Lesson 29: Tzav

From the book Mida Tova: Articles on the Principles of Halakhic Thinking by Rabbi Michael Avraham. Translated from Hebrew using gpt-5.4 (reasoning_effort=high, batch API).

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Concepts

• Thought and deed in consecrated offerings.
• A virtual act in halakha (Jewish law).
• Disqualifying intention.
• Intention, lishmah (for its proper sake), and lishmah in consecrated offerings.

Abstract

In this article we discuss intentions that render a sacrifice piggul, thereby creating liability to karet (spiritual excision) for eating its meat. We briefly present the sources of this law and its various branches, and we note the special complexity involved in piggul, which stems from the fact that two different rites are involved in it: one connected to the content of the disqualifying intention, and the other to its timing. We point out that in piggul this complexity is necessary, at least in the case of intending an improper sprinkling beyond its proper time, since there is no other way to create, within sprinkling, a disqualification that exists only in thought. A similar phenomenon also exists with the intention of shelo lishmah (not for its proper sake), in the case of reckoning intention from one rite to another, although there it is not necessary.

We propose an explanation of how the intention to sprinkle after the proper time renders the sacrifice piggul, whereas actual sprinkling after the proper time does not render it piggul. Moreover, the fact that the intention has this effect follows from the halakhic system’s treating it as an act, as implied by the Talmud, though contrary to the view of several later authorities. There is scriptural basis for this in the verse that teaches the law of piggul, which refers to it both as a disqualification of thought and as a disqualification in deed.

We discuss the relation between piggul and the rule of reckoning intention from one rite to another, and afterward the sugya of the intention to leave the blood over, where one sees clearly the reversed hierarchy between thought and deed that exists in the realm of consecrated offerings.

From the words of the medieval authorities it appears that halakha treats piggul-intention in sprinkling as though an actual disqualified act of sprinkling or slaughtering had been performed, but we show that this is probably not the correct understanding of their view. Our conclusion is that piggul-intention is treated in halakha as a virtual act, performed alongside the real act, and that it is this virtual act that disqualifies the sacrifice. We show that this picture is the necessary result of the Torah’s desire to place, at the center of the sacrificial realm, the thought of the officiant rather than his deed.

At the end of our discussion we suggest that the entire practical detail of the sacrificial procedure is intended only to provide a conceptual framework for the content of the intentions, valid and invalid, that accompany the service.

The Rules and Principles Emerging from the Article

Concerning Piggul

Overview

A. The Law of Piggul

Introduction

Last week we dealt with the role of thought in consecrated offerings, focusing on intentions of lishmah and shelo lishmah. We noted that these intentions generally do not disqualify the sacrifice, except in the case of the Passover-offering and the sin-offering; rather, they merely prevent it from gaining acceptance. In this week’s article we turn to a different intention, one that completely disqualifies the sacrifice and even makes eating its meat punishable by karet: the intention of piggul.

Source for the punishment for eating piggul

In our Torah portion the Torah commands the law of notar, that is, meat left over beyond its permitted time for eating (Leviticus 7:15-19):

And the flesh of the sacrifice of his thanksgiving peace-offering shall be eaten on the day of his offering; he shall not leave any of it until morning. But if the sacrifice of his offering is a vow or a freewill offering, it shall be eaten on the day he offers his sacrifice, and on the next day what remains of it may be eaten. But what remains of the flesh of the sacrifice on the third day shall be burned with fire. And if any of the flesh of the sacrifice of his peace-offerings is eaten at all on the third day, it shall not be accepted; it shall not be reckoned to the one who offered it; it shall be piggul, and the person who eats of it shall bear his iniquity. And the flesh that touches any unclean thing shall not be eaten; it shall be burned with fire. And as for the flesh, anyone who is clean may eat flesh.

The basic law is that the flesh of a peace-offering, like any other sacrifice except for the burnt-offering, which is entirely burned and not eaten, must be eaten within a specified time, and each type of sacrifice has its own time limit. Meat that remains after that time is called by the Sages notar, and it must be burned immediately. The Sages derive from the context of these verses that a similar law applies to piggul and to consecrated meat that became impure: these too must be burned.¹

In the middle of the passage appears an unusual verse dealing with piggul. This verse does not command that piggul be burned, but instead defines the concept and forbids the meat for consumption:

And if any of the flesh of the sacrifice of his peace-offerings is eaten at all on the third day, it shall not be accepted; it shall not be reckoned to the one who offered it; it shall be piggul, and the person who eats of it shall bear his iniquity.

As noted, this verse defines the very concept of piggul and imposes punishment on one who eats it. At first glance, the verse seems to define piggul as meat left over after its time for eating, which in our case of peace-offerings means the third day, and anyone who eats it instead of burning it as notar must bear his sin; the Sages explain that this means karet. But as we shall see below, this is not the law of piggul. The Sages derive that piggul refers to the meat of a sacrifice in which, during the sacrificial service, a specific improper intention was entertained, one that we shall define below. This intention disqualifies the sacrifice and turns it into piggul. Ordinary sacrificial meat eaten after the proper time is merely notar; that does not disqualify the sacrifice.

Source for the prohibition against eating piggul

So far we have seen a source for the punishment of karet for one who eats piggul. But the rule in our hands is that there is no punishment unless Scripture first issues a prohibition, and therefore there must also be an explicit warning that eating piggul is forbidden by a negative commandment.² Indeed, the Babylonian Talmud, Pesachim 24a, brings a source for the prohibition from a verse in Exodus 29:34, in the section dealing with the ordination-offering:

And if any of the flesh of the ordination-offering, or of the bread, remains until morning, you shall burn the remainder with fire; it shall not be eaten, because it is holy.

And the Talmud there expounds:

Rabbi Elazar said: “It shall not be eaten, because it is holy”—Scripture comes to impose a negative commandment on the eating of any disqualified sacred item.

Maimonides, in Sefer HaMitzvot, negative commandment 132, and Sefer HaHinukh, commandment 144, count this prohibition in their enumeration. They add another negative commandment derived from Deuteronomy 14:3:

You shall not eat any abominable thing.

And the Sages expound this in Babylonian Talmud, Avodah Zarah 66a:

As it was taught: Rabbi Yehudah says in the name of Rabbi Meir: From where do we know that all prohibitions in the Torah combine with one another? As it is stated: “You shall not eat any abominable thing”—anything that I have made abominable to you falls under “you shall not eat.”

Maimonides and Sefer HaHinukh explain that this too provides a negative commandment against one who eats piggul, thus making the act subject to two negative prohibitions.³

What is piggul?

As we noted, the simple sense of the verse suggests that piggul is meat eaten after the time when it is permitted to be eaten. But the Sages maintain that piggul is a disqualification of intention, not of deed. Thus Maimonides writes in Sefer HaMitzvot, negative commandment 132:

By tradition, the explanation of this verse is that it speaks of a sacrifice whose validity was ruined by intention at the time of its offering, and that is what is called piggul. The phrase “if it is eaten” means that one intended that it be eaten on the third day. As they said in Babylonian Talmud, Zevachim 29a: “Bend your ear and hear: Scripture is speaking of one who intends concerning his sacrifice that it be eaten on the third day.” It is invalidated by this intention.

He writes similarly at the opening of chapter 13 of Hilkhot Pesulei HaMukdashin:

By oral tradition they learned that the verse “And if any of the flesh of the sacrifice of his peace-offerings is eaten” speaks only of one who, at the time of the offering, intended that it be eaten on the third day. The same applies to any sacrifice regarding which, during one of its rites, he intended that it be eaten after the proper time for eating that sacrifice. Likewise, if he intended to burn on the altar, after the proper time for burning, something fit to be burned there. Thus they learned by tradition: whether it is the eating of a person or the “eating” of the altar, if he intended them for after their proper time, the sacrifice is piggul.

But if a sacrifice was not invalidated by intention, and its blood was sprinkled on the altar according to the law, and some of it remained after its time for eating, that remainder is called notar and is forbidden to be eaten. Yet the sacrifice has already been accepted and has effected atonement, as it says, “I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement.” Once the blood has reached the altar according to the law, the owners have attained atonement and the sacrifice has been accepted.

