The mishnahs on today’s daf continue examining the question of how different components of the todah (the thanksgiving offering of an animal accompanied by 40 loaves) affect one another’s ritual status. Another mishnah extends this discussion even further, to the case of libations, wine offerings, that accompany various animal offerings:
If the libations that accompany the offerings were already sanctified in a service vessel and the offering was discovered to be unfit, if there is another offering, the libations should be sacrificed with that offering; and if not, they should be disqualified by being left overnight.
If wine has already been poured for a sacrifice, and then the animal sacrifice was slaughtered and discovered to have a blemish, the mishnah teaches that rather than automatically tossing the wine away, one can instead offer it with another animal whose libation has not yet been poured. However, if there are no other offerings the wine can accompany, the wine should be left overnight, disqualifying its ritual status, then poured out. This is a standard way of “disposing” of a sacred item that cannot be offered — leave it alone until chance and natural processes render it invalid, then find a way to dispose of it.
This is a better outcome than usual in the case of ritual disqualifications: At least in some cases — when another offering can be accompanied by the already-sanctified wine — the wine won’t go to waste! The Gemara points out that this seems in tension with another ruling about oil:
But didn’t Rav Hisda say that oil that one separated for the sake of this one meal offering is unfit to be brought for the sake of another meal offering?
Unlike wine, if one has already poured oil for the sake of a meal offering, and the meal becomes unfit, one isn’t allowed to simply reassign the oil to a different offering. Rather, the oil should be discarded. So what is the difference between oil and wine?
Rabbi Yannai says: The court tacitly stipulates concerning the libations that if they were required, they were required. But if not, they should be brought with another offering.
Rabbi Yannai answers that the court sets a default stipulation with regard to the status of libations. If they end up being usable with the sacrifice for which they were initially designated, wonderful! But if not, the court stipulation allows those libations to be reassigned to another offering.
This answer is the equivalent of: because we said so. The Gemara still wants to know why: If the court makes this stipulation, presumably to reduce waste in such cases, why shouldn’t the same stipulation be applied to oil? Presumably, we should also wish to minimize cases of waste there.
The answer:
The oil is part of the meal offering itself.
Oil has a different status than libations, because oil is an element of the meal offering itself. Oil is not simply poured out on the occasion of a sacrifice, it’s mixed with the flour — making it part of the body of the sacrifice. Therefore, oil that was designated for a particular offering cannot be reassigned— because it is an essential part of that particular offering.
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