Chullin 124-130: Gifts of Animal Part to a Kohen
by R. Gidon Rothstein
True story: when I worked in a shul as a rabbi, I floated the idea of a big barbecue, where we would invite a shochet to kill an animal belonging to the congregation, and then give the kohanim the matanot, the gifts we are supposed to give from every domesticated animal we kill for food, the front foreleg, jaw, and keivah, one of the stomachs.
And then all enjoy together, having fulfilled a mitzvah in the Torah.
Anyone I mentioned it to thought I was crazy. Making the sugyot in these pages of Gemara irresistible to me, because it is a mitzvah, applies today (although slaughterhouses find ways around it), is a chapter of Shulchan Aruch, and very few of us even think about it. For this time, I’m going to try to capture the highlights of Yoreh De’ah 61, with Aruch HaShulchan.
Start with a Gemara, Move to Shulchan Aruch
Except this series takes a sugya from that week’s Daf, so let’s notice it. Chullin 130a has the opening Mishnah to the chapter named Ha-Zero’a Ve-ha-lechayayim, The Foreleg and the Jaw, where we learn that the giving of these gifts to a kohen applies in Israel and out, whether or not the Mikdash is standing, and only for chullin, non-sacrificial meats.
[Fun fact: in 61;21, when SA rules this way, the italics—usually Rema, but it may have been an editor—pauses to explain the phrase bifnei ha-Bayit, before the House, because it is the first time it appears in SA.]
Yoreh De’ah 61;1 similarly opens with the obligation, from bulls and sheep. Aruch HaShulchan (AH) in se’if one gives the verse, Devarim 18;3, and notes that Devarim 14;4 makes clear that goats are included in seh, the word our verse used for sheep.
Chayyot, non-domesticated animals like gazelles and deer, are not included, but mixes of domesticated animals are, such as an animal born of a sheep and a goat (Google says it’s very rare, called a geep, usually not viable, because sheep and goat have different numbers of chromosomes).
The Body Parts
In se’if two, Shulchan Aruch (SA) defines the zero’a, the right foreleg, meaning the bottom two-thirds of the leg (animals’ ankles are much higher up on the leg than in humans, so this zero’a starts from the hoof, through the ankle, to the second joint).
The jaw is from the cheekbone down to the thyroid cartilage (the parallel of this cartilage in humans is the human Adam’s apple, Google Search tells me). This comes with the hide and the wool, the owner may not shear or skin the sheep before giving these gifts to the kohen.
Se’if four tells us the kevah, the one of the four stomachs of ruminants known as the abomasum, has to be given with all its surrounding and internal fat, unless the kohen decides to cede those fats to the owner (meaning, I think, it’s not the essential gift, it’s that Chazal required the owner to give well and generously).
The Obligation to Give, ASAP
SA records the permissibility of the owner eating other parts of the animal before giving these gifts to the kohen. In contrast to terumah, where all of a harvest is tevel, prohibited, even to a kohen, until terumah has been separated from it.
AH, se’if eight, attributes it to the principle of zerizin makdimin, those who care deeply about fulfillment of the Torah perform mitzvot as soon as they can. [I wonder, because why would SA make a point of it here, and not every single time there is a faster way to do this? Perhaps because he had to make the point that it is not tevel, he wanted to forestall the idea we can give it whenever we get around to it. Or perhaps it is because]
In that same se’if, AH assigns the obligation to the shochet, the one who killed the animal, even if it is not his, because the verse addressed zovechei ha-zevach, those who slaughtered the animal. The obligation starts once the animal is properly killed and checked, proves to be kosher.
(It has to be checked first because there is no need to give these parts if the animal turned out to be a terefah, as SA writes in se’if six. We would have to give them even if the animal was slaughtered for a purpose other than human consumption, such as to feed dogs or use as medicine. AH points out that the key issue is whether the animal could be eaten, so for these purposes, even if it is only a possible terefah, or we will refrain from eating it due to a stringency of later authorities, it is a terefah and there would be no need to give the parts to a kohen.
It might not be an ordinary zerizin, then, since it is an unusual person who is fulfilling the mitzvah.
