Commentaire sur Menachot 4:2

הפרים והאילים והכבשים – those that are written in the Torah portion of “Speak to the Priests” (Leviticus 23:18): “With the bread you shall present, as burnt offerings to the LORD, seven yearling lambs without blemish, one bull of the herd, and two rams” that come with the two loaves of Atzeret/Shavuot. אינם מעכבים (do not impair the validity of one another) – the two bulls and the one ram and the seven lambs of the Musaf/Additional offerings of Atzeret/Shavuot that are written in the Torah portion of Pinhas (Numbers 28:27). For [two] bulls of the Musaf/Additional offerings do not impair the bull of the two loaves, neither does the bull of the two loaves impair the two bulls of the Musaf/Additional offerings. And similarly the two rams of the two loaves do not impair the one ram of the Musaf/Additional offerings, nor the one ram of the Musaf/Additional offerings impairs the two rams of the two loaves. And similarly, the lambs do not impair neither these nor those.

The [absence of either the] bullocks or the rams or the lambs does not invalidate the others. On Rosh Hodesh and festivals, bullocks, rams and lambs are offered, together with “drink-offerings” consisting of wine, flour and oil (see Numbers 28:11ff and Leviticus 23:18). If the community does not bring all of these, they can still fulfill the mitzvah of the offerings that they do bring.

רבן שמעון אומר אם היו להם פרים מרובין – that is to say, money in order to purchase bulls by the way for their needs, and they did not have money to purchase libations, they should bring one bull and its libations. And they derive it from Scripture, as it is written (Ezekiel 46:7): “And he shall provide a meal offering of an ephah for the bull, an ephah for the ram, and as much as he can afford for the lambs [with a hin of oil to every ephah],” can it really be that the measure of bulls and rams is one, but isn’t the meal-offering of the bulls is three Issaron and the meal offering of the rams two issaron, but rather to inform you hat it is better to bring one bull, one ram with his ephah, the measure that is appropriate for him, than to bring many bulls and many rams without their meal-offerings. But the Halakha is not according to Rabbi Shimon.

Rabbi Shimon says: if they had [money enough to buy] many bullocks but not [enough for] the drink-offerings, they should bring one bullock and its drink-offerings and should not offer them all without drink-offerings. Rabbi Shimon points out that it is preferable to bring one bullock with its drink-offerings than to bring more animals without drink-offerings. It seems that the drink-offerings, according to Rabbi Shimon, complete the sacrifice and therefore it is better to bring one completed sacrifice than multiple partial sacrifices.