places the scooped-up kometz in another kli sharet, an activity known as matan bakli, corresponding to the collecting of the blood in a kli sharet in the avodat hadam. He then scoops up the levonah from the former kli sharet and adds it to the kometz already in the kli sharet. The kohen then carries the kli sharet with the kometz and the levonah to the altar in an activity known as holachah, corresponding to conveying the blood to the altar in the avodat hadam ceremony.
Before burning the kometz on the altar, the kohen throws salt on the kometz and the levonah. All the while, care is taken that the solet mixture should not ferment and become chametz but that it should remain matzah, unleavened, or lechem oni, poor person’s bread. The kometz together with the levonah and the salt are then burned on the altar in a process know as haktarah.
Once the kometz and the levonah have been burned on the altar, the kohanim may now eat the shirayim, the remainder of the solet mixture still in the former kli sharet that was not burned on the altar. In view of the fact that the korban Minchah belongs to the category of Kodesh Kodashim, Holy of Holies, it can only be eaten by the kohanim, and only in the Temple Courtyard.
Today, in the absence of the Temple, our prayers are a substitute for the korbanot.
Why is the afternoon prayer called Minchah and not Tzoharayim, which means afternoon? Because, explains Rabbi David Feinstein, the afternoon prayers, like the korban Minchah, are God’s favorite. God listens and responds to the Minchah prayers just as he did when Elijah the prophet beseeched God in the afternoon to send down a heavenly fire and consume the sacrifice in the showdown between Elijah and the prophets of Ba’al. The Minchah prayer is time taken out of one’s working day just as the korban Minchah is food taken out of one’s mouth. And, after all, time is money.