Chulin 108 — “What Milk in Meat Teaches About Peer Influence”

Our Gemara on this daf discusses the halachic dynamics of a drop of milk that falls on a piece of meat, which is in a pot with other pieces of meat. Some of the considerations include: if the pot is stirred right away, then the entire volume can be counted to nullify the small amount of milk. On the other hand, if the milk sits for a bit of time on the piece of meat, and this piece alone does not have enough volume to nullify it, now the entire piece, not just a drop of milk, becomes a prohibited substance. This is known as chaticha naase neveilah, literally the entire piece becomes as if it was not kosher meat. Why is this? The Torah prohibits the cooking of meat and milk together; though each one separately is permitted, the new entity of them being cooked together becomes the prohibited substance. In such a case, we now have an piece of non-kosher meat in a pot with other pieces of meat. Now we need the volume of all the pieces of meat to be more than that one piece in order to nullify it. Otherwise, the entire pot will become unkosher. Another consideration is, there is an opinion that when you have two like substances (min b’mino), nullification does not occur. That is, since essentially all the pieces of meat are the same, there is no contrast to overwhelm and make the flavor of the unkosher piece of meat insignificant. The flavor is blended together and it is not eliminated (see Ran, Nedarim 52a).

Ba’aley mussar see this discussion as a metaphor for human relationships and influence. A small amount of negative influence can impact an entire group unless it is quickly nullified. Additionally, once the negative attitude takes root, the entire person changes, and now it is more difficult to nullify the negative influence.

One of the concerns of parents who are in kiruv or shlichus is:........

© The Times of Israel (Blogs)