In the next chapter we shall discuss how this conclusion was reached and what it means. Here we will merely summarize the main laws relevant to the definition of piggul; see Babylonian Talmud, Zevachim 13a-b, and Maimonides, Hilkhot Pesulei HaMukdashin, chapter 13 and onward.

The law of piggul applies to all sacrifices. In animal offerings, piggul is a type of intention that accompanies one of the four rites involving the blood: slaughtering, receiving the blood in a vessel, carrying it, and sprinkling it on the altar. If, during one of the first three rites, the priest intends to sprinkle the blood after the proper time, that is, after sunset, the sacrifice immediately becomes piggul and it is forbidden to continue the offering. The same applies if, during one of the four rites, he intends to pour out the residue of the blood after the proper time.⁴ Likewise if he intends to burn the sacrificial portions, or the limbs of the burnt-offering, on the next day after dawn, or if he intends that the meat be eaten after its proper time, each sacrifice according to its own law. The rule is: whenever one intends, concerning something that is “eaten,” whether by a person or by the altar, that it be consumed beyond its proper time, he has rendered it piggul, and the sacrifice becomes forbidden for consumption.

There is also a discussion of piggul regarding the various blood applications, as well as regarding dipping the finger into the blood, in the case of the inner sin-offerings, and the pouring out of the residue of the blood. There is piggul as well in meal-offerings, bird-offerings, and the showbread, but we will not deal with those here.

A note on the prohibition against rendering an offering piggul

Above we discussed the source for the prohibition against eating piggul meat and the punishment of one who eats it. Is there also a prohibition against rendering an offering piggul? Does the priest⁵ who entertains a piggul-intention thereby transgress a negative commandment? If piggul were understood according to the simple sense of Scripture, namely, meat left over after its time for eating, then the prohibition against rendering it piggul would simply be the prohibition against eating the meat after its proper time, and perhaps also the prohibition against leaving it over in the first place, the prohibition of notar. But now that we have seen that piggul depends on the intention of the officiant, it stands to reason that there should also be a prohibition against entertaining a piggul-intention.

And indeed, in our article last week we noted that there is a prohibition derived from the words “it shall not be reckoned,” which includes all improper intentions of the officiant. Some include within this prohibition only intentions that disqualify the sacrifice, while others include all improper intentions. In any event, according to all views, piggul, which is certainly a disqualifying intention, is included in this prohibition.⁶

Piggul and disqualification

We conclude this chapter with a note on the nature of piggul. As we have seen, there is a prohibition against disqualifying consecrated offerings, and perhaps against entertaining improper intentions more generally. But only some of these intentions turn the sacrifice into piggul. There are intentions that do not disqualify at all, as we saw in last week’s article, and there are intentions that disqualify the sacrifice, as in the final mishnah of chapter 3 of Zevachim, which will also be cited below. Here we are dealing with intentions that turn it into piggul. The difference between an ordinary disqualification and piggul is only the punishment imposed on one who eats the meat. Piggul is one of the disqualifications of consecrated offerings, and in that sense it is simply one of the things that invalidate a sacrifice. Its uniqueness, relative to other disqualifications, is that in the case of piggul there is liability to karet for eating the sacrificial meat.

Yet in several places it seems that there is also a difference between piggul and an ordinary disqualification beyond the matter of karet for eating the meat. The sacrifice itself is piggul, and it is only for that reason that it is forbidden to eat it. For example, the Mishneh LaMelekh on Hilkhot Pesulei HaMukdashin 18:7 is uncertain regarding piggul before its permitting rites, such as sprinkling, have been performed. He argues that the designation piggul takes effect from the time of slaughtering, and only the punishment of karet is said to take effect after the sprinkling. This implies that the category of piggul has significance beyond the prohibition itself; see also Ahiezer, part 2, sec. 30, subsec. 2, and Kehillot Yaakov on Zevachim, sec. 23, subsec. 4.

Beyond this, the Talmud treats the burning of a sacrifice that is piggul as though one were placing ashes on the altar, unlike any other disqualification. That is, the sacrifice itself is considered intrinsically piggul, and this is a condition distinct from that of an ordinarily disqualified offering. The karet incurred by eating it is a consequence of its being piggul. These are only hints, and we will not pursue this point here.

B. Is Piggul a Disqualification in Thought or in Deed?

Introduction

Above we cited the verse in our Torah portion that defines the concept of piggul. Its plain wording seems to indicate that piggul is meat left over after its proper time, and that one who eats it incurs karet. But the plain sense of the verse also suggests that eating after the proper time is what renders the sacrifice piggul, and then it is not accepted. On this understanding, the prohibition of piggul would not overlap with the prohibition of notar; it would be an additional law. Of course, on this reading it is not clear how the prohibition of eating commanded by the verse comes into being, since that prohibition derives from the fact that the sacrifice is piggul, whereas its being piggul is itself the result of eating it after the proper time.

This is an initial indication that the verse cannot be understood literally. Indeed, in halakha we adopt a different approach: piggul is a disqualification of intention, not of deed. The intention of being beyond the proper time, as defined above, renders the sacrifice piggul already at the time of slaughtering, or at whatever rite the disqualifying intention accompanied. As a result, the meat immediately receives the status of piggul, and it is therefore forbidden to eat it at all, even before the stage of sprinkling or eating would otherwise arrive.

How can there even be a disqualification of being beyond the proper time that exists only in intention? Sprinkling after the proper time is an act; the blood becomes disqualified at sunset, and from then on it may not be sprinkled, but that is not piggul. We are therefore forced to say that piggul concerns the intention to sprinkle after the proper time, not actual sprinkling after the proper time. But when must one think this thought in order to render the sacrifice piggul? At the moment of sprinkling this is impossible, since the priest is now engaged in a valid sprinkling within the proper time, and what meaning could there be to an intention to perform this very sprinkling after the proper time? We are therefore forced to conclude that the intention must accompany one of the first three rites. If one of them is performed with the intention to sprinkle the blood beyond its proper time, or if any of the four rites is performed with the intention that the meat be eaten after its proper time, the sacrifice is piggul.

Thus, the shift from deed to intention is part of the very essence of piggul. We will explain this matter at the end of the article. In any event, this shift creates a situation in which piggul-intention always involves two distinct actions:
1. The action during whose performance the piggul-intention is entertained.
2. The action that one intends to corrupt.

For example, if during slaughtering, which is the action during whose performance the disqualifying intention is entertained, one intends to sprinkle the blood, which is the action one intends to corrupt, beyond its proper time. This split creates a significant part of the complexity of the sugya of piggul, and we will address some of it below.

As we shall see, in lishmah and shelo lishmah there is no such complexity, because one can easily imagine a situation in which the priest sprinkles the blood within its proper time but does so with an intention of shelo lishmah. Nevertheless, even with shelo lishmah there is a similar case in which two rites are split apart, as in piggul. This is the sugya of reckoning intention from one rite to another, which we will discuss below.

The exposition in the Zevachim sugya

The fundamental exposition that shifts the interpretation of the verse from its plain sense, in which the disqualification lies in the deed, to the interpretive reading, in which it lies in the intention, appears in Zevachim 29b:

The Sages taught: “And if any of the flesh of the sacrifice of his peace-offerings is eaten”—Rabbi Eliezer said: Bend your ear and hear: Scripture is speaking of one who intends concerning his sacrifice that it be eaten on the third day. Or perhaps it speaks only of one who actually eats his sacrifice on the third day? Can you really say that? After it has once been valid, should it revert and become invalid?

Rabbi Akiva said to him: But we do find with a man or woman with a discharge, and a woman who observes one day corresponding to one day, that they stand in a presumption of purity, and once they see a discharge they overturn that status. So too, do not wonder at this, that although it was once fit, it may revert and become invalid.

