Ohalos, Chapter 16, Mishnah 2. Our mishnah opens by illustrating a principle taught at the close of the previous mishnah, and then moves on to two further cases: a potter walking past a grave with his wares hanging from a pole, and mounds of earth found near a city or a road.
The rule being illustrated is this: a movable utensil, no matter how narrow it happens to be, becomes tamei when it is positioned over a meis. Width becomes relevant only when we want the tumah to travel up into the utensil, spread across it, and then descend to something lying beneath it on the other side. For that, the object must measure a tefach across. To make the utensil itself tamei, however, no minimum width is required at all.
Keitzad? The kush in the wall
The mishnah therefore asks "keitzad," in what manner, meaning: give me a concrete case in which an object that is only "kolshehu," of the barest width, draws tumah onto itself. The example the mishnah chooses is one we would never have arrived at on our own.
The object is a "kush." The Bartenura explains that this is a long stick used by women in spinning thread. In essence it is a plain pole, and a plain wooden implement with no receptacle is not susceptible to tumah at all. What makes this one susceptible is the fitting at its end: there is a rounded metal ball through which the pole passes, with a small metal hook attached beyond it. Without that metal piece, the kush would be nothing more than pshutei klei eitz, an unfinished wooden object, and no tumah would attach to it.
Now set the scene. The mishnah says the kush is "tachuv bekosel": it has been driven into a wall and juts out horizontally into the room. On the ground below sits "kachatzi zayis mibasar hameis mitachtav," half a kezayis of flesh from a meis lying under the pole, out near the end that carries the hook rather than under the portion embedded in the masonry. Trace a vertical line upward from that flesh and it meets the pole. Then "vachatzi zayis me'al gabav": a second half-kezayis rests above the pole, clinging, let us say, to the wall itself right where the pole enters it.
Each half is aligned with the pole, one directly below it and one directly above it. But the two halves are not aligned with one another: the lower one is out toward the hook, the upper one is back at the wall. That is the force of the mishnah's words "af al pi she'einan mechuvanim," even though the two half-kezeisim do not line up one over the other. Nevertheless, says the mishnah, the kush is tamei. The half beneath it and the half above it join together through the pole to form a full kezayis of a meis. And the kush is far narrower than a tefach. This is precisely the illustration we were looking for: "nimtza hakush meivi es hatumah le'atzmo bekolshehu," the kush brings the tumah onto itself even though it is only the barest bit wide.
The potter and his pole
A second scene follows: "hakadar shehu over vehasal al kesefav." A kadar is a dealer in earthenware pots. Sal ordinarily denotes a basket, yet that is not its sense here. According to the Bartenura, sal in this mishnah means a carrying pole, the term being a contraction of "eisel." That word appeared earlier in Keilim, chapter 17, mishnah 16, in a mishnah discussing an eisel that contains a hollow deep enough to hold water. What our mishnah pictures, then, is the shoulder pole of a potter, his pots dangling from it.
So the potter passes by with the pole across his shoulders and pots hanging from it, and "he'ehel tzido echad al hakever": one end of the pole overhangs a grave, while the other end is of course overhanging the vessels hanging from it. If the pole is not "posei'ach tefach," if it does not measure a tefach in width, the mishnah rules "keilim shebetzad hasheini tehorin," the vessels on the far side remain tahor.
Imagine someone running over in alarm: "Don't use those pots! I watched the potter go by, one end of his pole was right over a grave, and the pots were hanging off the other end!" There is no need for alarm. So long as the pole is narrower than a tefach, the tumah does not travel across it, and the pots are unaffected. "Ve'im yeish basal posei'ach tefach, tmeiyin": only if the pole is a tefach wide do the vessels on the other side become tamei.
Mounds of earth near a city or a road
The mishnah's third subject is "hatlulyos," heaps of earth banked up like miniature hills. It speaks of heaps that are "krovos," close by, whether "la'ir," to a town, or "laderech," to a roadway. Standing before such a heap, I can usually judge whether the soil was piled up recently or has lain undisturbed for years. In this situation, rules the mishnah, that judgment carries no weight: "echad chadashos ve'echad yeshanos," the fresh ones and the aged ones alike are tmeiyos.
What is the worry? That a nefel might lie buried inside. A nefel is a baby that came out before its term, and is therefore tiny. Women would at times inter their nefalim in spots like these. And why does the mishnah single out the vicinity of a town or of a roadway? Because that is where it actually used to happen. A woman going out with a nefel had no wish to wander far from the settlement. Normally she would not go more than fifty amos by herself; for anything beyond that she would arrange for her husband to come along, and with him at her side the two of them would carry on to the beis hakevaros instead of stopping at some chance pile of dirt.
Accordingly, a mound far from a city gives me no cause for concern that a nefel lies in it. A woman would not have come out that far alone, and had she come with her husband, they would not have buried the nefel there but would have gone on to the beis hachayim. Near a city, however, it is entirely plausible that a woman slipped out, buried the nefel quickly, and returned.
And why should nearness to a roadway matter, even past fifty amos from the town? Because a different situation is being reckoned with: a husband and wife who left home with the nefel not long before Shabbos. They figured there was time to reach the beis hakevaros, do the burial, and get back. Along the way it becomes clear that they will not manage it, and having no alternative they place the nefel in a heap of earth beside the road and rush home before Shabbos arrives.
