Study Nazir folio 21B with parallel Hebrew-English text, traditional commentary, and modern study tools. Free access to Babylonian Talmud online.
Text Excerpt
ורמינהו: ״ידי נזירה״ ו״רגלי נזירה״ — לא אמר כלום, ״ראשי נזירה״, ״כבדי נזירה״ — הרי זה נזיר. זה הכלל: דבר שהנשמה תלויה בו — הרי זה נזיר.
And the Talmud raises a contradiction against this. If one said: My hand is a nazirite, and similarly, if he said: My foot is a nazirite, he has not said anything of consequence. However, if he said: My head is a nazirite, or: My liver is a nazirite, he is a nazirite. This is the principle: If one accepted naziriteship by means of an entity upon which life depends, i.e., a limb or a body part that he cannot survive without, he is a nazirite. Conversely, if he mentioned part of the body that is not essential for life, he is not a nazirite. In this case, as he referred to his hair, which is certainly not a vital part of him, he should not be a nazirite.
אמר רב יהודה, דאמר הכי: יעשה פי כפיו מיין, ושערי כשערו מלגוז.
Rav Yehuda said that it means that he said like this; this is what he intended: Let my mouth be like his mouth with regard to abstention from wine, and my hair be like his hair with regard to abstention from cutting it.
״הריני נזירה״, ושמע בעלה ואמר ״ואני״ אינו יכול להפר. איבעיא להו: בעל מיעקר עקר, או דלמא מיגז גייז? למאי נפקא מינה —
§ The Mishnah taught that if a woman said: I am hereby a nazirite, and her husband heard and said: And I, he cannot nullify her vow. A dilemma was raised before the rabbis: When a husband nullifies the vow of his wife, does he uproot his wife’s vow, making it as though she never vowed, or perhaps he merely severs her vow from that point onward, but her vow was still in effect until he nullified it? The Talmud asks: What difference is there resulting from this dilemma?