רב חנינא מסורא

Rav Chanina of Sura was an amora, identified with the city of Sura. He appears in the Talmud engaging matters of halachah across several tractates, at times challenging accepted principles. In Chullin he rejects certain rules and points to the teaching that an animal owned in partnership is obligated in the priestly gifts, while Rabbi Ilai exempts it, deriving the law of “giving” from the gifts of the first-shorn wool. In Menachot he explains the placement of the mezuzah in the handbreadth nearest the public domain, saying it should be there so that the mezuzah will guard the person.

In Zevachim he teaches a version of the law concerning bones, sinews, horns and hooves brought upon the altar, learning the matter on the latter clause where Rav Mari learned it on the former. In Bava Batra he raises an objection about whether the scribes might know what the sages themselves do not. In Bava Metzia, where he is called Rav Chanina of Sura of the Euphrates, he questions Ravina about why the Torah mentions the Exodus from Egypt in connection with creeping creatures, and brings the answer that Hashem, who distinguished between the drop of a firstborn and one that is not, will exact punishment from one who mixes the innards of impure fish with those of pure fish and sells them to a Jew.