Conflating Types of Nullification
The other day, I was kvetching a bit about how the Talmudic Narrator understood the Mishnah, where Rabbi Yehuda truly seemed to discuss consistency of the two menachot, whereas the gemara took Rabbi Yehuda as maintaining his famous position, that min bemino aino batel. I explained how this deviated from the simple language of the Mishnah; applied the rules of one kind of bittul (of liquids) to something solid or, if to liquids, in a rather strange manner. Since Rishonim, especially the Tosafists, grapple with all sugyot on a subject, and try to harmonize them, a misapplication in one sugya can deform the entire picture of bittul. See my post, Oily Dough Consistency and Min beMino.
Some of this was predicated on a Jewish Link article I wrote recently about Rabbi Yehuda and Scientific Nullification. You can read that article. Alternatively, I created a NotebookLM explainer video for the article, which you can watch here:
Anyway, at the start of that article, I wrote:
How does bittul, nullification, work? Does it operate via statistical likelihood, legal fiat, or scientific mechanism? I’d argue that different types of bittul fall into different categories. Here we focus specifically on liquids nullified in other liquids (lach belach), and we’ll posit that bittul operates physically.
What I meant was that bittul or rov is an overloaded term, a homonym of sorts. If you have a group of ten pieces of meat before you, and one of them is non-kosher, we might say that we pay attention to the majority and decide by fiat to treat all of them as that majority identity. Or, to say that, taking any item out from the group, we will assume that anything taken out is likely to be of the majority identity — kol de-farish, meiruba parish. When the items are not before you — ruba deleita kaman — you can still talk about statistics.
The laws of mixture of solids, including of flour, assumes that each particle is its own atom. Meanwhile, the laws of mixture of liquids seems to assume to continuum model for liquids, in which every unit of the liquid assumes the weighted average of the quality vector of the component liquids. One should not conflate the two. Indeed, there is a position that equates the two, mentioned in Rosh HaShanah 14a, but this is a speculative position for a Shmuel, and we don’t end up saying this — that bila, that is true mixture, can apply to solids and not minority / rejected position. Thus:
וּצְרִיכָא: דְּאִי אַשְׁמְעִינַן הֲלָכָה כְּרַבִּי שִׁמְעוֹן שֵׁזוּרִי, הֲוָה אָמֵינָא: מִשּׁוּם דְּקָסָבַר יֵשׁ בִּילָּה, קָא מַשְׁמַע לַן: לַכֹּל אֵין בִּילָּה.
The Gemara comments: It is necessary to state all three statements of Shmuel in order to clarify his position, as had Shmuel taught us only that the halakha is in accordance with the opinion of Rabbi Shimon Shezuri, I would have said that this is due to the fact that he holds that there is mixing even with regard to solids. Therefore, he teaches us the second statement, that there is no mixing for anything except wine, oil, and other liquids.
This would then be an explicit rejection of such conflation.
I also mentioned how in Zevachim 73, Rabbeinu Tam suggested — I think correctly from a sugya and historical scientific perspective — that Rabbi Yehuda’s position of min bemino aino batel only applied to liquids; but that retracted from that correct position based on another gemara.
Well, we have come to one such gemara in Menachot, and I am going to kvetch some more and just argue against the Talmudic Narrator. I am speaking of yesterday’s daf, Menachot 23.
Here are the different types of bittul than seem to be eventually conflated by this particular Talmudic Narrator operating in Menachot.
The Mishnah speaks of meal offerings that are mixed together — שְׁתֵּי מְנָחוֹת שֶׁלֹּא נִקְמְצוּ וְנִתְעָרְבוּ זוֹ בָּזוֹ, or a kometz scoop from one offering mixed with another offering, and other similar cases. Thus, it is flour with flour, which are particles. This should be aggregation of individual particles, or atoms, which even Artistotle speaks of as not true mixture. Perhaps given that there is some amount of oil, we could treat the dough as a quasi-liquid, but it really is aggregation. The Mishnah is entirely understandable within this framework. And that is why there is a a difficulty at play, where you cannot guarantee that any new scoop you take will be from the mincha that needs scooping.
And maybe we could bring in Rabbi Shimon Shezuri’s mixture of cowpeas, imagining putting these particles into a centrifuge, in which case anything taken will be equal parts X and equal parts Y, and see how that would play out. But if he, or we, don’t hold that there is such a guarantee.
Or, maybe since flour practically mixes so well, and this is all flour, we can talk about the flour assuming a shared identity, and an experiential perspective?
The gemara leads with a named Amora, third-generation Rav Chisda, arguing with another named Amora, Rabbi Chanina. This is no Talmudic Narrator!
גְּמָ׳ אָמַר רַב חִסְדָּא: נְבֵילָה בְּטֵילָה בִּשְׁחוּטָה, שֶׁאִי אֶפְשָׁר לִשְׁחוּטָה שֶׁתֵּעָשֶׂה נְבֵילָה.
