Chullin 71: שֶׁטּוּמְאָה בְּלוּעָה אֵינָהּ מְטַמְּאָה

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The Mishnah on our daf turns its attention to a woman whose fetus dies in utero and the questions of ritual defilement that stem from that situation. According to the Mishnah, if the midwife reached into the womb and touched the dead fetus, she contracts ritual defilement of contact with the dead; the mother remains ritually pure until the fetus is delivered.

The Gemara explains that on a Torah level the dead fetus does not defile as long as it has not been delivered since this is a situation of tumah belu’ah – “swallowed defilement” – which does not ritually defile. The defilement contracted by the midwife is a rabbinic decree, lest the fetus’ head is delivered – which determines that the fetus defiles – and the midwife believes that it has not yet attained that status.

We explore the notion of postmortem fetal survival known as coffin deaths in history…

Chullin 70: חֲזִיר בִּמְעֵי חֲזִירְתָּא לָא לִיטַמֵּא

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Our Mishnah rules that an offspring acquires the sanctity of the firstborn only when the majority of its body, or the majority of its limbs, has emerged from the womb. If most of the body has not yet emerged, then the parts that have emerged do not possess the sanctity of the firstborn. Consequently, they do not require burial and may even be fed to dogs.

On our daf the Gemara presents a series of questions investigating the precise nature of the process by which the offspring becomes sanctified as a firstborn upon leaving the womb. It describes a number of unusual and even bizarre birth scenarios in order to determine whether firstborn sanctity is conferred in those cases. One of the Gemara’s questions clearly identifies the underlying issue:

“Rav Aḥa asked: What if the walls of the womb were opened? Is it the airspace of the womb that sanctifies—and that is present—or perhaps it is contact with the womb that sanctifies—and that is absent?”

In essence, the Gemara asks whether the fetus must come into direct physical contact with the cervix (or birth canal), or whether merely emerging from the womb—even without such contact—is sufficient to confer the sanctity of the firstborn.

Our daf offers two rival constructions of the uterine wall, and it is worth drawing them out with some precision, because the whole of what follows depends upon the distinction. On the first construction, the wall of the womb is a threshold and nothing more.

Its legal significance is exhausted by the act of passage: the fetus that traverses it has been born, and birth is what sanctifies. The wall, on this reading, is a boundary in the topological sense, a surface whose crossing is a legal event but whose substance carries no charge. We claim that sanctity is a function of location, not of touch; the operative category is peter rechem, the opening of the womb, understood as the fetus's own act of egress.

Chullin 69: הַמְקַשָּׁה לֵילֵד – מְחַתֵּךְ אֵבֶר אֵבֶר

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If a pregnant animal is slaughtered and a fetus is found inside it (whether alive or dead), the fetus is permitted for consumption without requiring its own ritual slaughter (sheḥitah). Two possible explanations may be suggested for this halakhic ruling:

The slaughter of the mother is regarded as if the fetus itself has also been slaughtered.

According to Rav, if a limb of the fetus protruded from the womb and later retracted, that limb is not rendered permissible through the slaughter of the mother. Rabbi Yoḥanan, however, maintains that a limb which protruded and then returned is rendered permissible by the mother’s slaughter.

Our sugya discusses a doubtful case involving a fetus that extended one of its limbs into the Temple courtyard (Azarah) before the mother was slaughtered:

“Rav Ḥananya asked: If the fetus extended its hand into the Temple courtyard, what is the law? Since the walls of the courtyard constitute a boundary with respect to sacrificial animals, do they also constitute a boundary for this limb? Or perhaps, with respect to this limb, they do not function as a boundary?”

We explore the notion of the azarah as a boundary space akin to the womb and the temple as axis Mundi…

Chullin 68: בְּהֵמָה הַמְקַשָּׁה לֵילֵד

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The fourth perek of Masechet Chullin begins on our daf. Entitled beheima ha-mekashe leiled – “an animal that encounters difficulty while giving birth” – its focus is on the laws relating to an unborn fetus in its mother’s womb at the time that the mother is slaughtered.

When an animal that is in labor encounters difficulty in delivery, and its owner suspects that it may die, one option is to slaughter the animal. Such a situation raises many questions – not about the animal itself, which can certainly be slaughtered and eaten – but with regard to its fetus. Generally speaking, we assume that ritual slaughter will permit the entire animal, together with everything inside it, to be eaten Just as all of the animal’s internal organs will become permitted by means of shechita, similarly the fetus, which at the moment of slaughter is part of the animal, will become permitted, as well.

