For the source text click/tap here: Menachot 14
To download, click/tap here: PDF
In a situation where part of the Temple service became ritually defiled, e.g. when one of the two loaves brought on Shavuot becomes ritually defiled, or one set of the leḥem ha-panim – the shewbread (see above daf 7) becomes impure, can the remaining bread be eaten? Rabbi Yehuda rules that they must all be destroyed, since a communal offering cannot be divided into parts. The Sages of the Mishna disagree and rule that what has become ritually defiled must be destroyed, but that the rest remains unaffected and can be eaten.
We explore intentionality piggul and how piggul functions not merely as a technical halakhic category but as a moral and metaphysical grammar through which the Rabbis articulated fundamental claims about human agency, divine service, and the architecture of religious consciousness.