Menachot 66a — the Talmud in English

Rather,

for it says: “You shall count for yourself”,

the counting is dependent upon the court; Shabbat Bereishit, whose counting is by every person, is excluded

as explained above in the name of Rabbi Eliezer.

Rabbi Yosei says:

What the verse said,

“on the morrow of the Shabbat”,

means

on the morrow of the first Festival day

of Passover—

You say, “on the morrow of the Festival day”; or perhaps it is only “on the morrow of Shabbat Bereishit”

following the first Festival day of Passover

? You have said:

Was it stated

“on the morrow of the Shabbat that is within Passover”,

and surely it was stated only

“on the morrow of the Shabbat”

without specification,

and the entire

year is full of Shabbatot;

and if so,

go out and examine

for

which Shabbat

the Torah intended!?

That is to say, the verse did not come to obscure but to explain. And this is satisfactory if the intention is the morrow of the Festival day, for then the verse explained to you when you shall count. But if the verse intended the morrow of Shabbat Bereishit, then the verse did not explain to you which Shabbat the verse intended.

And furthermore,

a proof:

“Shabbat” was stated

below, [“Until the morrow of the seventh Shabbat you shall count fifty days, and you shall offer a new meal-offering to the Lord”],

is stated below—

“until the day after the seventh Shabbat, you shall count fifty days, and you shall offer a new meal-offering to the Lord”—

and Shabbat was stated above [“And you shall count for yourselves from the morrow of the Shabbat”]; let them come and teach one from the other:

“You shall count for yourselves from the day after the Shabbat.” They should be derived from one another:

Just as there,

below, the “Shabbat” on the eve of Atzeret is the Shabbat before Atzeret, which is

a Festival and the beginning of a Festival, and there is another Festival after it,

after that Shabbat,

so too here, the “Shabbat” on the eve of the counting is

the day

after which a Festival will begin.

And if it is according to the words of the Boethusians,

that the counting of the omer begins on the morrow of the Shabbat following the first Festival day of Passover, then

there are times when there is no Festival after it,

after that Shabbat,

and,

on the contrary,

it will be

“on the morrow of that Shabbat”

the one

after the Festival.

And this is

when the first Festival day

of Passover

falls on the first

day of the week,

and the seventh day of Passover

was

on Shabbat:

then “on the morrow of this Shabbat” is already after the Festival.

Rabbi Shimon ben Elazar says

another proof that the omer and the counting following it begin on the second day of Passover:

One verse

[Deuteronomy 16]

says:

“You may not slaughter the Passover-offering within any of your gates. Rather, at the place that the Lord your God will choose to cause His name to dwell, there shall you slaughter the Passover-offering in the evening. You shall cook and eat it at the place that the Lord your God will choose, and you shall turn in the morning [toward the morning of the second day; this teaches that one must lodge on the night following the Festival day].

For six days you shall eat matza

and on the seventh day there shall be a cessation for the Lord your God; you shall perform no labor. Seven weeks you shall count for yourself; from the beginning of the sickle in the standing grain you shall begin to count seven weeks”—thus there is no obligation to eat matza except for six days—

And one verse

[Exodus 12] apparently contradicts it, and

says

“For seven days you shall eat matzot”—

how

shall these two verses be fulfilled?

Matza that you cannot eat for seven

days of Passover

from the new

because on the first day the omer has not yet been offered, which permits the new produce,

you can eat for six

last days of Passover

from the new—

That is to say, this is what the first verse said: After the first day of Passover, on which you are required to lodge, you shall go in the morning to your tents; and then, after the offering of the omer, for six days you shall eat matza from the new produce, and from that time you shall count for yourself seven weeks—from the time the sickle began in the standing grain, which is on the day when you came to your tents and began to eat from the new produce—

whereas the verse “For seven days you shall eat matzot” means matzot that are not necessarily from the new produce, which you can eat throughout all seven days of Passover—

Thus we have learned that the omer is brought on the second day of Passover.