If someone reaches into the mother and cuts off one of the fetus’s limbs and leaves the limb in the womb, when the mother is slaughtered, that limb may be eaten. This is not considered to be eating a limb from a living animal, which is prohibited, because this is a limb of an animal that has not yet come to life. In contrast, if he reaches in and cuts off an organ from the animal itself and leaves it in inside the animal and then slaughters the animal, that limb is prohibited because it is a limb from a living animal. Without this mishnah one might have thought that as long as the limb is inside the animal when the animal is slaughtered, it is permitted. The mishnah provides the general rule which explains this particular halakhah: if the limb is part of the animal’s body it is prohibited, but if it is not part of the animal’s body, because it is a fetus, it is permitted.

We explore the curious case of Ben Pakuah.

Chullin 67: וְאֶת נִבְלָתָם תְּשַׁקֵּצוּ

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On the closing daf of Perek Eilu Tereifot, the Gemara turns its attention to the passage in Sefer Vayikra (11:42) that forbids eating a variety of different insects and creatures that crawl on the ground.

Pri Chadash states that the standard is not determined by what most people find disgusting, but rather by the subjective reaction of the individual eating the food.

There remains, however, an important question: Is the permission to eat the worms limited to when they are consumed together with the flesh of the fish, or may they even be eaten by themselves?

We explore the notion of the sacred and the disgusting with the meforshim on Vayikra 11:11.

Chullin 66: מִכָּאן תְּשׁוּבָה לָאוֹמֵר אֵין תּוֹרָה מִן הַשָּׁמַיִם

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Our daf is the most important reflection on aggadic themes in the masechtah.

It begins with yesterday’s challenges given to Rabbi Yehoshua ben Chananya from the Roman Emperor. When he wishes to see the Lord, Rabbi Yehoshua offers to look at the sun, which is impossible. That much more so to look at the master of the sun, he explains.

The Gemara then considers differences between bulls and donkeys. It also considers the prohibition against mixing species when referring to grass, which is already mixed.

The daf then discusses Adam harishon and the bull he offered with one horn.

We are told a story about the sun and the moon where Rabbi Shimon ben Pazi sees the moon in competition with the sun, offering that one should be less bright - but not the moon! Rabbi Shimon explains that the moon continues to beg for G-d's mercy and to allow it to be brighter. The moon understands that though people count our months with the moon, it is written in Genesis that we use the sun to count. G-d eventually convinces the moon that other creatures who are 'the lesser' are still great.

We explore these themes with reverence and a midrasnhic eye.

Chullin 65: ״לְמִינֵהוּ״ אַרְבַּע פְּעָמִים

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While insects are not part of a Western diet, the Torah includes certain types of locusts among the “winged swarming things” that can be eaten (see Vayikra 11:20-25), offering both a description – those that “have jointed legs above their feet, wherewith to leap upon the earth” – and a list of names of the kosher species. The Mishnah (daf, or page 59a) elaborates on the description, requiring that kosher locusts must have four legs, four wings, leaping legs, and wings covering the greater part of the body; Rabbi Yosi adds that they must bear the name hagav – locust.

On our daf, the Sages discuss the four specific names mentioned in the Torah as kosher species of locusts – arbeh, sol’am, hargol and hagav – and what the Torah is including when it adds that each of these is permitted “after its kind.” Thus we find a baraita teaching that the arbeh is the gobai, the sol’am is the vashon, the hargol is the nippol, and the hagav is the gadi’an.

Chullin 64: סִימָנִין לָאו דְּאוֹרָיְיתָא

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A new Mishna presents Chizikiya's question: Where in the Torah do we learn that the egg of a bird that is not kosher is prohibited? The Gemara reminds us of bat ha'ya'ana (likely the ostrich or the Eurasian eagle-owl, a bird of prey), one of the birds in the list of non-kosher birds (Vayikra 11:16), where bat means daughter. It implies that the egg of the ya'ana, the unclean bird, is not kosher either. Chizikiya's question may not be necessary because of the principal ha'yotzeh min ha'tameh, tameh, anything produced by a non-kosher animal is also non-kosher.

We explore the halachot of eggs from from different sources.

Chullin 63: מִשְׁנֵה תוֹרָה לְאוֹסוֹפֵי הוּא דַּאֲתָא

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As we have learned, unlike other animals, the Torah does not offer clear indicators that allow us to recognize which birds are kosher, rather it offers a list of 24 non-kosher birds.

