Nishuq b’oto maqom and the scope of kol ...

Nishuq b'oto maqom and the scope of kol ...

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Nishuq b'oto maqom and the scope of kol ma sheyirtze

1. Article scope

This article is confined to one question: within permitted marital relations, when the wife is muteret to her husband, does the rule of kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh include nishuq b'oto maqom, or is that act excluded by an independent issur?

The narrow case is this: a husband and wife are married, she is not nida, the act is mutually desired, no coercion is present, and the separate question of hotzaat zera lvatala is not being reopened except where the sources themselves make it the limiting condition.

This article is not discussing nida, coercion, nonmarital sexual contact, masturbation, general erotic speech, the full sugya of shelo khedarka, the medical or psychological evaluation of sexual practice, or practical counseling between spouses. Those are separate sugyot.

The core sugya is not whether marital intimacy may contain desire. The core sugya is narrower: whether the permissive formula umnasheq bkhol ever sheyirtze is literal, or whether oto maqom is excluded by the Raavad/Tur/Shulhan arukh Orah Hayim 240:4 line and the later Bet Shmuel.

The first correction is terminological. “Bash” in this discussion is almost certainly not Bah. It is B.S.h, meaning Bet Shmuel, the major commentary on Even HaEzer. The Bah is Bayit Hadash, R. Yoel Sirkes. The line being invoked here, however, is the Bet Shmuel on Even HaEzer 25:1: he limits “any limb” and says it excludes oto maqom.

2. The immediate restrictive control text: Bet Shmuel

Source: Bet Shmuel, Even HaEzer 25:1

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Umnasheq bkhol ever. Lav davqa kol ever, dha b'oto maqom assur, kmo shekatuv bashas, vkhen katvu haRaavad vhatur.

Translation:

“And he may kiss any limb. This does not mean literally any limb, for in oto maqom it is forbidden, as written in the Shas; and so wrote the Raavad and the Tur.”

The Bet Shmuel is the likely source of the claim “B.S.h says no.” He reads the Rema's permissive language nonliterally. “Any limb” means any limb except oto maqom. That is a direct answer to the practical phrase being debated.

But the Bet Shmuel's sentence contains a compression. He writes “as written in the Shas.” That phrase is not simple. The Bavli does quote Rabi Yohanan ben Dahavai saying that mute children come from “kissing oto maqom,” but the Bavli immediately records Rabi Yohanan's statement that the halakha does not follow Yohanan ben Dahavai. Therefore the Bet Shmuel's appeal to “Shas” is not a simple citation of the final Gemara. It is a reading of the sugya through the Raavad and Tur.

The legal question is therefore not whether the phrase appears in hazal. It does. The question is whether that phrase remains an operative issur after the Gemara says en halakha kYohanan ben Dahavai.

3. The permissive control text: Rema in Even HaEzer

Source: Shulhan arukh, Even HaEzer 25:2, Hagat Rema

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Vyakhol laasot im ishto ma sheyirtze, boel bkhol et sheyirtze, umnasheq bkhol ever sheyirtze, uva aleha ben kdarka ben shelo khedarka o derekh evarim, uvilvad shelo yotzi zera lvatala. Vyesh mqilin v'omrim shemutar shelo khedarka afilu im hotzi zera, im oseh b'aqrai v'eno ragil bkhakh. V'af al pi shemutar bkhol ele, kol hameqadesh atzmo bmutar lo qadosh yomru lo.

Translation:

“He may do with his wife whatever he wishes: he may have relations whenever he wishes, and kiss any limb that he wishes, and have relations with her either in the normal manner or not in the normal manner, or by way of limbs, provided that he does not emit seed in vain. And some are lenient and say that shelo khedarka is permitted even if he emits seed, if he does so occasionally and is not habituated to it. And although all these are permitted, whoever sanctifies himself in what is permitted to him, they call him holy.”

This Rema is the main permissive control text in the codified halakha. The phrase umnasheq bkhol ever sheyirtze is broad. On its face, “every limb” means every limb. It is especially hard to say that the phrase was not meant to address oto maqom, because the Gemara's disputed list itself includes nishuq b'oto maqom. If the Rema is importing the Gemara's phrase through the Rambam/Tur line, the natural reading is that he permits the very matter that Rabi Yohanan ben Dahavai had restricted.

The Rema then adds a second layer: even where permitted, qedusha may require restraint. This is not an issur layer. It is a midat qedusha layer. The Rema's own closing formula says “mutar bkhol ele,” “all these are permitted.”

Therefore the Bet Shmuel is not merely explaining an ambiguous Rema. He is materially limiting the Rema's plain language by reading it through another source stream.

4. The Rambam's formulation

Source: Rambam, Mishne Tora, Hilkhot Issure Bia 21:9

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Ishto shel adam muteret hi lo. Lfikhakh kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh. Boel bkhol et sheyirtze, umnasheq bkhol ever v'ever sheyirtze, uva aleha kdarka vshelo khedarka, uvilvad shelo yotzi shikhvat zera lvatala. V'af al pi khen midat hasidut shelo yaquel adam et rosho lkhakh, vsheyeqadesh atzmo bishat tashmish.

Translation:

“A man's wife is permitted to him. Therefore, whatever a man wishes to do with his wife, he may do. He may have relations whenever he wishes, and kiss any and every limb that he wishes, and have relations with her in the normal manner or not in the normal manner, provided that he does not emit seed in vain. Nevertheless, it is a measure of hasidut that a man should not make himself lightheaded for this, and that he should sanctify himself at the time of relations.”

The Rambam is decisive for the structure of the permissive view. His language contains three layers.

First, ishto shel adam muteret hi lo. The wife herself is muteret to him, assuming all ordinary conditions of permissibility are met.

Second, kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh. This is the broad permissive rule.

Third, uvilvad shelo yotzi shikhvat zera lvatala. The limiting legal condition is zera lvatala. The Rambam does not insert “except oto maqom.”

Fourth, v'af al pi khen midat hasidut. The Rambam then moves from issur to qedusha. That is not a disguised issur. It is a separate plane: technically permitted, but not necessarily ideal as a derekh qedusha.

This is important because the later restrictive position often tries to convert the qedusha material into issur. The Rambam does not do that. For him, the strictness is postlegal or supralegal conduct, not the core din.

5. The hazal source: Nedarim 20b

Source: Bavli, Nedarim 20b

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Amar Rabi Yohanan ben Dahavai: arbaa dvarim sahu li malakhe hasharet. Higrin mipne ma hovein? Mipne shehofkhin et shulhanam. Ilmin mipne ma hovein? Mipne shemnasheqin al oto maqom. Hershin mipne ma hovein? Mipne shemsaprin bishat tashmish. Sumin mipne ma hovein? Mipne shemistaklin b'oto maqom.

Translation:

“Rabi Yohanan ben Dahavai said: Four things the ministering angels told me. Why are lame children born? Because they overturn their table. Why are mute children born?

Because they kiss oto maqom. Why are deaf children born? Because they speak during relations.

Why are blind children born? Because they look at oto maqom.”

This is the actual hazal source for the negative claim. It is not late. The phrase “because they kiss oto maqom” is in the Bavli.

But the sugya does not stop there.

Source: Bavli, Nedarim 20b

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Amar Rabi Yohanan: zo divrei Yohanan ben Dahavai. Aval hakhamim omrim: en halakha kYohanan ben Dahavai, ela kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh. Mashal lvasar haba mibet hatabah: ratza l'okhlo bmélah — okhlo; tzali — okhlo; mvushal — okhlo; shaluq — okhlo. Vkhen dag haba mibet hatzayad.

Translation:

“Rabi Yohanan said: This is the view of Yohanan ben Dahavai. But the hakhamim say: the halakha is not like Yohanan ben Dahavai; rather, whatever a man wishes to do with his wife, he may do. It is comparable to meat that comes from the butcher: if he wishes to eat it with salt, he eats it; roasted, he eats it; cooked, he eats it; boiled, he eats it. And likewise fish that comes from the fisherman.”

This is the central hinge of the whole sugya.

The Bavli itself supplies both materials. One tannaic voice, Yohanan ben Dahavai, condemns several practices and associates them with defects in children. Rabi Yohanan then says the halakha does not follow that view. The hakhamim permit broadly.

The permissive formula is not a later liberal invention. It is the Gemara's own maskana according to Rabi Yohanan's presentation of the hakhamim.

The restrictive position therefore needs a theory. It cannot merely quote “mipne shemnasheqin al oto maqom” and stop. It must explain why that clause survives when the sugya says en halakha kYohanan ben Dahavai.

6. The stories in Nedarim and the tone of the sugya

Source: Bavli, Nedarim 20b

Hebrew text?

Transliteration:

Hahi d'atai lqameh dRabi, amra lo: Rabi, arakhti lo shulhan vahafakho. Amar lah: biti, tora hitiratikh, v'ani ma eese lakh?