And Rabbi Shimon ben Elazar further explains the verses:

It is written [Leviticus 23:15]: “And you shall count for yourselves from the morrow of the Shabbat, from the day of your bringing the omer of the elevation-offering; seven complete Shabbatot shall they be. Until the morrow of the seventh Shabbat you shall count fifty days, and you shall offer a new meal-offering to the Lord”—

And it is further written [Deuteronomy 16:9]: “Seven weeks you shall count for yourself; from the beginning of the sickle in the standing grain [from when the omer is harvested, which is the beginning of the harvest] you shall begin to count seven weeks”—

And Rabbi Shimon ben Elazar explains:

Since the verse says

“from the day of your bringing you shall count”,

one might

think that the verse did not intend to say that you shall count immediately upon bringing it, but rather that one

shall harvest

the omer on the morrow of the first Festival day of Passover

and bring

it on that same day,

and whenever he wishes he shall count,

for the verse said only that from the day of your bringing it, counting is fit to begin, but he is not required to begin counting immediately —

The verse says

“from the beginning of the sickle in the standing grain”,

from the harvesting of the omer,

“you shall begin to count.”

If

“from the beginning of the sickle you shall begin to count”,

that is to say, the meaning of the verse is that the counting begins after the harvesting of the omer but before its bringing, then

one might harvest

the omer

and count

after it,

and whenever he wishes he shall bring

the omer; but the bringing of the omer is not on the sixteenth of Nisan, contrary to the implication of the verse, according to which on the day of the counting there has still been no bringing —

The verse says

“from the day of your bringing

you shall count”; thus the counting is not only on the day of the harvesting but also on the day of the bringing, and we learn that all of them are done on the same day.

If

“from the day of your bringing”,

that is to say, since we have learned from all the verses mentioned that the harvesting of the omer, the counting, and the bringing are all at the same time, then

one might harvest, count, and bring by day

[he would do all three together during the day]—

The verse says

concerning the counting,

“seven complete Shabbatot

[complete]

shall they be”;

when do you

find “seven complete Shabbatot”?

When you count from the evening,

and not during the day, for these are not complete, since the night of the first day is missing.

And still

one might

harvest, bring, and count at night,

[he would do all three together at night]—

The verse says

“from the day of your bringing”,

thus we have learned that the bringing is during the day—

How so? The harvesting and counting are at night,

for the counting must necessarily be at night in order to fulfill “complete,” and it is after the harvesting, as the verse said, “from the beginning of the sickle in the standing grain”; therefore the harvesting too is at night,

and

if

the bringing

is only

by day,

because it says, “from the day of your bringing.”

Rava said

concerning the proofs explained in the two beraitot that Atzeret is not on the morrow of Shabbat Bereishit:

All of them have a refutation, except for the last two tannaim, both in the first beraita and in the latter beraita, who have no refutation

[all the proofs in the two beraitot have a refutation, except for the proofs of the last two tannaim in each beraita]. For—

If

his proof,

that of Rabban Yohanan ben Zakkai,

that one verse says, “You shall count fifty days,” and one verse says, “seven complete Shabbatot”—how so? Here, when the Festival day falls on Shabbat; there, when the Festival day falls in the middle of the week—there is a basis for refuting it:

Perhaps

the verse said “you shall count fifty days” and also said “seven complete Shabbatot” in order to teach us

as Abaye said: It is a mitzva to count days, and it is a mitzva to count weeks

[it is a mitzva to count days, and it is a mitzva to count weeks].

And

if

his proof,

that of Rabbi Eliezer,

from what the verse said, “You shall count for yourself,” that the counting is dependent upon the court,

and Rabbi Yehoshua

[or from Rabbi Yehoshua’s proof], just as the month’s beginning is recognizable as the time for beginning its calculation, so too the beginning of the fifty-count is recognizable at its beginning through a fixed day of the month—there is a basis for refuting both proofs, for

from where

do we know that the verse “And you shall count for yourselves from the morrow of the Shabbat” is referring to the first Festival day, to say that the counting begins on its morrow, which is a day dependent upon the court and is a fixed sign adjacent to the beginning of the counting?

Perhaps it is referring to the last Festival day,

to say that the counting shall begin on its morrow; and thus the counting is dependent upon the court, and adjacent to its beginning there is a recognizable fixed day.

But the proof of the last two tannaim in the first beraita, namely, the proof

of Rabbi Yishmael and Rabbi Yehuda ben Beteira, has no refutation

[there is nothing to raise against them].

And likewise you find in the second beraita. For

if

his proof,

that of Rabbi Yosei bar Rabbi Yehuda,

that the counting is only fifty days from a fixed day of the month, and if the beginning of the counting depends upon Shabbat, then relative to the fixed day of the month the counting is sometimes as though fifty days plus one day, up to six days—

I would have said

[I would say], that is to say, it can be said:

Perhaps

the verse did not say to count

fifty

days except

apart from six

[apart from the six days, or fewer than them, which are added to the counting itself]; that is to say, the counting itself is in any event only fifty days, and the verse refers only to the counting itself, not to the additional days that distance the end of the counting from the fixed day of the month.

