Tafsiran Bilangan 19:21: Rashi, Kli Yakar, Rabbeinu Bahya & Siftei Chakhamim

ומזה מי הנדה AND HE THAT SPRINKLED THE WATER OF SPRINKLING [SHALL WASH HIS GARMENTS] — Our Rabbis said that the one who sprinkles remains clean, and this statement is intended to intimate that one who bears the waters of purification becomes unclean with a more stringent uncleanness, in that he renders unclean the garments that are upon him (for it states here that he shall wash his garments), which is not so in the case of one who only touches these waters. And this fact that it here expresses it (the idea of “bearing the waters”) by the term “he that sprinkles” is only to tell you that they (the waters) do not render a person who bears them unclean unless they contain a quantity capable of being sprinkled (Yoma 14a).

And he who sprinkles the water of sprinkling shall wash his clothes. Most commentators have gone out to gather [explanations] but have not found a sufficient reason why the [red] heifer, which purifies the impure, would make the pure impure. Now, incline your ear and listen, for we find that no food is susceptible to impurity until water falls upon it. How is it possible that water, whose source is purity, would cause impurity? Rather, the explanation of the matter is as follows: It is natural that everything is only affected by its opposite, not by what is of its own kind. This is similar to how the evil inclination provokes Israel more than the nations, and Torah scholars more than anyone else (Sukkah 52a), because they are all opposite to it, therefore it wants to overcome them. This is the reason why darkness intensifies just before dawn, because everything is affected specifically by its opposite. Therefore, no food or seed is affected by impurity to make an impression until water, which is all purity, comes upon it. Then the impurity wants to defeat the purity, overcomes it, and makes an impression on it. Similarly, the water of sprinkling contains water which is all purity, and the ashes of the [red] heifer which is all impurity, and they are mixed together. Therefore, if the water of sprinkling is thrown on an impure person, the person is not affected by the ash because it is of his kind [both being impure], but he is affected by the water which is opposite to him, because he is impure and the water is pure. Therefore, the water acts upon him and overcomes the impurity. But a pure person who carries the water of sprinkling is not affected by the water because it is of his kind, as both are pure, but he is affected by the ash which is opposite to him, because he is pure and the ash is impure. Therefore, the ash acts upon him and makes an impression to make him impure.

ומזה מי הנדה יכבס בגדיו, “the one who administers the ash/water mixture has to wash his clothes.” Seeing that he himself is ritually pure and he administers the ash/water mixture to a ritually impure person why should he be required to immerse his clothing in a ritual bath? The reason is that in the process of sprinkling the ash/water mixture on the ritually impure person some of it may have splashed his clothing. This is what I have heard as an explanation of this halachah. However, the collective opinion of the sages in Yuma 14 is that the person concerned does not need to immerse his clothing in a ritual bath at all. The sages there understand the word מזה in our verse to mean נושא, “carries.” The reason why the Torah chooses the unusual word מזה to describe carrying is that the amount of water needed to wash the clothes in question is no larger than the amount of the ash/water mixture needed to sprinkle on the ritually impure person, just enough water as is absorbed by dipping the tips of the hyssop stalks in the mixture.

והנגע…יטמא AND HE THAT TOUCHETH … SHALL BE UNCLEAN, but does not require washing of his garments.