Translation:

“A certain woman came before Rabi and said to him: Master, I set a table for him and he overturned it. He said to her: My daughter, the Tora permitted you; what can I do for you?”

Source: Bavli, Nedarim 20b

Hebrew text?

Transliteration:

Hahi d'atai lqameh dRav, amra lo: Rabi, arakhti lo shulhan vahafakho. Amar: mai shna min binit?

Translation:

“A certain woman came before Rav and said to him: Master, I set a table for him and he overturned it. He said: How is it different from fish?”

These stories concern hafikhat hashulhan, not necessarily nishuq b'oto maqom. Still, they confirm the legal tone of the sugya. The Bavli is not building a general regime of sexual micromanagement inside permitted marriage. The governing image is meat or fish that the owner may consume in several manners.

This matters because the Raavad's restrictive reading narrows the Gemara sharply: he treats the permissive conclusion as addressing only hafikhat hashulhan or only certain details, not the whole list. The more natural flow of the sugya is broader.

7. Historical progression: from Raavad to Tur to the two-code problem

The historical progression has to be stated more sharply than the usual summary.

The first major poseq in the extant Rishonic halakhic stream who explicitly turns nishuq b'oto maqom into an issur is the Raavad, R. Avraham ben David of Posqieres, in Baalei Hanefesh, Shaar haqedusha. That formulation is important. Hazal already contain the negative statement in the name of Rabi Yohanan ben Dahavai. The Raavad is not inventing the phrase. His innovation is legal: he preserves the restriction even after the Gemara says en halakha kYohanan ben Dahavai.

That means the Raavad is not merely repeating Nedarim 20b. He is supplying a theory of how to read Nedarim 20b.

The Tur later brings both streams into the codificatory channel. In Even HaEzer 25, he quotes the Rambam's broad permission: a man's wife is muteret to him, and therefore he may kiss any limb that he wishes. But the Tur also preserves the Raavad's restrictive material in the laws of marital conduct, especially Orah Hayim 240. This is how the later two-code problem enters the Shulhan arukh.

The Shulhan arukh does not produce a simple single-sentence compromise. It preserves two legal registers in two locations. In Even HaEzer 25, the baseline marital-legal register follows the permissive Rambam/Rema structure. In Orah Hayim 240:4, the conduct/qedusha/tzniut register codifies the Raavad/Tur restriction as an issur.

That split is not accidental. Even HaEzer asks: what is the legal permissibility of marital intimacy as a marital right and relationship category? Orah Hayim 240 asks: how should a person conduct himself in tashmish hamita under the discipline of tzniut, boshet, and qedusha?

The danger is flattening the split. A lenient reading that cites only Even HaEzer 25 deletes oh 240:4. A strict reading that cites only oh 240:4 deletes the Gemara's permissive maskana and the Rambam/Rema formulation. The article's job is not to delete one side. It is to locate the contradiction and state which source controls which axis.

8. The Bet Yosef as editorial hinge

Source: Bet Yosef, Even HaEzer 25

The Bet Yosef quotes the Rambam's formulation and identifies its Gemara basis in Nedarim 20b. He presents the Rambam as ruling like the hakhamim against Yohanan ben Dahavai. The operative rule is that a man's wife is muteret to him and therefore kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh, with the ordinary limiting concern of zera lvatala.

The Bet Yosef's silence in Even HaEzer is not neutral. If Maran thought the Rambam's phrase umnasheq bkhol ever v'ever sheyirtze must exclude oto maqom as a matter of baseline marriage law, this is the natural place to say so. He does not say so there. This supports the claim that Even HaEzer carries the technical permissive rule.

But Maran also codifies the restrictive Raavad/Tur stream in Orah Hayim 240:4, where nishuq b'oto maqom is treated as forbidden. This creates a composite Maran structure.

The correct description is therefore not: “Maran simply follows the Rambam.” That ignores oh 240:4. It is also not: “Maran simply follows the Raavad.” That ignores Even HaEzer 25 and the Bet Yosef's presentation of the Rambam. The better description is: Maran's texts preserve both streams. Even HaEzer presents the broad marital-permission formulation; Orah Hayim codifies the restrictive conduct rule.

For Sephardic pesaq, oh 240:4 cannot be dismissed. For analytic reading, Even HaEzer 25 and Nedarim 20b prevent one from pretending that the restrictive view is the uncontested Gemara.

9. The restrictive codification: Shulhan arukh Orah Hayim 240:4

Source: Shulhan arukh, Orah Hayim 240:4

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Asur lhistakel b'oto maqom, shekol hamistakel sham en lo boshet panim, vover al vhatznea lekhet, umaavir habusha meal panav, shekol hamitbayesh eno hote, dikhtiv: uvaavur tihye yirato al pnekhem — zo habusha — lvilti teheta'u. Vod, dqa mgare yetzer hara bnafsheh. Vkhol sheken hanosheq sham, sheover al kol ele. Vod, sheover al bal teshaktzu et nafshotekhem.

Translation:

“It is forbidden to look at oto maqom, for whoever looks there has no shame of face, and transgresses 'walk modestly,' and removes shame from his face; for whoever has shame does not sin, as it is written, 'so that His fear shall be upon your faces' — this is shame — 'so that you not sin.' And further, he incites the evil inclination within himself. And all the more so one who kisses there, for he transgresses all these. And further, he transgresses 'do not make yourselves repulsive.'”

This is the strongest strict source in the codified halakha. It does not present the matter as mere midat hasidut. It says asur. It includes three mechanisms: boshet/tzniut, incitement of the yetzer hara, and bal teshaktzu.

This source is why a strict poseq can say “assur” without relying on vague social discomfort. It is in Shulhan arukh.

But the source is not the whole sugya. It is the codified Raavad/Tur stream. It must be placed next to Nedarim 20b, Rambam, Bet Yosef, and Rema. Otherwise the sugya is distorted.

9.1. The structure of Maran's bal teshaktzu language

Maran's oh 240:4 is built in layers.

First, histaklut b'oto maqom is prohibited because it destroys boshet and violates vhatznea lekhet. That is a tzniut/boshet mechanism, not yet bal teshaktzu.

Second, Maran says vkhol sheken hanosheq sham — all the more so one who kisses there. The kol sheken means that nishuq contains all the defects of histaklut: lack of boshet, breach of tzniut, and girui hayetzer.

Third, Maran adds vod — and further — that the one who kisses there violates bal teshaktzu. This is an additional mechanism. It is not the same issur as histaklut. Looking is prohibited because of tzniut and boshet. Kissing is prohibited because it includes the tzniut/boshet problem and adds the shiqqutz problem.

Therefore, the Shulhan arukh's bal teshaktzu claim is narrow. It is not saying that marital pleasure is disgusting. It is not saying that the wife is disgusting. It is saying that placing the mouth at oto maqom is classified as an act of shiqqutz. The object of the prohibition is the maase nishuq, not the wife, not marriage, and not ona.

This distinction is essential. If bal teshaktzu is the engine, the later question becomes whether the act is intrinsically ma'us or only socially/psychologically ma'us. That is where Pri Hadash, Kneset Hagdola, Pri Mgadim, R. Yosef Messas, and the modern cleanliness argument enter.

9.2. The two locations: oh 240 and Even HaEzer 25

The apparent contradiction is this.

In oh 240:4, Maran explicitly prohibits histaklut b'oto maqom and says all the more so nishuq b'oto maqom, adding bal teshaktzu.

In Even HaEzer 25, the Tur and Rema preserve the broad rule: vyakhol laasot im ishto ma sheyirtze, umnasheq bkhol ever sheyirtze. Maran's own Shulhan arukh text in Even HaEzer does not explicitly bring that entire permissive formula; it is the Rema who writes it there. But the Bet Yosef in Even HaEzer quotes the Rambam's broad formulation and ties it directly to Nedarim 20b, without presenting it as forbidden. The permissive Maran datum is therefore not that Maran explicitly writes “nishuq b'oto maqom is permitted” in Shulhan arukh Even HaEzer. He does not. The datum is that in Bet Yosef Even HaEzer he treats the Rambam's broad rule as the sugya's ruling, and in Shulhan arukh Even HaEzer he does not mention the Raavad/Tur prohibition.

That is why the contradiction is real but delicate. oh 240 has an explicit issur. Even HaEzer has a permissive Bet Yosef and an omission in Maran's code, while the Rema supplies the explicit heter-language.

The best explanation of why it appears in two places is that the two simanim are not asking the same question.

Even HaEzer 25 is the marital-permission register. Its question is: once she is his muteret wife, what is the scope of the husband-wife heter, subject to zera lvatala, nida, coercion, and other independent issurim? In that register, the Rambam/Rema rule is broad.

Orah Hayim 240 is the conduct/qedusha/tzniut register. Its question is: how should tashmish hamita be conducted under the disciplines of boshet, tzniut, perishut, and bodily dignity? In that register, Maran codifies the Raavad/Tur restriction.

