Eighteen Treatises from the Mishna, by D. A. Sola and M. J. Raphall, [1843], at sacred-texts.com

CHAPTER VI.

§ 1. The precept of covering the blood [of wild animals and fowl] [Lev. xvii. 19], is obligatory in and out of the Holy Land, during and after the existence of the Temple, in animals slaughtered for ‏חולין‎, but not in those which are consecrated sacrifices. It applies solely to wild animals and fowl, whether these were domesticated, or were caught in a wild state. Also to the ‏כוי‎, 1 because it is doubtful [whether that animal is to be classed among the domestic or wild animals]. It may therefore not he slaughtered on the festival, but if it was slaughtered [thereon], its blood need not be covered [on that day].

§ 2. When an animal was slaughtered and found to be Terefá, or if it was slaughtered for idolatrous purposes, or as ‏חולין‎ within, or as consecrated offerings without the temple-court; or a bird or wild animal condemned to lapidation, 2 R. Meir considers it obligatory [to cover the blood], but the sages hold, "It is not obligatory to do so." When it became Nebelah by being slaughtered, or when it was killed by a knife being thrust up its nostrils, or that the trachea and œsophagus were forcibly torn off, it is not obligatory to cover the blood.

§ 3. When a deaf and dumb person, an idiot, or a minor, have slaughtered in the presence of other [i.e. qualified] persons, the latter are bound to cover the blood, but not if the above [disqualified persons] had slaughtered by themselves; and thus also in respect to the precept of not slaughtering an animal and its young [on the same day]: if any of these [unqualified persons] had slaughtered

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one of the animals in the presence of [qualified] persons, the other animal may not be slaughtered after them [on the same day]. If they had slaughtered one of the animals by themselves, R. Meir permits to slaughter the other after them [on the same day], but the sages decide it to be prohibited; they admit, however, "That a person who did so slaughter it, is not liable to the punishment of the forty stripes."

§ 4. Should a person slaughter as many as a hundred wild animals or fowl in one place, one covering will suffice for all of them. If many fowl are killed in one place, one covering suffices for all. If many wild animals and fowl were killed in one place, one covering suffices for both kinds. R. Jehudah saith, "When a person slaughtered the wild animal, he must cover its blood first, and then slaughter the fowl." When a person had slaughtered [a wild animal or fowl], and omitted to cover the blood, if another person had observed that omission, the latter is bound to cover the blood. When the blood, after it was duly covered, became uncovered, it is not necessary to cover it again; but if the wind had covered it [and it was afterwards uncovered], it is required to be again covered.

§ 5. When the blood was mixed with water, if the blood is still apparent, the obligation of covering it remains in force. If mixed with [red] wine, [that wine] must be considered as if it were water. If it was mixed with the blood 4 of another domestic or wild animal, that blood must be considered as water; but R. Jehudah observes, "One kind of blood does not neutralise another kind."

§ 6. The blood which spirts [from the throat of an animal on its being cut, and bespatters a wall, &c.] and that on the slaughtering knife, it is obligatory to cover. R. Jehudah saith, "When is this the case? When there is no other blood but that; but when there is other blood besides, it is not required to do so."

§ 7. With what substances is it lawful to cover the blood, and with what may it not be covered? It is lawful to cover with pulverised manure, with fine sand, with mortar, with potsherds, with bricks, or with the earthenware cover [or bung] of a barrel, viz. when these substances had been pulverised, but not with unpulverised manure, coarse sand, or brick, or earthenware covering, which had not been pounded. Nor may it be covered by merely placing a vessel over it. Rabbon Simeon ben Gamaliel laid it down as a rule, "That

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it is lawful to cover with any substance which would sustain vegetation, but not with substances unfit for the growth of plants."

Footnotes

341:1 The offspring of a he-goat and a hind. (De Pomis.)

341:2 This does not refer to the precept Exod. xxi. 29, like the above, but to another case, viz. when an unnatural crime had been committed with any animal, when the animal, as well as the person who committed the crime, is to be put to death, as ordered in Lev. xx. 15 and 16.

342:4 Produced by venesection from the wild animal.