Avodah Zarah 49

The mishnah on today’s daf continues to detail the prohibited ways of benefiting from an ashera tree, a type of tree used in idol worship:

If one took wood from it, it is prohibited to benefit from it. If one kindled with it in an oven, if (the oven) is new, it must be shattered. But if it’s old, it may be used once cooled. If one baked bread with it, it is prohibited to benefit from it.

The mishnah lays out distinctions between different types of prohibited benefit. When kindling a fire with prohibited wood, it’s intuitive that benefiting from the fire is prohibited. But what constitutes benefit? Certainly warming oneself would be prohibited, as would eating any item cooked on the fire. But what about the oven itself? With a new oven, the first heating is believed to strengthen the oven. So if ashera wood were used for the fire, the oven has received a permanent benefit from the ashera and is therefore forbidden to use. But with an old oven, the fire has no impact on the structure itself. Therefore, once the heat has dispersed, the ashera wood has left no lasting impact on the oven, and it can be used going forward.

The mishnah continues:

(If this bread) was intermingled with others, it is prohibited to benefit from all of it. Rabbi Eliezer says: The benefit must be cast into the Dead Sea. The rabbis said to him: There is no redemption for idol worship.

If one took it as a weaving shuttle, it is prohibited to benefit. If one wove a garment with it, it is prohibited to benefit from it. If it was intermingled with other (garments), and those (were intermingled) with others, it is prohibited to benefit from all of them. Rabbi Eliezer says: The benefit must be cast into the Dead Sea. The rabbis said to him: There is no redemption for idol worship.

In both these cases, the rabbis consider objects used for idol worship to have a sort of infectious nature. Their prohibition is so severe that not only are they themselves prohibited, and not only are objects produced via their usage prohibited, but those secondary objects have the potential to render other objects prohibited if mixed among them.

Rabbi Eliezer seems intent on stopping this prohibition creep. Rather than tossing out 20 loaves of bread because one loaf of bread was made with a few logs of ashera wood, he suggests determining the value of said ashera wood and then casting the cash equivalent into the sea. This process functions similarly to other forms of monetary redemption in Jewish law. For example, if someone consecrated their property to the Temple, they are forbidden to derive benefit from it. But if they pay the value of that property plus one-fifth to the Temple, they can redeem the object and restore it to its original status.

Similarly, produce separated for ma’aser sheni, the second tithe, had to be eaten in Jerusalem. But since carrying an abundance of produce to Jerusalem from far away may not be practical, and it may go bad, one could redeem its value. Then the original produce could be eaten anywhere and the money used to purchase food in Jerusalem. 

Rabbi Eliezer suggests that the same sort of transferral can be done with items tainted by idolatry so as to lessen the burden of the prohibition. The rabbis, however, argue that this comparison doesn’t hold up. In cases involving redemption of Temple produce and second tithe produce, the items in question are permitted in some form. The process of redemption simply changes their status from sacred to non-sacred. That’s different, the rabbis argue, from items used for idolatry, which have been rendered completely prohibited. Once an idolatrous object has been used to produce an item, the entire item is irrevocably forbidden.

Read all of Avodah Zarah 49 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on August 6, 2025. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.