Sotah 15a — the Talmud in English

11.

And he brings it up

exact page location")

and burns it in a service vessel:

And we raise a difficulty:

And

if

“he burns it”

now

could it enter your mind

to say!?

Is he now burning the handful? But he must first salt it, and only later in the beraita is the burning mentioned, as we learned: “And he salts it, and places it upon the fires”

!? Rather, say: “He brings it up”

to the altar

in a service vessel—

in order

to burn it.

12.

And he salts it, and places it upon the fires:

As it is written: “

And every offering of your meal-offering, you shall salt with salt.”

13.

The handful has been offered

upon the altar—

its remainder

of the meal-offering

is eaten

by the priests:

And the Gemara explains:

from where do we know

that after the offering of the handful its remainder is eaten by the priests? Because

it is written: “

And when a person brings an offering of a meal-offering to the Lord, his offering shall be fine flour, and he shall pour oil upon it and place frankincense upon it. And he shall bring it to the sons of Aaron, the priests, and he shall take from there his full handful, from its fine flour and from its oil, together with all its frankincense,

and the priest shall burn its memorial portion

[the handful] upon the altar, a fire-offering, a pleasing fragrance to the Lord.”

And it is written

there:

“And what remains of the meal-offering shall be for Aaron and his sons.”

And the Gemara explains that what they said in the beraita,

“the handful has been offered”—

after which the remainder is permitted for eating—is understood:

According to one master—

Rabbi Hanina—

according to his view

[according to his method].

And according to the other master—

Rabbi Yohanan—

according to his view.

For it was stated: “The handful—

from when

does it

permit

the

remainder for eating?”

Rabbi Hanina said: Once

in the handful

the fire

of the altar, any degree of control.

Rabbi Yohanan said: Once the fire has ignited most of it

of the handful.

14.

And the priests are permitted to place into them

of the remainder

wine, oil, and honey:

And we explain:

What is the reason?

For

the verse says in the section of priestly gifts [Numbers 18]: “

For all the sacred things of the Children of Israel I have given them to you

for an anointing,”

and it means:

for grandeur

[as Onkelos translated, “for greatness”], to teach that they should eat them

in the manner in which kings

anointed with anointing oil

eat.

15.

And they are prohibited

the priests

only from causing to become leavened

the remainder. And we explain the reason: because

it is written: “

And this is the law of the meal-offering: bring it, the sons of Aaron, before the Lord, to the front of the altar. And he shall lift from it with his handful, from the fine flour of the meal-offering and from its oil, and all the frankincense that is upon the meal-offering, and he shall burn the altar, a pleasing fragrance, its memorial portion, to the Lord. And what remains of it, Aaron and his sons shall eat; it shall be eaten unleavened in a holy place; in the courtyard of the Tent of Meeting they shall eat it.

“It shall not be baked leavened; their portion

I have given it from My fire-offerings; it is most holy, like the sin-offering and like the guilt-offering.”

And

Rabbi Shimon ben Lakish said:

Read in it, “It shall not be baked leavened—their portion,” to teach:

even their portion

of the priests

shall not be baked leavened.

We learned in the Mishna:

All meal-offerings

require oil and frankincense, but this one requires neither oil nor frankincense:

And we raise a difficulty:

And

but

all

the other

meal-offerings require oil and frankincense!?

But there is “

the meal-offering of a sinner”

[a meal-offering brought on account of a sin],

for the Torah said: “

He shall not place oil upon it, and he shall not put frankincense upon it”!

Here there is another meal-offering, which likewise requires neither oil nor frankincense!? And we answer: The three distinctions taught in our Mishna do not each stand independently; rather,

this is what it says:

All meal-offerings require oil and frankincense.

and

And even when they do not require oil and frankincense,

they come

they do, in any event,

from wheat, and they come

also

as fine flour—

The meal-offering of a sinner, although it does not require oil and frankincense,

it nevertheless

comes from wheat, and comes as fine flour—

and

the omer meal-offering, although it comes from barley,

nevertheless

requires

it

oil and frankincense, and comes as groats

[similar to fine flour]—

whereas

whereas if

this one [the meal-offering of a woman suspected by her husband of infidelity],

[the sota meal-offering]

requires neither oil nor frankincense, comes from barley, and comes as flour.

It was taught in a beraita: Rabbi Shimon said:

By law, the meal-offering of a sinner should require oil and frankincense,

in order

that the sinner should not benefit,

by having his meal-offering made easier than the other meal-offerings, for he incurs expenses in order to bring oil and frankincense with them!

And for what reason does it not require

oil and frankincense? In order

that the offering of the sinner

of the sinner

should not be splendid.

And

And Rabbi Shimon further said:

By law, the sin-offering for forbidden fat

[a sin-offering brought for an inadvertent sin]

should require libations,

in order

that the sinner should not benefit,

by having his offering made easier than the other offerings, for he incurs expenses to bring libations with them.

And for what reason does it not require

the sin-offering for forbidden fat to bring libations with it? In order

that the offering

of the sinner

should not be splendid.

But the sin-offering of a person afflicted with tzaraat and his guilt-offering

[which likewise does not require libations anywhere],

require libations, since they do not come on account of a sin!

And we challenge what Rabbi Shimon said, that the sin-offering of a person afflicted with tzaraat does not come on account of a sin:

Is that so!?

But Rabbi Shmuel bar Nahmani said in the name of Rabbi Yonatan:

Afflictions come on account of seven things:

a. For slander; b. for bloodshed; c. for a vain oath; d. for forbidden sexual relations; e. for arrogance; f. for robbery; g. for begrudging one’s possessions.

It follows that the person afflicted with tzaraat is a sinner

!? And we answer:

There,

in the case of the person afflicted with tzaraat,

it is through his affliction that he has achieved atonement

[through his affliction his sin has already been atoned for, through the suffering and shame that he has; and he does not bring the offering to atone for his sin, since his sin has already been atoned for].

And

when he brings an offering

[when he brings an offering], it is in order to become completely pure,

it is in order to become permitted with regard to sacred things that he brings it

[he brings an offering in order to be permitted with regard to sacred things, for all those lacking atonement are prohibited from eating sacred things until they bring their atonement, since only through bringing the offering is their purification completed].

And we challenge:

If so,

since a sin-offering does not require libations because it comes on account of a sin, this is difficult: “

The sin-offering of a nazirite”—

which he brings when the days of his naziriteship are completed—

should require libations, since it does not come on account of a sin!?

And we answer:

He holds

Rabbi Shimon

like Rabbi Eliezer HaKappar, who said: A nazirite too is a sinner,

since he afflicted himself by abstaining from wine.

We learned in the Mishna:

Rabban Gamliel says: Just as

her deeds are the deeds of an animal, so her offering is the food of an animal:

It was taught in a beraita: Rabban Gamliel said to the Sages:

Scribes! Leave me, and I shall expound it as a precious ornament: