What is brought on Shavuot is two loaves of bread, which are also brought with a bull, two rams and seven lambs as olot (offerings), a goat as a chatat offering, and two other lambs as shelamim (offerings). This Mishnah will talk about what happens if the animals are available but the shtei lechem, the loaves of bread, are not, or the opposite: the shtei lechem are available but the animals are not. What do we do in that type of situation? We’ll first talk about the olot and the chatat animals.
The Mishnah says the bulls, rams and lambs that are brought as olot, and the goat that is brought as the chatat offering, are not considered essential for the bread to be valid. In other words, if you only have the bread and you don’t have any of these animals, you could still bring the bread, and the bread is not essential for them. Even though we want everything to be brought together, if the animals are available and you don’t have the shtei lechem, you could still bring the animals. And the opposite: if you have the shtei lechem but you don’t have the animals, you could still bring the bread.
But when it comes to the two lambs that are brought as shelamim offerings, there’s a difference: “Ha-lechem me'akev et ha-kevasim.” The bread is not essential for them. The bread is essential for the shelamim lambs to be valid. In order to bring the lambs, you have to have the bread. But the shelamim lambs are not essential for the bread to be valid. If we don’t have the shtei lechem, we don’t bring the shelamim lambs. But if we don’t have the lambs, we still bring the shtei lechem. The shtei lechem are brought regardless, even without those lambs. This is the opinion of Rebbe Akiva.
Amar (said) Shimon ben Nannas. Shimon ben Nannas disagrees. He says no. He says the opposite. The shelamim lambs are considered essential for the bread to be valid. If I don’t have the shelamim lambs, he cannot bring the bread. But the bread is not essential for the shelamim lambs to be valid. If, in his opinion, you have the shelamim lambs and you don’t have the shtei lechem, you still bring those lambs. So we have the opposite opinion from Shimon ben Nannas.
Shimon ben Nannas is going to bring a proof for his opinion. He says the shelamim lambs are valid even without the bread because we see that when Bnei Yisrael (Jewish people) were in the desert for 40 years, they brought shelamim lambs without any bread, because there was no bread in the midbar (desert). The Jewish people only served the bread. They only survived on the man (manna), and therefore there was no bread. There was no bread for them to bring, and they still continued to bring the lambs. So therefore, we see the lambs are valid—the shelamim lambs—even with no bread being brought with them. So it’s the same here as in the midbar: in the Beit HaMikdash (Holy Temple), if you don’t have the bread, you still bring the lambs on Shavuot. And that is his opinion.
Another opinion: Rebbe Shimon. “Halacha (Jewish law) k'divrei Ben Nannas.” Halacha is like Ben Nannas: the lambs are brought without the shtei lechem. But the reason, or rationale, behind it is not as he said. We don’t like his proof. It’s a bad proof, because the halacha is that whatever korbanot (offerings) are mentioned in the midbar were offered in the midbar. Over there, the musaf offerings that I talked about in the midbar were brought in the midbar. But whatever korbanot are mentioned in Sefer Vayikra (book of Vayikra) were not brought in the midbar. We talk about all different holidays. We talk about all the different korbanot that were brought on those days.
So those korbanot were not offered; they were not brought until eventually, at the end of the 40 years, Bnei Yisrael entered Eretz Yisrael. Once Bnei Yisrael came to Eretz Yisrael, both the korbanot that were mentioned in Bamidbar and those that were mentioned in the book of Vayikra were offered. So all the korbanot that we’re talking about in this context, with the shtei lechem, including the lambs of the shelamim, are only mentioned in the book of Vayikra. So we see from here they weren’t offered in the desert. So therefore, there’s no proof, because they’re only talked about in the book of Vayikra. Only the korbanot of Bamidbar were actually brought in the desert. So therefore, we see from here there was never a chance—a time when the shelamim lambs were brought in the desert without the shtei lechem—like Ben Nannas tried to say.
So therefore, Rebbe Shimon is going to explain why he agrees with the halachic opinion of Shimon ben Nannas, even though he doesn’t agree with his rationale. He says, “Why do I say, like Shimon ben Nannas, that lambs are allowed to be brought even if there’s no bread?” If there’s no shtei lechem, he gives us a proof that a korban only becomes permitted to be eaten when some of it has first been offered on the Mizbeach (altar). When talking about the lambs, once the lambs have been slaughtered and the blood is brought on the Mizbeach, it permits them to be consumed. The bread has no involvement at all in permitting the lambs to be eaten. The lambs, the shelamim, are their own internal service, and therefore they don’t need the bread to help them become permitted. So therefore, the lambs are allowed to be brought without anything else, without the bread.
But when talking about the bread without the lambs, there’s nothing to permit the bread to be eaten. The bread, the shtei lechem themselves, are waved together with the shelamim lambs, and there’s a union created between them. So when the blood of the lambs is applied to the Mizbeach, it also allows the shtei lechem to be eaten, just as it allows the lambs to be eaten. So therefore, there’s a connection between the shtei lechem and the kevasim. The kevasim, when they’re brought, allow the shtei lechem to be eaten, even though we have chatat and olah offerings, as we mentioned. There isn’t a close enough link for their blood, when offered on the Mizbeach, to permit the shtei lechem. That has nothing to do with them. Only the blood of the shelamim lambs allows the bread to be eaten.
So therefore, what he understands is that the only way for the bread to be eaten is for the lambs to be slaughtered and their blood applied to the Mizbeach. So therefore, in conclusion, if there are no lambs, there’s nothing that would allow the shtei lechem to be eaten. So therefore, the shtei lechem are not allowed to be brought without the lambs.