Rabbi Eliezer wonders whether the disqualification concerns one who eats from the sacrifice on the third day, or one who, at the time of slaughtering, intends to eat from the sacrifice on the third day. His conclusion is that the disqualification concerns intention, not the act of eating. His argument is that if the disqualification concerned the act, then we would have here a retroactive disqualification. After the sprinkling has been performed properly, the sacrifice is valid and brings acceptance. Three days later the meat is eaten. And now, that is, three days after the offering and the act of acceptance, the sprinkling, which is the principal atoning act, would suddenly be invalidated retroactively. In effect, the acceptance would be uprooted retroactively, and that cannot be.⁷

Rabbi Akiva argues against him that elsewhere in halakha we do find retroactive disqualifications, as in the cases of a man or woman with a discharge, and therefore there is no obstacle to understanding piggul in the same way. To this Rabbi Eliezer responds:

He said to him: But Scripture says, “the one who offers it”—it is invalidated at the time of offering, and it is not invalidated on the third day. Or perhaps “the one who offers it” means the priest who offers it? When it says “it,” it speaks of the sacrifice, not of the priest…

That is, Rabbi Eliezer proves from the wording of the verse that its intent is to teach that the sacrifice is invalidated from the time of the offering, and not retroactively. Another source then appears in the sugya:

Others say: “It shall not be reckoned”—it is invalidated by intention, and it is not invalidated on the third day.

This consideration is based on the plain meaning of the verse. If the verse really speaks of eating on the third day, what place is there for the term “reckoned” in this verse? We are therefore forced to conclude that the disqualification is a disqualification of intention. From these two expositions we learn that piggul is a disqualification of intention and not of deed.

From a halakhic standpoint, is piggul a disqualification of intention?

The plain sense of the verse teaches that the disqualification of piggul is a disqualification of deed and not of intention. Yet, as we saw, the verse also contains the term “reckoned,” which teaches that intention is involved here as well. The conclusion is that some combination of the two is present. But in the end, according to halakha, the disqualification seems to be a pure disqualification of intention, without a practical dimension. This helps us understand why later authorities, who discussed the essential understanding of piggul, proposed that it may nevertheless be viewed as a disqualification in deed.

A basis for their words is found in the language of Zevachim 13a, which discusses the disqualification of shelo lishmah in the Passover-offering and the sin-offering, as we saw in last week’s article. In the course of that discussion there is cited an obscure tradition that Rabbi Tarfon had received regarding a difference between receiving the blood and sprinkling it:

Rabbi Tarfon said: May I bury my sons if I did not hear a distinction drawn between receiving the blood and sprinkling it, but I cannot explain it.

Rabbi Akiva offers him an explanation of this tradition:

Rabbi Akiva said: I will explain. With regard to receiving the blood, the Torah did not make intention like deed; with regard to sprinkling, it made intention like deed…

Rabbi Akiva says that this tradition means that there is no piggul-intention at the stage of receiving the blood, but only at the stage of sprinkling, in the case of intending to eat the meat beyond its proper time. As a matter of halakha that is not correct, as noted above. But from Rabbi Akiva’s formulation it emerges that piggul-intention at the stage of sprinkling is like a deed, and that is why it disqualifies the sacrifice. From here there is proof that piggul-intention is considered like a deed.

If so, perhaps the plain sense of the verse, according to which the disqualification of piggul occurs through the act of eating, remains in force even in halakha. The word “reckoned,” which also appears in the verse, would then teach us that the intention during the service to eat after the proper time is regarded as though one performed a disqualifying act. As we have seen, the sacrifice becomes disqualified from the moment of the intention and not from the moment of actual eating. In practice, one need not eat after the proper time in order to disqualify the sacrifice, since the very intention to eat after the proper time disqualifies it. Once the sacrifice has been disqualified, we do not continue the sacrificial procedure at all, and therefore we never even reach the stage of eating, because it is forbidden to eat the sacrifice, as we saw from the verse above.

Do these points have halakhic significance, or do they merely describe a meta-halakhic way of viewing the matter? Does the claim that piggul-intention is considered as a deed have actual legal consequences? We will now see this in the words of the commentators.

The sugya of reckoning intention from one rite to another

To understand the nature of the disqualification of piggul-intention, we must first turn to the intention of shelo lishmah, discussed in last week’s article. We saw there that if one of the rites involving the blood is performed with an intention of shelo lishmah, whether changing the sacrificial designation or changing the owner, the sacrifice may be disqualified, or at the very least it does not count toward the owner’s obligation and does not gain acceptance.

We saw above that piggul, by its very definition, necessarily always involves two different rites: the rite accompanied by the disqualifying intention, and the rite one intends to corrupt. In contrast, with shelo lishmah there is no such necessity, and ordinarily it is connected to only one rite, one of the rites involving the blood. But we already mentioned that even in shelo lishmah there is a defined case that involves two rites, and that is what we now discuss.

In Zevachim 9b the Amoraim dispute the law in a case where the priest, while slaughtering, intends to sprinkle the blood shelo lishmah. This is a situation very similar to piggul, since here too two rites are involved: slaughtering and sprinkling. In piggul we saw that during slaughtering one intends to do the sprinkling beyond its proper time. Here, by contrast, the intention under discussion is shelo lishmah. At first glance there is no disqualification here at all, because the slaughtering was done lishmah and the later sprinkling too is done lishmah. What has happened is only that, while slaughtering, the priest thinks that he will later sprinkle it shelo lishmah. Why should that disqualify the sacrifice?

As noted, the Amoraim dispute this in Zevachim, where the question is formulated as whether intention is reckoned from one rite to another:

It was stated: If he slaughtered it lishmah with the intention to sprinkle its blood shelo lishmah, Rabbi Yohanan said: It is invalid, and Resh Lakish said: It is valid. Rabbi Yohanan said it is invalid because intention is reckoned from one rite to another, and we derive this from piggul-intention. Resh Lakish said it is valid because intention is not reckoned from one rite to another, and we do not derive it from piggul-intention…

As noted, the discussion concerns shelo lishmah, but the source רבי Yohanan brings for the view that intention is indeed reckoned from one rite to another, meaning that the sacrifice is invalid even in this situation, is the law of piggul itself:

Rav Yirmeyah raised an objection in support of Rabbi Yohanan, and Rabbi Ila in support of Resh Lakish. Rav Yirmeyah, in support of Rabbi Yohanan: Just as in a place where, if he says, “I am slaughtering it beyond its proper time,” it remains valid, yet if he slaughtered it with the intention to sprinkle its blood beyond its proper time it is invalid, so too in a place where, if he says, “I am slaughtering it not for its proper sake,” it is invalid, if he slaughtered it with the intention to sprinkle its blood not for its proper sake, is it not all the more so that it should be invalid?…

That is, Rabbi Yirmeyah understands that Rabbi Yohanan derived his law from piggul: just as in piggul such a case disqualifies, so too with shelo lishmah.⁸ If so, the definition of piggul-intention can be learned from whatever the Talmud concludes here about shelo lishmah-intention. We will therefore devote several subsections to clarifying the definition of reckoning intention from one rite to another regarding shelo lishmah, and from that we will return to learn about the nature of piggul-intention. But first a brief side note.

A note on the character of lishmah in sacrifices

Already from this general overview it becomes clear what we saw in last week’s article: the law of lishmah in sacrifices is unlike other laws of lishmah. In other areas of halakha, such as matzah, tefillin, tzitzit, a bill of divorce, and the like, when one did not think lishmah, the object or act is invalid only because the validating thought of lishmah is missing. By contrast, in sacrifices there is an active disqualification of shelo lishmah. In the situation with which we are dealing here, there are intentions of lishmah both at the time of slaughtering and at the time of sprinkling. Therefore, if the law of lishmah here were like that everywhere else in the Torah, we should validate the sacrifice in this case, since the required lishmah thoughts were present to validate it. But because shelo lishmah in sacrifices actively disqualifies, there is room to say that such an intention will count as shelo lishmah and therefore disqualify the offering.

It may be that this itself underlies the dispute between Rabbi Yohanan and Resh Lakish. Regarding piggul, all agree that this is a disqualifying intention, since there is no absence here of any required intention in the offering. At the time of slaughtering he thought lishmah, but he also thought that he would sprinkle beyond its proper time. That is not a deficiency of lishmah but the presence of a disqualifying intention. This is a novelty in the law of piggul. What Rabbi Yohanan and Resh Lakish dispute is whether this novelty applies also to the law of lishmah: according to Rabbi Yohanan, even lishmah is governed by an actively disqualifying contrary intention, whereas according to Resh Lakish there is only a requirement that there be a lishmah intention, and that requirement is satisfied here as well.

