Monday, July 2, 2012

Niddah 42 – Meat in the Mouth

If a woman emits the man's semen in the next three days after cohabitation, she is ritually impure, just as he was. However, while his impurity comes when the semen leaves his body, her impurity comes while the semen is on its way out, even before it leaves her body. Why? About the blood the Torah said, “in her flesh” - that is, already in her flesh, before it leaves the body, and about semen it said, “it will be,” giving it the same law. However, Rabbi Shimon says that her law should be just like his, that is, she does not become ritually impure until his semen actually leaves her body.

“Swallowed-up impurity” is a ritually impure object enclosed in a hidden bodily cavity, such as the stomach. This impurity is considered non-existent. “Concealed place impurity” is a ritually impure object places in a partly concealed such as an ear, nostril, or armpit. What is the status of a ritually impure object in “that place” of a woman? The Talmud asks, what's the difference? And it answers, swallowed-up impurity has no effect at all, but concealed-place impurity makes one who carries it impure. So if her friend inserted a peace of nevelah meat there, her ritual purity status would depend on the answer to this question. Rava said, “It is swallowed up, and she is pure,” while Abaye said, “It is concealed, and she is impure when she moves.”

A similar question: if a person's friend inserted an olive's volume of nevelah meat in his mouth, is it swallowed-up or concealed? Here Abaye and Rava reverse their opinions.

Art: Jacob Foppens Van Es - A still life of green olives in a blue and white porcalein bowl

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