GEMARA: Rav Ḥisda says: The meat of an unslaughtered animal carcass is nullified in a larger quantity of meat of a slaughtered animal. Although meat from a carcass generally imparts impurity, if one touches the mixture of the two meats he does not become ritually impure, as the carcass meat is considered a different type of substance from the slaughtered animal and is therefore nullified. This is not considered a mixture that comprises a substance in contact with the same type of substance, because meat from a slaughtered animal cannot attain the status of a carcass, and it is therefore viewed as a different type of substance.
While Rav Chisda’s position is quoted elsewhere, this does seem to be the primary sugya of dispute with Rabbi Chanina.
Even so, neither of these named Amoraim specifically reference our Mishnah about kemitza. And, neither of these named Amoraim discuss the Tanna, Rabbi Yehuda’s position, about min bemino.
Instead, it is the Talmudic Narrator, in analyzing this Amoraic dispute, that tries to relate their dispute to the position of either Rabbi Yehuda or the Sages who disagree with Rabbi Yehuda:
אַלִּיבָּא דְּמַאן? אִי אַלִּיבָּא דְּרַבָּנַן, הָא אָמְרִי: עוֹלִין הוּא דְּלָא מְבַטְּלִי אַהֲדָדֵי, אֲבָל מִין בְּמִינוֹ – בָּטֵל.
The Gemara asks: In accordance with whose opinion do Rabbi Ḥanina and Rav Ḥisda state their opinions? If their opinions are in accordance with the opinion of the Rabbis, this is difficult: Didn’t the Rabbis say that it is in the case of a mixture of items that ascend to the altar that the different components of the mixture do not nullify one another, but otherwise, a substance in contact with the same type of substance is nullified? Therefore, in any case where meat of a slaughtered animal becomes intermingled with unslaughtered animal carcass meat, the smaller quantity is nullified in the larger quantity.
אִי אַלִּיבָּא דְּרַבִּי יְהוּדָה, וְהָא רַבִּי יְהוּדָה בָּתַר חֲזוּתָא אָזֵיל, וְאִידֵּי וְאִידֵּי מִין בְּמִינוֹ הוּא.
If their opinions are in accordance with the opinion of Rabbi Yehuda, who holds that the blood of an offering is not nullified in the blood of a non-sacred animal because the two are the same type of substance, this is difficult: But Rabbi Yehuda follows the appearance of the item in determining whether the two items are the same type of substance. And therefore, this meat of a slaughtered animal and that meat of an unslaughtered carcass are viewed as a substance in contact with the same type of substance, since their appearances are identical, and neither one nullifies the other.
And, reading further in the same gemara, it is the Talmudic Narrator who brings in a brayta from Rabbi Chiyya (who has a Tannaitic status, but also a transitional Tanna / Amora status) as their basis, tries to attribute Rabbi Chiyya’s brayta to either Rabbi Yehuda or the Sages. Then, it is the Talmudic Narrator who tries to relate our Mishnah about two menachot that are intermingled as proof to Rabbi Chanina.
Thus, Rabbi Chanina and Rav Chisda, and Rabbi Yehuda and the Sages, and Rabbi Chiyya — the named Tannaim and Amoraim — , never specifically said that menachot mixing has to do with their other disputes. It is the Talmudic Narrator who relates them.
And it is only by this chain of association that we propose in the gemara that Rabbi Yehuda’s min bemino aino batel applies to majority of pieces of meat, which are separate entities standing side by side. And also by this chain of association that we say that the Mishnah, which is a flour intermingling, and thus yavesh beyavesh, not lach belach, might also be an application of min bemino aino batel according to Rabbi Yehuda.
It may well be that we should not conflate these different types of bittul, and that could make the analysis much simpler. For instance, let us reconsider what I just quoted:
אִי אַלִּיבָּא דְּרַבִּי יְהוּדָה, וְהָא רַבִּי יְהוּדָה בָּתַר חֲזוּתָא אָזֵיל, וְאִידֵּי וְאִידֵּי מִין בְּמִינוֹ הוּא.
If their opinions are in accordance with the opinion of Rabbi Yehuda, who holds that the blood of an offering is not nullified in the blood of a non-sacred animal because the two are the same type of substance, this is difficult: But Rabbi Yehuda follows the appearance of the item in determining whether the two items are the same type of substance. And therefore, this meat of a slaughtered animal and that meat of an unslaughtered carcass are viewed as a substance in contact with the same type of substance, since their appearances are identical, and neither one nullifies the other.
They may be right that Rabbi Yehuda follows the appearance / chazuta rather than status. Rashi sources this position to Rabbi Yehuda’s earlier position that dam does not nullify dam, though one is of goat and another of cow, because of appearance. And thus, they may be right that Rabbi Yehuda says min bemino is not nullified. But here is the leap! That Rabbi Yehuda said this about true mixture of liquids. Who says that he says this even about solid aggregation, like flour? And certainly, who says that he says this about pieces of meat not in a mixture, but laying side by side?