Seemingly, there's an idea that honey dissolves flesh (which thereby turns into honey. I don't have a primary source for this, but there is an ibn Ezra story about it). How does this fit in with the Bavli, Bava Basra 3:2, which says that honey preserves flesh? Dissolve would seem to be the opposite of preserve in this context.
(Note: I'm not asking about what modern science says about the issue. I'm asking only about how the two Jewish-sourced statements relate to one another.)
Answer
Maybe indeed honey will penetrate into organic material and dissolve it, but only some distance. With a small creature like a bee, then, that's enough to include its entire body; with a human corpse, the bulk of it will still remain intact.
The issue is discussed in Shulchan Aruch, Yoreh De'ah 84:12 and commentaries there. The Mechaber writes that "honey tends to preserve things immersed in it"; Shach (:37) observes that this is true only if the creature is whole, but that if it is dissected, then on the contrary the honey will dissolve it. The case at hand seems to have involved bees' legs that were in the honey (see Beur Hagra there :37), not the entire insect.
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