I have had to start and stop a post on this Daf several times. I am uncertain what to say and that has caused me to fall behind. As I mentioned before, one concern of the Talmud is how do we sanctify and elevate every day actions into something holy. Elevation implies direction, which means you know which way is up. In our pluralistic age, we are more accepting of many paths to the truth and therefore we do not thing quite as directionally. I am not knocking pluralism. Quite the contrary, some of the stories in this Daf are either creepy or humorous in that bad 80s B movie sort of way. However, when we consider that we have a public life and a separate religious life, we lose sight of how the minutia of the day are an opportunity to show holiness.

We have been focused on the status of a baal keri (a man who has experienced a seminal emission) and how that status changes religious obligation before the baal keri has a chance to immerse himself in a mikveh (a ritual bath) and wait until sunset to become ritually pure (tahor). The Rabbis will analogize the baal keri’s status to a niddah ( a woman who has menstruated and needs to purify herself by immersion in a mikveh). In particular, the Rabbis debate an earlier rabbinical decree from Ezra that said a baal keri cannot recite words of Torah (and hence the Shema) until he has immersed himself in a mikveh. Ezra did not require the baal keri to wait until sundown, provided he immersed. Therefore, the baal keri was not ritually pure, but he could recite the Shema.

The positions of various Rabbis can become confused and seemingly logically inconsistent given the possible permutations, particularly when the concept of pouring water over oneself instead of immersing in a mikveh is added to the mix. After much debate, however, the Rabbis conclude that a baal keri can study and recite Torah. They thus overturn the decree of Ezera. The Rabbis reach their conclusion because the Torah is pure and words of Torah can never be impure. Nevertheless, particularly observant Rabbis continue to follow purification practices (either immersion or the shower) when they are baal keri and the Talmud considers which practice was correct.

The proper balance is required. The Rabbis did not want to be too strict and make it impractical to study Torah or to neglect the very first command in the bible to be fruitful and multiply. However, the Rabbis did not want to be too lenient and make Torah scholars “like roosters” always having sex with their wives. [One other side note: the leniency of the shower procedure originally applied to sick people. The Talmud allows Torah scholars to take advantage of this leniency because they were less healthy than regular folks. This is the first example of the stereotype of the wimpy scholar that I can find.]

The problem of the baal keri in the academies was real and we read lots of stories about how the Rabbis would deal with young men coming to class and dealing with the embarrassment of not being able to study. I am sure their students were young men, some of whom were married and some of whom were not. Indeed, there is one story where Rabbi Yehudah was walking with his students by a river when he had a spontaneous ejaculation. In our society, we would consider this very creepy, but Rabbi Yehudah uses it as a learning experience. He jumps in the river to immerse himself despite being very lenient with others. He tells his students that he holds himself to a higher standard.

One final story before we introduce our next Mishnah. Rav Pappa, Rav Huna the son of Rav Yehoshua and Rava bar Shmuel were dining together. When the time came to recite the Berekhos Hamazon after the meal, each Rabbi argued why they were the most pure and should be allowed to recite on behalf of the group. Rav Pappa and Rav Huna argue for the superiority of their purification technique. Rava bar Shmuel simply states he is not a baal keri.

At this point, we get a new Mishnah which gives the rules if we are praying and we remember in the middle of our prayers that we are a baal keri. The Mishnah also considers the rules for a baal keri who has immersed himself (and hence is naked) and the time for the Shema is passing. Finally, the Mishnah tells us how far we have to be from excrement to pray. The Gemara then debates what to do if we are praying and we find excrement near by (there was no indoor plumbing) or what to do if we are praying and we urinate on ourselves.

Again, I had a lot of trouble trying to draw pertinent lessons from this Daf. We consider our religious life somehow apart from the rest of ourselves. The Rabbis did not think this way. In their mind, they needed to sanctify every action.