Therefore "harichokos, chadashos, tehoros": mounds distant from both city and road, which appear to have been heaped recently, are tahor. A woman would not have traveled so far unaccompanied, and had her husband come along they would have pressed on to the beis hakevaros rather than halting there. Similarly, if the mound stands far off a road, there is no reason to imagine travelers burying a meis there; if they were willing to walk that far off the road, they could just as well have completed the trip to the beis hakevaros.
"Viyeshanos, tmeiyos": but if the mound looks old, one that has stood there a long time, it is tamei even when it is far from a city and far from a road. Why? Because at some earlier point there may well have been a city right there, or a road right there, and the city or the road is simply no longer to be found.
The mishnah calls to mind something from our own neighborhood. Sitting between Boro Park and Flatbush is a vast cemetery, something on the order of a mile and a half in each direction. Why was it put there of all places? The explanation I was given is that this was once where the city ended. Past that point stood no homes whatsoever, only forest and open land, so the trees were cut down and a beis hachayim was laid out. Nowadays there are houses on both sides, and not merely houses but mile after mile of them. One never knows the past of a location. Our mishnah puts the identical observation to work in the opposite direction: no town is here today, but a town may well have stood here once. When the heap is new, though, that worry never gets started.
Defining near and old
Since the entire ruling hinges on nearness, the mishnah asks "eizehi krovah," which heap counts as close, so that even a recently made one is treated as tamei. Its answer: "chamishim amah," a distance of fifty amos, measured from the town or from the roadway. Anything beyond that is assessed purely on the basis of its age. And the fifty amos figure, as explained, reflects how far a woman would go unaccompanied to bury a nefel. Any greater distance and she would not have left the settlement without company, and once her husband was along the two of them would not have settled for a heap of earth but would have gone on to the beis hachayim.
And "viyeshanah," what makes a heap old, so that even a far-off one raises the worry that a town or a road stood nearby and has since been forgotten? For this the mishnah supplies a span of time: "shishim shanah, divrei Rabi Meir," sixty years, in the view of Rabi Meir. People generally do not carry a memory of what stood in a place more than sixty years back. It is therefore quite possible that this location sat beside a town or beside a road, with nobody left who recalls that town or that road. Such is the ruling of the Tanna Kamma.
"Rabi Yehudah omeir": Rabi Yehudah defines krovah differently. Near means "she'ein krovah heimenah," that there is no other mound closer than this one to the city or to the road. If I am standing before a brand-new mound, but another brand-new mound lies closer than it to the city or the road, then the one before me is tahor even if it falls within fifty amos. The reasoning is straightforward: had someone come out to bury a nefel, why would he pass by the nearer mound and continue to the farther one? Rabi Yehudah concedes the basic measure, that a mound not within fifty amos of a city or road is considered distant. His addition is that even within fifty amos a new mound will not convey tumah if a nearer one is available, since nobody chooses the farther option when a closer one is at hand.
As for the definition of old, Rabi Yehudah rejects the figure of sixty years. In his view old means "she'ein adam zoichrah," that no one recalls a time when this mound was not here. Ask the question: does anyone remember this mound being made? Does anyone remember a man standing here with a shovel? If nobody remembers, then presumably nobody remembers whether a city or a road once stood nearby either, and we must be concerned. But if someone does remember, "I recall exactly who piled up that mound and when," then even if it happened more than sixty years ago there is no concern for tumah, because that same person can be asked whether there was ever a city or a road in the vicinity.
Reviewing the mishnah
The mishnah began by unpacking the ruling with which the previous mishnah closed: even a very thin object, far less than a tefach across, pulls tumah onto itself. The case brought was a kush, the long spinning pole fitted at its tip with a metal ball and hook, driven into a wall. Half a kezayis from a meis rests on the ground below the pole toward the hook end, and a second half-kezayis lies above the pole against the wall. The two pieces do not stand one over the other, yet the pole unites them into a complete kezayis and turns tamei. A full tefach of width would be required only in order for tumah to climb to the pole, run along it, and drop down onto something else; for the pole itself to be rendered tamei, any thickness whatsoever will do.
The second case: a potter carrying a pole on his shoulder with pots suspended from it walks past a grave, one end of the pole overhanging the kever and the pots hanging at the other end. If the pole is narrower than a tefach, the pots remain tahor. If it is a tefach wide, they are tamei.
The third case: heaps of earth, where the worry is a buried nefel. A heap standing close to a town or to a roadway is tamei whether it is fresh or ancient. By a town, a woman may have slipped out unaccompanied and placed the nefel inside it. By a roadway, a husband and wife may have left before Shabbos, discovered that there was no time to reach the beis hachayim and return, and buried the nefel in a heap at the roadside.
When the heap lies well away from any town and from any roadway, we look at its age. A newly made heap is tahor: no woman would have gone out that distance by herself, and if her husband accompanied her they would have proceeded to the beis hachayim rather than halting at a heap. An ancient heap, however, is tamei, since a town or a road may once have been situated there with nobody left who recalls it.
What is near? Rabi Meir holds fifty amos from a city or from a road. What is old? Rabi Meir holds sixty years, beyond which people do not remember. Rabi Yehudah defines near as having no other mound closer to the city or road than it; in principle he accepts the fifty amos, but if one mound stands ten amos away and this one forty amos away, no one would have chosen the farther one, so the mound at forty amos is tahor despite being within the fifty. And old, for Rabi Yehudah, means that no one remembers when the mound was made. If someone does remember, "I recall the old farmer standing here with his shovel," then he would also remember whether a city or a road once stood nearby, and there is nothing to fear. But if no one remembers its making, we must reckon with the possibility that no one remembers the city or the road that once stood here either.