It follows from our discussion that if someone, while writing a bill of divorce, thinks for the sake of the woman but also plans in his mind to deliver the bill not for its proper sake, that would not invalidate the bill. The same is true in other halakhic settings where two different actions are involved, such as spinning and tying tzitzit, and the like.

Maimonides’ view: the disqualification lies in sprinkling

As stated, Rabbi Yohanan disqualifies the sacrifice because, in his opinion, intention is reckoned from one rite to another. This is also the halakhic ruling, as we shall see below. Because in such a case there are two distinct rites, Rabbi Yohanan’s opinion can be understood in two main ways. One may understand that the case is treated as slaughtering shelo lishmah, and that is why the sacrifice is disqualified. Or one may understand that it is as though there were here a sprinkling with an intention of shelo lishmah, and that is why the sacrifice is disqualified. The basic question in understanding Rabbi Yohanan is therefore whether what has been disqualified here is the slaughtering or the sprinkling. Several later authorities note that the medieval authorities divided over these two possibilities in understanding Rabbi Yohanan.⁹

Maimonides rules in accordance with Rabbi Yohanan and writes as follows in Hilkhot Pesulei HaMukdashin 15:10:

If he slaughtered it lishmah and, at the time of slaughtering, intended to sprinkle its blood shelo lishmah, it is invalid, because intention is reckoned from one rite to another. This intention that he entertained at the time of slaughtering is considered as though he had entertained it at the time of sprinkling, and therefore it is invalid.

Maimonides explains that the disqualification here stems from the fact that the thought is regarded as though it were entertained at the time of sprinkling. Thus, in the end the sacrifice is invalid because, from the halakhic point of view, it is as though its blood had been sprinkled with an intention of shelo lishmah.

At first glance, proof for this may be brought from Babylonian Talmud, Pesachim 78b:

The Sages taught: If he slaughtered it for those entitled to eat it, with the intention to sprinkle its blood for those not entitled to eat it, the Passover-offering itself is valid, and one fulfills one’s obligation with it.

The Talmud there explains that the basis of the law is that intentions relating to eaters do not apply at the stage of sprinkling; only at slaughtering does a Passover-offering become disqualified if one intends it for those not entitled to eat it. Now, if that intention were one that disqualified the slaughtering, then there would be here an intention of “not for those entitled to eat it” at slaughtering, and such an intention does disqualify at slaughtering. This proves that in such a situation the intention is attributed to the sprinkling; but in this particular type of shelo lishmah there is no disqualification in sprinkling, only in slaughtering, and therefore the sacrifice is valid. In our case, however, where we are dealing with ordinary shelo lishmah, the disqualification is in the sprinkling, and sprinkling shelo lishmah is invalid.

Tosafot’s view: the disqualification lies in slaughtering

In the Passover-offering there is an additional requirement: it must be slaughtered for circumcised Jews. One who slaughters it for the sake of the uncircumcised, who may not eat the Passover-offering, has disqualified the sacrifice. In Babylonian Talmud, Pesachim 61b, we find:

If he slaughtered it for the circumcised on condition that the uncircumcised receive atonement through its sprinkling, Rav Hisda said: It is invalid; Rabbah said: It is valid. Rav Hisda said it is invalid because intention regarding the uncircumcised applies to sprinkling. Rabbah said it is valid because intention regarding the uncircumcised does not apply to sprinkling.

Tosafot, in their comment beginning “If he slaughtered it,” explain that Rav Hisda is speaking specifically of one who slaughtered it for the circumcised with the intention that the uncircumcised receive atonement through its sprinkling. When he says that intention regarding the uncircumcised applies to sprinkling, he means a case in which one thought this at the time of slaughtering. But if he actually sprinkled it for the sake of the uncircumcised, even Rav Hisda agrees that the sacrifice is valid, because intentions concerning eaters do not apply at sprinkling, and this principle is agreed upon by all the Amoraim.

From here it emerges clearly that according to Tosafot, when at the time of slaughtering one intends to sprinkle with a disqualifying intention, that counts as a disqualification in slaughtering. For had it been considered a disqualification in sprinkling, the sacrifice would not have been invalid at all, because the intention of “not for its eaters” does not disqualify at sprinkling.¹⁰

A refinement of the definition according to Maimonides: the disqualification takes effect from the time of slaughtering

As we have seen, on a simple reading it appears that according to Maimonides, reckoning intention from one rite to another means that the earlier intention disqualifies the sprinkling that will take place in the future. That is, when the priest later sprinkles the blood with a lishmah intention, the earlier intention that accompanied the slaughtering will arise, and halakha will treat that earlier intention as the one accompanying the sprinkling. Thus, reckoning intention from one rite to another would mean as though he entertained a shelo lishmah intention in the sprinkling itself, and that is why the sacrifice is disqualified.

But later authorities proved from several sugyot that such an understanding cannot stand. First, Kehillot Yaakov on Zevachim, sec. 8, proves this from the Zevachim sugya itself, which ties the dispute of Rabbi Yohanan and Resh Lakish to their dispute regarding one who slaughters lishmah with the intention to sprinkle its blood for an idolater. Rabbi Yohanan disqualifies because intention is reckoned from one rite to another, and Resh Lakish validates. Rashi there, and also Meiri in Sanhedrin 60b, wrote that the disqualification takes effect even if the blood is never actually sprinkled afterward, and that is also the plain sense of the Talmud and is explicit in the Tosefta. If so, if the disqualification were in the sprinkling itself, there would be no basis to disqualify before the sprinkling. It is therefore clear that one cannot understand reckoning intention from one rite to another as simply equivalent to a shelo lishmah intention at the time of the actual sprinkling.¹¹

It follows that even according to Maimonides, the disqualification takes effect already at slaughtering. So what, after all, depends on the sprinkling? Apparently his intention is that the thought entertained during slaughtering is regarded now as though it were entertained during the sprinkling. But all this happens at the present moment. The thought during slaughtering is treated as an act of sprinkling performed with an intention of shelo lishmah. That is, the disqualifying intention is an intention of sprinkling, but such an intention may be entertained while the priest is engaged in any of the rites involving the blood.

The dispute between Maimonides and Tosafot is thereby narrowed, but it still remains. According to Tosafot, this counts as a disqualified slaughtering, whereas according to Maimonides, a shelo lishmah intention entertained during slaughtering is as though it were an act of sprinkling, performed at the time of slaughtering, with an improper intention. The practical difference concerns, for example, the Passover-offering intended not for its eaters, which disqualifies only at slaughtering and not at sprinkling.

Implications for piggul: “in sprinkling, thought was treated like deed”

As noted, the Talmud says that Rabbi Yohanan’s source for the law of reckoning intention from one rite to another is the law of piggul. It is therefore reasonable to assume that the definition we uncovered in relation to shelo lishmah from one rite to another is the same definition that applies to piggul. The conclusion is that, at least according to Maimonides, when a person slaughters a sacrifice with the intention of eating its meat after the proper time, its disqualification as piggul stems from the fact that this intention is conceived as though he had now, at the time of slaughtering, actually eaten its meat after the proper time, and thereby disqualified it.

We can now return to the statement in Zevachim 13a, in the give-and-take between Rabbi Akiva and Rabbi Tarfon, that in piggul the Torah made thought like deed. Here we see the halakhic meaning of that statement: the intention to sprinkle beyond the proper time is treated, from a legal standpoint, as actual sprinkling after the proper time, even though the intention occurs at the time of slaughtering. The intention to sprinkle after the proper time is therefore regarded as an actual deed, since at the time of slaughtering the sprinkling itself has not yet taken place. We are thus forced to say that the thought of sprinkling is itself regarded as an act of sprinkling.

This is the picture according to Maimonides. According to Tosafot, however, the situation appears different. We saw that in reckoning intention from one rite to another, Tosafot locate the disqualification in the slaughtering. It seems that for them the intention is not necessarily treated as a deed, because the act of slaughtering has already been performed at that point, and so one can explain that the intention to sprinkle shelo lishmah counts as a disqualifying intention in the slaughtering itself, not in the sprinkling. Since the act of slaughtering has already been done, there is no need to regard the improper intention as a disqualifying act; rather, it is an intention of shelo lishmah, as though he had entertained regarding the slaughtering itself an intention of shelo lishmah, and this disqualifies the slaughtering.

