Negaim, Chapter 11, Mishnah 11. This chapter deals with nigei begadim, the negaim of garments and of the materials from which garments are made, and much of it turns on a single question: when are two parts of one piece of work considered joined to each other, so that a nega in the one affects the other, and when does each part stand on its own? Our mishnah applies that question to a loom in mid work, to the fringes of a sheet, and to the decorative border of a cloak.
These are the words of our mishnah, with a few of the terms in the final clause glossed as we go:
"Nir'eh b'shessi ha'omeid, ha'oreg tahor. Nir'eh ba'oreg, shessi ha'omeid tahor. Nir'eh basadin, soreif es hanimin. Nir'eh banimin, hasadin tahor. Chaluk (a cloak) shenir'eh bo nega, matzil (spares) es ha'imriyos shebo (its borders), afilu hein argaman."
The standing warp and the woven cloth
The shessi ha'omeid is the standing warp, the vertical threads stretched on the upright loom. The case here is one in which the weaving has already begun: at the bottom of the loom, by the koveid hatachton, there is a stretch of finished fabric, warp and weft woven together, two or three feet of real cloth. But nothing further is going to be woven onto it. The work is finished, and the remainder of the warp still standing bare above it, without any weft threads in it, is destined to be cut away. This is what the Rav means when he defines the shessi ha'omeid here as "she'ein asid le'erog yoseir", warp on which no more weaving will be done.
A warp of this sort is on its own capable of receiving tumas negaim. Whether its threads are packed tightly against one another or left with gaps between them makes no difference to the halachah, for we do not follow the view of Rebbi Shimon, who insisted that the threads be set densely. Consequently, when a nega breaks out in the standing warp, that warp becomes tomei; and although it is at this moment one physical unit with the finished cloth suspended beneath it on the loom, the mishnah rules "ha'oreg tahor", the woven portion stays tahor.
Turn the case around and the halachah runs along the same lines. "Nir'eh ba'oreg, shessi ha'omeid tahor": should the nega break out in the woven cloth, the bare warp above remains tahor, for that warp is in any event slated to be severed and discarded.
A sheet and its fringes
"Nir'eh basadin, soreif es hanimin." The nimin are the loose threads left over from the weaving. When the standing warp is cut, the ends of those warp threads remain protruding at the edge of the finished fabric, and they are generally gathered and tied together. Anyone who has looked at a woolen tallis will recognize them: those little bunches of wool bound together and running along the bottom edge are the nimin, the leftover strands of the warp.
"Nir'eh basadin, soreif es hanimin." The nimin are the surplus threads that the weaving leaves behind. Once the standing warp has been cut, the tips of those warp threads still jut out along the edge of the completed cloth, and it is usual to collect them and knot them. Anyone familiar with a woolen tallis has seen them: the small tufts of wool tied off along its lower edge are these nimin, the remnants of the warp.
Should the nega break out in the body of the sadin, the sheet has become tomei and is consigned to burning, and the nimin go into the fire together with it, because they are tofeil, subordinate, to the sheet.
As for how much fringe counts as part of the garment, this is set out in Keilim, Chapter 29, Mishnah 1, where different garments are given different measures: for some the shiur of the nimin is three fingerbreadths, for others six fingerbreadths, and for others any amount at all is included. The Rosh here cites the measure of six fingerbreadths.
A cloak and its border
"Chaluk (a cloak) shenir'eh bo nega, matzil (spares) es ha'imriyos shebo (its borders), afilu hein argaman." Imriyos means the garment's edging, the finished ornamental strip stitched along its hem and fashioned from a material other than that of the garment itself. Should a nega break out in the cloak, rendering the cloak tomei and subject to burning, that edging is nonetheless spared, and so it is even when the edging is argaman.
The Rav renders the phrase "matzil es ha'imriyos" as referring to the sfas habeged, the hem strip of the garment, "she'eino soreifo", which is not consigned to the fire together with it, and he traces the halachah to a posuk. The Torah writes "v'saraf es habeged", he shall burn the garment, and then adds "batzemer o vapishtim". What do those added words come to include? They teach that the burning applies to the garment in its wool or in its linen, and not to the garment along with whatever edging it carries: the edging joins the garment in the fire only when it too is wool or linen.
The very word matzil, "saves", is instructive. It is not that the garment protects its border; rather, the border is spared because it is a different material and not truly an intrinsic part of the garment. Now, had the mishnah stopped there, we might have limited this ruling to a border made of a material that is never subject to nigei begadim at all, such as silk, or threads of gold and other metal. The mishnah therefore adds "afilu hein argaman".
Argaman means wool that has been dyed purple. Wool in itself is entirely subject to nigei begadim; what removes argaman from that category is nothing other than its dye, and the opening mishnah of this chapter already taught us that dyed materials do not receive tumas negaim. One could still have reasoned that this exemption operates only while such material stands alone, and that once it has been fastened onto a garment which turned tomei it would be consigned to the flames along with it. Our mishnah rules against that reasoning: an edging of purple wool, even stitched onto the very cloak in which the nega broke out, is treated as a thing in its own right, does not take on the tumah of the garment beside it, and stays tahor.