On our daf Rabbi suggests that the reason for this is because there are many more kosher birds in the world than non-kosher birds; it was therefore simpler to list the few birds that are not kosher, leaving us to understand that all the rest could be used in the kosher kitchen.

The challenge, of course is whether we can accurately identify all of the birds that appear in the Biblical list.

Chullin 62: כֹּל שֶׁנִּשְׁתַּנָּה שְׁמוֹ קוֹדֶם מַתַּן תּוֹרָה

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Unlike the case with mammals and fish, where the Torah gives identifying characteristics by which kosher and non-kosher types can be discerned, the Torah gives no such signs for birds. Instead, the Torah lists various types of non-kosher birds. Since these are the ones specified as being non-kosher, all the ones not listed are ipso facto kosher. That sounds straightforward enough, but there complications.

The Gemara indicates that simanim are sufficient to determine a bird’s kashrus, regardless of a tradition.

However, Rashi writes that simanim can be difficult to ascertain, and therefore rules that no bird may be assumed to be a min tahor unless it has a reliable mesorah. This view, set by Rashi, has been adopted by several rishonim and ultimately brought l’halacha by the Mechaber[5] and the Rama,[6] making the case for the turkey’s kashrus more challenging.

We focus on the turkey, the “Hindik” and the halachic problems it presents.

Chullin 61: לֹא נֶאֱמַר פֵּירוּשָׁן מִדִּבְרֵי תוֹרָה אֶלָּא מִדִּבְרֵי סוֹפְרִים

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When the Torah turns to the classification of permitted creatures, it does not legislate uniformly. For quadrupeds and for aquatic life it supplies positive, observable criteria—the split hoof and the chewing of the cud, the fin and the scale—by which any competent observer may adjudicate a species never before encountered. For birds it does something altogether different: it supplies no criteria at all, only a list of twenty-four forbidden names.

Abaye’s celebrated observation that: לֹא נֶאֱמַר פֵּירוּשָׁן מִדִּבְרֵי תוֹרָה אֶלָּא מִדִּבְרֵי סוֹפְרִים the avian signs were “not stated by the Torah but by the Sages” is read here not as a marginal technical remark but as a self-disclosure of the rabbinic system: an admission that, where Scripture withholds a definition, the chain of mesorah must itself constitute the law rather than merely describe it.

We follow this principle through the marsh-hen narrative, the contrasting case of fish, the medieval codification of avian mesorah by Rashi and Maimonides, its hardening in the Shulchan Arukh, the generalizing principle of the Chatam Sofer, and the modern test cases of the turkey and the Muscovy duck.

Chullin 60: מִכָּאן תְּשׁוּבָה לָאוֹמֵר אֵין תּוֹרָה מִן הַשָּׁמַיִם

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Our daf is the most important reflection on aggadic themes in the masechtah.

It begins with yesterday’s challenges given to Rabbi Yehoshua ben Chananya from the Roman Emperor.  When he wishes to see the Lord, Rabbi Yehoshua offers to look at the sun, which is impossible.  That much more so to look at the master of the sun, he explains.

The Gemara then considers differences between bulls and donkeys.  It also considers the prohibition against mixing species when referring to grass, which is already mixed.

The daf then discusses Adam harishon and the bull he offered with one horn.

We are told a story about the sun and the moon where Rabbi Shimon ben Pazi  sees the moon in competition with the sun, offering that one should be less bright - but not the moon!  Rabbi Shimon explains that the moon continues to beg for G-d's mercy and to allow it to be brighter.  The moon understands that though people count our months with the moon, it is written in Genesis that we use the sun to count.  G-d eventually convinces the moon that other creatures who are 'the lesser' are still great.

We explore these themes with reverence and a midrasnhic eye.

Chullin 59: כְּאַרְיָא דְּבֵי עִילַּאי מְתִיל

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The Gemara on our daf describes a lion of mythical proportions – the lion of Be-Ilai’i – and continues by relating the following story.

The Emperor once said to Rabbi Yehoshua ben Chananiah, ‘Your God is likened to a lion, for it is written:

‘The lion hath roared, who will not fear? The Lord God hath spoken, who can but prophesy?’ (Amos 3:8). But what is the greatness of this? A horseman can kill the lion’! He replied: ‘He has not been likened to the ordinary lion, but to the lion of Be-Ilai’i!’ ‘I desire’, said the Emperor, ‘that you show it to me’.