We must now ask how Tosafot can understand the law of piggul. After all, the Talmud equates these two laws, reckoning intention from one rite to another and piggul. Presumably Tosafot will say that in piggul too the slaughtering itself is disqualified, not the sprinkling. Piggul-intention, meaning the intention to sprinkle or eat beyond the proper time, when entertained at the time of slaughtering, disqualifies the slaughtering itself, not merely the later sprinkling, and the sacrifice becomes piggul already from the time of slaughtering. One may then ask whether this applies even regarding karet for one who eats the meat, or only regarding the disqualification of the sacrifice; see on this Mishneh LaMelekh on Hilkhot Pesulei HaMukdashin 18:7, Ahiezer part 2, sec. 30, subsec. 2, and Kehillot Yaakov on Zevachim, sec. 23, subsec. 4, among others.

Another possibility is to understand that even Tosafot disqualify the sprinkling and not the slaughtering. Their point would be that the reason intentions concerning eaters do not apply at sprinkling is that sprinkling concerns atonement, whereas slaughtering concerns eating. Therefore, disqualifications relating to eating apply specifically at slaughtering, while those relating to atonement apply specifically at sprinkling. We suggest that the reason there can be no disqualification lies in the fact that the disqualifying intention accompanies the act of sprinkling, not in the fact that the content of the disqualifying intention is a sprinkling. According to this, when the priest thinks about sprinkling at the time of slaughtering, an eater-related disqualification can indeed apply there, because the thought about sprinkling accompanied the act of slaughtering and not the act of sprinkling. As we saw, eater-related disqualifications are relevant at the time of slaughtering, and now we add that this remains so even if they are caused by thoughts whose content concerns sprinkling. What determines whether an eater-related intention can disqualify is not the rite that appears in the content of the thought, namely sprinkling, but the rite alongside which the thought occurs, namely slaughtering.¹²

According to this approach, in a certain sense even for Tosafot the disqualification lies in sprinkling rather than slaughtering, and the comparison to piggul becomes easier to understand. But in any event it is hard to say that the actual act of sprinkling is what is disqualified here. Rather, this is a disqualification of sprinkling at the time of slaughtering. In the categories we will propose below, this will be clearer.

C. In Sprinkling, Thought Was Treated Like Deed

Introduction

What we have seen so far shows that, at least according to Maimonides, the verse teaching piggul has genuine halakhic significance in its double meaning, as both a disqualification of intention and a disqualification of deed. One can learn that piggul is a disqualification in intention that is nevertheless legally regarded as a deed. The conclusion was that the Torah regards the intention as an act of sprinkling, or of eating, beyond the proper time, performed at the moment of slaughtering. In this chapter we will show that this picture cannot serve as an explanation of piggul, and we will therefore suggest another way of viewing intention as deed, according to both Tosafot and Maimonides.

Difficulties according to Maimonides

The starting point of the difficulty is that if the priest actually eats after the proper time, this is not piggul. It is notar, but not piggul, for the reason we saw above in Rabbi Eliezer: a sacrifice cannot be invalidated retroactively. Only if the priest, at the time of slaughtering, intends to eat after the proper time does the sacrifice become piggul.

We must now ask about the logic of this law. How can it be that the intention to sprinkle after the proper time renders the sacrifice piggul, whereas actual sprinkling after the proper time does not render it piggul? At first glance, this is an argument a fortiori: if the thought of doing an act renders it piggul, then actually doing the act should certainly render it piggul. One might answer that we learn from the verse that piggul is a disqualification in intention and not in deed. The exposition of the verse that we cited above teaches that one may not infer this argument a fortiori from thought to deed. Perhaps the explanation lies in the principle we saw in last week’s article, that in sacrifices the main thing is thought, not deed; we will return to this below.

But the objection arising from our understanding of Maimonides is far stronger. We saw that he understands the law of piggul as though the blood were actually sprinkled after its time, or the meat actually eaten after its time, and therefore the sacrifice becomes piggul: Scripture made thought like deed. But as we already noted, if one actually did the deed itself, meaning he ate or sprinkled after the proper time, the sacrifice would not become piggul. If so, how can one explain that the reason intention renders it piggul is that the intention was treated like deed? Even if it was treated like deed, the deed itself does not render it piggul. This, of course, can no longer be derived from our verse.

Indeed, in Likutei Halakhot on Zevachim, at the end of the chapter “All the Disqualified,” in Zevah Todah, at the comment beginning “Know,” and in Gevurot Shemonim by Rabbi Yosef Engel, letter 51, this question is asked, and on its basis they reject the possibility that piggul works because thought was treated like deed, since the deed itself does not render it piggul.¹³

However, Henshke, in the article cited above,¹⁴ already addressed this and explained that the whole reason actual eating after the proper time does not render it piggul is only a side issue: the sacrifice had already been valid and accepted, and therefore it cannot later revert and become invalid retroactively, as Rabbi Eliezer argued above. But if there were a hypothetical case in which the sacrifice were eaten after the proper time before it had yet been accepted, that is, before the sprinkling, we would certainly have to disqualify it. And that, he argues, is exactly the case in piggul: the disqualification is indeed located in eating, as though the eating occurred after the proper time, because thought is treated like deed, and yet this act occurs at the time of slaughtering, before acceptance by sprinkling. That is why the sacrifice becomes piggul, even though actual eating after the proper time does not make it piggul.

This may sound plausible with respect to piggul produced by an intention to eat beyond the proper time. But with respect to piggul produced by an intention to sprinkle beyond the proper time, the explanation cannot be maintained. In an actual case of sprinkling after the proper time, the sacrifice does not become piggul, yet when one slaughters with the intention to sprinkle after the proper time, it does. Here one cannot explain that sprinkling after the proper time does not create piggul because the sacrifice was already accepted, because until the sprinkling is performed the sacrifice has not yet been accepted. And if the sprinkling was performed improperly, the sacrifice is still not accepted, so there would still be room to render it piggul. In the background one must remember that the expression in Zevachim 13a, that thought was treated like deed, was said regarding sprinkling beyond the proper time, not regarding eating after the proper time. We have now seen that precisely with regard to sprinkling it cannot be said. It therefore appears, at first glance, that the objections of Likutei Halakhot and the author of Gevurot Shemonim are correct, and that in piggul thought was not treated like deed. Yet the words of the Talmud in Zevachim 13a, that in sprinkling thought was treated like deed, remain difficult.

Difficulties according to Tosafot

Until now we dealt with the view of Maimonides. According to Tosafot, it seems at first that there is no room at all to raise the principle that thought was treated like deed. According to Tosafot, everything remains within the realm of intention. They understand reckoning intention from one rite to another to mean that it is as though the sacrifice were slaughtered shelo lishmah, even though in fact it was slaughtered lishmah. As we already noted, there is no need here to treat the intention as deed in order to disqualify, because the disqualifying act is slaughtering, and that act has already been performed.

Moreover, this law was stated regarding the intention of lishmah. But if that is the case, why learn it from piggul? In piggul such a move is impossible, because if piggul were understood as an intention beyond the proper time concerning the slaughtering itself, it would not disqualify at all. An intention that the slaughtering itself be beyond the proper time is not a piggul-intention. At first glance, when the Talmud says with regard to piggul that thought was treated like deed, it is obvious that it means he is regarded as though he sprinkled beyond the proper time, not as though he slaughtered beyond the proper time. But if so, Rabbi Yohanan’s analogy between piggul and reckoning intention from one rite to another in shelo lishmah becomes problematic.

Thus, Tosafot face the same difficulty we saw in Maimonides’ view: why does piggul-intention disqualify the sacrifice if, had the act itself actually been performed, it would not have become piggul, especially when the basis for the disqualification is that thought was treated like deed? But we now see an additional difficulty according to Tosafot: how can the Talmud in Zevachim 9b learn from piggul to the intention of shelo lishmah at all?

