Zevachim – Daf 76
The Gemara on this daf continues its discussion of “Ein mevi’in kodshim l’beis hapisul” – one may not limit the time of the consumption of an offering, thereby causing the sacrificial animals to enter the status of unfitness prematurely.
For example, if an Asham guilt offering was intermingled with a Shelamim peace offering, the potential problem is that the Asham is consumed in one day and the subsequent evening, while the Shelamim has two days to be consumed, with the evening in between. While technically one could play it safe by offering the sacrifice conditionally, be it one or the other – being careful to consume it within the minimum window of one day – the Rabbis of the Mishna deem this not an acceptable solution. Why? Because on the chance that it is indeed a Shelamim, you are arbitrarily reducing the amount of time for its consumption, which could lead to the leftover meat being destroyed instead of consumed.
Although this has to do with laws regarding sacrifices in the Temple, there is a modern-day application. This is why it is customary to omit reciting the Mizmor leTodah psalm from Pesukei d’Zimrah on Erev Yom Kippur and Erev Pesach (Aruch HaShulchan 51:9). The psalm is a liturgical substitute for a thanksgiving offering, which includes chametz loaves. Since by the evening on both of those days it will be forbidden to consume those loaves (either because it is chametz on Pesach or because all food is forbidden due to the fast commencing), we never would initially bring a voluntary thanksgiving offering on such a day. This would violate the principle of prematurely limiting the consumption of sacrificial food, since if this thanksgiving offering was brought on a different day, a nighttime-plus-daytime window would also be available for consumption.
Each sacrifice’s range of time to consume represents the experience of holiness and influence (hispashtus) that it is supposed to have. The thanksgiving sacrifice too must be given its appropriate range for consumption of an entire day and evening, without placing limits upon it. And even though one sacrifice might be considered less holy than another, each one’s experience is qualitatively different. So, while the thanksgiving sacrifice is part of a Shelamim and, generally speaking, is not as holy as Chattas or Asham – such as the latter being consumed only by kohanim, while the former is also consumed by the owner – nevertheless each sacrifice and each level is marked with its unique distinction that is qualitatively different and, for the person in that situation, halachically required.
To prove this point, the thanksgiving sacrifice has a distinction above and beyond other sacrifices, despite it being, in a certain sense, of lesser holiness. The Midrash (Vayikra Rabbah 9:7) states that in the future World to Come, all prayers will be eliminated except for the thanksgiving prayer, and all sacrifices will be eliminated except for the thanksgiving sacrifice.
Why does it receive this special honor? Shelah (Toldos Adam, Beis Dovid 92) suggests that it is because the thanksgiving sacrifice does not come to fix anything. It is not an offering to commemorate a particular event nor to cleanse any sins. Rather, it is a voluntary, spontaneous outpouring of gratitude to G-d. In future times, when redemption has come and people will no longer sin, we will have new ways to understand and celebrate all of the sacrifices and prayers; thus, they will be transformed and different. Yet offerings and prayers of thanksgiving will still be the same because we must be thankful at every moment for every blessing, and even in a changed reality, we will express our thanks just the same.
Showing gratitude for the things in our life is apparently timeless. In that way, the thanksgiving sacrifice and the practice it represents is never limited to any time or space and occupies its own unique level of holiness and experience.
While I did not intend this analysis to correspond with the secular Thanksgiving that was observed this week, it is interesting that this material came to me at this time.
Schrödinger’s Korban: When Probability Meets P’sak
Daf 77
Our Gemara on amud beis discusses the opinion of Rabbi Eliezer in a case where limbs of burnt offerings fit for sacrifice were intermingled with limbs of blemished burnt offerings. Rabbi Eliezer says: Although all the limbs are unfit for sacrifice, if the head of one of them was sacrificed, all the heads shall be sacrificed, as the head that was sacrificed is assumed to have been that of the unfit animal in the mixture.
Yet, as some kind of insurance policy, the Gemara requires that the remaining heads, when they are sacrificed, are done two at a time. The stated rationale is that at least one of each pair is certainly from a permitted sacrifice.
