have to depart from the city,[1] the law being as severe in their case as in the case of those having a contagious disease like leprosy. It would have been impracticable in the period, when the Jewish people were at the pinnacle of their intellectual and material development, that a person merely by reason of such an occurrence should be constrained to give up communal life and leave the city. So the Sages amended the law in accordance with the new requirements. Such men as these, having no contagious disease (including those affected by noctis pollutio, and others), were merely incapacitated from entering the Temple-court or the Sanctuary, but were not compelled to keep apart from their fellow citizens and leave the city.[2]
Now we will examine the taḳḳanot themselves, that the Baraita ascribes to Ezra. This is the list: (1) Reading from the Scroll at Sabbath afternoon service; (2) Reading from the Scroll at morning service on Mondays and Thursdays;[3] (3) Holding court on Mondays and Thursdays; (4) Ritual bath (ṭebilah) for בעלי קרי; (5) Eating garlic on Eve of Sabbath; (6) Washing clothes [giving them out to be washed] on Thursdays; (7) That a woman should rise early and bake; (8) That a woman should gird herself with a belt; (9) That pedlars should carry about their wares in the cities; (10) That a woman should dress her hair before immersion.
The first three, concerning the reading from the Pentateuch on Sabbath afternoon, and on Monday and Thursday
- ↑ Num. 5. 2; Deut. 23. 11.
- ↑ Pesaḥim 67 and 68.
- ↑ In Pal. Megillah, ibid., the taḳḳanot to read from the Scroll during Minḥah of Sabbath and on Monday and Thursday are reckoned as one taḳḳanah; and there is another to complete the list, viz. שיהו הנשים מדברותזו עם זו בבית הכסא. But this, we are informed in the Talmud Babli (Sanhedrin 19 a) was a ruling of R. Jose in Sepphoris.