Therefore, the location itself is part of the pesaq. oh 240 does not define the wife as forbidden. It defines a mode of conduct as outside the standard of tzniut and as an act of shiqqutz. Even HaEzer does not erase conduct restrictions. It defines the baseline heter of marriage.

9.3. Three ways posqim resolve Maran

The posqim resolve the two locations in three main ways.

9.3.1. The strict-specific resolution: oh 240 controls as the specific exception

According to the strict reading, there is no contradiction. Even HaEzer/Rema gives a general rule: he may kiss any limb. oh 240 gives the specific exception: oto maqom is excluded.

This is exactly the Bet Shmuel's move.

Source: Bet Shmuel, Even HaEzer 25:1

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Umnasheq bkhol ever. Lav davqa kol ever, dha b'oto maqom assur, kmo shekatuv bashas, vkhen katvu haRaavad vhatur.

Translation:

“And he may kiss any limb. This does not mean literally any limb, for in oto maqom it is forbidden, as written in the Shas; and so wrote the Raavad and the Tur.”

Under this reading, Maran's oh 240:4 is the final controlling text for nishuq b'oto maqom. The Rema's “any limb” is general language, and the specific oh issur limits it. This is the path of Bet Shmuel, Hokhmat Adam, Od Yosef Hai, Igrot Moshe where cited strictly, and Darkhei Tahara.

The strength of this reading is that it takes the word asur in Shulhan arukh seriously. The weakness is that it must explain why Bet Yosef Even HaEzer presents the Rambam's permissive formulation without qualification, and why the Gemara's own final language sounds broad.

9.3.2. The technical-heter resolution: oh 240 is a qedusha/tzniut register, not the baseline marital issur

According to the lenient reading, the baseline din follows Nedarim 20b, Rambam, Bet Yosef Even HaEzer, and Rema. The oh 240 language is real, but it is read as conduct/qedusha/tzniut language rather than the core marital-permission rule.

This reading says: in Even HaEzer, the issue is whether the act is part of the permitted marital sphere. There, the answer is yes. In oh 240, the issue is whether this is proper conduct for one who is preserving boshet and qedusha. There, Maran writes asur because it violates the oh conduct standard.

This is not a perfect answer, because Maran does not say “midat hasidut” in oh 240:4. He says asur and bal teshaktzu. Therefore the lenient reading cannot simply erase oh 240. It must say that the issur is not the same kind of absolute marital issur as nida or erva; it is a tzniut/shiqqutz conduct issur whose application depends on whether the Raavad's mi'us premise is accepted.

This is the direction of the aharonim who read the Rema's broad language as technically dispositive: Atzei Arazim, Torot Emet, Ezer Miqodesh, Yeshuot Yaaqov, Levush in Even HaEzer, and Arukh Hashulhan in Even HaEzer. On this reading, oh 240 remains a strong restraint text, but not the final statement of the technical baseline where ona and marital joy require reliance on the lenient majority.

9.3.3. The danger/conception resolution: the warning is tied to conception, not every act

A third resolution does not focus on the contradiction between oh and Even HaEzer as much as on the Nedarim warning itself. Some sources read Yohanan ben Dahavai's danger-language as applying where conception results from that act. This is how Kala Rabati presents the warning: all this applies when she conceives from that intercourse. Menorat Hama'or appears to move in the same direction.

Under this reading, the Nedarim danger is not a universal prohibition on every instance of the act. It is a concern about the manner of the conception-act. That helps explain why Even HaEzer can preserve the broad marital heter while oh 240 preserves warnings and restrictions around tashmish.

This approach does not fully answer bal teshaktzu, because bal teshaktzu is not conception-dependent. But it does weaken the attempt to use the child-defect material as a blanket proof.

9.4. Which side is ikar hadin?

The phrase ikar hadin must not be used carelessly here. Two opposite outcomes cannot both be ikar hadin for the same authority, in the same case, under the same facts.

There are three different claims that people confuse.

First: ikar hadin in the Bavli/Rambam/majority-Rishonim track. On this track, the baseline answer is mutar, subject to the external limits of nida, coercion, zera lvatala, and actual mi'us. The proof is Nedarim 20b as read straight: en halakha kYohanan ben Dahavai, ela kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh. The Rambam codifies this as umnasheq bkhol ever v'ever sheyirtze. In that system, nishuq b'oto maqom is not intrinsically excluded unless one accepts the Raavad's added bal teshaktzu classification.

Second: ikar hadin in plain Maran Shulhan arukh. On this track, the baseline answer is assur. oh 240:4 is explicit, local, and speaks directly about the case: vkhol sheken hanosheq sham, sheover al kol ele, vod sheover al bal teshaktzu. Maran does not write this as midat hasidut. He writes asur, over, and bal teshaktzu.

Therefore, if the controlling question is “what is the plain Maran Shulhan arukh ruling for nishuq b'oto maqom,” the answer is not mutar. It is assur.

Third: ikar hadin according to later lenient reconstruction. On this track, the poseq does not deny oh 240:4, but limits its application. He says the core sugya follows the majority Rishonim, the Bet Yosef in Even HaEzer, and the Rema; oh 240 is read as a tzniut/mi'us/conduct register whose force depends on the Raavad's premise that the act is ma'us. If the act is not actually ma'us to the couple, is clean, private, mutually desired, and materially connected to ona, then the bal teshaktzu mechanism weakens and the baseline returns to the Bavli/Rambam/Rema track. In that system, the poseq may say mutar miiqar hadin, but that is no longer the plain surface reading of Maran oh 240:4. It is a later resolution of Maran through source-weighting and limitation.

Therefore, the article should use four precise labels.

Ikar hadin according to the Bavli/Rambam/majority Rishonim: mutar, with external limits.

Ikar hadin according to plain Maran Shulhan arukh oh 240:4: assur.

Ikar hadin according to Bet Shmuel and the strict aharonim: assur; oh 240 is the specific exception to “any limb.”

Ikar hadin according to the lenient aharonim who resolve oh through Even HaEzer/Rambam/Rema/Pri Hadash-style mi'us analysis: mutar in the clean, non-repulsive, mutually desired, ona-serving case, while still not recommended as a qedusha standard.

The article's meqorist formulation may say that the ikar hasugya in Nedarim, before later codification, is mutar. It may not say that plain Maran's ikar hadin is mutar without explaining that this requires limiting or re-reading oh 240:4.

That is the clean resolution. The contradiction is not solved by saying both are ikar hadin. It is solved by saying they are different pesaq systems and different readings of the same source set.

9.5. Practical result according to Shulhan arukh

A strict Maran-based answer says: oh 240:4 is explicit. Maran says asur and adds bal teshaktzu. Therefore nishuq b'oto maqom is assur, and the broad permissive material must be limited.

A lenient Maran-based answer says: Bet Yosef Even HaEzer accepts the Rambam's reading of Nedarim, Maran omits the prohibition in Even HaEzer, most Rishonim are lenient, and oh 240 is a conduct/qedusha/mi'us text. Therefore, where there is no actual mi'us, where cleanliness removes the Raavad's concrete repulsion argument, and where ona or marital joy is materially served, there is room to rely on the lenient majority and the permissive Even HaEzer register.

The article's meqorist maskana should not say simply “Shulhan arukh permits” or “Shulhan arukh forbids.” Both are too flat. But once the question is specifically plain Maran Shulhan arukh for this exact act, the more exact answer is that oh 240:4 is the explicit ikar hadin text and it says assur. The lenient side can still say mutar miiqar hadin only by following the Bavli/Rambam/majority-Rishonim track and limiting the reach of oh 240 through Bet Yosef Even HaEzer, Rema, and the mi'us analysis.

The correct formulation is:

“Maran codifies the Raavad/Tur prohibition explicitly in oh 240:4 as a conduct rule grounded in tzniut, boshet, girui hayetzer, and bal teshaktzu. In Even HaEzer, the Bet Yosef presents the Rambam's broad heter and the Shulhan arukh does not restate the prohibition; the Rema then codifies the broad heter explicitly. The strict posqim make oh 240 the specific exception to 'any limb.' The lenient posqim treat Even HaEzer/Nedarim/Rambam/Rema as the technical baseline and oh 240 as a qedusha/tzniut/mi'us register whose application is not absolute where the mi'us premise fails and ona is strengthened.”

10. The Raavad's actual text in Baalei Hanefesh

The Raavad section should remain narrow. The article is not presenting the Raavad's whole theory of tashmish. It is using only the part of Baalei Hanefesh that explains why the Raavad excludes nishuq b'oto maqom from the broad rule of kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh.

The relevant material has three moves: first, he narrows Rabi Yohanan's heter; second, he treats histaklut b'oto maqom as a violation of tzniut and boshet; third, he says nishuq is all the more severe because it also adds bal teshaktzu.

