Study Shabbat folio 12A with parallel Hebrew-English text, traditional commentary, and modern study tools. Free access to Babylonian Talmud online.
Text Excerpt
שלא ילקה הכותל — אינו ב״כי יותן״! מי דמי? התם לא קא בעי להו להני משקין כלל, הכא קא בעי ליה להאי כיס לקבולי ביה זיבה.
that the wall will not be damaged, it is not under the rubric of the verse: “If water be placed.” The water does not have the legal status of water poured for that purpose. This tanna does not consider protecting the wall from dirt as a significant usage. Similarly, protecting the zav from being soiled by the emission would not be considered a significant usage and the pouch used for that purpose would not be considered a significant vessel. The Talmud rejects this: Are these cases comparable? There, he does not need those liquids at all, and therefore the vessel is not considered to have been placed to receive them. However, here he needs this pouch to absorb the emission, to ascertain whether or not he experienced an emission. Although on that particular day he does not require the pouch, the zav typically requires his pouch for the purpose of ascertaining whether or not there is another emission.
הא לא דמיא אלא לסיפא: עריבה שירד דלף לתוכה, מים הניתזין והנצפין אינן ב״כי יותן״, ושבתוכה הרי זה ב״כי יותן״.
Rather, this halakha with regard to the zav is comparable only to the latter clause of the Mishnah dealing with rainwater, in which we learned: A bowl that the drip of rain from the roof dropped into it, the water that splashes or overflows from the bowl does not have the legal status of water collected for a purpose, and is not under the rubric of the verse: “If water be placed.” And the water that is in the bowl has the legal status of water collected for a purpose and is under the rubric of the verse: “If water be placed.” Although, fundamentally, one has no interest in the drip of water, once the water already dripped, he wants it to remain in the bowl and not dirty the house. That desire is sufficient to accord the water in the bowl the legal status of water placed there willfully. The same is true with regard to the pouch of the zav. In the current situation of the zav, he is interested in keeping the emission in its place, and therefore the original difficulty posed by the contradiction between the two baraitot remains intact.