Niddah 20b — the Talmud in English

For only

Rabbi Hanina is wise

and can examine in this manner, but

everyone—

are not wise in this way!

Rabbi Yohanan said: Rabbi Hanina’s wisdom caused me not to look at blood,

[so that I would not see and rule concerning the appearances of a woman’s blood], for in the place where I

deemed impure—

Rabbi Hanina deemed pure. And if I

and where I

deemed pure, he

was—

deemed impure.

Rabbi Elazar said: Rabbi Hanina’s humility caused me to

look at blood only in this way.

And if Rabbi Hanina, who is humble, places himself in doubt and looks, -

should I not look?

Rabbi Zeira said: The nature

[the nature of the people]

of Babylonia caused me not to look at blood, for I said—

I do not know nature,

as I do not know how to distinguish between the various types of blood, such as whether the blood is from a human being or from an animal,

but blood I know

to distinguish within the blood itself

between the impure and the pure, all of which are one species and differ only in their color; certainly I will not know!

And the Gemara asks:

Is this to say that the matter depends on nature,

that examination of menstrual blood depends on recognizing the nature of the bloods and their types,

but Rabba is the one who knew nature and did not know blood?

And it answers: Rabbi Zeira was stating a “kal va-chomer”

—

And if Rabba, who knew nature, did not look at blood,

then

I,

who do not even know nature—should I

look at blood?! Ulla happened to come to Pumbedita, and blood was brought before him—

and he did not look. He said—

And if Rabbi Elazar, who was the master of the Land of Israel,

who was the greatest expert among all the scholars of the land in the appearances of blood,

when he happened to come to Rav Yehuda’s place

[Pumbedita]

did not look at blood

out of respect for Rav Yehuda,

should I look?!

And the Gemara explains:

And why did they call him

Rabbi Elazar

“the master of the Land of Israel”?

Because of an incident that occurred:

For there was a certain woman who brought blood before Rabbi Elazar,

and

Rabbi Ami was sitting before him

Rabbi Elazar.

He smelled it

Rabbi Elazar [he smelled the blood] and

said to her—

This is blood of desire

it is

for she saw the blood of desire that she had felt for her husband, and it is pure!

After she left

the woman,

Rabbi Ami attended to her

to question her,

and she said to him—

My husband was on the road, and I desired him!

Rabbi Ami called

Rabbi Elazar’s

concerning him

:

“The secret of God”—

“is for those who fear Him!”

And the Gemara brings another incident:

Ifera Hormiz, the mother of Shapur the king

[who was a gentile woman but observed the laws of menstruation],

sent blood before Rava

to examine it.

Rav Ovadia was sitting before him

Rava.

He smelled it

Rava smelled the blood.

He said to her—

“This is blood of desire!” She said to him, to her son: “Come see”—

“how wise the Jews are!”

He said to her

her son:

Perhaps he is like a blind man—

in a skylight

; he might tell you that he succeeded only by chance?!

She sent it again

to Rava,

sixty [60]

types of blood, and he identified all of them

Rava said what they were.

That last one,

the last blood,

was lice blood, and he did not know

Rava what it was.

The matter was assisted, and he sent her

Rava a gift,

a comb that kills lice

[a comb that kills lice], and she understood that Rava’s intention in sending this gift was to answer by hint what the last blood she had sent him for examination was.

She said: “Jews”—

“in the chambers

of the heart you dwell”

[you are like those who sit in the chambers of the heart, for you are so wise]!

Rav Yehuda said: At first

in the beginning

I would look at blood. Once the mother of Isaac, my son, said to me

“This first drop”

[the first drop of blood that emerges]

“we do not bring it before the Sages, because it is spoiled,”

but only the drops that follow it, from then on—

I did not

look!

I stopped looking at blood and ruling concerning it, lest the first drop had been impure and the woman had become impure, and only afterward, when the impure appearance changed into the appearance of pure blood, she brought it. And since the women brought only that [later blood] to show to the Sage, Rav Yehuda refrained from ruling.

But,

between the impure and the pure,

to distinguish between the pure bloods of a woman after childbirth and the impure bloods that follow them,

certainly I look,

for here there is no concern that there had previously been impure blood that she did not bring, since the earlier bloods are certainly pure.

Yalta,

[the wife of Rav Nahman],

brought blood before

Rabba bar bar Hanna, and he deemed it impure. Then she brought

the same appearance of blood

before Rav Yitzhak, son of Rav Yehuda, and he deemed it pure

[and deemed it pure]

for her.

And the Gemara asks:

And how did he do this,

Rav Yitzhak, who deemed it pure?

But it was taught: If a Sage deemed something impure, his colleague may not deem it pure!