We explore the figure of ben Chananya.

Chullin 58: שַׁב שְׁנֵי אִימְּרַאי בָּקְתָּא מִבָּקָא

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The Gemara relates that people say that a mosquito can carry iron that is equal to the weight of sixty Maneh (one Maneh is equal to a hundred silver coins) on its stinger. RASHI explains that this means that its bite is very effective.

Why does the Gemara emphasize the painfulness of the bite of a mosquito in this way?

The MAHARSHA explains that the mosquito, which damages with its mouth, symbolizes a person who slanders others with his mouth by speaking Lashon ha'Ra. Such a person should not think that his words can do no harm, but rather he should know that his words can be extremely harmful.

We may apply this approach to explain the other incident involving mosquitoes recorded in the Gemara. The Gemara relates that a mosquito's wife quarrels with her husband for seven years when she discovers that he found a fat person and sucked the person's blood without telling her.

This symbolizes that Lashon ha'Ra harms even the one who speaks it. One who speaks Lashon ha'Ra believes that he suffers nothing, and that it is only the subject of his Lashon ha'Ra who suffers. The truth is that Lashon ha'Ra harms even the person who speaks it (see Erchin 16b). In the case of the mosquito, when the other mosquito hears that this mosquito bit (i.e. spoke Lashon ha'Ra) without informing her, she no longer wants to be his friend. (M. Kornfeld)

We explore the role of the mosquito as a metaphor as well as its place in literature.

Chullin 57: לֵךְ אֶל נְמָלָה עָצֵל

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The Gemara relates that Rebbi Shimon ben Chalafta wanted to see if Shlomo ha'Melech was correct when he stated that ants have no rulers (Mishlei 6:7).

How could Rebbi Shimon ben Chalafta have doubted the words of Shlomo ha'Melech? The Gemara in Bava Basra (75a) says that a person who doubts the statements made by the Torah scholars of the generation is a "scoffer" who deserves to be punished. (TOSFOS DH Eizil)

Rebbi Shimon ben Chalafta certainly trusted Shlomo's statement. He wanted to show others how Shlomo ha'Melech knew that ants have no kings.

However the question is not merely exegetical. It opens onto one of the most persistent problems in Jewish thought: the relation between knowledge that is received through revelation and tradition and knowledge that is won through observation and inference.

The principal medieval and early-modern commentators—Tosafot, the Maharsha, and, in his commentary upon Kings, the Malbim—took up the difficulty and produced answers so divergent that they amount to competing epistemologies of Torah which we explore, the relative weight of scientific epistemology vs the truths of tradition.

Chullin 56: אֲוָוזֵי דִּידַן כְּעוֹף שֶׁל מַיִם דָּמְיָין

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Having clarified issues regarding animals that are considered treifah, i.e. a terminal condition that will lead to the animal’s imminent death, the Mishnayot on our daf turn their attention to conditions that would render kosher birds as tereifot. In truth, as Levi points out in a baraita that appears in the Gemara, most of the laws of tereifot in birds parallel those of animals that were enumerated in the Mishnayot on daf 42a and daf 54a. Nevertheless, the ones that appear here are mentioned since they clarify rules and regulations that are unique to the situation of birds.

We explore the predatorily owl in bible Ancient near east and representation in poetry.

Chullin 55: שְׁאֵילְתִּינְהוּ לְכוּלְּהוּ טָרוֹפָאֵי דְּמַעְרְבָא

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The kidneys are essential organs that serve the body as a natural filter of the blood and remove wastes which are diverted to the bladder. Furthermore, they function as a regulator, maintaining the acid-base balance and regulating blood pressure by maintaining the salt and water balance). The kidneys also are responsible for the reabsorption of water, glucose and amino acids; they also produce hormones and enzymes. A human being whose kidneys are removed would face certain death, yet the stomachs of ruminant animals contain a mechanism that removes wastes to the stomach so that such an animal could survive even if its kidneys were removed.

On our daf, Rachish bar Papa teaches that although missing kidneys would not render the animal a treifah, if one of the kidneys is diseased, then the animal would be rendered a treifah.

Chullin 54: כַּמָּה חֲבִיבָה מִצְוָה בִּשְׁעָתָהּ

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Our daf relates that tradesmen are not allowed to stand in the presence of Torah scholars while working. Rashi explains that the Gemara refers to tradesmen who are employed by others rather than tradesmen who work for themselves.

