Q&A: Slaughtering the Passover Offering
Slaughtering the Passover Offering
Question
My question is this:
Maimonides counted as a positive commandment both to slaughter the Passover offering and to eat the Passover offering.
On the other hand, regarding the sin offering and the guilt offering, he counted the procedure of the sin offering and the procedure of the guilt offering, and also the commandment of eating the sin offering and the guilt offering—however, as one commandment, and not as two separate commandments of eating. Why is that not counted as two separate commandments, as the Passover offering is a commandment in its own right?
A second question: why, with the sin offering and guilt offering, is the act of slaughter not counted separately—is it because it is included in the procedure of the sin offering and the guilt offering, or because it is included in the eating? Whereas with the Passover offering, slaughter is counted on its own, even though it could be included in the eating, since there is no eating without slaughter.
A third question: where did the commandment of the procedure of the Passover offering disappear to—from receiving the blood to the sprinkling, including the burning of the sacrificial portions? It is obvious that this is not included in slaughter or in eating, whereas for the sin offering and guilt offering the procedure of the sin offering and guilt offering is indeed counted, which includes everything.
A fourth question: what place do atonement and appeasement have in the Passover offering? For what does it come to atone and appease through the sprinkling of the blood?
Thank you in advance for your expansive response.
Answer
1. The question of what Maimonides’ criterion is for splitting commandments is a difficult one, and I do not have clear criteria. I suspect that he did not really have them either. He writes that he relies on the Sages, but not on direct criteria of his own. See Root 11, and especially 12—there he discusses counting the parts of the sacrificial offering. As for eating the Passover offering, it seems to me that it really is different from eating the other edible offerings. There, the eating is part of the process of offering the sacrifice, but with the Passover offering it appears that the offering is intended for the sake of eating, and not the reverse. Eating is the primary element there (you can see this from laws such as that it must be for those registered for it, and the like).
2–3. I did not understand how this differs from question 1. The slaughter is of course the entire process of offering it up (the four sacrificial rites); see Root 12.
4. All offerings are regarded as something that comes to appease. Every offering must be brought for its proper purpose (the six intentions listed in the Mishnah in tractate Menachot). According to some medieval authorities (Rishonim), even the four species is a commandment that comes to appease (and there is a practical difference regarding a commandment that comes through a transgression as opposed to a positive commandment overriding a prohibition, since with commandments that come to appease we do not say that a positive commandment overrides a prohibition).
Discussion on Answer
I don’t understand what is difficult. I wrote that with all offerings there is a command concerning the offering itself, and the eating is part of it. With the Passover offering there is a command concerning the offering itself (that is the commandment of slaughter) and a command concerning the eating, because there it has independent and separate significance.
If something is unclear, explain it and bring the sources you are referring to.
The Passover offering is about the Exodus from Egypt.
The other offerings are about curbing idolatry.
There is no point in asking from one to the other. There is no connection at all.
I do not understand why I am not being clear enough.
Maimonides counted in his enumeration of the commandments one positive commandment: the procedure of the sin offering, commandment 64, and in commandment 65 the procedure of the guilt offering, and this includes the entire offering process. But he also added in commandment 89 to eat the meat of the sin offering and guilt offering. הרי these are two separate commandments.
If the eating were part of the offering, it would not be counted as a separate commandment according to Maimonides’ rules in the Roots.
To The Last Decisor:
There does not need to be a connection.
Maimonides has fourteen general roots in counting the 613 commandments, and that includes all of them even though there is no connection among them all.
Eating in the offerings is a general law for all offerings, but it is not part of the sacrificial procedure. Therefore it is counted separately. It is counted as one commandment for all offerings because eating is a general law for all offerings (the edible ones), that they must be eaten. That is unlike the Passover offering, where the eating is a law in its own right, as explained above.
Many thanks for the response,
but it is still difficult.
A.] If with all offerings the eating is part of the process of offering, then why is it counted as a commandment in its own right and not included in the commandment of the entire sacrificial procedure of the sin offering and likewise of the guilt offering?
B.] And even after we accept an explanation of why it should indeed be counted as a commandment, it still needs explanation why he does not count a commandment of eating for each offering separately: eating the sin offering on its own and eating the guilt offering on its own.
C.] In your words there seems to be something of a contradiction. At first you write that with the Passover offering the offering is intended for eating, and therefore the whole sacrificial procedure—the four rites and the burning—is part of the commandment of eating, and therefore is not counted separately.
But afterward you write that the slaughter includes the whole sacrificial process mentioned above, and if so they are included in the commandment of slaughter and not of eating. So what is the correct way to say it?