If he prohibited it, his colleague may not permit it!?

And it answers: Rav Yitzhak

initially—

would deem it impure,

although he held that it was a pure appearance, because of the rule that if a Sage deemed something impure, his colleague may not deem it pure. But

once she told him

Yalta told Rav Yitzhak

that every day

Rabba bar bar Hanna himself

would deem such a case pure

as he too held that such an appearance was pure,

and nowadays

when he deemed it impure

he

did so because

he was concerned in her eyes

, he deemed it pure for her

Rav Yitzhak, since Rabba bar bar Hanna too held so.

The Gemara asks:

And are they believed

to say, “A Sage deemed such a thing pure for me”? And it answers:

Yes! But it was taught: A woman is believed to say—

“Such

an appearance of blood

I saw, and I lost it,”

for she brings a sample of her own blood or of her friend’s, and even if it is a pure appearance, she is believed to say that the appearance of the blood that was lost was exactly like this, and she is pure.

They raised a question:

A woman shows blood to her friend, and the friend says to her,

“Such

an appearance

a certain Sage deemed pure

for me,

a certain Sage

—what is the law?

May the woman who showed it rely upon the testimony of her friend?

Come and hear: “A woman is believed to say, ‘Such a thing I saw, and I lost it’!”

And the Gemara rejects this:

It is different there—

for it is not present

the blood

before us

; therefore we rely upon her words. But if the blood is present, she must bring it to a Sage to examine it.

And the Gemara brings a proof:

Come and hear: Yalta brought blood before Rabba bar bar Ḥana, and he deemed it impure; and she brought it before Rav Yitzḥak son of Rav Yehuda, and he deemed it pure!

And in order to understand the proof, the Gemara brings the question and the answer concerning Rav Yitzḥak’s conduct, which were written above:

And how did he act in this manner? But it was taught in a beraita: If a colleague deemed [an item] impure, his fellow is not permitted to deem it pure, etc.; and we said: He did deem it impure for her, since she said to him: Every day he deems for me such a sight pure, but today he is concerned in his eyes; he then returned and deemed it pure

And Rav Yitzḥak relied upon Yalta, who showed him blood that Rabba bar bar Ḥana had deemed pure. -

Evidently, she is believed!

And the Gemara rejects this:

Rav Yitzḥak bar Yehuda—

relied upon his learning!

He did not rely upon her testimony at all; rather, he too held, according to the tradition in his possession, that this sight was pure. And the Gemara remains in uncertainty.

The Gemara brings another law concerning the ruling on blood sightings:

There was an incident in which

Rabbi saw,

he examined

blood at night and deemed it impure,

and on the following day

saw

the same blood again

during the day—

and deemed it pure

it.

Rabbi waited

one hour

and then

and then

retracted

his ruling. And the Gemara understood that he retracted without seeing it a third time, because he thought that the difference between the sight during the day and the sight at night resulted from the fact that at night the blood was wet, while during the day it had dried, and his seeing it at night, when the blood was wet, was the correct [seeing];

and he deemed

it impure!

Rabbi said

Rabbi:

Woe is me—

perhaps I erred

in what I retracted and deemed impure, for now the sight was pure!

And the Gemara raises a difficulty: Why did Rabbi say

“Perhaps I erred”—

but

he certainly erred!

For it was taught in a beraita: A sage should not say: Had the

blood

been wet, it would certainly have been impure; rather, he should say: A judge has only what his eyes see!

And Rabbi saw that now the sight was pure, and he had no reason to be concerned that it appeared this way because it had dried.

And we answer: The incident did not happen in this manner; rather, Rabbi examined the blood a third time.

And this is what happened: Rabbi

initially,

when he examined it at night by candlelight,

regarded it as

certainly

impure.

And

when he saw in the morning that it had changed,

it had become whiter than its appearance at night,

he said: It was certainly pure, and at night it was merely not seen properly.

When he saw

after an hour

that it had changed again,

and had become even whiter,

he said: This

blood

is impure, and it is merely becoming clearer and clearer,

meaning that its reddish appearance is becoming progressively clearer. And what we said, that a judge has only what his eyes see, refers to a case where he did not initially see an impure appearance.

Rabbi examined by candlelight 236 .

Rabbi Yishmael son of Rabbi Yosef examined

even

on an overcast day

and even

between the pillars

in the beit-midrash where he studied, despite there not being strong light there.

Rav Ami bar Shmuel said: And all of them

all the bloods—

are examined only between sunlight and shade.

Rav Naḥman said in the name of Rabba bar Avuha:

he examines

in sunlight and

shades the sight

with the shade of his hand 237 .

We learned in the Mishna:

And like wine diluted with two parts.