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Keritot 21 for kids: Which Blood Counts?

כריתות כ״א

🐟 This daf asks which kinds of blood are included in the Torah’s prohibition. The sages discuss a koy, birds, creeping animals, and fish.

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Rashi and Tosafot on Keritot 21 in simple English

Rashi on Keritot 21a, in English Tab translation (23)
  1. I will exclude the blood of creeping animals, which do not impart severe impurity — Creeping animals do not make a person impure in a way that also makes the person’s clothes impure.
  2. Which are entirely permitted — This is explained later, on the next side of the page.
  3. Bird or animal — Why are both mentioned? From either one alone, I could have reasoned that the law applies only to things resembling that example.
  4. If just as a bird, etc. — If the verse had mentioned only birds, I would have said: Just as a bird is not subject to the prohibition of mixed wool and linen—because feathers are not subject to that prohibition—so too with other creatures.
  5. So too, an animal whose wool is not subject to the prohibition — One would be liable for consuming the blood of an ox or a goat, but not the blood of sheep, whose wool is subject to that prohibition.
  6. So too, a bird not subject to the law of the mother with her young — One would be liable for consuming the blood of a non-kosher bird, whose mother need not be sent away, but not the blood of a kosher bird.
  7. Of the school of Rabbi Yishmael, who interpret generalizations and details in such a case — As explained near the end of the chapter ‘These Are Treifot’ (Hullin 66a), they do so even though the first generalization differs from the last.
  8. To include a koy — There was no need to include undomesticated animals, since they are included in ‘animal,’ as explained in the chapter ‘An Animal Having Difficulty Giving Birth’ (Hullin 71a) and as Rabbi Yohanan explains below.
  9. Is a verse needed to prohibit an uncertain case? — This is a rhetorical question: Whether the koy is classified as an undomesticated or a domesticated animal, its blood is forbidden.
  10. From where do we derive the law of its carcass? — From where do we derive that eating its carcass is forbidden?
  11. The Merciful One made it depend on the hip socket — The prohibition of the sciatic nerve applies to any creature with a rounded hip socket. As explained in the chapter ‘The Sciatic Nerve’ (Hullin 92b), it does not apply to birds because their hip socket is not rounded.
  12. Its impurity — That its carcass imparts impurity.
  13. Require intention and preparation — This is the wording of the Mishnah in tractate Uktzin.
  14. Cutting off a piece counts as intention — By cutting it off, one shows that one regards it as food; it can therefore become impure if it comes into contact with impurity.
  15. The carcass of an animal anywhere — Even in markets, where many people are present, it requires an intention to eat it before it can contract food impurity, since people do not ordinarily eat it.
  16. And likewise the carcass of a kosher bird in villages — Where there are few people, it requires an intention to eat it before it can contract food impurity.
  17. And they do not require preparation — They can impart severe impurity: an animal carcass through carrying it, and the carcass of a kosher bird to a person’s clothes when swallowed. As stated below, anything that can eventually impart severe impurity does not require preparation.
  18. Do not read ‘and the fat’ here — Although fat is mentioned in the clause about markets, implying that it requires intention in villages, it cannot be included in this opening clause, which says preparation is unnecessary. Fat from an animal that died without slaughter requires preparation because it does not impart severe impurity. In villages, fat from a slaughtered animal is not prepared by the blood of slaughter, since preparation that precedes the intention to use it as food does not count. The Mishnah is at the end of tractate Uktzin.
  19. The carcass of a kosher animal anywhere — Even in villages, where few people live, it needs no intention to use it as food, since it is presumed destined as food for non-Jews. The same applies to the carcass of a kosher bird and to animal fat in markets, where many people are present.
  20. They require neither intention nor preparation — Animal and bird carcasses can impart severe impurity. The fat meant here is from a slaughtered animal, and the blood of slaughter has already prepared it to contract food impurity.
  21. But it is itself impure — It imparts carcass impurity.
  22. When it is less than an olive’s volume, it does not impart carcass impurity. If one intends to eat it, it can combine with other food to reach the egg-volume required to impart food impurity.
  23. If so — If it is less than an olive’s volume and cannot impart carcass impurity, it should also require preparation, as taught by the school of Rabbi Yishmael.