10.1. The Raavad limits Rabi Yohanan's broad heter

Source: Raavad, Baalei Hanefesh, Shaar haqedusha

Hebrew text…

Transliteration:

Uma she'amar Rabi Yohanan: en halakha kRabi Yohanan ben Dahavai, ela kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh… nir'e li she'eno ela al hafikhat hashulhan bilvad, kide'ita bishmata… aval al ha'aherot, af al pi she'eno nidon alehem din hamur, mikol maqom issur yesh bahen…

Translation:

“And what Rabi Yohanan said, 'The halakha is not like Rabi Yohanan ben Dahavai; rather, whatever a man wishes to do with his wife, he may do'… it appears to me that this applies only to hafikhat hashulhan alone, as appears in the sugya… but regarding the other matters, even though one is not judged for them with the severe judgment, nevertheless there is an issur in them…”

This is the hinge of the Raavad.

He does not deny that the Gemara says en halakha kYohanan ben Dahavai. He reads that rejection narrowly. According to him, the Gemara's explicit permission is limited to hafikhat hashulhan. The other practices in Yohanan ben Dahavai's list lose the severe birth-defect consequence, but they do not become permitted.

This is why the Raavad's position is not simply “the Gemara says no.” His position is: the Gemara permits one item explicitly; the other items retain issur status.

10.2. The Raavad's objection to histaklut b'oto maqom

Source: Raavad, Baalei Hanefesh, Shaar haqedusha

Hebrew text…

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Keivan sheasa khen samukh ltashmish biza et atzmo vnahag ba minhag hefqer. Vkhol sheken im mistaklim sham shelo bishat tashmish shehu minhag hefqer vhu mshase hayetzer batzmo ka'asher perashnu bshaar haprisha…

Vkhen hamistakel b'oto maqom over al vhatznea lekhet im Elohekha, umaavir et habusha meal panav, ukhtiv: baavur tihye yirato al pnekhem — zo habusha — lvilti teheta'u, shekol hamitbayesh eno hote.

Translation:

“Since he did this close to relations, he degraded himself and conducted himself with her as a practice of hefqer. And all the more so if they look there not at the time of relations, for that is a practice of hefqer, and he incites the inclination within himself, as we explained in Shaar haprisha…

And likewise, one who looks at oto maqom transgresses 'walk modestly with your God,' and removes shame from his face; and it is written, 'so that His fear shall be upon your faces' — this refers to shame — 'so that you not sin,' for whoever has shame does not sin.”

This is the Raavad's non-bal teshaktzu argument. Histaklut b'oto maqom violates tzniut, boshet, and the anti-hefqer structure of tashmish. That matters because nishuq is then introduced as a kol sheken: if looking already has these problems, kissing has them all the more.

10.3. The Raavad's added issur for nishuq: bal teshaktzu

Source: Raavad, Baalei Hanefesh, Shaar haqedusha

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Vkhol sheken hanosheq sheyesh bo kol ele. Vod sheovrin mishum bal teshaktzu et nafshotekhem, ka'asher amru rabotenu zal: hai man dsheti maya bqarna d'umana avar mishum bal teshaktzu. Vrav Kahana dahava maavar shushiva al pumeh va'amar leh Rav: shaqleh dla lemru mekhal qa akhil vqa avar mishum bal teshaktzu, vkhol sheken hakh.

Translation:

“And all the more so one who kisses, for all these are present in him. And further, they transgress because of 'do not make yourselves repulsive,' as our Rabbis of blessed memory said: one who drinks water from the horn of a bloodletter transgresses because of bal teshaktzu. And Rav Kahana was passing a shushiva by his mouth, and Rav said to him: remove it, so that people should not say that he is eating it and transgressing bal teshaktzu — and all the more so in this case.”

This is the legal center of the Raavad for this article. He does not merely dislike the act. He analogizes nishuq b'oto maqom to putting a repulsive thing into the mouth.

His proof texts are Makot 16b and Shabat 90b. The operative category is not erva, not nida, not zera lvatala, and not the birth-defect warning. The operative category is shiqqutz.

10.3.1. Does the Raavad explain why it is shiqqutz?

The Raavad does not explicitly say: “because of smell,” “because of feces,” “because it is near the anus,” or “because of urine.” Those may be later explanatory inferences, but they are not his stated reason in this passage.

His stated reason is analogical. He brings two hazal cases where mouth-contact with a repulsive object creates bal teshaktzu: drinking from the bloodletter's horn and placing a shushiva by the mouth so that people might think he is eating it. Then he says vkhol sheken hakh — “all the more so this.”

That means the Raavad's own argument is not anatomical description but legal classification. He assumes that nishuq b'oto maqom is at least as ma'us as those mouth-contact cases. The disgust is not spelled out through odor or proximity to feces. It is conveyed by the comparison: mouth plus ma'us object equals bal teshaktzu; nishuq b'oto maqom is treated as a stronger instance of that model.

This is why the Raavad's text is vulnerable to Pri Hadash-style analysis. Since the Raavad does not define the physical cause of the mi'us, a later poseq can ask whether his classification is intrinsic and universal or dependent on ordinary human revulsion. If the basis is actual filth, odor, or bodily waste, cleanliness changes the factual matrix. If the basis is that halakha itself classifies the place as ma'us regardless of cleanliness, then cleanliness does not answer the Raavad.

The general bal teshaktzu sources show the kinds of things that normally generate the category.

Source: Rambam, Mishne Tora, Hilkhot Ma'akhalot Asurot 17:29

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Asru hakhamim ma'akhalot umashqin shenefesh rov bne adam qeha mehen, kgon ma'akhalot umashqin shenitarev bahen qi o tzo'a vleha sruha vkhayotze bahen. Vkhen asru le'ekhol vlish'tot bkelim hatzo'im shenafsho shel adam mit'onena mehen, kgon kle bet hakise ukhle zkhukhit shel saparin shegorin bahen et hadam vkhayotze bahen.

Translation:

“The hakhamim forbade foods and drinks from which the soul of most people recoils, such as foods and drinks into which vomit, feces, foul mucus, or the like became mixed. And likewise they forbade eating and drinking from filthy vessels from which a person's soul is distressed, such as toilet vessels and glass vessels of barbers with which they draw blood, and the like.”

This Rambam is not the Raavad's source for nishuq b'oto maqom, but it defines the normal bal teshaktzu field: vomit, feces, foul discharge, dirty vessels, toilet vessels, and bloodletting vessels. Therefore, when one tries to explain the Raavad's unstated rationale, the strongest inference is not “smell” narrowly. It is “mouth-contact with something halakhically treated as physically repulsive,” in the same family as foul mixtures and filthy vessels.

Source: Shulhan arukh, Yore Dea 116:6

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Asur le'ekhol ma'akhalim umashqim shenafsho shel adam qatza bahem, kgon mashqim v'okhlim shenitarvu bahem qi o tzo'a vleha sruha vkhayotze bahem, vkhen asur le'ekhol vlish'tot bkelim hatzo'im shenafsho shel adam qatza bahem.

Translation:

“It is forbidden to eat foods and drinks from which a person's soul is disgusted, such as drinks and foods into which vomit, feces, foul mucus, or the like became mixed; and likewise it is forbidden to eat and drink from filthy vessels from which a person's soul is disgusted.”

This gives the later explanatory frame. If one says the Raavad's bal teshaktzu is about proximity to feces, smell, bodily waste, or biological filth, he is drawing that explanation from the general bal teshaktzu category, not from the Raavad's explicit words. The Raavad himself says only: nishuq there is a kol sheken from drinking from a bloodletter's horn and from the shushiva case.

That is why the Pri Hadash matters later. If bal teshaktzu depends on actual mi'us, then the Raavad must prove that this act is intrinsically ma'us. If the act is not ma'us to the couple in a clean, mutually desired context, the Pri Hadash-style critique attacks the Raavad at the exact point of his legal mechanism.

10.4. What the Raavad proves for this sugya

The Raavad's strict position in this sugya rests on three claims.

First, Rabi Yohanan's permissive sentence is limited to hafikhat hashulhan. It does not erase every item in Yohanan ben Dahavai's list.

Second, histaklut b'oto maqom violates tzniut, boshet, and the anti-hefqer structure of tashmish.

Third, nishuq b'oto maqom adds bal teshaktzu because it is treated as placing the mouth in contact with something ma'us.

The main weakness in the Raavad is also now visible. The Gemara's language sounds broad, while he reads it narrowly. His bal teshaktzu argument depends on accepting his classification of the act as ma'us. His tzniut argument depends on accepting that the act remains a degradation even where both spouses desire it and it is done as part of ona rather than unilateral male appetite.

That is exactly where the later machloqet develops.

11. The meat-from-the-butcher analogy: Rambam versus Raavad

The fight over Nedarim 20b is not merely about one act. It is about how to understand the Gemara's food metaphor.

