ושימש תלמידי חכמים הרבה, מפני מה מת בחצי ימיו? ולא היה אדם מחזירה דבר. פעם אחת נתארחתי אצלה והיתה מסיחה כל אותו מאורע. ואמרתי לה: בתי, בימי נדותך מה הוא אצלך? אמרה לי: חס ושלום, אפילו באצבע קטנה לא נגע [בי]. בימי לבוניך מהו אצלך? אכל עמי ושתה עמי וישן עמי בקירוב בשר, ולא עלתה דעתו על דבר אחר. ואמרתי לה: ברוך המקום שהרגו, שלא נשא פנים לתורה. שהרי אמרה תורה: ״ואל אשה בנדת טומאתה לא תקרב״. כי אתא רב דימי, אמר: מטה חדא הואי. במערבא אמרי: אמר רב יצחק בר יוסף, סינר מפסיק בינו לבינה.
and served Torah scholars extensively, why did he die at half his days? Where is the length of days promised him in the verse? No one would respond to her astonishment at all. Eliyahu said: One time I was a guest in her house, and she was relating that entire event with regard to the death of her husband. And I said to her: My daughter, during the period of your menstruation, how did he act toward you? She said to me: Heaven forbid, he did not touch me even with his little finger. And I asked her: In the days of your white garments, after the menstrual flow ended, and you were just counting clean days, how did he act toward you then? She said to me: He ate with me, and drank with me, and slept with me with bodily contact and, however, it did not enter his mind about something else, i.e., sex. And I said to her: Blessed is God who killed him for this sin, as your husband did not show respect to the Torah. The Torah said: “And to a woman in the separation of her impurity you should not approach” (Leviticus 18:19), even mere affectionate contact is prohibited. The Talmud relates that when Rav Dimi came from Eretz Yisrael to Babylonia, he said: That student did not actually sleep with her with bodily contact; rather, it was in one bed that they slept without contact. In the West, in Eretz Yisrael, they say that Rav Yitzḥak bar Yosef said: When they would sleep together in one bed, she wore a belt [sinar] from the waist down that would separate between him and her. Nevertheless, since the matter is prohibited, that student was punished.