Chullin, Chapter 9, Mishnah 2. The previous mishnah established the general rule that or, the skin of an animal, does not itself convey tumah the way the flesh does. Skin can be joined to the meat to help reach the minimum measure of a k'beitzah, but on its own it carries no tumah. Our mishnah now qualifies that rule: there are certain skins that are soft and edible enough that the halachah regards them as meat rather than as hide.
The List of Meat-Like Skins
The mishnah opens: "Eilu she'oroteihen k'visaran", these are the skins that have the status of their own flesh for the laws of tumah. Because they are treated as meat, they can transmit tumah to something else, and not merely be joined to meat to complete a measure.
First on the list is "Or ha'adam", human skin. Then comes "ve'or chazir shel yishuv": the hide of the pig raised among people is tender and fit for eating, so it too is reckoned as flesh rather than as leather.
To this a third item is added by Rabbi Yosei: "Af or chazir ha-bar". In his opinion the covering of the pig that lives in the wild is also soft enough to be counted as meat.
The mishnah continues its list:
- "Ve'or ha-chatoteret shel gamal harakah", the hide over the hump of a camel while it is still young and tender.
- "Ve'or harosh shel egel harakh", what covers the head of a soft young calf.
- "Ve'or haparsot", literally the hooves' skin. The intent is not the hoof material itself, but the covering of the lowest stretch of the leg above it, the part usually trimmed away before an animal is flayed.
- "Ve'or beit haboshet", the hide of a female animal's genital region.
- "Ve'or hashilil", what covers an unborn calf.
- "Ve'or shetachat ha-alyah", the delicate hide found underneath the fat tail.
The Sheratzim
"Ve'or ha'anakah, veha-koach, veha-leta'ah, veha-chomet." Four species are named here: hedgehog, chameleon, lizard and snail. Of the eight sheratzim enumerated in the Torah, the Tanna Kamma holds that in these four the covering counts as part of the flesh, and it therefore conveys tumah.
"Rabbi Yehudah omeir: haleta'ah kachuldah." Rabbi Yehudah disagrees regarding one of them. In his view the skin of the lizard belongs with the other four sheratzim that the mishnah did not list, such as the weasel, whose skins everyone agrees are not treated as flesh.
When the Skin Is Worked
The mishnah now turns the ruling around: "V'chulan she'ibedan". Every skin on this list forfeits its meat-status once it has been tanned into leather. There is a second way this can happen as well: "o shehilech bahen k'dei avodah", if a person trod upon a skin long enough for that treading to count as one of the stages of tanning, the skin is already partly processed. In either case the verdict is "tehorin": such a skin no longer passes on tumah in the manner of flesh, since it has turned into hide.
"Chutz me'or ha'adam", with the exception of human skin, which conveys tumah in every case, even after it has been fully worked into leather.
Rabbi Yochanan ben Nuri's Position
The mishnah closes with a third view: "Shemonah sheratzim yeish lahem orot", taught by Rabbi Yochanan ben Nuri. The Tanna Kamma and Rabbi Yehudah had been arguing over a count, whether the meat-like coverings among the eight creeping creatures number four or only three. Rabbi Yochanan ben Nuri sets aside the premise of both. Each one of the eight, he holds, has a true hide, separate from the flesh and tahor, and so none of them transmits tumah through its skin.