The Rambam reads the metaphor directly. Meat from the butcher may be eaten salted, roasted, cooked, or boiled. Once the wife is muteret to her husband, the permitted marital relationship gives broad technical autonomy. The boundary is not “only the most procreative or visually modest form.” The boundary is independent issur: nida, coercion, zera lvatala, forbidden thoughts, or other external prohibitions. Inside the permitted marital relationship, umnasheq bkhol ever v'ever sheyirtze is literal.

The Raavad reads the metaphor with an implied boundary. Meat can be prepared in many ways, but it cannot be treated as rotten, filthy, or degraded food. The metaphor permits different forms of marital intimacy; it does not permit an act that the Raavad classifies as shiqqutz. Under that model, bal teshaktzu is not a detail. It is the boundary that stops the meat metaphor from becoming absolute.

This is the philosophical-legal split.

For the Rambam, the main category is heter plus qedusha. The act may be legally permitted while still being below the ideal standard of midat hasidut or hameqadesh atzmo bmutar lo.

For the Raavad, the main category is heter with structural red lines. Once an act crosses into shiqqutz, it is not merely less holy. It exits the permitted zone.

Do not describe the Rambam as saying that every desire is spiritually ideal. That is false. He expressly adds midat hasidut and qedusha. Do not describe the Raavad as merely giving mussar.

That is also false. He states issur through bal teshaktzu.

12. The bal teshaktzu mechanism

Bal teshaktzu is not a decorative argument. It is the strict side's fallback mechanism.

If the only source were Nedarim 20b, the lenient side would be very strong: Rabi Yohanan says en halakha kYohanan ben Dahavai. The Raavad therefore needs another legal engine. That engine is bal teshaktzu. In other words: even if the birth-defect warning is rejected, and even if the meat-from-the-butcher analogy permits broad marital variation, an act can still be excluded if it is classified as shiqqutz.

This is where bal teshaktzu fits into the sugya. It is not the same axis as Yohanan ben Dahavai. It is an independent issur-category superimposed onto the marital-permission sugya.

12.1. The basic source

Source: Vayiqra 11:43

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Al teshaktzu et nafshotekhem bkhol hasheretz hashoretz.

Translation:

“Do not make yourselves repulsive with any creeping thing that creeps.”

The verse's literal context is sheratzim. The broader category comes through hazal.

Source: Bavli, Makot 16b

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Amar Rav Bevai bar Abaye: hai man dsheti bqarna d'umana qa avar mishum bal teshaktzu et nafshotekhem.

Translation:

“Rav Bevai bar Abaye said: One who drinks from the horn of a bloodletter transgresses because of 'do not make yourselves repulsive.'”

This is the model used by the Raavad: the Torah verse concerns sheratzim, but hazal apply the category to repulsive human conduct.

12.2. The Raavad's application

The Raavad's legal move is to say that nishuq b'oto maqom is like drinking from a bloodletter's vessel. It is not merely “less refined.” It is an act of shiqqutz. Once framed that way, the permission of kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh no longer controls. The act exits the marital heter not because the wife is forbidden, but because the particular act is classified as repulsive. The Raavad does not explicitly identify the repulsiveness as smell, feces, urine, or anatomical proximity to the anus. His proof is by analogy to repulsive mouth-contact cases.

That is why the Raavad is so important. He changes the legal object. The object under analysis is no longer simply “a husband with his wife.” The object becomes “a human being placing his mouth at a place halakha classifies as ma'us.”

Under this reading, the meat analogy has an implied boundary: meat can be eaten roasted, cooked, salted, or boiled, but not in a form that is rotten or disgusting. Likewise, marital intimacy can take several forms, but not one that falls under bal teshaktzu.

12.3. The Pri Hadash's general theory of bal teshaktzu

The Pri Hadash is relevant because he analyzes when something is legally called ma'us. His discussion is not primarily a sugya of marital intimacy. It is a general Yore Dea discussion of repulsive foods and creatures. But his categories directly affect the Raavad's argument.

Source: Pri Hadash, Yore Dea 84:3

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Lo azlinan binyan miusata batar ruba dalma, ela batar kol had vhad.

Translation:

“In the matter of repulsiveness, we do not follow the majority of the world, but each person individually.”

Taken alone, this sounds like a fully subjective test: if he is not disgusted, there is no bal teshaktzu. But that is not the whole Pri Hadash.

Source: Pri Hadash, Yore Dea 84:3

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Umihu hanehu dkhatav haRambam… lkhule alma asiri mishum bal teshaktzu, mishum dhanehu khule alma m'isi lhu.

Translation:

“However, those cases that the Rambam wrote… are forbidden to everyone because of bal teshaktzu, because those things are repulsive to everyone.”

Source: Pri Hadash, Yore Dea 84:3

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Umihu kol ze eno ela derabbanan, dmai dmasmkhinan leh aqra dbal teshaktzu lav dqra mayri bhakhi, ela asmakhta balma have.

Translation:

“Nevertheless, all this is only rabbinic, for what we attach to the verse of bal teshaktzu is not what the verse itself discusses; it is only an asmakhta.”

The Pri Hadash therefore gives three categories.

First: something repulsive to everyone. In that case, even a person who claims not to be disgusted is not followed. Batla daato etzel kol adam. His private taste does not define the halakha.

Second: something repulsive only to him. In that case, he may not do it, because for him it is shiqqutz.

Third: something that many or even most people dislike, but not everyone, and this person is not disgusted. In that case, the Pri Hadash is lenient. We do not automatically follow rov haolam in mi'us when the matter is not universally repulsive.

This is the key to applying the Pri Hadash to this sugya.

12.4. How the Pri Hadash weakens the Raavad's bal teshaktzu argument

The Pri Hadash does not have to say: “The Raavad is wrong because desire cancels every disgust.” That would be a weak formulation. Desire does not permit objectively filthy conduct. If everyone classifies something as disgusting, private appetite is not enough.

12.4.1. Categories of posqim interpreting the Raavad, from most accepting to most skeptical

The Raavad's kol sheken is the problem point. His proof cases are external ma'us objects — a bloodletter's horn, a shushiva by the mouth, filthy vessels, food mixed with vomit or feces. Nishuq b'oto maqom is not that. It is a marital act with one's muteret wife, in a context of attraction, consent, ona, and often preparation. The later posqim therefore fall into a spectrum.

12.4.1.1. Full formal acceptance: Raavad's classification is decisive

This category accepts the Raavad's move without reopening the psychology of attraction. Once Raavad classifies nishuq b'oto maqom as shiqqutz, desire does not redefine the maase. A person can want something and halakha can still call the act ma'us.

Source: Raavad, Baalei Hanefesh, Shaar haqedusha

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Vkhol sheken hanosheq sheyesh bo kol ele. Vod sheovrin mishum bal teshaktzu et nafshotekhem… vkhol sheken hakh.

Translation:

“And all the more so one who kisses, for all these are present in him. And further, they transgress because of 'do not make yourselves repulsive'… and all the more so in this case.”

This is the strict baseline. The Raavad does not prove attraction is absent. He does not need to, according to this category. He treats the act itself as a stronger form of repulsive mouth-contact than the hazal cases.

This category includes the Raavad himself, the Tur where he transmits this material, and Maran in oh 240:4 where the language is codified as asur and over.

12.4.1.2. Specific-exception acceptance: Raavad limits the general heter

This category accepts the Raavad through the codified contradiction. It says: the Rema/Rambam language “any limb” is general; oh 240 and Raavad supply the exception. This is less about explaining why it is ma'us and more about how to read the codes.

Source: Bet Shmuel, Even HaEzer 25:1

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Umnasheq bkhol ever. Lav davqa kol ever, dha b'oto maqom assur, kmo shekatuv bashas, vkhen katvu haRaavad vhatur.

Translation:

“And he may kiss any limb. This does not mean literally any limb, for in oto maqom it is forbidden, as written in the Shas; and so wrote the Raavad and the Tur.”

The Bet Shmuel does not investigate the Raavad's disgust theory. He makes Raavad/Tur the controlling exception. This is the line of later strict sources that treat oh 240 as the specific limitation on Even HaEzer.

12.4.1.3. Objective/majoritarian defense: mi'us is not erased by private attraction

This category supplies a theory that helps the Raavad. It says: even if this couple is not disgusted, halakha may follow the objective or majority classification of mi'us. Attraction is not enough if the act is socially or halakhically ma'us.

Source: Kneset Hagdola, Hagahot Tur, Yore Dea 84

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Kol ma sherov haolam mo'asin bo, af dildideh en ma'us, asur leh, vkhol sheken im lo ma'us.

Translation:

“Anything that most of the world finds repulsive, even if to him it is not repulsive, is forbidden to him; and all the more so if it is repulsive to him.”

Applied to the Raavad, this gives the strict side its best theoretical answer. If nishuq b'oto maqom belongs to the rov haolam ma'us category, the fact that some husbands are attracted to it does not help.

This category does not prove that nishuq b'oto maqom is actually rov haolam ma'us. It only says that if it is, subjective attraction does not remove bal teshaktzu.

