עבודה זרה ב׳:ה׳ - ב׳:ו׳

מפני מה אסרו גבינת של עובדי כוכבים – with regarding to eating, but the Rabbis require it because the milk of an impure animal one doesn’t have to suspect anything for we hold that the milk of an impure animal does not curdle.

שורפה חיה – it is a mere secretion (and no longer real milk – see Tractate Hullin 116b).

בקיבת עגלי עבודה זרה – and even though it is a mere secretion, it is prohibited, for idolatry is different, as it is written concerning it (Deuteronomy 13:18): “Let nothing that has been doomed stick to you hand,[in order that the LORD may turn from His blazing anger and show you compassion, and in His compassion increase you as He promised your fathers on oath].”

השיאו לדבר אחר – and he did not want to tell him the reason of the matter because twelve months had not yet passed from when they made this decree. For when the Rabbis make a decree, they do not reveal the reason until twelve months of a year until their decree will become widespread. For perhaps there is someone who doesn’t hold by this reason and will come to despise it, and the reason why they forbade the cheeses of idolaters is because they curdle it in the skin of an animal slaughtered by an idolater which is a carcass, but even though it is a small amount corresponding to all of the milk, since he curdles the milk and performs an act, it is not negated, and we hold that everything goes according to the one who curdles the milk. But because of meat with milk, he did not forbid it, for since the meat on its own is permitted, it is not forbidden with milk, even though he curdles it until he gives forth into it a taste , but I is a matter of something forbidden from its outset. He forbids something that is permitted, even though it does not give forth a taste while he is curdling it.

כי טובים דודייך מיין – The Holy One, blessed be He says this to the congregation of Israel.

אין הדבר כן – but rather the congregation of Israel stated before the Holy One, blessed be He (see Talmud Avodah Zarah 35a): “The words of Your beloved ones are a surety before Me,” meaning to say, the ordinances that the Sages have established and decreed are better than the wine of the Torah, from the principle of the Written Torah (as they supplement the Written Torah and complete it).

הפת והשמן [וכו'] – all of these are prohibited as a guard of intermarriage (between Jews and gentiles – see Tractate Avodah Zarah 31b) and the bread of bakers they permitted but the bread of house owners they did not permit other than those who were traveling or at a time of emergency. But regarding, they saw that their prohibition did not stretch and they resolved upon it and permitted it as they decided in the Mishnah.

ושלקות – everything that the idolaters cooked and even if they cooked it in the utensils of Israelites, and in their presence, for one would not suspect forbidden mixtures, and the cleansing of an impure vessel (by means of boiling water) by idolaters, they (i.e., the Sages) forbade this because of cooking done by idolaters and this is the case even where no Israelite helped out neither at the beginning nor at the end, but they did not prohibit this because it was cooking done by idolaters, but rather, because it is something that is not consumed when it is alive and ascends on to the tables of kings that is combined with bread but, if one of these was missing, there is no [concern] regarding that it is something cooked by idolaters.

וכבשין שדרכן לתת בהן יין – and their prohibition is not one where they cannot have benefit from it because the taste of the wine is not recognized/known but with regard to eating, it is prohibited.

טרית טרופה – [a species of] ritually pure fish that they chop very finely and are not recognized and are prohibited since they were taken from idolaters lest there are crushed with them an impure fish.

וציר שאין בה דגה – a small fish that is called stickleback (see Talmud Avodah Zarah 39b) and it is the manner that it grows in the midst of [the brine of] pure fish, but when there is brine of impure fish mixed with it, it will not grow stickleback.

והחילק – a species of pure, small fish and they lack fins and scales which they will eventually grow after a while. But small impure fish that are analogous to them are combined with them and are not recognized, even when it is not beaten. But salted/pickled fish, the impure kinds are not like it, and therefore, they are permitted since they are not hashed/beaten.

חלתית – this is its name in Arabic and they cut its particles with a knife and are forbidden because of the fatty/oily substance of the knife and along with the sharpness [of the assa foetida (an umbelliferous plant used as a resin or in leaves, for a spice and for medical purposes), the fatty/oily substance of the knife sweetens the taste of the fatty/oily substance that is absorbed in it.

ומלח סלקונתית – a salt that the gentry of Rome eat and they are accustomed to smear it in the fat of pigs (i.e., lard), and in the fat of impure fish and it is large and the mostly white.