Tosafos further elaborates that the phrase אינם רשאים – they are not allowed – implies that there is a prohibition for the tradesmen to stand for a Torah scholar.

Since there is no prohibition for a person to interrupt his own work to stand for a Torah scholar it must be that the Gemara refers to someone who is an employee of someone else. Tosafos maintains that the Gemara refers to a tradesman who works for himself and the phrase רשאים אינם should be understood that one is not obligated to stand.

Rabbi Ḥana the money-changer (paturaʾah) recounts that Bar Nappaḥa — Rabbi Yoḥanan — once stood over him and requested a Kurdish dinar in order to measure tereifot according to Zeʿeiri’s ruling. Rabbi Ḥana, recognising in his customer one of the towering sages of the generation, made to rise out of respect. Rabbi Yoḥanan would not permit it. He said to him:

“Sit, my son, sit; craftsmen are not permitted to stand before Torah scholars at the time they are engaged in their work.”

The Gemara immediately presses the claim. Is it truly the case that artisans need not rise? A Mishnah in tractate Bikkurim (3:3) appears to say the opposite: when the pilgrims ascend to Jerusalem bearing their first fruits, all the craftsmen of Jerusalem stand before them and greet them, “Our brothers, men of such-and-such a place, you have come in peace.” Rabbi Yoḥanan resolves the contradiction with a single distinction that has reverberated through the codes for a millennium:

before them — the bringers of first fruits — the craftsmen rise; before Torah scholars they do not rise.

Which we explore.

Chullin 53: אֵין דְּרוּסָה אֶלָּא בַּיָּד

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While the Gemara uses the term treifah to denote any animal with a terminal condition that cannot be slaughtered as kosher since it will die within a short amount of time, the single case of terefah that is mentioned in the Torah is when an animal attacks another animal and kills it (see Shemot 22:30). 

This most basic case occurs when the predator locks its claws on the body of the animal that is being attacked, and the poison in its claws enters the animal, threatening its life, According to the continuation of the Gemara, this poison “burns” in the body of the animal, injuring and puncturing its internal organs, which renders it a terefah.

The example of a terefah that appears in the Mishnah is a wolf, and Rav Yehudah quotes Rav as teaching that in the case of cattle it is “from the wolf and upwards,” i.e. either a wolf or animals larger than a wolf like a lion. Ultimately the Gemara suggests that this teaching comes to exclude the case of a cat that attacks in a predatory manner. While I might have thought that the Mishnah simply mentions ordinary cases of attacking animals, but that smaller animals would be included as well, Rav Yehuda teaches that in the case of cattle an attack by a cat would not be considered significant to render the animal a treifah.

A wolf, canis lupus, is a predatory animal, similar to a dog. It grows to a length of between 3 and 5 feet and an adult can weigh up to 130 pounds. Wolves live and hunt in packs, which allow them to hunt not only small animals, but larger animals, as well. An attack by a pack of wolves can cause serious damage to a herd of cattle.

A cat, felis, is a relatively small predator that weighs between 7 and 15 pounds. We are most familiar with the common house cat – F. silvestris catus – but there are numerous types of wild cats, as well. From the Talmud it appears that there were ferocious wild cats that lived in close proximity to human habitation during the time of the Sages. These cats attacked animals much larger than themselves, such as sheep and goats, and there is even reference to a case when a child’s hand was bitten off by such a creature.

Chullin 52: צֵלָע בְּלֹא חוּלְיָא אָמְרִי

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Our Daf discusses the status of an animal whose ribs are either uprooted or broken. Rav issued a ruling that if a rib became uprooted together with the vertebra to which it is attached, the animal is a tereifah.

The other rib which had been attached to that vertebra on the other side of the animal remained in its place. Rav Kahana and Rav Assi asked Rav what the halacha would be in a case where both ribs connected to a vertebra from both sides of the animal became uprooted, and the vertebra itself remained intact. Rav responded that this animal, although still “alive” is a neveilah.

The animal is, in effect, split into two and is legally a neveilah which can even convey tum’ah. The Gemara notes that Rav had just taught that if a rib and its vertebra are uprooted the animal is a tereifah.

This should necessarily mean that the rib on the other side is no longer attached to its vertebra either, as the vertebra has been uprooted with the first rib. Yet, now Rav is saying that such an animal is a neveilah.