레위기 11:29의 주석

וזה לכם הטמא THESE ALSO SHALL BE UNCLEAN TO YOU — All these statements regarding uncleanness that follow are not intended as a prohibition against eating them (not as טמאה ,טמא in vv. 4—7 in the beginning of this section which is the result of eating the animals mentioned) but refers to actual uncleanness, — that one becomes unclean by contact with them and is thereby forbidden to eat the heave-offering and the holy sacrifices, and to enter the Sanctuary.

וזה לכם הטמא. This is what is impure for you among the swarming things which swarm on the earth; considering that Torat Kohanim on the previous paragraph explained the word ואלה as teaching that eating living tissue of an animal causes impurity, the word וזה may be interpreted as comparing present legislation to previously announced legislation. Accordingly, this word teaches that our paragraph also speaks about אבר מן החי, teaching us that it is the limb size and not the size of the meat on it which determines when one becomes culpable regardless of whether we speak of mammals or swarming creatures.

The author quotes Rabbi Avraham Bing, of Wuerzburg, Germany who calculated that the numerical value of the word השורץ is equivalent to the numerical values of the word כשעורה, a measure that our sages established as the minimum quantity of bone of such a cadavar which has the ability to confer ritual impurity on those contacting it. [These numbers do not match, i.e word כשעורה having a numerical value of 601, whereas the word השורץ as spelled here without the letter ו amounting only to 595. Ed.] Later authorities question the relevance of this as the minimum size of such a piece of bone is not the size of a kernel of barley, i.e. כשעורה, but the much greater size of כעדשה, corresponding to the size of a lentil. I have heard an answer concerning this apparent inconsistency, by a statement that the author of the book שמרה רוחי in which this gimmatria appeared meant כשערה, “as the size of the width of a hair”. His words would then be in line with those expressed in a baraitha in Chulin folio 126 according to which the size of hole in an eggshell of the egg of such a teeming creature (the inside of which already contained the beginnings of an embryo) so that he who touches it on the outside is perceived as having touched that embryo, would need to be of that thickness. Our verse would hint at this, seeing that the word השורץ is spelled with the letter ו missing, i.e. as השרץ. Once we accept this the supposed numerical value of the word השרץ spelled effectively would match that of the word כשעורה, =595. Personally, I find all this difficult.

על הארץ, “on the earth;” as opposed to the ones “in the water.”

החלד — moustille in O. F.; (English = weasel).

Furthermore, the letter ו before the word זה does not have to mean that we are to make the legislation in this paragraph interchangeable with that in the previous paragraph (as is the usual function of this letter ו at the beginning of a new pragaraph), but to give us warning that an additional type of impurity is conferred upon the person contacting the dead שרץ, namely having contacted merely its blood. Touching or otherwise being in contact with the blood of a dead mammal does not confer ritual impurity on a person (compare Torat Kohanim on our verse).

והצב — bot in old French; (English = toad), which is like a frog.

The word לכם, "unto you," is explained by Torat Kohanim as excluding blood from such creatures making plants susceptible to impurity as opposed to water and certain other liquids. The word also means that impurity is conferred by such creatures only on Jews, not on Gentiles.

We need to examine why the Torah did not include the snake, the original cause of all ritual impurity, in the list of creatures whose carcass causes impurity on contact? Perhaps the reason is that the impurity caused by the serpent was of a spiritual rather than a physical nature. When the serpent dies, its body remains devoid of any vestige of spirituality so that impurity has nothing to attach itself to. We find a similar reasoning in Baba Metzia 114 where we are told that the reason the corpse of a pagan does not confer ritual impurity when one finds oneself under the same canopy with such a body is for this very reason. [The Talmud reports the prophet Elijah explaining that the term אדם is not applicable to pagans; hence their dead bodies cannot confer impurity by one being under the same canopy with such bodies. Ed.] Whereas the bodies of Israelites confer impurity when one is under the same canopy with them, this is because there is a residue of spirituality adhering to such bodies. [in kabbalistic terms there has not yet been a clean break between the fusion of soul (source of spirituality) and body which existed when the person was alive. Ed.] שרצים confer impurity by their bodies rather than by their spirits and this is why they confer such impurity only after they are dead. The impurity of the serpent by contrast is far more intense than that of the שרצים.

למינהו, according to its kind. The meaning of the word is that there are numerous categories of turtles and lizards. Even if there were only one category of lizards the Torah would still use the word למינהו. In Chulin 122 we find the following Baraitha: "when the Torah speaks of הטמאים, the impure ones (an unnecessary letter ה ), this includes the skin of the soft skinned שרצים being considered as part of their flesh [when the skin is attached to the flesh. Ed.]; I might think that this rule applies to all of the animals listed; to inform me that this is not so the Torah writes אלה in the following verse (30). To the question that the word אלה is a collective term including all the previously mentioned animals, Rav answered that the word למינהו separates between what was described in the previous verses and what follows from here on in." Whence does Rav know that the word למינהו is intended to serve as an interruption of what was listed before instead of telling us that there are several varieties of turtles and lizards? We must assume that Rav did not mean to invalidate the plain meaning of the verse, i.e. that there are different varieties of lizards. He considered the fact that on the one hand the word הטמאים is used inclusively to extend the ritual impurity to the skins of these animals. On the other hand, the verse immediately adds an exclusion by writing the word אלה. If the word למינהו had not been written in between I would not have known how to apply the inclusive ה in the word הטמאים and the exclusive message contained in the word אלה. Now, -even though the word למינהו - is required in its own right, it also serves to separate between what was written in the previous verse and what is written in verse 30. This also answers the question raised by Tossaphot on that folio that if the word למינהו acts as separating the previous verse from the following one, why did the Torah have to write the word אלה? (Tossaphot remain with the question). When you adopt our approach there is no problem even according to the opinion that the word הטמאים includes the legislation that the skin of these animals also confers impurity. If we follow the opinion of Rabbi Yehudah, the determining factor of whether the skin is treated like the flesh of the animal depends on the feel of the skin relative to the flesh. It does not depend on the verse these animals are mentioned in relative to other verses. [it appears that the main disagreement concerns the skin of the lizard which according to Rabbi Yehudah (Shabbat 107) would certainly not be considered as integral to the rest of the body. Ed.] At any rate, the word למינהו is certainly needed in its own right.

That is that He commanded us to [administer the laws of impurity] of eight creeping creatures. This commandment includes the impurity of the creeping creature and its regulations. (See Parashat Shemini; Mishneh Torah, Other Sources of Defilement 1.)