We learned yesterday that, according to the Talmud, a shochet (kosher slaughterer) is obligated to present his knife for inspection to a Torah scholar to ensure that it is sharp and has no nicks. Today’s daf explains how this obligation was enforced:
Rav Huna says: This slaughterer who did not present the knife before a scholar, we ostracize him. And Rava says: We remove him from his position, and we proclaim about his meat that it is treifa.
Rav Huna lays out social consequences for a kosher slaughterer who does not submit to rabbinic oversight: ostracism. Rava, meanwhile, lays out financial consequences: loss of his position and an inability to sell his meat to kosher-keeping Jews. But how do these two opinions relate to each other? Is Rava adding to Rav Huna’s position with additional consequences? Are Rav Huna and Rava disagreeing?
They do not disagree. Here (in Rav Huna’s position), it is where his knife was discovered intact. There (Rava’s position), it is where his knife was discovered not intact.
The Talmud explains that Rav Huna’s consequences takes effect if the shochet is in fact careful about his knife, keeping it sharp with no nicks. In this case, because the shochet refuses to submit to rabbinic authority, he is ostracized from the rabbinic community. He doesn’t get to be a part of a community he isn’t committed to and whose leaders he does not show proper respect.
The Talmud asserts that Rava, however, is addressing a case where the shochet both does not submit to rabbinic authority and is careless with his knife, so that the animal is slaughtered in a way that causes more pain than necessary and is thus not kosher. When the meat isn’t kosher, it is treifa and can’t be sold to Jews. In some ways, Rav Huna’s ruling seems harsher than Rava’s. While it is true that this butcher experiences significant financial loss, he doesn’t seem to experience any social consequences. But if someone is both disrespectful and careless, shouldn’t their punishment be worse than if they were just disrespectful? Ravina offers a creative solution.
Ravina said: Where his knife was discovered not intact, one spreads excrement on the flesh so that it cannot be sold, even to a gentile.
As any school child will tell you, no one is going to want to buy from, let alone hang out with, the guy known for selling “poop meat.” How would this kind of regulation have worked in practice? The Talmud continues:
A certain slaughterer did not present his knife before Rava bar Hinnana. Rava bar Hinnana ostracized him, removed him and proclaimed about his meat that it is treifa.
Rava bar Hinnana combines the rulings of Rav Huna and Rava to impose both social and financial consequences. As for his knife inspection, he outsourced that responsibility to his students:
Mar Zutra and Rav Ashi happened before Rava bar Hinnana. Rava bar Hinnana said to them: Let the sages examine the matter of the slaughterer, as small children are dependent upon him. Rav Ashi examined his knife and it was discovered intact, and he deemed his meat kosher.
When his students find that the knife is in fact sharp, and the meat is therefore kosher, Rav Ashi removes the financial consequences while keeping the social consequences intact.
This whole discussion demonstrates the rabbis’ delicate communal position in late antique Babylonia. On the one hand, they created the legal and ritual framework for rabbinic Jewish life. On the other hand, not all Jews readily and unquestioningly accepted their authority. Perhaps for this reason, their prescribed consequences could not be so harsh as to permanently repel Jews from following them and being a part of their communities. Then, as now, positions of leadership are more complicated than we might think.
How explicitly relevant is this particular regulatory system today? Not much. In the modern era, shochets are considered to be learned enough to do their own knife inspections, so a situation such as this one would not arise.
Read all of Chullin 18 on Sefaria.
This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on May 18, 2026. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.
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