פירוש על חולין 9:3

בטהורה ובטמאה – whether it (i.e., the animal – beast or wild animal) is ritually slaughtered as a pure animal and the one who flays it is impure, or whether it is a impure carrion and the one who flays it is pure, if he flays it to make from the hide a spread–mat, that is, a mattress to spread out on top of the bed or on top of a table, as for example, when he tears and severs the hide completely lengthwise from the head of the animal until its tail, and he begins to flay the hide, there would be a connecting handle to remove the defilement from the carrion if a pure individual comes in contact with the hide, to bring in the defilement to the meat if it is pure.

Introduction Our mishnah discusses how long a hide that is being flayed from an animal is considered to be part of the animal. The importance of this issue is for matters of purity: if it is considered to be connected to the animal, then it conveys impurity to the remainder of the flesh and receives impurity as well. When it is disconnected it is considered a separate entity with regard to matters of purity.

עד כדי אחיזה (enough for a hold [on the carcass]) – which are two handbreadths, but more than this it is not handle to bring in or to remove defilement, but if the meat is pure and defilement touched it with more than these two handbreadths, the meat was not defiled, but if the meat was carrion and something pure that is more than two handbreadths touched it, these did not defile the pure [meat].

One who was flaying cattle or wild animals, clean or unclean, small or large: The rules in this mishnah apply to all animals, whether domesticated or wild, clean (kosher) or unclean, small or large.

ולחמת (waterskin) – if he did not sever the hide lengthwise from the beginning, but rather flays it double for the needs of the waterskin, he begins from the neck and turns it over towards its tail.

In order to use the hide for a covering, if he stripped as can be taken hold of [the hide is no longer considered as connected to the flesh.] The amount of hide necessary for it to be considered as disconnected to the flesh is going to depend on what he wants to use the hide for. If he is using it for a covering, either for a chair or table, or other such object, then once he has removed enough to grab hold of, the part that he has removed is considered to be disconnected from the flesh. If the animal is a nevelah, then the hide that has been already flayed does not make the person who touches it unclean. And if the animal was properly slaughtered but the hide became unclean, the remainder of the flesh remains clean.

עד שיפשיט את החזה (until he will flay the breast) – which is the connector. And one who touches the hide is like one who touches the meat–skin – whether to become impure–contract uncleanness or whether to make impure–impart it, because the breast is the hardest to flay from all of the limbs.

In order to make a water-skin, until the breast has been flayed. If he was intending to use the hide as a water-skin, then the hide is considered connected until he flays the breast. When skinning an animal for this purpose, he would cut a small hole at the place of the neck and then flay the rest of the skin whole. The skin counts as being connected until he gets down to the breast, because this is the most difficult place to properly flay. Until he reaches this point, the purity status of the skin and flesh is shared.

המרגיל (one who flays the animal from the foot upwards (the entire skin is considered as connected with the flesh – as long as the process lasts – for purposes of Levitical uncleanness) – that he begins from the feet of the animal to flay and he flays it double for the needs of the waterskin.

If he was flaying from the feet upwards, until the whole hide [has been flayed]. If he was flaying in the opposite direction, from the feet upwards, then the skin is considered connected until it is all removed.

כולו חבור – because e he breast is the end of his flaying. Therefore, it is all connected until the breast, and a person who touches the flayed hide, l=is like touching the skin–meat whether to impart uncleanness or to become unclean.

[All of these measures apply] for both conveying uncleanness and becoming unclean. As I have explained above, these rules apply in both directions: both to convey uncleanness from the animal to the hide, and from the hide to the animal.

עור שעל הצואר – and it was flayed of itself. Therefore, it is not connected to do the first playing that is connected in the manner that the breast makes.

As for the skin that is on the neck: Rabbi Yohanan ben Nuri says: it is not connected. But the sages say it is connected until the whole hide has been flayed. The skin that surrounds the neck is easily separated from the flesh and therefore Rabbi Yohanan ben Nuri considers it as disconnected from the flesh. If it becomes unclean, the flesh is not unclean and if the flesh is unclean, it remains clean. The other sages say that this hide is treated just as is the rest of the hide. One who touches it, it is as if he touched the flesh, even if part of it was removed. It is not separate until it has all been removed.

וחכמים אומרים וכו' – and the Halakha is according to the Sages.