Halakhah su Levitico 12:2

And in tractate Yoma, in the chapter “The Appointee,”¹²⁴B. Yoma 30a. they said: “It is halakhah at a meal, that a person who leaves the dining room to urinate washes one of his hands and re-enters. But if he spoke with his companion [while he was out],¹²⁵That is, he didn’t just relieve himself and come right back, but socialized for a bit while he was out. he washes both hands and returns, he does not wash outside, but rather inside, returns to and sits down at his place at the table, and turns his face back towards his fellow guests.¹²⁶I.e., to confirm through eye contact that his fellow guests saw that he properly rewashed before rejoining them at the table. Indeed, that’s precisely the intent of the sequence of most of these particular actions prescribed for a guest returning to the table after urinating, according to Chavel, p. 473. Rav Hisda said, ‘They meant this only for someone returning to drink, but in if he’s returning to eat, he washes outside and re-enters. It is known that he has a delicate sensitivity about such things.¹²⁷Because you can assume that everyone washes their hands after peeing before eating (with their hands) without having to see it, while you can’t assume this for drinking, since as long as it’s from a cup, some might not care how clean their hands are.

And thus one needs to say words of Torah over the table, because even though one has said all the blessings he is required to say, and will eventually conclude with birkat ha-mazon, saying birkat ha-mazon will not exempt him from his requirement unless he speaks words of Torah. And so our rabbis said: “Every table over which they ate and said words of Torah, it is as if they ate from the table of God [Makom], as it is said, ‘He said to me, This is the table before the Lord,’”¹³⁹M. Avot 3:3, quoting Ez 41:22. that is to say, when they spoke over it words of Torah, then “this table is before the Lord.”¹⁴⁰Ez. 41:22. “And every table over which they ate and did not say over it words of Torah, it is as if they ate from the sacrifices of the dead. As it is said, ‘For all tables were full of vomit, no place [bli Makom] without excrement,”¹⁴¹M. Avot 3:3, quoting Is 28:8. that is to say, the words of Makom, i.e., God, are not mentioned there.¹⁴²R. Bahya, following M. Avot’s midrashic interpretation, also creatively attributes the use of the later rabbinic term for God – Ha-Makom – “The Place” to Isaiah’s Biblical Hebrew “bli makom,” i.e., “without God.” And all this is to instruct you that humankind [adam] was not created for eating and drink, but rather to engage in Torah. For this is what Scripture meant when it said, “for man [adam] was born for toil [‘amal].”¹⁴³Job 5:7. Our sages interpreted this in a midrash:¹⁴⁴B. Sanhedrin 99b. “’For man was born for toil’ – I don’t know if this is toil by mouth, or if it’s toiling in the Torah. When Scripture says, “The appetite of a toiler [‘amel] toils [‘amlah] for him, because his mouth craves it,”¹⁴⁵Prov 16:26. toil by the mouth is being spoken about. But this is exactly how I fulfill “For man was born for toil” when it refers to toiling in Torah, so I say it means “for toiling in Torah he was born.”¹⁴⁶In other words, R. Bahya has it both ways, since you use your mouth to “toil in Torah,” that is, by speaking words of Torah. And so they said in another midrash: Just as in the Creation, He created domestic and wild animals, birds, reptiles and swarming things, and after that created Adam, as it is said, “And God created Adam in his image,”¹⁴⁷Gen 1:27. so it was written in the Torah “This you shall eat” and “this you shall not eat,”¹⁴⁸Lev 11:9,4. and after that Adam was born. This is why Scripture connects this parashah (“Shemini”) with the next one that begins “When a woman at childbirth bears a male,”¹⁴⁹Lev 12:2. to say it is for toil in Torah he was born. And thus right after that it is written, “On the eighth day the flesh of his foreskin shall be circumcised,”¹⁵⁰Ibid. 12:3. teaching that even before he was formed the Torah and commandments encircled him, and afterwards he was born. This is what it meant when it said, “When a woman at childbirth bears a male”¹⁵¹Lev 12:2. – that The Holy One Blessed be He imposed commandments before him and after him, and he is in the middle.¹⁵²In other words, even the syntax of the vv. 12:2-3 in Leviticus “sandwiches” the birth of a man between two commandments, one directed to his mother giving birth to him, the second, after he’s born, that he himself be circumcised. In other words, the man’s birth is literally surrounded by Torah and commandments. Circumscribed (and circumcised) by the Torah from his birth – of course that “proves” that’s what he was born for!This is what it meant when it said, “For man was born for toil”¹⁵³Job 5:7.– that for toil in Torah he was born.

We find a declaration of Rav Chisda (Yevamot 69b) to the effect that the daughter of a kohen widowed shortly after marriage to an Israelite may partake of terumah during the first forty days following consummation of her marriage despite the fact that she has become a widow in the interim. Permission to eat terumah is a privilege accorded an unmarried daughter of a kohen or a widowed daughter who has no children. The concern in the case presented to Rav Chisda is that the widow, unknown to herself, may be pregnant with child, in which case terumah would be forbidden to her. Rav Chisda argues, if the widow is not pregnant there is no impediment to her partaking of terumah; if she is pregnant the embryo is considered to be "mere water" until after the fortieth day of pregnancy. Therefore she may continue to eat terumah for a full forty days after her marriage. The ruling of Rav Chisda indicates that fetal development within the initial forty days of gestation is insufficient to warrant independent standing in the eyes of Halakhah. Another source for this distinction is the Mishnah (Niddah 30a), which declares that a fetus aborted less than forty days following cohabitation does not engender the impurity of childbirth ordained by Leviticus 12:2–5.²⁹It is perhaps of interest to note that Aristotle (De Historia Animalium, VII, 3) declares that the male fetus is endowed with a rational soul on the fortieth day of gestation and the female on the eightieth. This distinction corresponds not only to the respective periods of impurity prescribed by Leviticus but to the opinion of R. Yishmael in the Mishnah, Niddah 30a, who is of the opinion that the prescribed periods of impurity correspond to the number of days required for the animation of the respective sexes and therefore declares that no impurity results from the miscarriage of a female embryo of less than eighty days. Aristotle’s representation of animation as occurring on the fortieth or eightieth day, depending upon the sex of the fetus, was later incorporated in both Canon and Justinian law. See Rabbi Immanuel Jakobovits, Jewish Medical Ethics (New York, 1959), p. 175. Similarly, according to Mishneh le-Melekh, Hilkhot Tumat Met 2:1, the defilement associated with a dead body is not attendant upon an embryo expelled during the first forty days of gestation. Furthermore, in the opinion of many authorities, a fetus cannot acquire property prior to the fortieth day of development.³⁰Shakh, Ḥoshen Mishpat 210:2; Ẓofnat Pa‘aneaḥ, no. 59.