An alternative proposal

It may be that we must understand the statement that piggul is a disqualification in deed in a different way. Until now we assumed that deed is necessarily more powerful. In the Talmud we find the principle that speech cannot come and nullify a deed; deed is something effective, whereas thought or speech cannot uproot it. Similarly, matters residing only in the heart cannot overturn something fixed by deed. From this it naturally followed that the meaning of the Talmud in Zevachim 13a is that, in the case of sprinkling, thought too is regarded like the deed itself.

But now we see that, at least in the realm of consecrated offerings, this assumption is not correct. Thought is primary, even more than deed. Thought disqualifies and renders piggul, whereas deed does not. Sprinkling or eating beyond the proper time do not create piggul, whereas the intention to eat or sprinkle beyond the proper time does. If so, it cannot be said that the intention of sprinkling is regarded as an actual act of sprinkling, for the intention accomplishes more than the act itself.

The conclusion seems to be that in consecrated offerings it is specifically thought that acts, just as deed acts in other halakhic contexts. The actual act of sprinkling, although physically a deed, does not operate on reality with the same force. It does not render the sacrifice piggul, whereas the thought does.

If so, what the Talmud in Zevachim 13a means is not that thinking about something is regarded as if one actually did it, meaning that the intention of sprinkling is equivalent to an act of sprinkling. Rather, in the realm of consecrated offerings, as a matter of principle thought is like deed, which elsewhere is what acts and affects, while deed is like thought, which elsewhere does not act or affect. In consecrated offerings, then, only thought is treated as actual doing, whereas the actual doing of the deed is not so treated. When the Talmud says that with regard to sprinkling thought was treated like deed, it means that the thought of sprinkling has the legal status of a deed, not that it is itself the rite of sprinkling in the sacrificial procedure.

According to this, when we come to the sugya of reckoning intention from one rite to another, and we see that according to Rabbi Yohanan such an intention disqualifies, we should not look for which rite is regarded as though it was improperly performed. That was the right question only so long as we assumed that the improper intention is treated as though one of the rites had actually been performed improperly, and therefore the question was which one, the slaughtering or the sprinkling, about which Maimonides and Tosafot disagreed. But now we understand that the meaning of the Talmud is that the intention itself is treated as a deed, and that is why it disqualifies. It is not treated as slaughtering or as sprinkling, since slaughtering and sprinkling themselves do not disqualify. Rather, it has the status of a deed in principle, and therefore it disqualifies the sacrifice.

According to this proposal, both Maimonides and Tosafot do not mean to say that halakha treats piggul-intention, or the invalid intention reckoned from one rite to another, as one of the ordinary rites that became disqualified, sprinkling according to Maimonides and slaughtering according to Tosafot. All agree that the Talmud’s intent was to say that the intention is itself a rite that disqualifies as though it were a deed. This resolves the difficulties raised above, both on Maimonides and on Tosafot. Piggul-intention is an intention that is treated as a deed, and that is why it disqualifies. Neither the actual slaughtering nor the actual sprinkling is what becomes invalid, for both were performed properly and with the correct intentions, as we explained in the sugya of reckoning intention from one rite to another. The sacrifice itself is disqualified because of an improper intention, as though there had been a disqualifying act.

Here we can also understand the explanation of Minhat Mordekhai on Tosafot cited above. According to our approach, when one says that the disqualification lies in sprinkling, this does not mean that the actual sprinkling became invalid. The intention concerning sprinkling is treated as an act that disqualifies the sacrifice, because it occurs at the time of slaughtering. But this is not actual sprinkling, nor actual slaughtering. At most, there is here a kind of virtual sprinkling, and it is that which became disqualified, not the real sprinkling.

The dispute of Rabbi Yehudah and the Sages

We will now bring support for our proposal from another sugya. In the mishnah at Zevachim 35b, the Tannaim dispute the disqualification created by an intention to leave over the blood beyond its proper time or place:

If he slaughtered it with the intention to leave its blood or its sacrificial portions until the next day, or to take them outside, Rabbi Yehudah invalidates, and the Sages validate… For intention invalidates only with respect to beyond its proper time, beyond its proper place, and the Passover-offering and sin-offering when offered not for their proper sake.

The general point of the mishnah is that the only disqualifying intentions are beyond the proper time, which is piggul, beyond the proper place, and shelo lishmah in the Passover-offering and the sin-offering, which are disqualifications other than piggul. The specific issue at the beginning of the mishnah is slaughtering with the intention to leave the blood, rather than sprinkle it, until after the proper time. The Sages validate, because there is here no intention of sprinkling or eating, whether by person or altar, beyond the proper time. But Rabbi Yehudah maintains that this too is an intention of beyond the proper time, even though it concerns neither sprinkling nor eating.¹⁵

The Talmud there, Zevachim 36a, discusses Rabbi Yehudah’s view and offers two reasons:

What is Rabbi Yehudah’s reason? Rabbi Elazar said: Two verses are written with regard to leftover meat. One says, “You shall not leave any of it until morning,” and one says, “He shall not leave any of it until morning.” If one is not needed for the act of leaving, apply it to the intention of leaving…

This explains intending to leave. But what can be said about intending to take it outside? Furthermore, Rabbi Yehudah’s reason is logical. As it was taught: Rabbi Yehudah said to them, Do you not admit that if he actually left it until the next day it would be invalid? So too, if he intended to leave it until the next day, it should be invalid. Rather, Rabbi Yehudah’s reason is logical.

The first reason is the familiar kind of argument: if a verse is not needed for its obvious case, apply it to another case. If actually leaving something over does not disqualify here, then the Torah’s intention must be to teach the intention to leave it over. It should be noted that this is an unusual use of that method, somewhat different from its usual form in the Talmud. Normally, a verse that cannot be interpreted according to its plain sense is redirected to a different subject. Here, the verse is interpreted according to its plain sense, but the meaning of the term “leaving” is transferred to the intention to leave. This is an interpretive reading of the words of the verse. Usually this method does not propose an alternative interpretation of the words themselves, but rather learns a different law from a verse whose wording is left aside.

In any event, even this first argument already reveals something fundamental for our purposes. The word “leave” in the Torah is here not an action but an intention. Thus, here too the Torah treats intention as action. It may be that here too the reason is that the Torah wishes to teach us that if this intention disqualifies, it apparently has the legal status of a deed, a virtual deed.

It should also be noted that here the act is the very content of the intention itself, not merely an act in general. The intention to leave is here called “leaving.” This hints that the treatment of intention as deed is not entirely independent of the content of the intention.¹⁶

The second reason given there in the Talmud for Rabbi Yehudah is that if actually leaving it over until the next day disqualifies, then the intention to leave it until the next day should certainly disqualify. At first glance, this line of reasoning is very perplexing. Its structure says that if an action disqualifies, then it is obvious that a thought should also disqualify. Seemingly, the a fortiori should run in the opposite direction, since deed is stronger than thought. Even if we accept our proposal that in consecrated offerings thought has the status of deed, the novelty here is far more dramatic: thought is even stronger than deed.

We are therefore forced to conclude that the Talmud here is assuming the following: action usually does not disqualify, even in places where thought does disqualify. Therefore, in a case where even the action disqualifies, one may certainly infer a fortiori that the corresponding thought will also disqualify. Thought is indeed stronger than deed.

This picture precisely parallels what we proposed above. When the Talmud says that thought was treated like deed, the point is not that thought receives the status of deed, but that it takes deed’s place. In the Torah generally, deed acts and thought does not. In consecrated offerings, specifically thought acts and deed less so.

Tosafot, in their comment beginning “This one excluded” in Zevachim 27a, explain that even according to Rabbi Yehudah, a thought that does not disqualify is not considered as deed. All Rabbi Yehudah said applies only to a disqualifying act. In Ahiezer, part 2, sec. 29, subsec. 2, this is explained to mean that according to Rabbi Yehudah, the intention to leave is not considered literally an act of leaving, but rather a disqualifying act.¹⁷ Therefore one must not identify the thought with the deed; rather, the thought is treated as a disqualifying deed, and this is exactly our point here.¹⁸

Does this principle remain true in halakha?

If so, Rabbi Yehudah’s words prove our proposal. But the Sages dispute him, and it would seem that they reject his reasoning. What basis is there, then, to build our halakhic picture on a rejected view and a rejected argument? In this subsection we will see that the reasoning remains in force even in halakha, at least according to Maimonides, and apparently also according to Rashi.

