Keilim, Chapter 27, Mishnah 12. This chapter deals with the minimum measurements of cloth that allow a fabric to receive tum'ah. A cloth of three tefachim by three tefachim is large enough to serve as a seat, and can therefore receive tum'at midras, the tum'ah transmitted by the pressure of a zav or a zavah who sits or leans on it. A much smaller piece, three etzba'ot (fingerbreadths) by three etzba'ot, is still useful as a small patch and can receive the ordinary tum'ah of a garment. Our mishnah examines what happens when such pieces are damaged, incomplete, or discarded.
A cloth of three by three tefachim that tore
"Shalosh al shalosh shenikra": a cloth measuring three tefachim by three tefachim developed a tear. The tear did not split the fabric into two separate pieces; it opened up in one place only and did not run through the whole length of the cloth. Is such a cloth still a seat?
How can we tell whether the tear has ruined it? The mishnah offers a simple examination: "Im nitnah al hakisei", we lay the cloth over a chair and a person sits down upon it. Then comes the test, "uvesaro nogeia bakisei, tahor": if his skin reaches the chair through the opening, the fabric is no longer holding itself between him and the surface below. A covering that fails to cover what lies beneath it has stopped being a seat, so it is tahor and tum'at midras does not take hold in it.
"Ve'im lav, tamei": but if the tear is not that wide, so that when the cloth is spread on the chair the person sitting still does not touch the chair itself, the cloth is doing exactly what a seat covering is supposed to do. It retains its status as a seat, and it can receive tum'at midras.
A cloth of three by three etzba'ot that is missing something
"Shalosh al shalosh": now the mishnah turns to the smaller measure, a piece of cloth that is exactly three fingerbreadths by three fingerbreadths, with nothing to spare. Precisely because it is exactly the minimum, anything that eats into that measurement removes it from the category of a keli. The mishnah lists three such cases:
- "Shenimha mimena chut echad": a single one of its threads has rubbed away and is no longer there.
- "O shenimtza bo kesher": the piece turns out to contain a knot, and the knot swallows up part of the measure.
- "O shenei chutin mat'imin": two threads are seen matching one another side by side, the sign that a pair of threads had ripped and were then tied to each other.
In all of these cases the mishnah rules "tehorah." The cloth is tahor and does not receive tum'ah, because what remains of it now measures less than the required three etzba'ot by three etzba'ot.
Thrown out and taken back in
"Shalosh al shalosh shehishlichah ba'ashpah, tehorah": a person took a cloth of three etzba'ot by three etzba'ot and threw it onto the garbage heap. It is tahor. By discarding it he has declared, through his own action, that the piece has no value or importance to him. It is not something he intends to use, and therefore it is not a keli at all.
"Hechezirah, temeiah": should he go back, pick the piece up off the heap and carry it indoors again, it becomes fit to receive tum'ah once more. The very act of bringing it into the house announces that the scrap does have worth in his eyes and that he counts it as something.
"Le'olam hashlachatah metaharatah vehachzaratah metam'atah": the mishnah formulates this as a standing rule. Throwing the cloth out always renders it tahor, and bringing it back into the house always renders it capable of tum'ah, and this holds even if he threw it away and brought it back on that very same day.
The fabrics that never lose their value
"Chutz mishel argaman veshel zehorit tovah": there are exceptions to the rule. Cloth dyed purple, and fine crimson-dyed cloth, are costly materials. Because of their expense, even when they are found lying in the garbage they do not lose their importance. Throwing such a fabric away does not succeed in stripping it of its status, and it remains able to receive tum'ah.
"Rabbi Eliezer omer, af matlit chadashah kayotzei vahen": Rabbi Eliezer adds a patch of new material to this list. New fabric, too, retains its importance no matter what, and does not become insignificant even when it is thrown onto the garbage heap.
Rabbi Shimon: the reason these fabrics were singled out
"Rabbi Shimon omer": Rabbi Shimon rejects this entire distinction as far as tum'ah goes. "Kulan tehorin", he says: fabric of every sort, purple and crimson included, forfeits its significance the moment it has been cast out, and all such pieces are tahor. And why were these two named at all? "Lo hizkiru", they were brought up only "mipnei hashavat aveidah."
What, then, moved the Chachamim to mention purple and crimson? According to Rabbi Shimon their point belonged to an altogether different area of halachah: hashavat aveidah, the mitzvah of restoring lost property to its owner. Someone who comes across purple or crimson cloth lying on a refuse heap may not conclude that it was thrown out on purpose; material of such value must have ended up there by accident, and he is bound to pick it up and bring it back to whoever owns it. Plain cloth found in the same place tells a different story: presumably it really was discarded, and its owner has already despaired of ever seeing it again. Once ye'ush has set in, the owner's ownership lapses, the finder carries no duty of return, and he may keep the scrap for himself.
The mishnah thus teaches us how closely the status of a keli is bound up with a person's own attitude toward it. A tear that lets the flesh through, a missing thread in a minimum-sized patch, and a trip to the garbage heap all say the same thing in different ways: this object no longer serves. And when the owner reverses that decision and carries the piece back into his home, the object is restored along with his regard for it.