Chullin 100

You’re cooking a delightful kosher stew. It smells delicious. But oh, no! A piece of non-kosher fish or meat falls into the pot! Is the stew still kosher?

Rabba bar bar Hana taught: A piece of unslaughtered carcass meat or flesh from a non-kosher species of fish that fell into a pot of kosher food does not render the contents of the pot forbidden unless it imparts flavor to the broth and to the deposits of food remaining in the pot and to the other pieces of food in the pot.

We’ve been introduced to this fundamental principle already: If the taste of the unkosher food is transferred, that renders the previously kosher food forbidden. If the taste doesn’t transfer, the non-kosher morsel can be nullified — which means it is no longer considered unkosher and the soup can be consumed. But now we’re getting into the detailed mechanics. Rabba bar bar Hana’s view is that the soup is rendered unkosher only if the taste transfers to everything: the broth, the solids — even the bits of stew cooked onto the side of the pot. Rav, however, has a different take:

Once the non-kosher meat or fish has imparted flavor to another piece in the pot, that second piece becomes non-kosher. And this second piece renders all the pieces of meat or fish in the pot forbidden, because they are of the same type.

For Rav, the whole pot doesn’t need to take on the flavor of the forbidden food to be rendered unkosher. If even a single morsel picks up the forbidden flavor, they are all now forbidden. Why? Because similar pieces are given the same status. If one piece of previously kosher meat is tainted, they all are.

Rav Safra said to Abaye: Now, in accordance with whose opinion did Rav say his statement?

(Abaye said:) It is in accordance with the opinion of Rabbi Yehuda, who says that a type of food mixed with food of its own type is not nullified.
 
Abaye cites Rabbi Yehuda’s position that a food can’t be nullified in a like substance. This means that if you drop unkosher meat into a pot of kosher meat of the same variety, it can’t be nullified; the whole pot is automatically ruined. For Abaye, this explains Rav’s position that a non-kosher piece of meat spoils all the other pieces of meat in the stew. Rav Safra is not satisfied with this explanation:

But if so, why does Rav state specifically that the non-kosher meat renders all the pieces forbidden only when it has imparted flavor to one other piece? Even if it did not impart flavor to another piece, it should render all the contents of the pot forbidden!

Abaye said to him: Here we are dealing with a case where he cooked the non-kosher piece with one kosher piece and first removed the non-kosher piece before adding the other pieces.
 
Abaye is committed to the view that Rav is following Rabbi Yehuda, so he adds a detail to the picture that was not apparent in Rav’s telling: The pot only contained one piece of kosher meat before the non-kosher meat fell in; then the non-kosher meat was removed and only afterward was the rest of the kosher meat added.

Rava offers an alternative to Rav Safra’s challenge:

You may even say that it is referring to a case where he did not first remove the piece of non-kosher meat or fish. Nevertheless, this is a case of a mixture of one type of food with its own type of food and with something else.

And in any case of a type of forbidden food mixed with its own type of food and with something else, disregard the food that is its own type, as though it is not present in the mixture, and if the amount of permitted food that is not its own type is 60 times greater than the forbidden food, the permitted food nullifies it.

Rava suggests that we imagine this pot has both meat and fish stewing, when non-kosher meat falls in. (The original scenario likely meant us to imagine a stew with meat or fish.) According to Rabbi Yehuda’s principle, the kosher meat cannot nullify the non-kosher meat, because they are like types. But if there’s enough fish — specifically, 60 times as much — the fish can nullify the meat because they are not like types.

Nullification can be a useful tool. After all, it’s a shame to have to waste an entire pot of stew because a piece of unkosher meat or fish accidentally fell in. At first, it seems relatively straightforward. But, as is so often the case, what at first appears simple actually turns out to be surprisingly complex.

Read all of Chullin 100 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on August 8, 2026. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.