12.4.1.4. Conditional mi'us analysis: Pri Hadash pressures the Raavad's assumption

This category does not directly overturn the Raavad. It asks whether the Raavad's key assumption is true. Is this act universally ma'us, or is the mi'us contingent on context, cleanliness, culture, and personal reaction?

Source: Pri Hadash, Yore Dea 84:3

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Lo azlinan binyan miusata batar ruba dalma, ela batar kol had vhad.

Translation:

“In the matter of repulsiveness, we do not follow the majority of the world, but each person individually.”

Source: Pri Hadash, Yore Dea 84:3

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Umihu hanehu dkhatav haRambam… lkhule alma asiri mishum bal teshaktzu, mishum dhanehu khule alma m'isi lhu.

Translation:

“However, those cases that the Rambam wrote… are forbidden to everyone because of bal teshaktzu, because those things are repulsive to everyone.”

The Pri Hadash creates a split. Universal mi'us remains objective. Non-universal mi'us may follow the individual. This weakens the Raavad only if nishuq b'oto maqom is not intrinsically and universally ma'us.

This is not yet a heter. It is a demand for classification.

12.4.1.5. Strong subjective mi'us: the couple's reaction can define the case

This category goes further. It treats the individual's disgust or lack of disgust as highly significant, even where most people are disgusted.

Source: Pri Mgadim, Mishbetzot Zahav, Yore Dea 84:2

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Dbal teshaktzu lo azlinan batar ruba, ela im ldideh la ma'us, af lrov haolam ma'us — share; v'im ldideh ma'us, ulkhule alma en ma'us — asur.

Translation:

“For bal teshaktzu, we do not follow the majority. Rather, if to him it is not repulsive, even if it is repulsive to most of the world, it is permitted; and if to him it is repulsive, even if to everyone else it is not repulsive, it is forbidden.”

Applied here, this is the strongest theoretical answer to the Raavad's external-object analogy. A bloodletter's horn is ma'us because people recoil from it. If this act is not ma'us to this couple, and is instead part of desire and ona, the analogy weakens sharply.

This category must still answer oh 240:4. It can weaken bal teshaktzu, but it does not automatically erase the tzniut/boshet side.

12.4.1.6. Direct rejection of the bal teshaktzu analogy: Torot Emet

This is the most explicit attack on the Raavad's jump. R. Refael Birdogo in Torot Emet says that bal teshaktzu belongs to eating a repulsive item. Nishuq vhiba is not that kind of case.

Source: Torot Emet, Even HaEzer 25

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Gam ma shekhatav harav over mishum bal teshaktzu hu tamuah, dbal teshaktzu hu b'okhel davar ma'us, aval binshiqá vhiba balma ma shiqqutz baze, vdavar shene'ehav lkhol haolam, v'en hefresh ben ze uven okhel karkashta shel behema.

Translation:

“Also what the Rav wrote, that he transgresses because of bal teshaktzu, is astonishing, for bal teshaktzu applies to one who eats a repulsive thing; but in mere kissing and affection, what repulsiveness is there in this? It is something loved by the whole world, and there is no difference between this and eating the animal's karkashta.”

This is not only a leniency. It is a frontal conceptual critique. Torot Emet denies the equation between external filth and marital affection. His point is exactly the objection: the Raavad's cases are repulsive objects; this case is hiba.

The karkashta comparison is also important. Even eating an animal's lower intestinal part is not automatically bal teshaktzu if it is treated as food. Therefore the category cannot be “body area equals disgust.” The halakhic question is whether the maase is treated as repulsive in the relevant human context.

12.4.1.7. Metziut-based limitation: R. Yosef Messas and modern hygiene

This category does not necessarily reject the Raavad's rule in its original setting. It says the factual basis of the mi'us may have changed. If the concern is that the sight or contact will make the wife repulsive to him, regular washing and ordinary hygiene can remove the concern.

Source: Peninei Halakha, citing R. Yosef Messas, Mayim Hayim 1, p. 92

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Vharav Yosef Mashash… sover linyan histaklut shehahashash shema titgane alav, vlakhen kayom sheyesh miqlahat bkhol bayit urgilim lirhotz yoter, en issur.

Translation:

“And R. Yosef Mashash… holds regarding looking that the concern is lest she become repulsive to him; therefore today, when there is a shower in every home and people are accustomed to washing more, there is no prohibition.”

This is not the same as Torot Emet. Torot Emet challenges the category itself. R. Yosef Messas limits the application by metziut. If the original concern was actual repulsion, and the repulsion no longer exists under modern hygienic conditions, the issur no longer applies in that form.

Peninei Halakha extends that logic to nishuq because the strict mechanism there is bal teshaktzu. If bal teshaktzu rests on actual mi'us, then preparation and cleanliness matter.

12.4.1.8. Mode-based narrowing: Ezer Miqodesh

This category narrows the Raavad/oh side by defining the problematic act more precisely. It does not say that every contact or every glance is forbidden. It says the issur is focused looking, not passing sight.

Source: Ezer Miqodesh, Even HaEzer 25:1

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Vkhvar katavti bmaqom aher she'en geder histaklut ki im bimayen vtokea dato baze, ma she'en ken derekh haavara balma en shum qpeida bkhol mile she'amru hazal shelo lhistakel.

Translation:

“And I have already written elsewhere that the category of looking applies only when one examines and fixes his attention on this; but a mere passing glance has no concern in all matters where hazal said not to look.”

This weakens the absolutist reading of the tzniut side. It suggests that the issur is not “the body exists and therefore it is forbidden.” It is a degraded mode of looking. That same type of analysis can support a more precise reading of nishuq: the act must be defined carefully before being classified as shiqqutz.

12.4.1.9. Synthetic practical skepticism: Peninei Halakha

This category combines the above doubts with the majority Rishonim. It does not claim the Raavad is imaginary. It says the strict side is real, but the doubts are enough that the practical baseline follows the lenient majority when ona and marital joy require it.

Source: Peninei Halakha, Simhat Habayit Uvirkhato 2:19

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Kivan shedaat rov harishonim lhaqel, uvenosaf lkhakh gam la'osrim ha'isur midivrei hakhamim bilvad, en badavar issur. Amnam kivan sheldaat rov harishonim mitzad hatzniut vhaqdusha adif lhahmir, nakhon lahush ldatam… vkha'asher ehad mibne hazug hash mize dhiya, nakhon sheyinhagu kdaat hamahmirim.

Translation:

“Since most Rishonim are lenient, and in addition, even according to those who forbid, the prohibition is only rabbinic, there is no prohibition in the matter. However, since according to most Rishonim, from the side of modesty and holiness it is preferable to be stringent, it is proper to account for their view… And when one spouse feels revulsion from this, it is proper that they conduct themselves according to the stringent view.”

This is the most skeptical practical category. It does not say Raavad is impossible. It says the Raavad's bal teshaktzu mechanism is weak where there is no dhiya, and where ona is strengthened the majority Rishonim control.

12.4.1.10. Summary of the spectrum

The spectrum is therefore:

1. Raavad/Tur/Maran oh: the act is shiqqutz; attraction is irrelevant.

2. Bet Shmuel and strict aharonim: Raavad/oh is the specific exception to “any limb.”

3. Kneset Hagdola framework: even if this person is not repulsed, rov haolam mi'us can still prohibit.

4. Pri Hadash framework: universal mi'us prohibits; non-universal mi'us may follow the person.

5. Pri Mgadim framework: the individual's actual disgust or lack of disgust is central.

6. Torot Emet: the bal teshaktzu analogy itself is astonishing, because nishuq vhiba is not eating an external ma'us object.

7. R. Yosef Messas: even if there was once a mi'us concern, hygiene and washing can remove the metziut.

8. Ezer Miqodesh: the tzniut side itself is mode-dependent, such as focused looking rather than passing sight.

9. Peninei Halakha: combine the doubts with the majority Rishonim and ona; where there is no repulsion and the act materially serves marital joy, the practical baseline is heter.

The underlying dispute is whether attraction changes the halakhic object. The strict side says no: some acts remain ma'us even when desired. The skeptical side says that where the whole issur is mi'us, attraction, cleanliness, marital context, and lack of revulsion are not peripheral facts. They define whether the Raavad's analogy to external filth applies at all.

The stronger Pri Hadash-style answer is this: the Raavad must prove that nishuq b'oto maqom is in category one — universally repulsive — or at least that halakha classifies it as objectively ma'us. If he cannot prove that, then a marital context changes the analysis. Where the couple is mutually willing, clean, private, and not repulsed, the act may fall into category three rather than category one.

That is why modern conditions matter only inside this axis. Showers, ordinary cleanliness, and the couple's lack of repulsion do not repeal Shulhan arukh. But they do weaken the claim that the act is intrinsically shiqqutz. If the whole issur depends on mi'us, and the operative mi'us is absent, the Pri Hadash framework gives the lenient side a real legal argument.