Commentaries have struggled to explain the logic of this particular stringency. If we are relying on majority, so be it. In what sense does it make it any better to bring two at a time? Technically, whether you bring them one at a time or two at a time, the odds are exactly the same of bringing an improper offering. Somehow, having at least one permitted portion of the sacrifice being brought along with the other is helpful. The logic for this is not clear.
The Steipler (Kehillas Yaakov Zevachim 6:8, he’aros) offers a creative suggestion. There is a concept known as ikva issura – that the prohibited object is established. The principle of ikva issura is used in regard to the obligation of an Asham Taluy, which is a special sacrifice that is brought when a person is unsure whether he unknowingly violated a transgression that would incur kares and require a Chattas if violated due to lack of knowledge. However, the obligation for the Asham Taluy is only if ikva issura, such as when there are two pieces of meat in front of him, one from forbidden fat and the other of regular kosher meat, and he is not sure which one he ate. This is the situation where he has to bring an Asham Taluy to provide temporary atonement in case he did transgress. Yet if there was only one piece of meat in front of him, and he was unsure whether that particular piece of meat was forbidden fat or kosher meat, he does not incur an obligation to bring an Asham Taluy. Here, there was no established presence of forbidden meat; it was only a statistical question (See Kerisos 18a).
This is where it gets interesting – because in terms of odds and probabilities, depending on other variables, it could go in either direction. There is nothing intrinsically different about the odds between the two cases. This is why the Steipler notes that there is something phenomenological about having the presence of an established forbidden item – and somehow the Torah relates to it differently. In a similar manner, the Steipler suggests that there also could be a concept called ikva heteira – that the permitted substance is established. Offering one head on the altar along with another, where for sure there is one permitted head in the offering, establishes heter – permissibility.
While the Steipler makes this interesting comparison, tali tanya b’delo tanya – he is supporting one unknown concept with another unknown concept. How do we understand this trend in which the optics of the matter influence the halacha when mathematically the odds are the same?
I have an insight that might help us understand the lomdus. Part of our challenge is that we are inserting Western scientific sensibilities into the thought processes of the ancients. The ancients – our Sages, and also the Greek mathematicians and astronomers – were no fools. They drew conclusions about the world based on their observations, and while at this time we might think differently, there are aspects of mathematics and physics that are based on postulates and a priori assumptions. If you make different postulates and different assumptions, certain things will be interpreted differently.
The first thing that is important for us to understand is that the whole science of mathematical probabilities was not something that the Rabbis or the Greek mathematicians considered a discipline. Calculating odds, while it might have mathematical significance and be useful for predicting trends, is completely irrelevant from a different perspective: Odds do not tell you whether something will or will not happen, nor do they tell you what something truly is. Furthermore, the ancients were less arrogant, and they understood that much of reality was based on the way in which G-d presented it for humans to see and perceive.
This is a key principle: If something looks a certain way and it is interpreted to be similar to other things that look like it, that perceptual category matters. Much of ancient medicine (which has something to offer, by the way) is based on similarities. If somebody is feeling depressed, dark, and down, there is an assumption that there is an abundance of bitter bile in the body, and therefore they need to take foods that are lighter. If a person is suffering from a fever or inflammation, then foods that create heat are to be avoided, while foods that reduce inner heat or give off less heat, or are less spicy, are the better choice. The mandrakes that Rachel and Leah desired in order to enhance fertility are not accidental in that the roots look like homunculi, literally the “man” in “mandrakes” (Bereishis 30:14; see Ibn Ezra’s reasoning regarding body humors as well as their appearance).
Consider the following thought experiment: Imagine a person blind from birth. This person could easily identify a ball or a square by feeling whether it was round or had edges. If his sight were miraculously restored, and he saw a ball or a square, would he recognize what it was without touching it? Remember, his reality of a ball had to do with feeling curves or sharp edges, not the mental image of a ball or square that most of us have. So what is a ball in reality? What is a square in reality? Here we begin to see how much of reality is based on perception, not an objective reality.
