Chullin 61b (סא:) — the Talmud in English

And we object:

Let us derive it from the raven: What is the case there,

with the raven, which has

two

signs,

we do not eat it;

we do not eat it,

so too, every

bird that possesses

two

signs,

we do not eat it!?

we do not eat it!?

And we answer:

If so,

if you say that even a bird possessing two signs of purity is forbidden,

the peres and the ozniya,

which have only one sign of purity,

why did the Torah write

that they are forbidden to eat—

what need is there for this?!

For

now,

a bird

that possesses two

signs of purity,

we do not eat [

as you sought to derive from the raven]; the peres and the ozniya,

each of which possesses

one

single

sign of purity—

need it

to be written that we do not eat them?

And we object:

Let us derive it from the peres and the ozniya:

Just as the peres and the ozniya, which have one sign of purity, are forbidden to eat, so too, every bird possessing one sign is forbidden to eat!?

And we answer:

If so,

if you seek to say that even a bird possessing one sign of purity may not be eaten,

the nesher,

which has not even one sign of purity,

why did the Torah write

that it is forbidden to eat,

what need is there for this?

Now,

where

it possesses one

sign,

we do not eat it [

as you sought to derive from the peres and the ozniya]; the nesher,

which possesses no sign at all

of purity—

need it

to be stated that we do not eat it!?

Rather, conclude from this that one cannot derive from the peres and the ozniya that every bird possessing one sign is forbidden.

Rather,

we derive it from the nesher as follows:

The nesher, which possesses no sign at all

of purity,

is the one that you may not eat. But

every bird

that possesses one

sign of purity—

eat it!

And all the more so, if it possesses two or three signs of purity, you may eat it. This excludes the birds enumerated in the Torah: although they possess signs of purity, you may not eat them [and therefore the Torah enumerated them as forbidden, so that we would not derive from the nesher that they are permitted].

And we challenge this:

Is the reason only because the Torah wrote the nesher,

and for that reason we know that a bird possessing one sign is pure?

If not,

if the nesher had not been written in the Torah,

I would have said: Let us derive from the peres and the ozniya

that a bird possessing one sign is forbidden.

And why? For

the peres and the ozniya would be two verses written for the same purpose [

since it would have sufficed to write only one of them, and we would have learned through a binyan av that the other, which resembles it and possesses one sign, is also forbidden. Since the Torah wrote both the peres and the ozniya, they are “two verses written for the same purpose”],

and

we hold that

two verses written for the same purpose do not teach a principle!

Therefore, only those two are forbidden, but it is impossible to derive from them that other birds possessing one sign are forbidden. If so, how could one have thought to forbid other birds that possess only one sign!?

And we answer:

It is received by tradition:

we have a tradition that a sign of purity

that is present in one of these,

the peres or the ozniya,

is absent from the other,

the other bird. And that sign of purity

that is present in one of these,

the other bird,

is absent from the other one,

the first bird. Therefore, they are not two verses written for the same purpose. For if the verse had stated that the peres is forbidden, we would not have known that the ozniya is forbidden; and if the verse had stated that the ozniya is forbidden, we would not have known from this that the peres is forbidden. Since the verse had to state both [the peres and the ozniya], one might have said that we should derive from them that a bird possessing one sign may not be eaten.

And we challenge again:

Granted,

there are

twenty-four impure birds,

as mentioned in the Torah. And among twenty of them there are three signs of purity.

It cannot be that one

sign of purity

that is present among these,

in the peres or the ozniya,

is absent from these

twenty impure birds mentioned in the Torah. If so, it emerges that the Torah wrote twice that one may not eat a bird possessing a sign like that of the ozniya or like that of the peres [once in the case of the peres or the ozniya, and a second time in the case of one of those twenty impure birds that the Torah enumerated].

And these would be

the birds possessing one sign like that of the peres or the ozniya

two verses written for the same purpose,

and two verses written for the same purpose do not teach a principle! From where, then, would we derive a prohibition for a bird possessing one sign, and why would it be necessary to derive from the nesher that a bird possessing one sign is pure!?

And we answer:

It is received by tradition:

there are twenty-four impure birds, and there are four signs

of purity among birds.

Three

of the three signs of purity

are found in all of them.

Among

twenty of them,

there are

three each

signs of purity.

And two

of those three signs of purity are found

in the raven!

And the fourth sign is found in none of all those birds that were mentioned [neither among the twenty birds nor in the raven].

One of the three signs of purity is found either in the peres or in the ozniya, while the fourth sign of purity is found in the other one.

One

sign of purity is found

in the peres, and one

sign of purity is found

in the ozniya.

That sign

that is present in this one,

in one of them, is the sign

that is absent from this one,

the other bird.

It follows that the fourth sign of purity, which is found either in the peres or in the ozniya, is mentioned only once in the Torah. If so,

one might have said that we should derive from it

to forbid a bird possessing one sign, since we do not know which sign appears in the Torah only once; therefore, every bird possessing one sign would be forbidden by uncertainty, because perhaps that sign is the one written only once in the Torah. Therefore,

the Torah wrote the nesher

as forbidden,

to teach us:

The nesher, which possesses no sign at all

of purity,

is the one that you may not eat. But if there is

a bird

that possesses one

sign of purity—

eat it!

And we object: Since you have said that even a bird possessing one sign of purity is permitted,

then why did the Torah write the turtledoves—

what need is there for this?

Since we derive no law from them.

And we answer:

Rav Ukva bar Hama said:

The reason the Torah wrote the turtledoves is to teach that they alone are fit

for an offering,

and not other birds.

Rav Naḥman said: