We now begin the tenth chapter of Maseches Menachos, which in the Babylonian Talmud is actually the sixth chapter. The subject of the chapter is the Omer offering - the barley meal offering brought on the second day of Pesach.
There are only three meal offerings that are obligations of the community:
The Omer meal offering - the subject of our chapter.
The lechem hapanim - which is arranged, waved and eaten every Shabbos.
The shtei halechem - the two loaves waved together with the two lambs on Shavuos.
In this chapter we will deal with the Omer meal offering, while in the next chapter we will deal with the two other offerings - the lechem hapanim and the shtei halechem.
The Omer offering in brief:
The Omer was harvested on the night following the first day of Pesach, that is, the night after the Seder night, and it came from the new barley crop. The verses do not mention barley explicitly, but the tradition is that it came from barley - and this is unusual, since nearly all meal offerings come from wheat flour, whereas here we are dealing with barley flour.
The verse also states that the Omer comes "mimacharas haShabbos" - on the day after the Shabbos, and according to the tradition this means the day after the first day of Pesach. This point was the focus of a significant dispute between the Sages and the Tzedukim and those like them, who understood that the obligation to bring the Omer falls specifically on the day after Shabbos, that is, on Sunday. This dispute stands in the background of a considerable portion of the halachos before us, and especially of the manner in which the Omer was harvested.
The order of the procedure: they harvest at night, and the next morning they take three se'ah of barley as the halachah requires. These are roasted, ground and sifted in order to produce barley flour. From the flour they bring one isaron, as usual, with a log of oil, as usual, and with levonah, as usual, and it is all burned on the mizbe'ach.
When the day of harvesting falls on Shabbos:
The first topic of the chapter, in Mishnah 1, deals with the case in which the night following the first day of Pesach - the night on which the Omer is harvested, the night of the sixteenth of Nisan, which in Eretz Yisrael is the first day of Chol HaMoed - falls on Shabbos. The rule is that any communal offering that has a fixed time overrides Shabbos. Therefore, even though the harvesting, the grinding and the sifting are melachos, they are permitted, since the offering must come specifically on a particular day. In our sugya we will learn that even the harvesting itself must be done specifically on the sixteenth of Nisan.
The question is how to do this: do we reduce, out of respect for Shabbos, the quantity of work or the types of melachos performed, or do we perhaps do it in its usual and ideal manner, since this is permitted and this is the proper way to do it?
The Mishnah opens: "Rabbi Yishmael omer: ha'Omer hayah ba beShabbos mishalosh se'in uvachol meichamesh" - Rabbi Yishmael says: the Omer would come on Shabbos from three se'ah and on a weekday from five. In Rabbi Yishmael's view, the ideal way to bring the Omer offering is from five se'ah of barley stalks, from which the single isaron of flour is produced. In this way, after the sifting, one takes the first and finest of the crop. But on Shabbos, in order to reduce the amount of work, it is done from only three se'ah rather than from five.
And "V'chachamim omrim: echad b'Shabbos v'echad b'chol mishalosh hayah ba" - the Sages hold that whether it falls on Shabbos or on a weekday, it is always brought from three se'ah of barley and not from five.
To picture this clearly, keep in mind: an issaron is a tenth of an eifah, and an eifah is three se'ah. In other words, one takes a full eifah of barley kernels - a volume you can imagine as eighteen two liter bottles - and after threshing, winnowing, sorting, grinding and sifting, one produces from it a single issaron of flour, which is a tenth of that volume: about three and four fifths bottles, that is, roughly 3.6 liters, as usual.
On the surface it looks as though the dispute is only about the formula: is the issaron produced from three se'ah or from five? But the real dispute runs deeper. Rabbi Yishmael holds that the preferred and finest way is specifically with five se'ah, so that the flour that passes through the sieve is the choicest of the batch. Still, he says, one should not increase the labor performed on Shabbos for the sake of that enhancement. The Sages, however, hold that this is not a consideration at all: a mitzvah is performed in full, in its complete, correct and proper manner, and if the mitzvah falls on Shabbos, then it is performed on Shabbos. And this is the halachah.
The number of reapers on Shabbos:
The second part of the Mishnah deals with a case in which the reaping falls on Shabbos: should the number of people involved in it be reduced? True, it is permitted to reap and process this barley, but is it proper that one man do it, or specifically three men?
The Mishnah teaches: "Rabbi Chanina s'gan hakohanim omer: b'Shabbos hayah niktzar b'yachid, b'magal achas u'v'kupah achas" - according to Rabbi Chanina, the deputy Kohen Gadol, who actually served in the Beis HaMikdash, on Shabbos only one man reaps, with a single sickle - the curved blade - and everything is gathered into a single basket. On a weekday, though, he agrees that the reaping is done by three men, with three baskets and three sickles, each man with his own basket and sickle.
The Sages disagree: whether the barley is reaped on Shabbos or on a weekday, the reaping is done by three men, with three baskets and three sickles.
What moves the Sages to require three reapers, each with his own sickle and basket? The desire for publicity and a large crowd, for a prominent public event that everyone sees and recognizes: this is the reaping of the Omer, taking place right now. This is especially important on Shabbos, because the Sages wish to teach that the reaping can fall on any day of the week, and is not tied specifically to Sunday, the day after Shabbos. Therefore, even when it falls on Shabbos, we want the full splendor of three participants bringing the three se'ah of barley, in a large and conspicuous display - to counter the claims of the Tzedukim and their associates, and to announce that even though today is Shabbos, this is the night following the first day of Pesach, and from it we count the time of the Omer.
In summary: In this section we examined the nature of the Omer offering - a barley minchah from the new crop, one of the three obligatory communal menachos - and the order of its bringing: reaping on the night after the first day of Pesach, and processing the barley until an issaron of flour is produced, with a log of oil and frankincense. We learned the dispute between Rabbi Yishmael and the Sages as to whether one reduces on Shabbos from five se'ah to three in order to lessen the labor, or whether the mitzvah is performed in its full and proper manner in any case; and the dispute between Rabbi Chanina, the deputy Kohen Gadol, and the Sages regarding the number of reapers, with the Sages emphasizing the public publicity that counters the position of the Tzedukim.
In the next chapter we will take up the two remaining obligatory communal menachos - the lechem hapanim and the shtei halechem.