Parshas Vaeschanan (Nachamu) 5786
- Torah Tavlin
- 1 day ago
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חולין דף פג: "כיסוי הדם"
In the Gemara, ר' זירא states: one who his שוחט (a חיה or עוף), must place עפר beneath the דם ie; שחט over looseעפר and then must place עפר on top of the spilled דם. He learns this from the fact that the Torah says וכסהו "בעפר" and not just עפר. From this we see that the blood must be completely enveloped by עפר.The [ויקרא יז',סו"פ י"א] רמב"ן explains, the reason for the דין of כיסוי הדם is that it would not be proper to discard the דם of a living creature (הדם הוא הנפש), rather it should be covered over respectfully. However, בהמות (domesticated animals) whose blood is often placed on the מזבח are not included in this ציווי. Since only 2 species of birds are brought on the מזבח (תור,יונה) and their שחיטה is different (מליקה), כיסוי applies to them as well. The [קפז] חינוך explains, since the נפש is תלוי בדם, it is proper to cover the נפש before we eat the בשר, as it would be "קצת אכזריות" to eat the בשר while the נפש is spilled before us. בהמות whose דם is put on the מזבח for כפרה and not possible to be covered, the Torah didn’t differentiate between מוקדשין and חולין, so all בהמות are exempt.
The [יו"ד ס' כח,ב'] שו"ע says: we make a beracha: "אקב"ו על כיסוי דם בעפר" before covering the blood. The ט"ז says even though we never find that we specify the פרטים of the מצוה in the ברכה, why do we add "בעפר" in the ברכה? This is because כיסוי הדם has: 1) כיסוי שלמטה, 2) כיסוי שלמעלה, which is derived from the word "בעפר". So we add the word בעפר in the beracha which teaches us this דין of these 2 parts.
The [שחיטה פי"ד,א] רמב"ם says one makes the ברכה before the כיסוי. The מגיד משנה points out that this is פשוט like all ברכות, it must be recited עובר לעשייתן. The רמב"ם here is לאפוקי שיטת בה"ג that one makes a ברכה after the כיסוי because (עיין טור) he holds כיסוי is the גמר מצוה and during a מצוה one isn’t מפסיק. The אדרת [חשבונות של מצוה קפ"ז] says really we should make the ברכה before the כיסוי שלמטה, but since at that point we don’t know if there is a דין of כיסוי because we hold שחיטה שאינה ראויה לא שמה שחיטה and if it turns out to be a טרפה there is no חיוב of כיסוי, and it would be a ברכה לבטלה. It is true that we follow רוב and make a ברכה על השחיטה prior to שחיטה even though it might be a טרפה, but that is different because at least the שחיטה would help to be מטהר מידי נבילה. But this reasoning doesn’t apply by כיסוי.
The Mishnah [פז.] states: if one did כיסוי הדם and the wind uncovered it, he is פטור and need not cover it again. Why isn’t this the same דין as השבת אבידה where we say "השב" - אפילו מאה פעמים? If one returns a lost item, even if the owner keeps losing it, one has the מצוה to keep returning it? The Gemara answers that by כיסוי הדם we have a מיעוט that says "וכסהו", which teaches us to cover it, and once covered it need not be covered again. רע"א asks: how can the Gemara compare כיסוי הדם to השבת אבידה? Each time the item is lost, it is a new אבידה, but by כיסוי הדם, once one covered it he is יוצא? [This קשיא is צ"ב, because maybe if not for the מיעוט we would learn it must remain covered, so like השבת אבידה one must keep covering it?]