And

if

his proof,

that of Rabbi Yehuda ben Beteira, from “You shall count for yourself,” that the counting is dependent upon the court, there is a basis for refuting it:

From where

from where

does the verse

perhaps refer to the last Festival day

—as was explained above concerning the identical proof of Rabbi Eliezer in the first beraita.

And if it is from Rabbi Yosei’s proof, that the verse did not obscure which Shabbat it intended, then

Rabbi Yosei too saw a refutation

[Rabbi Yosei himself also saw that there was a refutation of this proof], namely: From where is it known that the counting begins on the morrow of the first Festival day of the Festival? Perhaps it begins on the morrow of the last Festival day .

And this is what

Rabbi Yosei himself

said: “And furthermore”

“Shabbat” was stated below; he required an additional proof only because there is a refutation of the first proof.

But Rabbi Yosei’s second proof, and Rabbi Shimon ben Elazar’s proof, have no refutation.

The body of the matter: Abaye said: It is a mitzva to count days, and it is a mitzva to count weeks:

The Sages of the house of Rav Ashi

indeed

counted days and counted weeks

[they counted days and weeks]—but

Amemar counted days and did not count weeks,

and because he

said:

Counting at a time when the Temple does not exist and the omer is not offered

is a remembrance of the Temple,

and is not a Torah obligation, and counting the days without the weeks is sufficient.

Mishna:

The Mishna continues to explain the order of preparing the omer:

They harvested it

for the omer in the manner explained in the preceding Mishna,

and placed it

in the field, at the place of its harvesting,

in baskets.

They brought it to the Temple courtyard,

and singed it [

the barley as it was ]

with fire [

with flame ]

in order to fulfill in it the mitzva of “

parched,”

as it is stated: “Parched in fire, you shall offer the first fruits of your offerings,”

the words of Rabbi Meir.

And the Sages say:

They did not fulfill the mitzva of parched immediately upon bringing the barley ears to the Temple courtyard, nor did they fulfill the mitzva of parched in this manner; rather: a. Once they brought it to the Temple courtyard, first

with reeds

soft ones

and with cabbage stalks [

cabbage stalks ]

they beat it,

not in the manner in which they ordinarily do so, with a stick, and this

was so that it would not be crushed.

b. The mitzva of parched was performed in this manner:

They placed it in an avuv [

a copper vessel designated for this purpose ] and when the barley was inside it, they passed it through fire,

and

it

was a perforated avuv, so that the fire would have control over all of it.

Here the Mishna returned to explain the order of preparing the omer:

They spread it out [

the barley of the omer ]

in the Temple courtyard, and the wind blew through it.

They placed it

all the se'ah measures that they had harvested

in coarse-grain mills [

mills in which it is customary to grind groats ] that do not grind finely, but coarsely, for if they grind it well, the bran of the husk would pass through the sieve together with the fine flour, and this is what the verse said: “Coarse-grain flour of fresh grain.”

And they removed from it —

from all the ground flour —

one tenth-measure

only, after

it had been sifted through thirteen sieves,

as will be explained below, on page 76b, concerning the manner of sifting the omer; and this law is a halakha given to Moses from Sinai.

And the remainder

of everything that they had harvested and ground

was redeemed

like other consecrated property, for all the barley had been consecrated,

and was eaten

the remainder after the redemption

by every person

like other consecrated property that was redeemed.

And

the remaining flour, when they would make dough from it,

was obligated in challa,

because the kneading of the dough, which makes the dough obligated in challa, had already taken place in the possession of an ordinary person —

but

however

was exempt

it

from the tithe,

because the threshing — which makes grain obligated in the tithe — took place in the possession of consecrated property, as will be explained in the Gemara.

Rabbi Akiva

disagrees and

obligates

it

both in challa and

both

in tithes,

as the reason for this will be explained in the Gemara.

Gemara:

The Sages taught:

It is written: “Fresh grain parched in fire, coarse-grain flour of fresh grain; you shall offer the first fruits of your offerings,” and the beraita expounds the entire verse: “

Fresh grain” —

this is fresh grain,

the beginning of the barley’s ripening. “

Parched in fire,”

the verse teaches

that

Israel would singe it with fire, in order to fulfill in it the mitzva of parched, the words of Rabbi Meir.