Today's daf is the beginning of Perek V. We learn that following a cesarean section, a woman need not wait for the seven or fourteen days of ritual impurity, nor is she required to bring an offering after thirty-three or sixty-six days. Rabbi Shimon disagrees, saying that she is subject to the same halacha as that following normal childbirth.
We are then reminded that all women become ritually impure when blood flows from the uterus into the outer chamber, the vagina, even when it has not left the woman's body: "And her issue in her flesh shall be blood, she shall be in her menstruation seven days", (Leviticus 15:19). A zav, one who experiences any discharge and one who has a seminal emission (even the size of a mustard seed) do not become ritually impure until the emission of impurity leaves the body. Thus women are subject to ritual impurity much more easily than men.
Finally, the Mishna teaches that a priest taking teruma who feels quaking in his limbs or another predictor of an emission should hold his penis firmly to prevent the emission from leaving his body and swallow the teruma while he is still ritually pure.
Is a woman considered to be ritually impure following a cesarean section? She would normally be called ritually impure with tum'at leida, the impurity of childbirth (Vayikra 12:1-5). This would be the case even if there is no blood in the vaginal canal, says Rabbi Shimon. But the Tanna Kamma of the Mishna say that if the child born is a yotze dofen, that it emerges from the side of the body, then the laws of tum'at leida do do not apply to its mother.
Steinsaltz teaches us that a yotze dofen refers to any birth that does not progress in an ordinary way. Cesarian sections were performed on mothers who had already died. It has only been in modern times that women have survived cesarean sections done while they are alive. However, the Gemara seems to discuss several cases where a mother survives this surgery and goes on to have more children. It is difficult to know the details of this critical part of our history.
We are then reminded that all women become ritually impure when blood flows from the uterus into the outer chamber, the vagina, even when it has not left the woman's body: "And her issue in her flesh shall be blood, she shall be in her menstruation seven days", (Leviticus 15:19). A zav, one who experiences any discharge and one who has a seminal emission (even the size of a mustard seed) do not become ritually impure until the emission of impurity leaves the body. Thus women are subject to ritual impurity much more easily than men.
Finally, the Mishna teaches that a priest taking teruma who feels quaking in his limbs or another predictor of an emission should hold his penis firmly to prevent the emission from leaving his body and swallow the teruma while he is still ritually pure.
Is a woman considered to be ritually impure following a cesarean section? She would normally be called ritually impure with tum'at leida, the impurity of childbirth (Vayikra 12:1-5). This would be the case even if there is no blood in the vaginal canal, says Rabbi Shimon. But the Tanna Kamma of the Mishna say that if the child born is a yotze dofen, that it emerges from the side of the body, then the laws of tum'at leida do do not apply to its mother.
Steinsaltz teaches us that a yotze dofen refers to any birth that does not progress in an ordinary way. Cesarian sections were performed on mothers who had already died. It has only been in modern times that women have survived cesarean sections done while they are alive. However, the Gemara seems to discuss several cases where a mother survives this surgery and goes on to have more children. It is difficult to know the details of this critical part of our history.
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