Aristotle was a brilliant scientist and philosopher. If you asked him why a rock falls to the earth while smoke and fire rise toward the sky, he would tell you the answer is obvious. Smoke comes from fire; fire is more related to air and heavenly material; therefore, it naturally “desires” to go upward and join the rest of its material, while stone is made from earth, which is on the ground, and it naturally “desires” to be with like objects. To him, this is no different than family members being attached to each other and wanting to be together. Everything is designed by the same intellect and guiding force of G-d, and if it looks logical and sounds logical, that is probably what it is. So, if we know that things that are alike are drawn to each other, why would it make a difference whether it was a stone or a human being? He knew nothing of gravity or kinetic energy and felt very satisfied with his observation of the world, his conclusions, and what they meant. (See Aristotle, Book Two of Physics.)
While we can prove that gravity exists mathematically and that Newtonian physics, to a degree, allows for a more accurate, predictable presentation of how objects behave, ultimately, we still have no idea how gravity works. When it comes to other forces of nature – kinetic energy, light waves – we at least have some sense of the vehicles and manifestations and processes. Science has not yet discovered what a gravity wave is and how it works. We modern scientists know the “what” much better than the “why,” while the ancients looked at the “why” first, and that gave them an idea about the “what.” They certainly were not always right, but they were not fools.
When you look at it from this perspective, it is easier to understand why the Sages believed that the Torah’s rulings were affected by perception. If something looked a certain way, tasted a certain way, or even was paired with something that was permitted, this itself might create a status of permissibility and have an influential force.
The Kosher and the Unkosher in Relationships
Daf 78
Our Gemara on amud aleph discusses the idea that two different prohibited substances might alternately join with a permitted substance to nullify a different forbidden substance. In other words, two different prohibited substances can each join with the majority of permitted material to nullify the rest.
The Rosh (Shu”t klal 20, article 2) says that even though our Gemara was discussing halachos that pertain to sacrifices, there is a modern-day application of these principles.
Consider: 59 k’zeysim of permitted substance, then one kzayis of blood and one kzayis of forbidden fat get mixed together. On the one hand, we do not have 60 times the permitted substance to nullify the prohibited. On the other hand, we have 60 times the non-blood (59 permitted substance plus one forbidden fat) to nullify the blood. Similarly, we have 60 times of “other substance” (59 permitted substance plus one part blood) to nullify the forbidden fat. (There is another case similar to this one, and both are brought down and ruled as permitted by Shulchan Aruch, YD 98:9.)
As I often remark, we see how patterns in nature, psychology, physiology, and spirituality seem to repeat themselves and correspond with each other. The idea that something can be toxic but nevertheless contribute to reducing the toxicity of another element plays itself out in many arenas.
On a physiological level, we easily understand that one ounce of a particular toxin mixed with another ounce of a different toxin is not the equivalent of having two ounces of the same toxin. The load of toxicity is mitigated because each kind of toxicity is different and the body can tolerate small amounts of each.
This is also true when it comes to personality. All of us have flaws. In a good relationship, each party learns how to bear and work with the other person’s flaws. As long as the flaws are not overwhelming – even if there are numerous ones – it is not the same as having a toxic level of one particular flaw. That is why differentness in a relationship can actually be an advantage. If two people were the same in many respects, but also shared the same flaws, there could be an overwhelming shortcoming and problem that would threaten stability far more than an aggregate of several different flaws.
For example, imagine both parties were rigid – or the opposite, both parties were undisciplined. No one would keep the other in check, and it could reach an extreme without resolution. On the other hand, if they are different, but able to have respectful dialogue, they can keep each other in check and balance out their flaws.
In essence, this is what is being reflected by this halachic principle. Instead of labeling something as unkosher without nuance — saying, “Well, now we have two parts unkosher and 59 parts kosher, so we do not have enough to nullify” – we take a more holistic approach. We understand that one kind of unkosher is not the same as another kind of unkosher, and therefore the overall presence of permitted substance – and even forbidden substance of a different kind – is able to nullify that particular toxic agent within one type of unkosher part.