This also explains why Peninei Halakha says that if either spouse finds it repulsive, they should follow the strict view. That is not psychology fluff. It is the bal teshaktzu mechanism itself. If the act is ma'us to the people doing it, the heter becomes much weaker.

12.5. Who disagrees with the Pri Hadash, and how

There are two different ways to disagree with the Pri Hadash.

The first disagreement is stricter: rov haolam is enough. If most people are disgusted, the act is forbidden even for the individual who claims not to be disgusted. This is the line attributed to Kneset Hagdola.

Source: Kneset Hagdola, Hagahot Tur, Yore Dea 84

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Kol ma sherov haolam mo'asin bo, af dildideh en ma'us, asur leh, vkhol sheken im lo ma'us.

Translation:

“Anything that most of the world finds repulsive, even if to him it is not repulsive, is forbidden to him; and all the more so if it is repulsive to him.”

Applied here, this stricter line helps the Raavad. It means the permissive side cannot say: “This couple is not disgusted, therefore no bal teshaktzu.” If the act is socially or halakhically classified as disgusting by rov haolam, the individual's lack of disgust is not enough.

The second disagreement is more lenient, or at least a softer reading of Pri Hadash. The Pri Mgadim appears to emphasize the individual's own daat even more strongly, reading the rule as dependent on whether the person himself is disgusted.

Source: Pri Mgadim, Mishbetzot Zahav, Yore Dea 84:2

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Dbal teshaktzu lo azlinan batar ruba, ela im ldideh la ma'us, af lrov haolam ma'us — share; v'im ldideh ma'us, ulkhule alma en ma'us — asur.

Translation:

“For bal teshaktzu, we do not follow the majority. Rather, if to him it is not repulsive, even if it is repulsive to most of the world, it is permitted; and if to him it is repulsive, even if to everyone else it is not repulsive, it is forbidden.”

This is more useful for the lenient side than the Pri Hadash himself. But it is also dangerous to overuse it, because if something is universally disgusting, even the Pri Hadash himself says the individual is not followed.

The strict aharonim in our sugya do not need to refute every detail of Pri Hadash. They can simply say that oh 240:4 has already classified the act as shiqqutz, and that the Bet Shmuel already excluded it from umnasheq bkhol ever. Once the Shulhan arukh has codified it as bal teshaktzu, general Yore Dea categories cannot easily uproot the specific Orah Hayim ruling.

That is the strict answer to Pri Hadash: even if repulsiveness is partly subjective in ordinary foods, nishuq b'oto maqom has already been halakhically classified by Raavad/Tur/Maran as shiqqutz. The individual's arousal or preference does not reclassify the act.

12.6. Practical analytic placement

Bal teshaktzu therefore sits between the Gemara and the final pesaq.

It comes after Nedarim 20b because it is not the Gemara's direct maskana. It is the Raavad's independent mechanism.

It comes before modern application because the practical case turns on whether this act is legally ma'us in the operative context.

The Pri Hadash does not by himself prove a heter. He creates the question: is oto maqom universally/objectively ma'us, or is the Raavad treating as ma'us what in a clean, desired, marital context is not ma'us to the couple?

Kneset Hagdola and the strict oh 240 line answer: rov haolam / halakhic classification is enough; the individual's lack of disgust does not matter.

Pri Mgadim-style subjectivity and the modern cleanliness argument answer: if there is no actual mi'us to the couple, the bal teshaktzu mechanism is weak, and the sugya reverts toward the majority Rishonim who read Nedarim 20b leniently.

That is the real machloqet. It is not “does bal teshaktzu exist?” It exists. The question is whether this act falls into that category.

13. The Rambam/Rema theory

The Rambam/Rema theory reads the Gemara straight. Yohanan ben Dahavai's list is not halakha. The hakhamim permit broadly. The legal line is zera lvatala, coercion, nida, forbidden thoughts, and other independent issurim. Inside permitted marital intimacy, umnasheq bkhol ever sheyirtze is literal.

This theory also distinguishes issur from qedusha. There may be a real recommendation for restraint. There may be a real category of hameqadesh atzmo bmutar lo. But a qedusha recommendation does not by itself create an issur.

This reading explains the Rambam's wording elegantly. It also explains the Rema's wording elegantly. Its difficulty is Shulhan arukh Orah Hayim 240:4, which states a prohibition explicitly.

Therefore, under this view, one of the following must be said: either Orah Hayim 240:4 follows a stricter stream not accepted as the main technical din in Even HaEzer; or it addresses a narrower form of act, such as direct nishuq of the place of intercourse itself; or it speaks within a tzniut/qedusha register and not the full legal permission register. Each answer has costs. None is textually cost-free.

14. Posqim horizontal to Rambam: oto maqom is included

“Horizontal to Rambam” means sources that stand in the same legal plane as the Rambam, not merely later writers who found a heter after the fact. Their shared claim is simple: Nedarim 20b rejected Yohanan ben Dahavai's whole restrictive list, and therefore kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh includes the very items Yohanan ben Dahavai had named, including histaklut and nishuq b'oto maqom, unless some independent issur is later established.

This line is not a modern invention. It begins before the Rambam, appears explicitly in Rishonic material, is codified by the Rambam, and is later defended by aharonim who say that “any limb” must mean the limb that one might otherwise have thought forbidden.

14.1. The Geonic reading in Shita Mqubetzet

Source: Geonim, cited in Shita Mqubetzet, Nedarim 20b

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Zo divrei Rabi Yohanan, shelo yahafokh shulhano vlo ysaper vlo yistakel. Aval hakhamim omrim en halakha khen, ela kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh, dhatora hiqna lo khefetz haqanui bdamim, dikhtiv: ki yiqah ish isha. Al ken hevi mashal mibasar umidag haqanui ladam she'okhlo bkhol inyan sheyirtze, af ha'isha btashmish ken.

Translation:

“This is the view of Rabi Yohanan: that he should not overturn his table, and should not speak, and should not look. But the hakhamim say that the halakha is not so; rather, whatever a man wishes to do with his wife, he may do, for the Tora gave her to him as something acquired by money, as it is written: 'When a man takes a wife.' Therefore it brought a parable from meat and fish acquired by a person, which he eats in whatever manner he wishes; so too the woman regarding tashmish.”

This is the strongest pre-Rambam or Rambam-horizontal reading. The Geonic text does not say that the hakhamim rejected only hafikhat hashulhan. It explicitly lists the prohibited items — hafikhat hashulhan, speaking, and looking — and then says the hakhamim reject that whole position.

The acquisition language is jarring in modern ears, but it is legal-formal language, not the ethical center of the sugya. Its function is to define the marital heter as broad. For this article, the important point is the scope: the Geonic reading treats histaklut itself as included in the hakhamim's heter. If histaklut is included, nishuq is not excluded by the syntax of Nedarim unless one adds the Raavad's independent bal teshaktzu mechanism.

14.2. Yere'im: no deficiency of qedusha

Source: Sefer Yere'im, cited in Shita Mqubetzet, Nedarim 20b

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh — v'en hesron qedusha.

Translation:

“Whatever a man wishes to do with his wife, he may do — and there is no deficiency of qedusha.”

This is even stronger than the Rambam's formulation. The Rambam says mutar, but then adds midat hasidut not to be lightheaded and to sanctify himself in tashmish. The Yere'im, as cited, states that there is no hesron qedusha. That means the act is not merely technically permitted while spiritually defective. On this reading, once the hakhamim reject Yohanan ben Dahavai, the restriction is gone as both issur and qedusha-defect.

That does not answer a separate bal teshaktzu claim. But it is a direct contradiction to the idea that the Bavli's final line leaves the act inherently unholy.

14.3. The Rambam's syntax: “any limb” means the disputed limb

The Rambam's language is not vague.

Source: Rambam, Mishne Tora, Hilkhot Issure Bia 21:9

Hebrew text…

Transliteration:

Ishto shel adam muteret hi lo. Lfikhakh kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh. Boel bkhol et sheyirtze, umnasheq bkhol ever v'ever sheyirtze…

Translation:

“A man's wife is permitted to him. Therefore, whatever a man wishes to do with his wife, he may do. He may have relations whenever he wishes, and kiss any and every limb that he wishes…”

The lomdut is direct. The Rambam is codifying Nedarim 20b, where the disputed item was nishuq b'oto maqom. If “any and every limb” excludes oto maqom, the phrase loses its primary hidush. Ordinary limbs were not the sugya's problem. The problem limb was oto maqom.

Therefore the Rambam-horizontal reading says: kol ever v'ever includes oto maqom by force of context. The Raavad must create an exception. The Rambam does not.

14.4. According to those who say Rambam does not include oto maqom, what is the hidush?

The non-inclusion side needs a real answer. If Rambam's “any and every limb” excludes the exact limb named in Nedarim, then what did Rambam add?

There are four possible answers.

