Makkot 21: Bald Spots, Self-Harm, Tattoos

In yesterday's daf (Makkot: 20b), we learn a new Mishna that directs the ways in which men should and should not cut their hair.  If this cutting is incorrect, the Mishna teaches that the men will be liable to receive different numbers of lashes.  

First, the Gemara discusses the creation of forbidden bald spots on one's head.  This could be purposefully or accidentally, perhaps from a person who has depilatory cream on the fingers and thumb of one hand and touched his hair.  Forewarnings and lashings follow the number of each one of these bald spots.  How big does a bald spot have to be?  The length of two missing hairs?  Or perhaps the size of a certain type of bean maybe a lentil or civilian bean?  The rabbis also connect this transgression with that of cutting on Shabbat, which is liable at the point of two hairs.  In fact, they consider Deuteronomy (22:5), which considers men wearing women's clothing.  This act of haircutting is considered to be connected to that prohibition.

Men are prohibited from cutting the extremities of his hair and rounding the corners of his head.  The rabbis debate about what these terms might mean.  They also speak about the beard, and the five points from which one must not cut.  Images in Steinsaltz describe the points from which hair must not be cut.

The Gemara notes that we are not permitted to cut ourselves over the bodies of the dead, and that each cut would make one liable to receive one flogging.  This act of self harm is not permitted as part of mourning rites, but it also forbidden more generally.  

We learn about tattoos in a new Mishna.  It states that one who imprints a tattoo by inserting dye into the recesses carved into the skin is liable to receive lashes.  However, if one receives a tattoo without carving the skin, or without imprinting with a dye - ink, kohl, or any other lasting substance, he is not liable. However, Rabbi Shimon ben Yehuda says in the name of Rabbi Shimon that one is only liable if G-d's name is written in the tattoo based on Leviticus (19:28).  That verse suggests that G-d is concerned that people do not inscribe anyone else's name of the Lord.  

Amud (a) ends with the first few thoughts of a new Mishna.  It names three examples of those who receive only one lashing for multiple transgressions.  These are a nazarite who drinks all day, a nazarite who exposes himself to corpses all day, a nazarite who shaves all day, and a person who wears a coat of diverse kinds over and over in the course of a day.  They are lashed multiple times if they are forewarned multiple times.  

A case of multiple punishments/lashings for one action is described, as well.  This would be one who ploughs a single furrow with an ox and donkey together, that are consecrated, and the field holds diverse kinds, and it is a Sabbatical Year and a festival, and the driver is both a priest and a nazarite, and the ploughing is in a place made impure by the presence of a corpse.  This is challenged - perhaps he is wearing diverse kinds, as well.  But the rabbis reject this, as that is a different category of transgression - just like the nazarite and priest would be punished not for ploughing but for doing this action near a corpse, which is a different category of punishment.  

The Gemara walks through each of these, of course.  At the end of our daf, the Gemara suggests other examples of multiple floggings resulting from one action.