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Daf Yomi for kids · Talmud Bavli · Masechet Bechorot

Bechorot 61 for kids: Mistakes in Counting

בכורות ס״א

🐑 What happens when someone calls the wrong animal “tenth”? The daf asks which animals become holy, and what happens when an agent makes the mistake.

Daf Yomi day:

📖 Open Bechorot 61a in Daf Quest

In the app: the Gemara with Rashi and Tosafot, the printed page, games made from this daf, play coins and treasure chests.

Stories from Bechorot 61

Words to know

Rashi and Tosafot on Bechorot 61 in simple English

Rashi on Bechorot 61a, in English Tab translation (14)
  1. It is a substitute — And a substitute for animal tithe is not sacrificed; it is left to die.
  2. According to his own view — Rabbi Meir means: In my view, a substitute for animal tithe is not sacrificed. Therefore, the eleventh animal is not a substitute, for if it were, it would not be sacrificed.
  3. The eleventh animal — When it was called the tithe, its only difference from an ordinary peace offering is that a peace offering produces a substitute that may be sacrificed, while the eleventh animal does not. Rabbi Yehuda holds that a mistakenly designated animal tithe is itself a substitute, and a substitute cannot produce another substitute. The phrase “may be sacrificed” is included at the end so we can infer that the eleventh animal itself is sacrificed as a peace offering.
  4. As it is taught: “If it is from the herd” — The verse says, “If his offering is a sacrifice of peace offerings from the herd,” and so on.
  5. Before it — That is, before the original animal itself becomes holy. It stands to reason that it can produce a substitute only after it becomes holy.
  6. He explained it — He explained the teaching that says the animals must die.
  7. In the present time — This teaching does not follow Rav Huna, who said at the start of the chapter that animal tithe is not practiced today, as a safeguard against mistakenly tithing purchased or orphaned animals. The animals are not left to graze until they develop a blemish, lest someone meanwhile shear them, put them to work, or slaughter them without a blemish. Instead, they are confined and left to die on their own.
  8. Why specifically two? — Why does the teaching specify that two animals emerged as the tenth and he called them both “tenth”?
  9. If he called the ninth animal “tenth,” it is holy — The owner loses nothing entirely, since he may eat the animal once it develops a blemish.
  10. It is not holy — As a peace offering, it would cost the owner the breast and thigh, which go to the priests. He can say to the agent, “I did not appoint you to cause me a loss.”
  11. And not to harm me — It is a disadvantage to have to wait for the animal to develop a blemish; until then, one may not shear it or put it to work.
  12. He reduced it by ten — He separated one-fortieth as teruma, a generous amount.
  13. That is how I judged you — I judged that you wanted to separate as much teruma as I separated.
  14. You should not have made a mistake — Therefore, that mistaken designation has no effect.
Tosafot on Bechorot 61a, in English Tab translation (3)
  1. They shall be offered — This follows Rabbi Shimon, who permits bringing sacrificial animals into a situation where they might be disqualified. But peace offerings require the owner to lay hands on them, while animal tithe does not. Since omitting this act does not invalidate an offering, it need not prevent the animals from being offered. Several sources seem to support this: the Gemara says that uncircumcised and impure people may send offerings, and its wording, ‘all offerings,’ cannot be limited to firstborn and tithe animals. Two nazirites each bring an offering on a condition. A found animal may be offered as a burnt offering or peace offering, though its owner is apparently unknown and cannot lay hands on it: the Mishnah says that finders were once made to provide security for its libations. An heir also brings his father’s offering without laying hands on it. In another case, a person brings his guilt offering and log of oil, although that guilt offering requires laying on of hands; according to the view that this requirement for a leper’s guilt offering is not biblical, the act there is only perfunctory. A mourner, by contrast, may not send offerings because Scripture requires a person to be ‘whole’; without that verse, he could. The Gemara asks whether someone under a ban may send offerings and cites the Israelites’ sending offerings during their years under a ban in the wilderness. Other sources allow someone uncertain whether he pledged a bull or a calf to bring both, or allow a priest to wave the offering on behalf of someone who sent it from abroad. Yet other passages do object to omitting the laying on of hands: an offering sent from abroad is explained as a bird offering or a woman’s offering, neither of which requires it. Five people whose Passover-offering hides were mixed up and one proved blemished do not bring a conditional offering from the surplus of a Passover offering: the Passover offering needs no laying on of hands, but its surplus does. This remains so despite the severe penalty for failing to bring a Passover offering. Similarly, when offerings of the same kind are mixed, the Gemara limits permission to offer them to women’s offerings because of the requirement to lay hands on them. The distinction is this: if an offering has no remedy through being left to graze until it develops a blemish and would instead have to die, it may be offered without laying on of hands. If grazing provides a remedy, it may not. This explains the found animal and the heir’s offering; the mixed offerings have the grazing remedy. The guilt offering with the log of oil is different because it enables the person to complete his purification. The mourner and the person under a ban could be sending bird offerings or women’s offerings; the Israelites in the wilderness sent the daily offerings. The bull and calf can be brought as voluntary offerings for the altar. Uncircumcised and impure people are different because they cannot lay hands on their offerings: an uncircumcised man may be unable to undergo circumcision because his brothers died from it, and an impure person, such as one with a discharge or a leper, may have an offering due at a fixed time or one whose delay would violate a prohibition. The priest’s waving on behalf of an absent person can likewise concern such people or an heir, following Rabbi Yehuda’s view that an heir does not lay hands on the offering. Here, and in the cases of the two people bringing a sin offering and the two nazirites bringing conditional offerings, the animals were not eligible for laying on of hands when first set aside, since the act could not then be performed. Alternatively, in our case it is uncertain whether either animal requires laying on of hands when offered. Finally, how can these animals be offered when animal tithe and peace offerings require different numbers of applications of blood—one and four? The Sages disagree about a mixture of blood requiring four applications with blood requiring one: Rabbi Eliezer requires four, while Rabbi Yehoshua requires one, since even an offering requiring four is valid if given one. Rabbi Eliezer holds that the excess is offered as firewood; this passage appears to indicate that Rabbi Shimon agrees with him in the case of the guilt offering brought the next day.
  2. Animal tithe in the present time — The beginning of this chapter concludes that animal tithe is not practiced now because of the risk of a mishap. Nevertheless, if someone does tithe his animals, the designation takes effect.
  3. If he called the ninth animal ‘tenth,’ it is sanctified — Rav Pappi holds that the owner cannot say here, ‘I sent you to benefit me, not to harm me’: the animal may still be eaten once it develops a blemish, although the owner must wait and may not shear it or put it to work. Alternatively, Rav Pappi’s reason for ruling differently about the eleventh is that once the tenth animal emerged, the agent had completed his task, since the tenth becomes holy automatically.

Sources

Kid summary and story cards written by Tab from the William Davidson Edition English (Sefaria, CC BY-NC 4.0).

Tab translation (machine-assisted) of Rashi and Tosafot, from the Vilna Edition Hebrew (public domain) on Sefaria. May contain mistakes.

In the app, the Gemara text comes from Sefaria (William Davidson Edition, CC BY-NC 4.0; Hebrew/Aramaic Vilna Edition). Rashi and Tosafot Hebrew: Vilna Edition (public domain) via Sefaria.

Also spelled: Bekhorot, Bechoros, Bekhoroth 61.