Achrei Mot -A discussion about the sprinkling of the blood on or before the parochet leading to a fascinating historical journey.

The Paroches was the curtain which separated the Kodesh Kodashim where

the Aron resided, from the Kodesh area, which housed the Shulchan, Menorah, and incense altar.

This is the detail of the Yom Kippur Avoda

The Kohein gadol does sprinkling on the incense altar and on the golden altar and in all he does 43 spinklings.

The Kohen Gadol would leave the Hechal sanctuary and take the blood of the bull that was being mixed. He would enter the Holy of Holies a second time and sprinkle the blood in front of the Kaporet (ark cover). He would sprinkle it eight times. First, he would sprinkle it upward.According to some, the blood would not touch the Kaporet; rather, it would fall below. The seven last times he would direct his hands downward and sprinkle directly toward the Kaporet. Each time he would sprinkle, he would count one, one and one, one and two....

The Kohen Gadol would then leave the Holy of Holies and he would put the blood of the bull on the golden pedestal in the Hechal sanctuary. There were two gold pedestals in the Hechal sanctuary. On one of them he would place the blood of the bull.
He would then leave the Hechal sanctuary and slaughter the goat which had on it the lot for G-d. He would receive the blood in another vessel. He would then enter the Holy of Holies and sprinkle the blood in exactly the same manner as he did the blood of the bull.
He would then leave the Holy of Holies and put the goat's blood on the second pedestal in the Hechal sanctuary.
He would take the blood that he put on the first pedestal and sprinkle it seven times toward the parochet (veil) in the direction of the Holy Aron. Of course, he would be standing outside the Holy of Holies at this time.
He would then put down the bull's blood and take the goat's blood, and he would sprinkle another eight times toward the parochet in exactly the above manner.

So a lot of the Sedrah is devoted to the Avodah of the Cohen Gadol on Yom Kippur.

In the actual Sedra you will only see written about sprinkling upon or near the Kaporet.

The sprinkling upon the parochet we see only later on in the Talmud -

He does two sacrifaces - the par hachatas and the Se'ir hachatas and each time he sprinkles blood in the direction of the Parochet.

The first mention of sprinkling on or near the parochet is in the Mishna Azehu Mekoman

In the Gemara beginning in Yoma 55a and going on for a few blatt there is a machlokes between the Tannaim about whether the blood was actually sprinkled literally onto the paroches or in front of the paroches.

Then in 57a it reaches a conclusion about it and brings a historical ra'aya -

The Tanna Kamma says that the Cohen didn't sprinkle directly onto the Parochet but the next opinion i,e that of Rabbi Elazar ben Yosi is that he must have sprinkled directly onto the curtain because he actually saw the curtain in Rome.

How did R. Alazar ben Yosi merit to see this curtain?

There is an article in Ami magazine in 2013 which tells about a Rabbi in Jerusalem called

Rabbi Shtrencel who was learning with his chavrusa this gemara about Rabbi Elazar ben Yosi and he was so fascinated by the whole topic that he wrote a letter to the Pope to ask the vatican to return the Kelim of the BM. There are other mentions in shas about Rabbi Elazar ben Rabbi Yosi seeing several objects from the Beis Hamikdash: the Menorah, the shulchan hapanim, the tzitz of the kohen gadol and the paroches. They also found the machteshes (grindstone) of Beis Avtinas.

In fact, Chazal mention having seen the Menorah and other keilim in various other places including Maseches Yoma 57a; Maseches Me’ilah, fourth perek; and Tosefta on Kippurim

2:16. A more detailed description of what Rabbi Elazar ben Rabbi Yosi saw is contained in

Avos D’Rabbi Nasan, perek 41. In Sifrei Zuta, Behaaloscha (Bamidbar 8:2), Rabbi Shimon is quoted as saying, “When I went to Rome, I saw the Menorah there.”

He actually received an answer from the Papal Nuncio denying that the vatican had them.

The article goes on to say that the Vatican would definitely not have the keilim because the vatican is in fact a newish invention. It was only around from the year 700CE. The places that the keilim were housed have long been destroyed and pillaged. Also the Vatican has been accused of keeping many Jewish books under lock and key. This is also untrue as most of the manuscripts which it holds are available online for scholarly study.

The Lubliner Rov - Rav Meir Shapira wrote a scholarly article on the "blood on the paroches" machlokes as mentioned above.

He brings another mention of the Paroches in Gittin -

Rav Meir Shapira asks - maybe the blood that was on the Paroches that Rav Elazar ben Yosi saw in Rome was not because of the sprinklings of the Kohein gadol on Yom Kippur but because of the blood that came out when Titus ran it through with a sword and a miracle occured. The destruction had taken place and this occurrence with Titus had taken place and then the Parochet was taken to Rome when it was seen by Rav Elazar ben Yosi.

So Rabbi Elazar ben Yosi saying that he saw blood on the parochet is not necessarily a proof that they sprinkled blood on the curtain.

Also we can ask why should a miracle be performed for this Rosho ?

Why should he have the zechus that a special nes would happen for him.

Also the Rosh says on massechet Tamid that they had two Parochot.

If one got dirty or stained they would swap over and put up a new paroches.

Also the Rosh says on massechet Tamid that they had two Parochot.

If one got dirty or stained they would swap over and put up a new paroches.

So how could it be that from Yom Kippur to Tisha B’Av they would have left the Parochet spoiled and tarnished with blood. They would have changed it and put on another one if it had got bloody. This also seems to contradict R, Elazar ben Yosi who holds that the blood was actually sprinkled on the parochet and says his proof was because he saw blood on the curtain in Rome.

Rav Shapira says that in reality it was as Rav Elazar ben Yosi said and that on Kippur the blood was sprinkled directly on the curtain but because of the great holiness of the parochet the curtain would mavlia – absorb the blood completely so that there was no evidence of the blood from the outside at all. That was the nes – this ensured that the parochet was never seen in an undignified state and was able to be seen in all its glory and splendour.

But when Titus HaRosha came and ran it through it lost its nes character and the blood that was held inside it poured out. The nes was not performed for Titus – it was Titus that disrupted and desecrated the sanctity of the nes.

Titus did not know the Lomdus – he thought he had killed clapei ma’aleh.