In Zevachim 27a another consequence of the dispute between Rabbi Yehudah and the Sages is discussed. Some sacrifices have blood that must be applied above on the altar, and some have blood that must be applied below. If one applied it above in place of below, this is like a case of beyond its proper place, and the sacrifice is disqualified though not piggul, because piggul exists only in the case of intention beyond the proper time.

The Talmud there discusses someone who slaughtered with the intention to place the blood tomorrow in the wrong place. This is simultaneously an intention of beyond the proper time, tomorrow, and beyond the proper place, above in place of below or vice versa. Such an intention does not create piggul, because for piggul the sacrificial process, apart from the piggul-intention itself, must be valid and must permit the meat for eating. Since an intention of beyond the proper place disqualifies, meaning that it does not permit the meat for eating, a piggul-intention accompanying an already disqualified offering does not render it piggul.

The Talmud asks why, then, the sacrifice is disqualified at all: if it is not piggul, perhaps it should not even be disqualified? The Talmud answers that this is in accordance with Rabbi Yehudah, because if one were actually to apply the blood above or below tomorrow the sacrifice would be invalid, and therefore the intention to do so likewise disqualifies. Again, the same inference from action to thought. It follows that according to the Sages such an offering ought to be valid.

Yet we find that Maimonides rules in Hilkhot Pesulei HaMukdashin 16:6 as follows regarding beyond the proper time and beyond the proper place:

If he intended, concerning blood that is to be applied above, to apply it tomorrow below; or concerning blood that is to be applied below, to apply it tomorrow above; or if he intended, concerning blood that is to be applied inside the Sanctuary, to apply it tomorrow on the outer altar; or concerning blood that is to be applied on the outer altar, to apply it tomorrow inside the Sanctuary—this is not piggul. Although he intended concerning time, since in his intention he changed the place of the blood-application, this is disqualified and not piggul. And after we have explained in these laws that blood applied not in its proper place is treated as though it had been applied in its proper place, why should this not be piggul when he intended to apply the blood tomorrow not in its proper place? Because blood applied not in its proper place, although the sacrifice itself remains valid, does not permit the meat for eating, as we have explained. And any sprinkling that does not permit the meat for eating, if one intended to perform it beyond its proper time, does not render the offering piggul. Therefore, if he again entertained an intention of time concerning this sacrifice, it is disqualified and not piggul.

Raavad’s gloss: “If he intended concerning the blood…” In my opinion, there is an error here.

At first glance, Maimonides is ruling here like Rabbi Yehudah. The Kesef Mishneh there explains that this is precisely what the Raavad intended in his gloss. The problem is not only that Maimonides rules like an individual against the majority, but that Maimonides himself rules in Hilkhot Pesulei HaMukdashin 13:8 like the Sages against Rabbi Yehudah regarding the intention to leave, in their dispute in Zevachim 36a.

The Kesef Mishneh explains that Maimonides read the Talmud in Zevachim 27a differently. According to him, the Talmud did not say that the law there follows Rabbi Yehudah specifically. Rather, the Talmud meant that here too we apply the reasoning Rabbi Yehudah stated regarding the intention to leave: just as there this is disqualified but not piggul, so here too, by the same reasoning, we conclude that it is disqualified but not piggul.

Later authorities objected to this; see Keren Orah there and Hazon Ish on Zevachim, sec. 7, subsec. 4. How can one rely on a reasoning that the Sages themselves do not accept? The whole dispute with רבי Yehudah concerns precisely this reasoning, so how can we base a halakhic ruling on it? What has the Kesef Mishneh gained by his answer?

From this it emerges clearly that Maimonides understood that the Sages did not dispute Rabbi Yehudah’s reasoning itself. They merely held that it should not be applied to the intention to leave, but the basic reasoning they accepted. This is why Maimonides also rules it as halakha. The Sages apparently held that the comparison between thought and deed applies to intentions of sprinkling and eating, but not to leaving something over.¹⁹ Rabbi Yehudah wished to extend the principle to the intention to leave as well, and in that respect the halakha does not follow Rabbi Yehudah. This is also the conclusion of Kehillot Yaakov on Zevachim, sec. 22, and see there for additional proof and for the claim that this also appears to be Rashi’s view.

It follows that the reasoning equating thought with deed remains in force even in the final halakha. If so, our proposal that the comparison between thought and deed operates at the principled level of efficacy, and not necessarily with regard to the specific act named in the content of the thought, still stands. One may still ask why, in the final halakha, a similar reasoning is not applied to the intention to leave; on that, see further below.

D. What Is Piggul? The Status of Thought in the Offering of Consecrated Sacrifices

Introduction

The question that now arises is this: if so, what exactly remains of the dispute between Tosafot and Maimonides? Why does Maimonides treat piggul as though it were an invalid sprinkling, while Tosafot see it as though there were an invalid slaughtering? If the Talmud’s intent is only that thought has the status of deed, but not that the thought is regarded as one of the sacrificial rites themselves, then there should be no room to ask whether this is an invalid sprinkling or an invalid slaughtering. It is simply a thought that counts as a disqualifying deed.

The dispute between Tosafot and Maimonides

It appears that the dispute among the medieval authorities revolves around how to view that virtual act which disqualifies the sacrifice. Maimonides does not say that the improper intention causes the real sprinkling, which was performed validly, to be viewed as invalid. Rather, he means that the thought itself is as though it were an act of invalid sprinkling. Maimonides holds that the character of the virtual act is determined by the content of the improper intention.

Tosafot, by contrast, hold that although the content of the thought concerned sprinkling, the thought itself accompanied the slaughtering. Therefore, if that thought is treated as a deed, it should be viewed as an act of invalid virtual slaughtering, not as an act of invalid virtual sprinkling.

Thus, there are two acts in the sacrificial process: the real act and the virtual act. The real act is the actual slaughtering or sprinkling itself. The virtual act is the thought of slaughtering or sprinkling that is treated, from the halakhic point of view, as a deed. The medieval authorities dispute the identity of this second, virtual act. According to Tosafot, it is the thought that accompanies the slaughtering or sprinkling, meaning that what determines the nature of the virtual act is the rite alongside which the improper intention occurs. According to Maimonides, it is the thought about slaughtering or sprinkling, meaning that what determines its nature is the content of the improper intention. In any event, according to all views, the disqualifying act is specifically the virtual act and not the real one.

Why the medieval authorities resort to the terminology of slaughtering and sprinkling

The question that arises here is why one should rely at all on terminology drawn from the practical world, such as slaughtering, sprinkling, leaving over, and the like. We are, after all, speaking of disqualifying intentions that are treated as virtual acts. Why import terms such as slaughtering, sprinkling, or leaving over, and refer to them as acts of slaughtering, sprinkling, or leaving over? Why not simply say that there is here a virtual act, without characterizing it as slaughtering or sprinkling?

Here we come to the question of the relation between thought and deed in the offering of sacrifices. The Torah defines a detailed procedure of sacrificial acts. Parallel to this, there are intentions that must accompany the offering, and also intentions that disqualify it. The content of some of these intentions is indeed not tied to the mechanics of the sacrifice, such as for a pleasing aroma and the like. But the disqualifying intentions all refer to the sacrificial acts themselves, or to the owner, who is the offerer.

If so, the practical level is what defines the content of the intentions. A piggul-intention is an intention to sprinkle or eat beyond the proper time. As we saw, sprinkling or eating beyond the proper time do not render the offering piggul; only the thought about them does. But it is the thought that defines that there was here a virtual sprinkling, or a virtual slaughtering, that disqualified. It is specifically the virtual act that disqualifies. The real acts are meant only to define, characterize, and delimit the thoughts. For example, if there were no commandment regarding sprinkling with its proper parameters, there could be no such thing as an intention of sprinkling beyond the proper time. The practical layer of sacrifices is therefore meant to direct the thoughts and give them concrete content. In order that we be able to perform the service in a mode of concentration and intention, the Torah defines forms of action about which one must think and forms about which one must not think. The sacrificial acts are nothing but the contents of the thoughts that accompany them.

