Niddah Chapter 9, Mishnah 5: Blood Found Beneath One of Three Women in a Bed

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Niddah, Chapter 9, Mishnah 5. Much of this chapter is occupied with blood that turns up somewhere and the question of whom, if anyone, we may hold responsible for it. Here the Mishnah presents a case of shared sleeping quarters, where several women could equally be the source, and asks how each of them is to be treated.

Here is the case. "Shalosh nashim", three women, "shehayu yesheinos bemitah achas", who were asleep together in a single bed. Afterward, "venimtza dam tachas achas meihen": underneath one of the three, blood was discovered. The halachah in such a case is "kulan temeios", that every one of them is given the status of a temeiah.

Why should the other two be implicated at all, when the blood was lying beneath a particular woman? Because people do not lie perfectly still while they sleep. Over the course of a night a woman shifts and turns and may well have been lying, at some earlier point, exactly where the blood was later found. We therefore do not simply pin the blood on the woman above whose place it happened to be discovered; each of the three is a genuine possibility, and each is treated as temeiah.

When one of them examines herself

"Badkah achas meihen venimtzes temeiah", one of the three performed an internal examination and found that she was in fact temeiah, that there was uterine blood inside her. In that case, "hee temeiah ushtayim tehoros": the one who examined herself is temeiah, and the other two remain tehoros. The Mishnah adds "vesolos zo bezo", the women are cleared through one another.

The logic is straightforward. Once it has been established that one of the three was actively a niddah at the time, the blood on the bed has a ready and obvious source. The other two are then entitled to attribute the stain to her, and they need not examine themselves at all in order to remain tehoros. One woman's discovery resolves the doubt for her companions.

Women who are not expected to see blood

The Mishnah then closes off an avenue one might have thought to use: "ve'im lo hayu re'uyos liros, ro'in osan ke'ilu hen re'uyos", if some of these women were not at a stage of life at which seeing blood is expected, we nevertheless regard them as though they were.

Consider a woman who is past menopause, or a girl too young to have begun seeing blood, or a woman who is currently pregnant or nursing. In each of these situations blood is not the ordinary expectation. One might therefore have argued that the stain should be laid at the door of the woman for whom bleeding is normal, leaving the others tehoros. The Mishnah rules otherwise. In this circumstance that consideration does not help her. All three are viewed as equally liable to have been the source, and for this purpose they stand on precisely the same footing as one another.

The lesson of the mishnah, then, is that shared space creates shared doubt. Where three women slept side by side, the blood belongs to all of them until something concrete, such as an examination that identifies its true source, settles the question.

Original maamar

אות נדה ט:ה

שָׁלשׁ נָשִׁים שֶׁהָיוּ יְשֵׁנוֹת בְּמִטָּה אַחַת וְנִמְצָא דָם תַּחַת הָאֶמְצָעִית, כֻּלָּן טְמֵאוֹת. תַּחַת הַפְּנִימִית, שְׁתַּיִם הַפְּנִימִיּוֹת טְמֵאוֹת וְהַחִיצוֹנָה טְהוֹרָה. תַּחַת הַחִיצוֹנָה, שְׁתַּיִם הַחִיצוֹנוֹת טְמֵאוֹת וְהַפְּנִימִית טְהוֹרָה. אָמַר רַבִּי יְהוּדָה, אֵימָתַי, בִּזְמַן שֶׁעָבְרוּ דֶרֶךְ מַרְגְּלוֹת הַמִּטָּה. אֲבָל אִם עָבְרוּ שְׁלָשְׁתָּן דֶּרֶךְ עָלֶיהָ, כֻּלָּן טְמֵאוֹת. בָּדְקָה אַחַת מֵהֶן וְנִמְצֵאת טְהוֹרָה, הִיא טְהוֹרָה וּשְׁתַּיִם טְמֵאוֹת. בָּדְקוּ שְׁתַּיִם וּמָצְאוּ טְהוֹרוֹת, הֵן טְהוֹרוֹת וְהַשְּׁלִישִׁית טְמֵאָה. שְׁלָשְׁתָּן וּמָצְאוּ טְהוֹרוֹת, כֻּלָּן טְמֵאוֹת. לְמַה הַדָּבָר דּוֹמֶה, לְגַל טָמֵא שֶׁנִּתְעָרֵב בֵּין שְׁנֵי גַלִּים טְהוֹרִים, וּבָדְקוּ אַחַד מֵהֶן וּמָצְאוּ טָהוֹר, הוּא טָהוֹר וּשְׁנַיִם טְמֵאִין. שְׁנַיִם וּמָצְאוּ טְהוֹרִים, הֵם טְהוֹרִים וְהַשְּׁלִישִׁי טָמֵא. שְׁלָשְׁתָּן וּמָצְאוּ טְהוֹרִים, כֻּלָּן טְמֵאִים, דִּבְרֵי רַבִּי מֵאִיר, שֶׁהָיָה רַבִּי מֵאִיר אוֹמֵר, כָּל דָּבָר שֶׁהוּא בְחֶזְקַת טֻמְאָה, לְעוֹלָם הוּא בְטֻמְאָתוֹ, עַד שֶׁיִּוָּדַע לְךָ, טֻמְאָה הֵיכָן הִיא. וַחֲכָמִים אוֹמְרִים, בּוֹדֵק עַד שֶׁמַּגִּיעַ לְסֶלַע אוֹ לִבְתוּלָה: In a case of three women who were sleeping in one bed that was located adjacent to a wall, and blood was discovered beneath the middle woman, all of them are ritually impure. If the blood was discovered beneath the woman on the inside, closest to the wall, the two innermost women are ritually impure and the woman on the outside is ritually pure. If the blood was discovered beneath the woman on the outside, farthest from the wall, the two outermost women are ritually impure and the woman on the inside is ritually pure. When is that the ruling? It is when they passed into their positions on the bed via the foot of the bed; but if they passed into their positions on the bed via the side of the bed, over the place where the blood was discovered, all of them are ritually impure. If immediately after the blood was discovered, one of them examined herself and she was found to be ritually pure, she is pure and the other two are impure. If two of them examined themselves and found that they were ritually pure, they are pure and the third is impure. If all three of them examined themselves and found that they were ritually pure, all of them are ritually impure, as the blood must have originated from one of them. To what case is this matter comparable? It is similar to the case of a ritually impure pile of stones with an olive-bulk of a corpse beneath it, where this pile was intermingled with two ritually pure piles, and they examined one of them and found it pure. That pile is pure and the other two are impure. If they examined two of them and found them ritually pure, they are ritually pure and the third is impure. If they examined all three of them and found them ritually pure, all of them are impure; this is the statement of Rabbi Meir, as Rabbi Meir would say: With regard to any item that has the presumptive status of ritual impurity, it forever remains in its state of ritual impurity, even if one examined the relevant area or item and the source of impurity was not found, until it becomes known to you where the ritual impurity is. The assumption is that the impurity was not found because the examination was not conducted properly. And the Rabbis say: One continues searching the relevant area until he reaches bedrock or virgin soil, beneath which there is certainly no ritual impurity. If no ritual impurity is found at that stage, presumably an animal dragged the olive-bulk of the corpse from beneath the pile, and the pile of rocks is pure.

Inspired by R' Micah Greenland