« אין האשה עולה מטומאתה ברחיצה במרחץ ואפילו עלו עליה כל מימות שבעולם עדיין היא בטומאתה וחייבים עליה כרת עד שתטבול כל גופה בבת אחת במי מקוה או מעיין שיש בהם מ׳ סאה » (שו״ע יו״ד ר״א:א)
« ארבעים סאה שאמרו צריך שלא יהיו שאובים שאם הם שאובים פסולים » (שו״ע יו״ד ר״א:ג)
A woman does not emerge from her impurity by washing in a bath-house — and even if all the waters of the world came upon her, she is still in her impurity — until she immerses her whole body at once in the water of a mikveh or a spring containing forty se’ah. And those forty se’ah, says seif 3, must not have been drawn.
Shulchan Arukh, Yoreh De’ah 201:1 and 201:3
LEVEL 01
רמת המתחיל
Base — Beginner & Intermediate
The seventy-five seifim in Hebrew, one by one, with a fluent English translation: the measure of forty se’ah, the difference between a spring and rainwater, drawing and its threshold of three log, what a vessel is, channelling (המשכה), contact (השקה), the immersion itself and the eight seifim of doubt. Then the vocabulary set down once for all, the four hundred and four entries of the apparatus cited one by one with their references, the Rambam’s הלכות מקואות, the Arukh HaShulchan and seven practical cases of today.
📖 Study
LEVEL 02
רמת הלמדן
Lamdan — Talmid Hakham
Pilpul: is drawing Torah law or scribal law, and why that question governs the measure of השקה — a hairbreadth or the neck of a wineskin; the Rosh’s זריעה, which explains why a thousand drawn se’ah do not spoil a constituted mikveh; the Taz’s objection about the perforated bucket and the truncated responsum of the Ramban; channelling over what (Raavad, Rokeach); doubt and presumption, and why seif 67 and seif 71 answer each other without contradiction; and the Arukh HaShulchan’s reading of the Chakh at ס״ק י״ז.
📖 Study
LEVEL 03
חזרה וסיכום
Synthesis — Revision
The seventy-five seifim arranged by mechanism — the water and its origin, the measure, the vessel, contact and השקה, channelling, flowing away, the immersion, doubt — with a master table that keeps the order of the book so a seif can be found by its number. A table of measures (forty se’ah, three log, שפופרת הנאד, three handbreadths, twenty-one se’ah), golden rules, classic pitfalls and a checklist for inspecting a mikveh.
📖 Study
LEVEL 04
הלכה למעשה
Halakha lema‘assé — The ruling
The siman’s line of psak: what is held (the forty se’ah, the undrawn water, the water at rest), what belongs to custom (the heated mikveh, immersion in a river) and what goes to the Rav before digging (perforating a fixed vat, channelling, joining). The Chakh, the Taz, the Nekudot HaKesef, the Pit’hei Teshuva, the Rambam and the Arukh HaShulchan, each with its reference — and the constant referral to the Rav and to the mikveh attendant.
📖 Study
Frequently asked questions — Siman 201
What is a valid mikveh, according to siman 201?
A valid mikveh is a body of at least forty se’ah — one אמה by one אמה by three אמות high, that is, by the reckoning of seif 1, forty-four thousand one hundred and eighteen fingerbreadths of a thumb and a further half — of gathered water, in which a whole body is covered at once. Three defects disqualify it: it must not have been drawn (seif 3), it must not be inside a vessel (seif 6), and — if it comes from rain and not from a spring — it must not be flowing away (seif 2). The building and supervision of a mikveh are done under the authority of the Rav; this page sets out the source, it does not replace a ruling.
What is “drawn water” (מים שאובים), and when does it invalidate?
It is water that a man’s hand detached from the ground by gathering it into a vessel. So long as the mikveh does not hold its forty se’ah, three log of drawn water suffice to invalidate it (seif 15); once the forty se’ah are gathered, drawing no longer invalidates. The Rama, at seif 3, sets out the distinction that governs all the rest: a mikveh entirely drawn is invalid by Torah law and its doubt is stringent; a drawn minority is only a rabbinic prohibition and its doubt is lenient. The Rambam, for his part, holds that even entirely drawn the prohibition is only scribal (הלכות מקואות פרק ד הלכה ב).
May one immerse in a river or in the sea?
Seif 5 lays down that all the seas have the status of a spring and therefore purify even while flowing. For a river, seif 2 distinguishes: so long as the spring waters predominate, it purifies while flowing; but if the rainwater prevails, it purifies only in an אשבורן, that is, where the water comes to rest. The Mehaber teaches stringency; the Rama reports the lenient custom of places without a mikveh, “and one does not protest against those who are lenient, for they have whom to rely upon.” The Arukh HaShulchan adds the practical condition: a true river that does not run dry, and not a seasonal pond. Each case is settled with the Rav.
May the water of the mikveh be heated?
Seif 75 brings an opinion forbidding it — casting a cauldron of hot water into the mikveh to warm it — and the Taz gives the reason in five words: גזירת מרחצאות, lest one end by immersing in the bath-house. The Rama brings the lenient, writes that one should be stringent except where the custom is to be lenient, and notes that in the hot springs of Tiberias it is permitted according to all. The Arukh HaShulchan writes that in all his lands, for several generations, the mikveh has been heated — by hot water or by a machine — and that there is no room to cavil. This is the universal practice today, and it rests on that line.