The whole siman reduced to what one must be able to say from memory
יורה דעה · סימן ר״ד
דִּין הַמַּתְפִּיס בְּנֶדֶר
📘 Synthesis level · חזרה
✦ ❖ ✦
This page adds nothing: it arranges. The four seifim, the vocabulary, the three rules that carry all the rest, the pitfalls one falls into, and what remains disputed. To be read after the Base level, and reread before the Lamdan level.
Subject : Siman 204 — Synthesis: התפסה, in tables Source : שולחן ערוך יורה דעה סימן ר״ד
Compilation : הרב יוסף חיים סממה DAAT · daattorah.com
📑 Plan of study
1. The siman in one sentence
2. The four seifim, in a table
3. The vocabulary to know by heart
4. The three golden rules
5. The classic pitfalls
6. What remains under discussion
7. The revision checklist
1. The siman in one sentence
A word creates a prohibition when it attaches (מתפיס) a permitted thing to a thing already forbidden by a man's word — a קרבן, or anything consecrated by the mouth. The attachment propagates: from loaf to loaf, from day to day, from man to man, up to a hundred; and it reaches even what is not yet in the world.
2. The four seifim, in a table
Seif
What is said
The point to retain
א
עיקר נדר — attaching to a דבר הנדור; or “יאסר עלי”; or “עלי איסור”; the chain up to a hundred; a day attached to a day
Binds — and the first object itself becomes an anchor
ב
Anything דבר הקדוש בקדושת הפה: כאימרא, כדירים, כמזבח, כהיכל, כירושלים, the vessels of the service
Binds — Rama: “כשלחן סתם” does not bind, but one releases for an עם הארץ (and both Shach and Taz contest)
ג
“ואני כמותך” said within כדי דיבור, up to a hundred persons
Binds — each is caught in the vow of the one before
ד
Forbidding to oneself a דבר שלא בא לעולם
Binds, for when the thing comes — but upon oneself only (Shach ס״ק ט)
3. The vocabulary to know by heart
Term
Meaning
Where it serves
נדר
prohibition placed on the thing (חפצא)
the whole definition of seif א
שבועה
binding of the person (גברא)
the opposite — decisive at siman 206:ה
דבר הנדור
a thing forbidden by a man's word
the only valid anchor
דבר האסור
a thing forbidden by the Torah (pork, נבלה)
does not serve as an anchor — siman 205
המתפיס
the one who attaches
the verb of the whole siman
קדושת הפה
holiness coming from a human mouth
the criterion of seif ב
איסר
the bond, the Torah's word
the formulation “עלי איסור” of seif א
קונם
a substitute (כינוי) for the word קרבן
returns at siman 206:ד
סתם נדרים להחמיר
an ambiguous formulation is read on the binding side
Taz ס״ק ב, on “כאימרא”
כדי דיבור
the time of a brief greeting
seif ג
דבר שלא בא לעולם
what does not yet exist
seif ד
4. The three golden rules
1. It is not holiness that counts, but its origin. One attaches to what a mouth has made forbidden. The firstborn animal, holy from its mother's womb, cannot serve as an anchor — and it is the same reason that will exclude, at siman 205, pork and נבלה.
2. The first link itself becomes an anchor. As soon as a loaf is forbidden by vow, it is a דבר הנדור: another loaf may be attached to it — and one is stopped neither by number (“even a hundred”), nor by delay (Rambam: “even after several days”), nor by kind (Shach ס״ק ד: bread, meat, fruit).
3. Attachment exists only in the נדר.המתפיס בשבועה פטור ובנדרים חייב: one does not attach to an oath. The reason is the one that governs the whole block — the נדר forbids the thing, the שבועה binds the person, and a bond of the person is not copied from one object to another.
« הַמַּתְפִּיס בִּשְׁבוּעָה פָּטוּר וּבִנְדָרִים חַיָּב » (רמב״ם הלכות נדרים פרק ג׳ הלכה א)
5. The classic pitfalls
Confusing “holy” with “forbidden by a word”. Jerusalem binds; the firstborn animal does not. The criterion is not holiness but its provenance.
Thinking a קרבן must be named. “יאסר עלי ככר זה” names nothing at all, and binds nonetheless (seif א, Shach ס״ק ג).
Thinking the chain requires the same kind. It does not (Shach ס״ק ד, Baer Hetev ס״ק ג).
Taking the Rama's gloss on the table for a settled rule. The Shach (ס״ק ח) and the Taz (ס״ק ה) both contest it; one does not lean on it to permit.
Extending seif ד to another person. One may forbid to oneself a דבר שלא בא לעולם; one may not forbid it to another (Shach ס״ק ט, Pitchei Teshuva ס״ק א).
Letting the כדי דיבור pass. The “ואני” of seif ג is valid only within that interval.
6. What remains under discussion
The point
Rama
Shach
Taz
“ככר זה עלי כשלחן” unqualified
does not bind (but one releases for an עם הארץ)
צ״ע — the distinction is not the source's (ס״ק ח)
binds, by סתם נדרים להחמיר (ס״ק ה)
Vowing or swearing by the table (אני נודר בשלחן)
—
does not bind — there are no אזכרות in a table (ס״ק ח)
does not bind, consecrated or not (ס״ק ה)
The vow to give מעשר from a profit to come
—
reported in the name of the Maharam MZ: he may retract (ס״ק ט)
disputes it, at siman 215 (reported by the Baer Hetev ס״ק ו)
7. The revision checklist
I can say in one sentence what התפסה is and why it is the heart of the נדר.
I can distinguish דבר הנדור from דבר האסור, and say what each can and cannot carry.
I can name the five objects of seif ב and say what they have in common.
I can explain why the בכור is excluded, and connect that exclusion to siman 205.
I know the ma'hloket of the שלחן, and that the Shach doubts where the Taz decides.
I know that the chain stops neither at number, nor at delay, nor at kind.
I know what seif ד permits, and to whom it does not extend.
I know that this chapter is for study, and that any real vow is brought before a Rav.
The sources of this level may be consulted on Sefaria: