Daf Reactions Zevachim 95: The Substances

GEMARA: The mishna teaches: If the garment became ritually impure outside the curtains, one tears the garment in order to render it ritually pure, enters the courtyard with it, and launders it in a sacred place. Ravina objects to this: How can the mishna say that one tears it? The Merciful One states in the Torah that one must launder “a garment” (Leviticus 6:20), and once this article is torn, this is no longer a garment, but only a scrap of cloth.

The Gemara answers: The mishna describes a scenario when he leaves untorn a fragment of the garment that is size enough for a small cloth. Is that so? If he leaves such a portion intact, is he still permitted to bring the garment back into the courtyard? But doesn’t Rav Huna say: The Sages taught that an impure garment, most of which has been torn, loses its impurity only when one did not leave of it enough for a small cloth, but if he left enough of it untorn for a small cloth, it is considered a joining of the pieces, and the garment remains ritually impure. Accordingly, leaving a piece that size would not serve any purpose with regard to ritual impurity.

The Gemara answers that Rav Huna’s statement means that it is ritually impure by rabbinic law, since the Sages decreed the small cloth impure lest one fail to tear a garment enough to render it truly pure. By Torah law, this small cloth is torn enough to be ritually pure, so that one may bring it back into the Temple courtyard to launder it.

§ Earlier (94b–95a), the Gemara discusses a garment upon which the blood of a sin offering has sprayed; if it has contracted ritual impurity outside of the Temple courtyard, it must be torn before it is brought back into the courtyard to be laundered. Reish Lakish says: If the robe of the High Priest upon which the blood of a sin offering has sprayed has contracted ritual impurity outside of the Temple courtyard, one does not tear it; rather, he brings it in to the courtyard gradually, in portions less than the measure of a garment susceptible to impurity, which is three by three fingerbreadths, and he launders it section by section as the robe crosses the threshold. The ritually impure robe must be brought into the courtyard in this manner because it is stated with regard to the High Priest’s robe: “It shall not be torn” (Exodus 28:32).

Rav Adda bar Ahava raises an objection based upon a mishna (Kelim 28:8): The particularly thick garments and the soft garments are not subject to the standard measure of three by three fingerbreadths, with regard to determining their susceptibility to becoming ritually impure. Because of their particular qualities, such garments are useful only when they are larger and are not considered significant items when they measure three by three. Since the High Priest’s robe is a thick garment, why must one bring it into the courtyard only in portions of less than three by three?

The Gemara answers: With regard to the whole robe of the High Priest, which is a garment of particular significance, even the small portions of the robe are significant due to their source garment, and are susceptible to impurity in portions measuring three by three fingerbreadths.

§ The Gemara asks a fundamental question with regard to the procedure for laundering a garment upon which the blood of a sin offering has sprayed: But isn’t it so that laundering requires seven abrasive substances? As Rav Naḥman says that Rabba bar Avuh says: Blood of a sin offering that has sprayed on a garment, and shades of leprous marks on garments, which are subject to laundering (see Leviticus 13:54), require the seven abrasive substances used as laundering agents; and these substances include urine (Nidda 61b). And it is taught in a baraita: But urine is not brought into the Temple, because it is inappropriate for the Temple, although urine is theoretically suitable for use in the preparation of the incense spices. Accordingly, how is a garment laundered in the Temple?

The Gemara rejects a solution: And if you would say that the urine is absorbed together with the rest of the seven abrasive substances used as laundering agents, and one applies all of them at once to the garment, such that the urine is not discernable separately, that is difficult: But didn’t we learn in a mishna that this method is invalid? The mishna states (Nidda 62a): If one applied them not according to their prescribed order, or if one applied all seven substances simultaneously, he has done nothing, and the laundering has not been effective.

The Gemara rejects another solution: And if you would say that the urine is absorbed together with only one of the cleansing substances, that is difficult: But didn’t we learn in that mishna: One must rub the garment three times with each and every one of those substances independently? The Gemara resolves: Rather, it must be explained that the urine is absorbed in tasteless saliva, which comes from one who has not eaten since waking; as Reish Lakish says: Tasteless saliva must accompany each and every one of the substances applied to the garment.