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Text Excerpt
מוכי שחין עושין בירושלים, הולך לו ערב פסח אצל הרופא, וחותכו עד שמניח בו כשערה, ותוחבו בסירא, ונמשך ממנו,
the people afflicted with boils, whose limbs were dangling due to their affliction, act in Jerusalem: Each of them would go on Passover eve to the doctor, who would cut the affected limb almost completely until he would leave it connected by a hairbreadth of flesh, so that neither the doctor nor the afflicted would be rendered ritually impure by a severed limb. Then, the doctor would impale the limb on a thorn attached to the floor or the wall, and the afflicted would pull away from the thorn, thereby completely severing the limb.
והלה, עושה פסחו והרופא עושה פסחו, ורואה אני שהדברים קל וחומר.
And that person afflicted with boils would perform the rite of his Paschal offering, and the doctor would perform the rite of his Paschal offering, as neither had come into contact with the limb once it was severed. In any case, as long as it was dangling, the limb did not impart impurity. And I consider that these matters can be derived from an a fortiori inference. If a person’s limb, the impurity of which when amputated is severe, does not impart impurity when it is dangling, it is all the more so logical that an animal’s limb, the impurity of which when amputated is lenient, does not impart impurity when it is dangling.
גמ׳ תנן התם: המוחק את הכרישה, והסוחט בשערו ובכסותו – משקין שבתוכו אינם ב״כי יותן״, והיוצאין ממנו הרי הן ב״כי יותן״.
Talmud: We learned in a Mishnah elsewhere (Makhshirin 1:5): With regard to one who forcefully wipes rainwater from the surface of a leek or squeezes out water absorbed in his hair or in his clothing, the liquid that remains within it is not included under the rubric of the verse: “If water be put upon the seed, and some of their carcass fall on it, it is impure for you” (Leviticus 11:38). Therefore, it cannot render food susceptible to contracting ritual impurity. But the liquid that is released from it, in this process of wiping or squeezing, is included under the rubric of the verse: “If water be put,” and therefore it renders any food it touches susceptible to ritual impurity, as the person has accorded it significance.