Therefore, a disqualifying thought is only as though there had been a disqualifying act. Again, it is not correct to say that this means the act itself was as though performed improperly, for if the act were actually performed improperly it would not render the offering piggul. Moreover, the act was in fact performed, and it was performed properly. For example, when someone slaughtered with the intention of sprinkling beyond the proper time, the later sprinkling was done on time and with the correct intention, and so was the slaughtering. It is therefore hard to say that the thought accompanying the slaughtering defines the sprinkling better than the actual act of sprinkling itself.

We are thus forced to the conclusion already presented above: an intention of beyond the proper time is not treated as a concrete act of slaughtering or sprinkling beyond the proper time, but as another, virtual, disqualifying act. Nevertheless, because the Torah defines a practical sacrificial procedure, in order to disqualify the offering we must identify what in that practical process was lacking. There is therefore room to discuss, when an improper intention was entertained, which of the practical acts was as it were disqualified, or how to define the nature of the virtual act that disqualifies. Tosafot see it as a disqualification of the virtual slaughtering, and Maimonides see it as a disqualification of the virtual sprinkling. That is why we still require practical terminology in defining the disqualifying intentions.

Connection to last week’s article: why is piggul defined in such a strange and convoluted way?

In our article last week we saw that in the realm of divine service, meaning prayer and sacrifices, thought occupies a central place. In fact, we argued there that if the thought is correct, the deeds have only secondary importance, except where the Torah explicitly established otherwise by means of a negative prohibition or by repeating a positive commandment.

Here we have seen another striking example of that principle. The intention to sprinkle beyond the proper time, when accompanying the slaughtering, is treated as a disqualifying act, whereas if the sprinkling itself were actually performed beyond the proper time, which would be an improper deed, the sacrifice would not become piggul. Moreover, the disqualification of the thought is presented as deriving from the Torah’s defining it as a deed, and yet the actual deed itself contributes nothing either way, while only the thought alone counts as a virtual act that renders the sacrifice piggul.

At the end of our discussion we even tried to say more than that: the acts exist in order to give the thought something to revolve around. Without halakha’s defining an act of sprinkling, with all its details, there could be no such thing as an intention of sprinkling, and therefore no such thing as an improper intention of sprinkling. The same is true of slaughtering and the other rites.

The whole concept of piggul, from which the process of reckoning intention from one rite to another is also defined, is a result of this tendency. Sprinkling is the main act of acceptance and atonement, and therefore intention is central specifically there. If so, what renders the offering piggul cannot be the act of sprinkling beyond the proper time, but specifically the intention of sprinkling beyond the proper time. But an intention of beyond the proper time during the sprinkling itself is impossible, because we are looking for a situation of improper intention alone without an improper deed. Therefore, in halakha piggul applies only when the entire rest of the process is completely valid, as we saw in the sugya of beyond the proper time and beyond the proper place in Zevachim 27a. As we noted, when in practice he sprinkles on time, meaning a valid sprinkling, there is no significance to a simultaneous thought that he will sprinkle beyond the proper time. We are therefore left with only one possibility: to define as piggul a situation in which, during slaughtering, receiving the blood, or carrying it, he intends to sprinkle beyond the proper time. That is the only way to create a case where there is only an improper thought while all the acts themselves remain valid.

And from here we also learned something about the intention of shelo lishmah. Although there, technically, one could define the disqualifying situation more simply, namely by sprinkling on time with an intention of shelo lishmah, which would be a valid act with an invalid intention, the law of piggul compelled the Torah to place on the map also the case of reckoning intention from one rite to another. There, no other way exists to define a case of pure improper intention, meaning one without any improper deed. From this we inferred that even in the intention of shelo lishmah there is a disqualification in reckoning intention from one rite to another. There, however, it is not entirely clear whether the thought itself has the status of deed; we saw that perhaps Tosafot do not accept that.

We can now understand why Maimonides, although he holds that the comparison between thought and deed remains true even in the final halakha, does not rule like Rabbi Yehudah regarding leaving something over, that even the intention to leave counts as an act of leaving. As we saw, the desire to define thought as deed applies only to the acts that atone and disqualify, such as sprinkling and eating. Leaving something over is not a defined act in the sacrificial process, and therefore there is no reason to define the thought there as a deed. Rabbi Yehudah held that the identification between thought and deed is sweeping. But in the final halakha we rule like the Sages, that this identification is valid only with regard to central acts in the offering and the atonement, because of the Torah’s tendency to emphasize disqualifications of thought.

And this is indeed what Sefer HaHinukh writes in commandment 144:

Among the roots of this commandment is the principle we established earlier, that the matters of sacrifice are intended to refine human thoughts and to depict within the soul, through the action done by one’s hands, the evil of sin and the goodness of upright ways. Therefore, since its primary purpose concerns thought, it was fitting that it be invalidated by a thought that deviates from uprightness in any of its acts. This is clear and close to reason, testifying to the truth.

It seems that this is precisely the lesson the Torah wants to teach us. First, it wants to emphasize the importance of thought in divine service. Therefore it presents us with the apparently absurd picture in which deed does not render piggul, whereas thought about that very same deed does. But the point is not only that thought renders piggul. There is an exposition teaching that piggul is created because thought is treated as deed, and that is why it disqualifies. This is not because deed renders piggul and thought is considered equivalent to it, but because in the context of the service of God, thought, not deed, is the true deed. This completes the picture presented in last week’s article.

Final note: lishmah in consecrated offerings as a third type of halakhic thought

We opened last week’s article with a distinction between kavvanah, the intention to fulfill a commandment, and lishmah. We saw that kavvanah is the thought of fulfilling one’s obligation at the time of performing the commandment, and there is a dispute whether commandments require such intention, that is, whether such intention is indispensable to the commandment. Lishmah, by contrast, is a thought required for preparing an object for the performance of a commandment. It is not disputed, and it accompanies the stages of preparing the object rather than the actual performance of the commandment.

The law of lishmah in consecrated offerings is exceptional. The six intentions defined in the mishnah in Zevachim 46b do not include the thought of fulfilling one’s obligation, and in that sense the discussion is indeed about lishmah and not kavvanah. But the timing is at the time of performing the commandment, not at the time of preparing some object for the commandment.²⁰

True, as we saw, piggul-intention always precedes the stage named in the content of the disqualifying intention. For example, during slaughtering one intends to sprinkle beyond the proper time, or during sprinkling one intends to eat beyond the proper time. But that is true only of piggul, not of the law of lishmah. A lishmah-intention accompanies the very performance of the commandment, namely the stages of the sacrificial service. Why is that so? Does this not return us to the category of kavvanah, over which there is a dispute?

In light of the picture that emerged in this week’s article, perhaps we can propose an explanation of this peculiarity. We saw that thought is not only the main component of the service; it constitutes the service itself. In consecrated offerings, thought is the “act,” meaning the element that actually operates, and not the deed. We suggested that the deed exists only to provide a framework and character for the thoughts that accompany it. If so, it is now clear that this is not a case of kavvanah, but neither is it the ordinary concept of lishmah. It is a category unto itself: not preparation of an object for a commandment, and not a thought accompanying the performance of a commandment-act. Rather, thought in the realm of consecrated offerings constitutes the very act of the commandment itself.

Here, however, one must distinguish between thoughts that disqualify, or render piggul, and thoughts of lishmah, which are required only ab initio, though their absence prevents the sacrifice from gaining acceptance. It may be that the fact that in most cases the absence of a lishmah-intention prevents acceptance but does not disqualify the sacrifice is also a consequence of the picture presented here. Without a lishmah-intention, there is no sacrificial commandment in the full sense, meaning no acceptance or atonement. But the sanctity of the sacrifice itself is not necessarily impaired, except in the case of the Passover-offering and the sin-offering. In these contexts one may say that lishmah-intention is the deed of the commandment, not the deed of the sacrificial procedure.

Footnotes

It may be that piggul of sprinkling beyond the proper time is learned from piggul of eating beyond the proper time, especially since that is the piggul described by our verse. But it may also be that the explanation for why even in piggul of sprinkling beyond the proper time the disqualification is one of intention at slaughtering lies in what we saw above: at the moment of sprinkling one cannot realistically define a case of the intention of being beyond the proper time.