Tosafot on Keritot 21a, in English Tab translation (5)
  1. I will exclude the blood of creeping animals, which do not have severe impurity — Although their carcasses impart impurity through contact, they do not do so through carrying, nor do they render clothing impure.
  2. I will exclude the blood of bird eggs, which are not a type of meat — Rabbeinu Baruch wonders why the exclusions do not all use the same criterion. The blood of eggs and grasshoppers could also have been excluded because they lack severe impurity. Rather, the Gemara gives the reason it considers clearer for permitting each.
  3. A koy is a distinct creature — In Hullin, the sages say that a koy is a distinct creature but did not decide whether it is a wild or domesticated animal. There, “distinct creature” means it belongs to one of those two categories. Here it means neither: if it belonged to either, no verse would be needed to include its blood. Likewise, when Yoma says that “any fat” includes a koy and a quantity smaller than the minimum measure, calling the koy a distinct creature cannot mean that its category is merely uncertain; no verse would be needed to forbid its fat in that case.
  4. When one cuts it up for a dog — The Gemara could also have answered that one cuts it up for medicinal use. It chooses the case of a dog to teach that even then, one must intend to designate it as food.
  5. For example, there is less than an olive-sized piece of carcass, and one combines it with other food — We cannot say that the carcass is olive-sized and is combined with other food. If that were so, designating the mixture as food could allow the resulting egg-sized quantity to impart impurity to other foods even when they touch only the added food, not the carcass. But this would not explain the reference to an animal carcass with only the lighter, food-related impurity: an olive-sized carcass also has severe impurity. Furthermore, the cited mishnah appears to compare an animal carcass to the carcass of a kosher bird, which likewise requires designation as food. That is why the Gemara specifies less than an olive-sized piece.
Rashi on Keritot 21b, in English Tab translation (19)
  1. To exclude a corpse — This is why the Gemara said that humans do not have the lighter impurity of food: even if someone adds food to less than an olive-bulk of a corpse to make an egg-bulk, the corpse does not combine with it. His intention to treat it as food is disregarded because no one eats it.
  2. Covered it with dough — The dough is less than an egg-bulk, and the carcass brings the total to an egg-bulk. Although the carcass is itself impure, combining it with the dough matters: the covering prevents it from transmitting impurity by contact, but together they form an egg-bulk of impure food that can render other food impure by contact.
  3. If so — Since it is covered and will not transmit severe impurity, should it not also need contact with liquid to become susceptible to food impurity?
  4. To exclude a corpse — This is why the Gemara said that humans do not have the lighter impurity of food. Even if a corpse is covered with dough, its severe impurity breaks through and rises: when a covering over a corpse has no handbreadth of open space beneath it, the impurity passes upward, as stated in HaOr VeHaRotev (Chullin 125a).
  5. The Master said: Creeping animals are excluded — I think these words should not be in the text. The Gemara answers that creeping animals do not transmit impurity by carrying, but birds do not transmit it by carrying either, and the Gemara said earlier that they transmit severe impurity.
  6. Wild animals and birds are likewise — The mishna in Bava Kamma 54b applies the laws concerning a pit, diverse kinds, and Shabbat to wild animals and birds as it does to domesticated animals.
  7. One is flogged for it — At this point, the Gemara assumes the lashes are for consuming blood.
  8. Under a prohibition — But not punishable by karet, because it is not lifeblood.
  9. One is not liable for it — This means one does not receive lashes.
  10. For one thing, that is the first clause — If so, what distinguishes human blood from blood of the limbs, and why did the baraita list them separately?
  11. Moreover, the earlier tanna excludes creeping-animal blood even from a prohibition — He says that creeping-animal blood is excluded from the category of blood covered by “You shall not eat.”
  12. If he was warned against eating a creeping animal, he is flogged — As stated earlier (Keritot 4b), “And these are impure for you” teaches that its blood and flesh combine to make an olive-bulk for purposes of eating. Thus its blood is treated like its flesh.
  13. If he collected it — Blood collected in a vessel is forbidden because it can be mistaken for animal blood; someone watching might think that animal blood may be eaten.
  14. Fish and grasshopper blood is permitted outright — This is the final clause of the baraita cited earlier, which begins with the blood of the spleen and the blood of the heart.
