Chullin 107

Today, Jews ritually wash their hands in many circumstances, including upon waking up in the morning, when leaving a cemetery and, most ubiquitously, before eating a meal. On today’s daf, we catch a glimpse of this ritual in formation.

Jewish hand washing originated in the priestly duty to consume sacred food while ritually pure. Notably, priests maintained this purity requirement for eating terumah even after the destruction of the Temple. While ritually washing hands was originally instituted to create a habit of purity so no priest would make a mistake with holy food, it eventually took on independent standing as a mitzvah for all Jews, even before eating non-sacred foods. In this new form, the original concern — purity — became symbolic rather than practical.
Today’s daf offers us a look at the development of this mitzvah: 

Rav says: A person may wash both of his hands in the morning and stipulate with regard to them for the entire day.
 
Rabbi Avina said to the inhabitants of the Valley of Aravot: People such as you, for whom water is scarce, should wash your hands in the morning and stipulate with regard to them for the entire day.
 
Rav rules that a person can wash their hands once in the morning and keep in mind that this purification will last all day long. This obviates the need to wash before every meal or act of consumption. Rabbi Avina seems to be more stringent. He suggests that this ruling should only apply to people in extreme climates, like the Arava desert, where one does not have access to water over the course of the day. In both cases, the idea that one can wash in the morning to permit eating for the entire day is reminiscent of other purity rituals. Presumably, if you wash your hands and remain alert during the day, you can remain pure and eat food. This notion of morning-only hand washing does not closely associate the ritual with meal times, nor does it detach it from practical purity concerns (even though they seem to have in mind non-priests as well as priests). Those changes would come later — or, at least, with other rabbis.
 
Today’s daf is filled with debates over ritual hand washing that evince a similar tension: The original concern for purity required precise regulation, while its evolution into a mealtime ritual permits washing to become more experiential and fluid. For example, there is a discussion about the requirements for the water used in ritual hand washing. Must it meet the same standard as water found in a mikveh that is used for other purification purposes? Or will any water do? Likewise: Does it matter what vessel is used to store and pour the water? Does it matter how much water is used? Some opinions see ritual hand washing as akin to immersion in a mikveh (and therefore, driven by practical purification concerns), while others do not.

Here is another complex text for consideration:

A dilemma was raised before the sages: What is the halakhah with regard to eating with a cloth over one’s hands? Are we concerned that perhaps he will touch the food with his hands, or not?

This question, like other texts from the daf we’ve considered, assumes that the purpose of hand washing is removing impurity. If you use a cloth napkin as a barrier between the food and your hand, there is no need for washing, since the cloth protects the food from contracting impurity.

The Gemara answers this dilemma with an anecdote:

Come and hear proof from a mishnah (Sukkah 26b): “And when they gave Rabbi Tzadok on the festival of Sukkot less than an egg-bulk of food, he took the food in a cloth, and he ate it outside the sukkah. And he did not recite a blessing after eating it.” What, is it not to be inferred that consequently, if one eats an egg-bulk, it requires washing of the hands?
 
In this anecdote, Rabbi Tzadok eats a small mouthful of food. His behavior indicates he does not view that small snack as a meal: He does not eat it in the sukkah (on Sukkot) and he does not recite a blessing after eating it. However, he does use a cloth as a barrier so he does not touch the food. But it is unclear to the Gemara why he did this. Was it because of an impurity concern? Because of general hygiene?

Because the story is inconclusive, the Gemara turns to other cases, where colleagues and students watch their rabbis’ table habits and try to infer the law. The questions abound: Can a cloth barrier regularly replace ritual washing? Should a servant wash his hands before he gives bread to his employer? Can we assume servers wash and then offer them food from the meal?
 
The anecdotes raise more questions than they answer and the stories are seldom conclusive. This suggests that we are looking at a historical moment when washing before a meal was not yet standardized — it was neither universally required, nor was its meaning universally agreed upon. The two poles of the ritual, the older pole of removing impurity and the newer pole of ritually marking the start of a meal, are deeply intertwined in this period. Only later did the purity concerns fade as the symbolism of the mealtime ritual became ascendant.

See you tomorrow!

Rabba Alieza Salzberg Yizhar teaches rabbinic texts and Jewish history in Jerusalem. She holds an MA from Hebrew University in Midrash and Aggada as well as an MA in Creative Writing from CCNY. She is currently writing a doctoral dissertation on gender and war in the Babylonian Talmud.

Read all of Chullin 107 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on August 15, 2026. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.