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Eighteen Treatises from the Mishna, by D. A. Sola and M. J. Raphall, [1843], at sacred-texts.com
§ 1. The following internal wounds or defects render animals Terefá: 1 when the œsophagus is perforated; 2 when the trachea is split or torn across in its width; when the membrane or thin skin [which is innermost and nearest] to the brain is perforated; when the heart is perforated till within the cavity of its two ventricles; when the spine is broken, and the spinal chord is severed; when the liver is wanting, and not a vestige thereof remains; when there is a perforation through the two membranes covering the lungs; when the lungs are deficient [of any of their lobes]; R. Simeon saith, "[An animal is only then Terefá] when the lungs are perforated within the bronchial tubes;" when there is a hole in the maw, or in the gallbladder, or in the thin or small intestines; when there is a hole in the interior or lower stomach, or that the greatest part of the external fleshy part thereof is torn; R. Jehudah saith, "If a hand-breadth is torn off in large cattle [oxen or cows, it is Terefá], but in a small one [a calf, &c.] when the greatest part thereof is torn; when there is a perforation in the omasum [many plies] and the magnus venter
or upper stomach, beyond the place where they are connected; 3 when the animal fell off a roof; when the greater part of its ribs are fractured, or when it had been hugged by a wolf [with its fore-paws or claws]; R. Jehudah saith, "The hug of a wolf causes small cattle only to become Terefá, but large ones only become so when a lion had struck its claws or fangs in them." Small birds are Terefá when a sparrow-hawk had struck its talons in them; and large birds [as fowls, geese, &c.] when they were struck by a [falcon, eagle, or other] large bird of prey. This is the rule. "When an animal under similar circumstances cannot survive, it is Terefá."
§ 2. The following cases are Cashér: when the trachea is perforated or split. Of what size may the deficient part be? According to Rabbon Simeon ben Gamaliel, "As large as an [Italian] asser." 4 When the bones of the skull are wounded, but the interior skin of the brain is uninjured; when there is a perforation in the heart, but not quite through to within the ventricles; when the vertebræ of the spine are broken, but the spinal chord was not severed; when the liver is deficient, but a small piece thereof of the size of an olive remained; when the omasum and the upper stomach are pierced one within the other; when the animal is deficient of milt or kidneys, or nether jaw, or matrix, or when through fear [from the appearance of any of the phenomena of nature] caused by the hand of God, its
lungs had become dessicated. R. Meir considers also an animal whose skin was stripped off as Cashér, but the other sages consider it Pasool,
§ 3. The following defects render fowl Terefá: when the œsophagus is perforated; when the trachea is torn off; when a weasel bit it on the head, in a place where it may render it Terefá [viz. near the brain]; when the stomach or thin intestines are perforated; when it had fallen into the fire; when its viscera 5 had become scorched, if they had turned yellow it is Terefá, but when they remained red it is Cashér; 6 when a person had trodden on it, or knocked it against a wall, or that it was trodden upon by cattle, and it struggles and lives twenty-four hours after the accident [and was then slaughtered], it is Cashér.
§ 4. The following cases are Cashér in fowl: when the trachea is perforated or split; when it was bitten by a weasel on its head, in a place where it does not render it Terefá; when the crop is perforated, and, according to Ribi, even when that organ is entirely deficient; when the intestines protruded from the body without being perforated; when its wings or legs are broken, or when its large feathers are plucked off; R. Jehudah saith, "It is Pasool when stripped of its plumage."
§ 5. When an animal became ill through plethora of blood, or suffered from a bad state of bile, or viscosity of mucus, or that it had fed on the plant rosebay [or the oleander], or that it had swallowed fowl's dung, or drank noxious water, it is Cashér; but when it had swallowed poison, 7 or had been bitten by a venomous serpent, although it is not prohibited as Terefá, yet it is forbidden to be eaten, on account of the danger it may cause to the persons eating thereof.
§ 6. The signs by which the clean animals, domestic and wild, may be distinguished [from the unclean and prohibited ones] are mentioned in the Holy Law, but not those of fowl. The sages have, however, established, "That every [predaceous] bird, which strikes its talons into its prey, is of the unclean: every bird which has an additional claw, 8 a crop, and of which the internal coat of the stomach
may be readily peeled off, is of the clean species." R. Eleazar ben Zadok saith, "Every bird which [when placed on a perch] divides its toes equally, is an unclean one."
§ 7. Of locusts, all the species are clean which have four feet, four wings, and four leaping legs, and whose wings cover the greatest part of its body; R. Jehudah saith, "Only then when they are called by the name חגב." 9 Of fishes, are clean, those furnished with fins and scales; R. Jehudah saith, "When they have at least two scales and one fin." Scales are attached to the body of the fish, and fins are the organs by which it moves through the water.
332:1 The word Terefá [טרפה], in its ordinary acceptation, signifies an animal or bird which was struck down, or mortally wounded, by another beast or bird of prey. The flesh of an animal so struck it is not lawful to eat, as appears from Exodus xxii. 31. When an animal has a wound, of which it is held that it cannot survive, whether it is owing to accidental falls, wounds, deficient organisation, or to any other cause, it is considered Terefá, or prohibited to eat thereof, as of the flesh of a torn animal.
332:2 Through both its coats, the outer one of which is red, and the inner one white.
333:3 For the proper understanding of this Mishna, it is necessary to know, that the ox, and other ruminants, have four stomachs. In the first two they ruminate, or chew the cud of the grass, &c., they have but slightly macerated in eating. After undergoing there a second maceration, it passes thence by a narrow opening into the third and fourth stomachs, where it is finally converted into nourishment. The first two of these [for the second stomach is only a prolongation of the first] are called, in Hebrew, בית הכוסות; the third stomach is called, in Hebrew, מסס [the ה prefixed being only the denoting ה, or article; but, according to Buxtorf, it is derived from the Latin name, omasum]; the fourth is called קיבה or maw, where the food is farther prepared for being absorbed by the lacteals and converted into chyle, for which purpose it passes through the דקין small intestines. The following are the Hebrew, English, and Latin names of the four stomachs:—the first "stomach," or "paunch," "magnus venter rumen," or "penula;" the second stomach is called "the honey-comb bag," "bonnet," or "king's-hood," in English, and "reticulum arsineum," in Latin; these first two are here called בית הכוסות; the third is called the "many plus," or, rather, "many plies,"—"omasum," in Latin, and מסס in Hebrew; the fourth is called the "'red. abomasum faliscus ventriculus intestinalis," and קיבה in Hebrew.
333:4 Vide Treatise Kedushin, chap I., § 1, and note 4.
334:5 Namely, the heart, liver, and crop, which are naturally of a red color.
334:6 In aquatic birds when the mentioned parts have turned red from the accident, because they are yellow in a sound state.
334:7 Namely, a poison which affects man, but is innoxious to cattle.
334:8 Namely, that which is placed behind, and above the front ones.
335:9 This Hebrew word signifies "locust."