  15. The corresponding case for humans — Must you also explain the baraita’s middle clause, which says human blood is forbidden but carries no liability, as referring to blood that was not collected? That is how you explained its final clause.
  16. Blood on a loaf — Though it is not like blood collected in a vessel and is not forbidden, one should still refrain from eating it. Blood between the teeth, however, is still attached, so there is not even a duty to refrain from it; one may suck it without concern.
  17. That has scales in it — Fish blood containing visible scales is permitted outright, because it cannot be mistaken for the blood of a domesticated animal, wild animal, or bird.
  18. Bipeds — Human beings.
  19. There is no duty to refrain from it — One need not abstain from it, even as a general measure of restraint.
Tosafot on Keritot 21b, in English Tab translation (3)
  1. Rav Ḥananya said: You may even say — He does not adopt Rabbi Ḥiyya’s explanation. It is strained to say that a piece smaller than an olive-bulk needs no contact with liquid merely because it could be combined with other material to make an olive-bulk: one could equally say here that it needs no contact with liquid because, if it were not covered with dough, it would transmit impurity. Instead, Rav Ḥananya explains that even now it transmits impurity through carrying. Rabbi Ḥiyya’s explanation is also strained because it locates severe impurity and light impurity in two different cases—an olive-bulk and less than an olive-bulk. Rav Ḥananya finds both in one case: an olive-bulk covered with dough transmits severe impurity through carrying and light impurity through contact. The wording “you may even say it is an olive-bulk” is imprecise: it sounds as though Rav Ḥananya also accepts the explanation for less than an olive-bulk, but, as explained, he does not.
  2. And correspondingly, human blood when it has not been collected — The baraita permits fish blood but forbids human blood. Is human blood forbidden even when it is not separately visible? Another baraita says that one may suck blood from between one’s teeth without concern. Rashi explains that this blood is not subject even to an obligation to abstain. Otherwise, what would the objection be? Blood between the teeth has neither become visible nor separated, whereas blood that has separated is forbidden even if uncollected, as shown by the rule that blood on a loaf must be scraped off. Rashi therefore explains that scraping blood off a loaf is an obligation to abstain, though there is no formal prohibition. But this is difficult: an obligation to abstain is itself a genuine prohibition. And if the objection comes only from the rule about blood between the teeth, why not answer that it is different because it has not separated? Human blood that has separated could be forbidden even when uncollected, while fish blood on a fish could be permitted even after separating. Alternatively, blood between the teeth may be permitted because its source is known, whereas the prohibition of human blood concerns blood whose source is unknown. Blood dripping from one’s finger is likewise permitted: its source is clear, so it cannot be mistaken for the blood of a domesticated or undomesticated animal. Rabbi Baruch explains the objection differently. If fish blood were permitted even when collected, the baraita’s statement that human blood is forbidden would teach something new about collected human blood; it would not need to mention that unseparated human blood is permitted, since collected blood is its main subject. But if collected fish blood is forbidden, the baraita permits fish blood only when it is uncollected. Its statement that human blood is forbidden must then concern uncollected blood too. If any human blood were permitted, the baraita should have stated that exception, just as it states when fish blood is permitted. Its omission implies that even blood between the teeth is forbidden—contrary to the other baraita. The answer is that the baraita permits fish blood when it has scales in it. There is no comparable condition for human blood, so it need not state when human blood is permitted. This discussion also implies that fish blood is forbidden only when it has been collected and has no scales in it.
  3. They are prohibited by a negative commandment — The objection concerns the liability to lashes; the baraita does not assign the penalty of karet to these cases.

Sources

Kid summary and story cards written by Tab from the William Davidson Edition English (Sefaria, CC BY-NC 4.0).

Tab translation (machine-assisted) of Rashi and Tosafot, from the Vilna Edition Hebrew (public domain) on Sefaria. May contain mistakes.

In the app, the Gemara text comes from Sefaria (William Davidson Edition, CC BY-NC 4.0; Hebrew/Aramaic Vilna Edition). Rashi and Tosafot Hebrew: Vilna Edition (public domain) via Sefaria.

Also spelled: Kerisus, Kritot, Kerithoth 21.