Sunday 28 September 2014

Chagiga 21: Teruma, Sacrificial Offerings, Non-Sacred Food and Ritual Purity

Today was one of those days where the text assumes knowledge of a huge amount of information.  I am going to review the pieces that I have picked up:

  • Teruma is the donated food that is eaten by the priests
  • Sacrificial food is what is offered by groups of people and then eaten on Festivals
  • Non-sacred food might travel along with other foods
  • Food is carried to Jerusalem in vessels that are pure
  • Teruma does not require the same degree of ritual purity as do sacrificial offerings
  • To ensure the purity of vessels, they must be immersed
  • The rabbis argue about whether or not a smaller vessel can be successfully ritually immersed within a larger vessel
  • The rabbis wonder whether there might be an interposition in the immersion due to the vessels touching each other and thus not being fully in contact with the water
  • The rabbis note that the size of a vessel's opening must be as large as or larger than a wineskin to allow water to connect from one bath to another
  • Ten stringencies regarding sacrificial food will be detailed in Chagiga 22
  • The first five of those stringencies are based on Torah law and apply to sacred and non-sacred food
While Talmud scholars would note which rabbis were arguing which details; which lines of argument were augmented, I am satisfied at this point to untangle and distill at least the basic premises from this text.







No comments:

Post a Comment