To Whom
Se’if eight shares an halachah I find fascinating, that we can give these gifts to a kohenet, a woman born to a kohen family, even if she has since married an ordinary Jew. Meaning, a woman from a priestly family has that characteristic her whole life, for some purposes. (She cannot eat terumah while married to a non-kohen or has non-kohen children or other offspring. She joins the non-kohen family in those terms, but remains a kohenet in zero’a lechayayim terms).
But wait, there’s more. We can give these gifts to her husband, because he’s the husband of a kohenet. All the more so, says SA, that he need not give these gifts. [An added benefit to marrying a kohenet,]
However, SA reports a view that limited the obligation to Israel (despite the Mishnah, for reasons I will not analyze here), and says that is the common custom. The editor of SA sends us to Sefer HaChinuch (he says of the Re’ah, although I believe the Machon Yerushalayim’s valuable introduction to its printing of Minchat Chinuch agreed with the evidence Re’ah, R. Aharon Ha-Levi, teacher of Ritva, did not write Sefer Ha-Chinuch, but perhaps his brother, R. Pinchas, did).
Sefer HaChinuch indeed reports a controversy on the issue, although he concludes the obligation does apply outside of Israel, as Rif and Ramban both said, bemoans rabbis’ lack of the requisite authority to enforce the giving of the gifts to a kohen.
From Whom
In se’if twenty-three, SA exempts Levi’im, because there is a doubt about whether they are included in the am, nation, to which the verse referred. In all cases of financial doubt, claimants (in this case, the kohen) bear the burden of proof. That being so, says SA, if a kohen grabbed these matanot, we could not extract them from him, either, because now the claimant has been reversed, the Levi is trying to get those parts of the animal back from the kohen. However, the italics (I think Rema, in this more substantive comment) note a disagreeing view, we do return these meats to the Levi.
[Another fun fact: Shach wrote a small book titled Tokfo Kohen, about how to resolve financial disputes with no clear legal ruling either way. The phrase comes from ours and similar examples, where the kohen grabbed what wasn’t obviously his.]
AH, se’if sixteen, contrasts our case with when we have a doubtful first-born animal, where we do require a kohen who grabbed it to return it to the owner. There, says AH, the doubt is about whether the animal is a first-born at all; here, the meats are definitely the ones included in the gifts, the question is only whether this owner is obligated to give them. To AH’s mind, the kohen has clearer standing in this case, making it harder for us to take it back.
In se’if eighteen, AH wonders why women would be obligated in the mitzvah (as we assume they are), since the exempting reason for kohanim was that they were not the am. As we all know, Shabbat 62a says women are an am of their own, also not part of the usual am. He answers with Devarim 31;12, where Moshe transmits the commandment of Hakhel, the national gathering on Sukkot after a shemittah year, saying to gather the whole am, men, women, and children. Showing women are part of the am for many purposes, including these matanot.
How We Avoid It Today
There’s really a lot more, but we have to know our limits and limitations (or some of them, anyway). Before we go, I do want to explain why none of us know about this today.
First, we don’t kill our own animals, it’s done in a factory somewhere. Still, the owners of that factory would presumably have to give a lot of meat to kohanim, and I’ve never heard of such. One option is what Rema said earlier, butchers rely on the view that this mitzvah doesn’t apply outside in Israel. How about in Israel?
In se’if twenty-five, SA exempts any animal slaughtered on behalf of a kohen (since the kohen isn’t obligated, neither is the shochet), or anyone who is in partnership with them. In the next se’if, he limits it to where the kohen or non-Jew are partners in the whole animal, even if they own only a small percentage. But owning just one body part is not enough.
Better, Rema rules that it’s enough if a Jew has a regular arrangement with a non-Jew, that if the animal turns out to be a terefah, the non-Jew will take it. To his view, that’s enough to exempt from matanot.
Skipping a whole bunch, I note that in se’if 53, when he addresses SA’s having said we follow the view that it doesn’t apply outside Israel, AH admits that’s the general custom and it’s impossible to change, anyone who wants to give the matanot to a kohen may do so without it smacking of religious arrogance (yuhara, look at how frum I am). He does know of some who are careful to fulfill the mitzvah, and he himself saw it as a child.
He closes reminding us he is a Levi, and therefore cannot fulfill the mitzvah, but ashrei, fortunate and blessed, is the one who does.
A mitzvah fascinating even only for its having fallen into disuse, with other fun elements along the way.