One-Page Learn · The Halachos at a glance
טֻמְאַת מֵת
Defilement by a Corpse 6-8
Sefer Taharah · The materials impurity can never touch, the covering stone that conveys it anyway, the doorway and the intention that decide where it goes, and the lime poured over ground nobody is sure about
7
Days of impurity for touching the covering stone of a grave
40
Se'ah of liquid that puts a wooden container beyond impurity
4
Handbreadths of doorway required where a full corpse lies within
20
Years back a witness may reach to say no grave was here
Ch 6What cannot be defiled, and what defiles anyway
- Whole categories stand outside the system. Keilim made from the bones or skin of a fish, the green moss on the surface of the water and everything else that comes from the sea, and keilim of animal turds, stone or raw earth, receive no impurity from the Torah or from the Sages, for corpse impurity or any other kind; the same applies to containers made to be left in place, a chest, a cabinet, or a beehive shaped container holding forty se'ah of liquid with a base, called oversized wooden containers. (6:1, 6:2)
- Earthenware is defiled through its inner space alone. Flat implements of wood and earthenware are pure while those that serve as containers are susceptible; a corpse touching the outer surface of an earthenware container does not defile it, impurity entering its inner space does, and a container with a cover fastened to it stays pure along with its contents even in the tent of a corpse. (6:3)
- A gollel made of immune materials still conveys seven days. A stone, a vessel made from earth, an oversized wooden container, a fastened earthenware container or fish skin placed on a grave gives the impurity that lasts seven days to whoever touches it; should it cease serving as a gollel, or the corpse be removed, it is pure. A tied animal used as a gollel behaves the same way, and a sealed barrel of liquids conveys the impurity while the barrel and the liquids stay pure. (6:4)
- Only the portion over the opening counts. A beam used as a gollel is impure only in the part above the opening of the grave and one who touches the end lying outside is pure; a beam standing upright is gollel for the four handbreadths immediately above the grave unless the upper portions will never be cut off, and a mound of small stones is gollel only in the inner layer that covers the grave. (6:5, 6:7)
- An open route ends the impurity. Where two stones of four handbreadths by four served as a gollel, one who stands over either is impure; once one of them is removed, one who stands over the other is pure, because the impurity has a path through which to depart. (6:6)
RememberA stone cannot contract impurity. Set it over a grave and it conveys seven days to anyone who touches it, and lift it off and it is a stone again.
Ch 7Openings, intentions, and a single handbreadth of air
- A sealed structure is a closed grave. A corpse in a closed structure, or in one whose doorframe was destroyed and then blocked up, imparts impurity to all its surroundings, and touching the back or the roof gives seven day impurity; where an entrance was opened and later closed with the doorframe intact, the back and roof are pure and only the area in front of the door is impure. (7:1)
- The measure of a doorway. A full corpse in the building requires an entrance of four handbreadths, an olive sized portion requires one handbreadth, and any portion larger than an olive sized portion is treated as an entire corpse and requires the four. (7:1)
- An intention opens a door. Where many entrances are all closed they all defile, and opening one, or intending to remove the corpse through one even after the death, or fixing on a window four handbreadths by four, or hollowing out an area four handbreadths by four, saves all the others; relatives may replace a chosen northern entrance with the southern one and purify it, provided they do not say so as a ruse, in which case both defile. (7:2)
- Impurity leaves the way it came in. Where several houses open onto an exedra, the gateway and the houses are impure if the corpse is usually carried out through the exedra and the houses are pure if not; a corpse brought into a closed room through an open window leaves the outer part of the house pure, since the impurity departs through the window it entered by. (7:3)
- A cubic handbreadth decides everything above. A grave defiles its surroundings only where there is empty space a handbreadth long, wide and high above the corpse, and then a structure built over that space up to the heavens is grave in its entirety; where the impurity is flush with its covering it pierces through upward and downward and does not defile the sides, and a sukkah rested against a wall holding flush impurity is impure once a roof is over it. (7:4, 7:5, 7:7)
RememberA settled intention about which doorway will be used changes the status of every other wall in the building, and a ruse changes nothing.
Ch 8Ground nobody is certain about
- A lost grave compromises the whole field. Its earth imparts impurity when touched or carried, one who stands over any part of the field is impure, and everything inside a structure built there is impure; a loft whose entrance sits directly above the house entrance is pure, while a loft whose entrance is offset is impure, since it may be projecting over the grave. (8:1, 8:2)
- Sow it, do not plant it. Any seeds may be sown there because their roots do not reach the grave, while fruit trees may not be planted because theirs will; low hills near a town and near a cemetery or its road are presumed impure whether ancient or new, because women bury there what they miscarry and lepers bury their limbs, while distant hills are pure if new and impure if ancient. (8:3)
- A field for weeping is pure and still off limits. Its earth is pure since it has not been established that anyone is buried there, yet nothing may be planted or sown so that people will not frequent it, because the owner has despaired of the land and someone may bury a corpse there; its earth may nevertheless be used to make ovens for cooking sacrificial meat. (8:4)
- Where a body is found is where it is buried. A grave discovered on one's property may be disinterred and reburied while a grave known to be in a field may not, and a grave that harms the public is disinterred with its place left impure and forbidden to benefit from; a meit mitzvah found within the Sabbath limits is brought to the cemetery, and one found outside them acquires its place and is buried there, even in a field of saffron. (8:5, 8:6, 8:7)
- Lime, and not too much of it. A discovered grave imparts impurity retroactively unless someone testifies it was definitely not there, even reaching back twenty years; agents of the court go out during Chol HaMoed to pour lime over doubtful places, extending the mark somewhat past the impurity so pure articles are not ruined and not much past it so as not to spoil Eretz Yisrael, and when all four boundary lines of a field are designated the lines are pure and the entire field is impure. (8:8, 8:9, 8:11)
RememberMark all four sides of a field and you have not been thorough. You have declared the entire field impure.