Keilim, Chapter 10, Mishnah 1. This chapter returns to the subject of the tzamid patil, the tightly sealed covering. When a vessel is closed off with a seal that runs all the way around its opening, the tum'ah of a corpse in a tent does not penetrate it, and whatever lies inside remains tahor. Our mishnah takes that principle and works out its details: which vessels can do this, where the seal may be placed, how the vessel may be positioned, and what exactly the sealed vessel protects.
The list of vessels
The mishnah opens: "Eilu kelim matzilin betzamid patil," these are the vessels that shield their contents from tum'ah when a seal encircles their opening.
- "Kelei gelalim": vessels fashioned out of dried animal dung.
- "Kelei avanim": vessels of stone.
- "Kelei adamah": vessels formed of clay that was never fired in a kiln.
- "Kelei cheres": ordinary baked earthenware.
- "Kelei neter": vessels made of neter, a chalk-like earth. Their status parallels that of earthenware: they contract tum'ah through their inner space, but not through contact with their outer surface.
- "Atzmot hadag ve'oro": vessels made from the bones of a fish or from fish skin.
- "Atzmot chayah shebayam ve'orah": the bones or hide of other sea creatures, any living thing that comes from the sea and is not a fish.
- "U'kelei etz hatehorim": wooden vessels that cannot become tamei at all. A wooden container whose capacity reaches forty se'ah of liquid is too large to receive tum'ah, as the Mishnah will teach further on.
What unites this list is that none of these vessels is susceptible to tum'ah in the ordinary way, and therefore each of them, when properly sealed, can serve as a barrier.
Where the seal may be, and how the vessel may lie
"Matzilin bein bifneihem bein mitzideihen": these vessels protect whether the seal covers the mouth of the vessel or whether it covers a hole in the vessel's side. Even an opening in the wall of the vessel, which would otherwise let tum'ah in, becomes harmless once it is stopped up with a proper seal; the tum'ah has no way through.
"Bein yoshvin al shuleihen bein mutin al tzideihen": the position of the vessel makes no difference either. It may be standing upright on its base with the sealed cover above, or it may be lying on its side with the sealed part facing sideways. In every one of these arrangements the vessel does its work.
A vessel turned mouth down
Now the mishnah considers a case with no cover at all: "Hayu kefuyin al pihen." The vessel was overturned so that its mouth rests against the ground, and the join between the rim and the ground was sealed with clay. The interior is genuinely closed off, yet nothing was placed over it as a lid. Does the ground itself, together with the seal around the rim, count as a tzamid patil?
The mishnah rules that it does, and even goes further: "Matzilin kol shetachteihen ad hatehom," they shield not only what is inside them but everything directly beneath them, down to the depths. Normally the tum'ah of a corpse in a tent spreads not only through the tent but also downward into the ground below it. Here the sealed, inverted vessel blocks the tum'ah twice over: it keeps it out of its own interior, and it also keeps it from descending into the earth underneath.
"Rabbi Eliezer metamei": Rabbi Eliezer disagrees and holds that in this case everything is tamei. In his view, a vessel resting mouth down on the ground has no true tzamid patil, since there is no actual cover with a seal running around it, and the ground beneath cannot take a cover's place.
What each type of vessel protects
Finally, the mishnah draws a distinction between a sealed earthenware vessel and a sealed vessel of the other materials on the list. "Al hakol matzilin": all of these vessels, when sealed, protect everything held inside them, whether food, drink or other vessels.
"Chutz mikelei cheres, she'eino matzil ela al ha'ochalin ve'al hamashkin ve'al kelei cheres": earthenware is the exception. A sealed earthenware vessel shields only foods, liquids, and other earthenware vessels placed within it. Smaller vessels of metal, wood or cloth inside it are not protected, and they contract tum'ah.
So this mishnah gives us the full working picture of the tzamid patil: a defined set of vessels immune to tum'ah, a seal that functions at the mouth or at a hole in the side, a vessel that may sit or lie in any position, an inverted vessel that (against Rabbi Eliezer's view) protects even the ground down to the depths, and one limitation unique to earthenware, whose protection extends to food, drink and its own kind alone.