After establishing at the beginning of this chapter that sacrificing outside the Temple courtyard incurs liability, the Gemara has spent significant time discussing the details. One principle that has been established is the notion that one is only liable for offering a sacrifice that could have been offered in the Temple. A mishnah on today’s daf tests the boundaries of that principle:
A meal offering from which a handful was not removed, and one sacrificed it outside the Temple courtyard, he is exempt. If a priest took a handful from it and then returned its handful into the remainder of the meal offering, and one sacrificed the entire mixture outside the courtyard, he is liable.
Here’s how a mincha (meal offering) worked: The owner would place either flour, or cakes baked in the Temple and broken into pieces, in a vessel. To the flour or crumbs, they would add oil and frankincense. This mixture was then brought to a priest, who would separate a handful of the flour/oil mixture and the entirety of the frankincense and place them in a separate vessel. The contents of this second vessel were offered up on the altar, and the remainder of the meal offering in the first vessel was consumed by the priests.
One might have thought that because the first vessel contained a portion of flour and oil destined for the altar, sacrificing its entire contents before the handful was removed would incur liability. However, that’s not how the rabbis see it. When a handful has not yet been taken from the first vessel, its entire contents are not considered destined for the altar. This is why one is not liable for sacrificing it outside the Temple. However, once that handful has been removed, it’s considered to exist as an independent entity fit to be offered in the Temple. Therefore, as the latter clause of the mishnah notes, if that handful is mixed back in, we treat the flour and oil before us as if it contains both the portion meant to be consumed and the portion meant to be sacrificed, so one is liable for sacrificing that mixture outside the Temple.
The Gemara asks a question about this latter case in which the handful is mixed back in:
But why? Let the remainder nullify the handful.
When two like substances of different ritual statuses are mixed, the Torah law is that one substance can be nullified by a majority of the other. For example, if two scraps of kosher meat are mixed with one scrap of neveilah (improperly slaughtered meat), the neveilah is nullified and all three pieces are permissible. The Gemara is suggesting that, similarly, we might say that the handful, which upon removal gained a new status as destined for the altar, should be nullified upon return to the first vessel by the greater quantity of flour and oil that was destined for consumption by the priests.
This is a good challenge. But the Gemara overturns it:
Rabbi Zeira said: The word “burning” is stated with regard to the handful removed from the meal offering, and “burning” is stated with regard to the remainder of the meal offering. This provides a verbal analogy that teaches that just as with regard to the burning of the handful, if two handfuls are mixed together one handful does not nullify another, so too, with regard to the burning of the remainder, if the remainder and the handful are mixed together, the remainder does not nullify the handful.
The mincha is an exception to the nullification rule: Unlike most other scenarios, the handful and the remainder both retain distinct identities and cannot nullify one another in any quantity. Therefore, once the handful has been separated and mixed back in, one who offers up the mixture outside the Temple courtyard is liable for offering something that would normally be sacrificed in the Temple.
Read all of Zevachim 110 on Sefaria.
This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on January 2, 2026. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.