First, “any limb” can mean any limb within the ordinary permitted body, excluding a limb or place already removed by independent issur. Halakhic language often uses broad terms that are later limited by another din. Under this reading, Rambam teaches that erotic affection with the wife's body is not intrinsically nivul, hirhur issur, or kalut rosh. A man may kiss her limbs because the wife is muteret to him. But oto maqom is excluded not because the wife is forbidden, but because Raavad/oh 240 classify that act as tzniut-breach and shiqqutz.

Second, Rambam's hidush can be against a different hava amina: one might think that permitted marriage allows only the maase bia itself, while surrounding erotic acts are merely tolerated or improper. Rambam says no. The heter of ishto shel adam muteret hi lo includes affection, kissing, and derekh evarim, provided there is no zera lvatala. Under this reading, “any limb” expands marital permission beyond intercourse, but does not necessarily include a place that later posqim classify under bal teshaktzu.

Third, the phrase can be read as a general marital-access rule rather than as a direct lexical answer to every item in Yohanan ben Dahavai's list. Rambam is codifying the hakhamim's broad orientation: the wife is muteret, and ordinary body-contact within marriage is permitted. The phrase is not designed to adjudicate each item in Raavad's list unless it says so explicitly. This answer is weaker textually, because Rambam's source is Nedarim, and Nedarim's disputed case includes oto maqom. But it is a possible strict reading.

Fourth, the non-inclusion side can say that Rambam's own final clause, uvilvad shelo yotzi shikhvat zera lvatala, shows the method: the rule is broad but not absolute. If zera lvatala can limit the rule, so can bal teshaktzu or tzniut when established elsewhere. Rambam did not need to list every external limiter in this halakha.

He listed the limiter most intrinsic to the sexual act itself. oh 240, on the strict reading, supplies the separate conduct limiter.

This is the best defense of the Bet Shmuel-style reading. It says: kol ever v'ever is a broad permission, but not a permission against an independently prohibited maase. Oto maqom is outside the phrase because the act is independently classified as shiqqutz.

The weakness remains sharp. The hidush becomes less natural. Ordinary kissing of permitted limbs did not need Nedarim 20b nearly as badly as oto maqom did. Therefore Torot Emet's objection remains strong: if “any limb” does not include the limb Yohanan ben Dahavai named, what is the poseq teaching that was not already obvious?

14.5. Why Rambam does not mention tzniut here

The phrase “oh conduct siman” needs precision. It does not mean “not letter of the law.” oh 240 is part of Shulhan arukh and can contain full issurim. The point is narrower: oh 240 is organized as a siman of hanhagat tashmish, the manner of conduct in marital relations.

Such a siman can contain several legal layers: explicit issur, ona obligation, tzniut regulation, perishut, and midat hasidut. The label “oh” does not itself decide whether a line is binding din or pious conduct. The source-language decides.

Source: Shulhan arukh, oh 240, heading

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Eikh yitnaheg ha'adam btashmish mitato.

Translation:

“How a person should conduct himself in marital relations.”

The heading marks the siman as conduct law. That does not make every seif optional. It means the subject is derekh hanhaga in tashmish, not the baseline definition of qiddushin, ona, or erva.

Source: Shulhan arukh, oh 240:4

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Asur lhistakel b'oto maqom… vkhol sheken hanosheq sham… vod, sheover al bal teshaktzu et nafshotekhem.

Translation:

“It is forbidden to look at oto maqom… and all the more so one who kisses there… and further, he transgresses 'do not make yourselves repulsive.'”

This is binding-law language: asur, over, bal teshaktzu. It is not written as midat hasidut. Therefore, when the article says oh 240 is a conduct siman, it is not downgrading oh 240:4 into advice. It is saying that Maran located this issur in the conduct/tzniut register, not in the Even HaEzer register of the marital heter.

Source: Rambam, Mishne Tora, Hilkhot Issure Bia 21:9

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Ishto shel adam muteret hi lo. Lfikhakh kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh… uvilvad shelo yotzi shikhvat zera lvatala. V'af al pi khen midat hasidut shelo yaquel adam et rosho lkhakh, vsheyeqadesh atzmo bishat tashmish.

Translation:

“A man's wife is permitted to him. Therefore, whatever a man wishes to do with his wife, he may do… provided that he does not emit seed in vain. Nevertheless, it is a measure of hasidut that a man should not make himself lightheaded for this, and that he should sanctify himself at the time of relations.”

This is the contrast. Rambam's legal boundary is zera lvatala. His qedusha language is introduced as midat hasidut.

That phrase is not letter-of-law issur language. It means a higher conduct standard inside the zone of technical heter.

Source: Rambam, Mishne Tora, Hilkhot Deot 5:4

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Af al pi she'ishto shel adam muteret lo tamid, raui lo ltalmid hakham sheyanhig atzmo biqdusha, vlo yhe matzui etzel ishto ktarnegol, ela milele shabat llele shabat im yesh bo koah… vlo yaquel rosho byoter, vlo ynabel et piv bdivrei havai va'afilu beno lvena.

Translation:

“Even though a man's wife is always permitted to him, it is proper for a talmid hakham to conduct himself in holiness, and not be constantly with his wife like a rooster, but from Shabat night to Shabat night if he has strength… and he should not be excessively lightheaded, and should not vulgarize his mouth with empty words, even between him and her.”

This Deot passage proves the same structure. Rambam begins with muteret lo tamid, then says raui lo ltalmid hakham. The language is not “asur to all men to do otherwise.” It is a hanhagat talmid hakham and qedusha standard. It is real halakhic guidance, but it is not identical to the issur-language of oh 240:4.

Source: Ramban, Vayiqra 19:2

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Qdoshim tihyu — hevu prushim min haarayot umin haavera… vhainyan ki hatora hizhira baarayot uvma'akhalot ha'asurim, vhitira habia ish b'ishto va'akhilat habasar vhayayin. Im ken yimtza baal hata'ava maqom lihyot shatuf bzimát ishto… vyihye naval birshut hatora. Lfikhakh ba hakatuv, ahare sheperat ha'isurim she'asar otam lgamre, vtziwa bdavar klali shenihye prushim min hamutarot.

Translation:

“'You shall be holy' — be separated from sexual prohibitions and from transgression… The matter is that the Tora warned against forbidden sexual relations and forbidden foods, and permitted intercourse between a man and his wife and eating meat and wine. If so, a person of desire could find room to be immersed in the sexual indulgence of his wife… and he would be a degenerate within the permission of the Tora. Therefore the verse came, after specifying the prohibitions that it forbade entirely, and commanded in a general matter that we be separated from permitted things.”

This Ramban is not the Rambam, but it explains the category used by Mishna Brura and oh conduct literature: perishut min hamutarot. It is not the same category as erva or nida. It is a general qedusha command that limits indulgence even where the technical object is mutar.

Therefore the taxonomy is:

Asur / over / bal teshaktzu: binding prohibition-language.

Muteret / oseh / uvilvad: baseline legal permission with specified limit.

Midat hasidut / raui / yanhig atzmo biqdusha: higher conduct standard within the mutar.

Qdoshim tihyu / prushim min hamutarot: general holiness discipline preventing the mutar from becoming naval birshut hatora.

oh 240 contains the first and fourth categories. Rambam Issurei Bia 21:9 contains the second and third categories. Rambam Deot 5:4 contains the third category. Do not collapse them.

14.6. According to the inclusive Rambam reading, what does “sanctify himself in tashmish” mean?

According to those who read Rambam as including oto maqom, v'sheyeqadesh atzmo bishat tashmish does not mean “the act was really forbidden.” If that were the meaning, Rambam's structure would be incoherent: he would first say kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh and then secretly retract it.

Rather, the phrase means this: even where the maase is mutar, the man should not convert marital heter into animal appetite, kalut rosh, vulgar speech, obsessive frequency, or self-indulgent pursuit of pleasure. Qedusha regulates how a permitted act is done, not always whether the act exists in the mutar category.

The Rambam's own parallel in Hilkhot Deot 5:4 defines the content of qedusha in tashmish: not being constantly with his wife like a rooster, not speaking at the wrong bodily times, not excessive lightheadedness, and not nivul peh even in private. Those are conduct controls around the act. They are not a list of prohibited body parts.

Therefore, according to the inclusive reading, nishuq b'oto maqom may be mutar on the din plane and still be subject to qedusha review on the conduct plane. The poseq would ask: is this part of ona, mutual desire, and marital closeness, or is it kalut rosh and indulgence? Is there zera lvatala?

Is there actual mi'us? Is it obsessive or degrading? Is it being imported as secular imitation or used as a controlled marital act?

This reading also explains why Rambam does not use the Raavad's language. He does not say minhag hefqer. He does not say vhatznea lekhet. He does not say bal teshaktzu.

He says midat hasidut and v'yeqadesh atzmo. That means the act remains in the mutar field, while the manner, frequency, speech, intention, and psychological posture are judged by qedusha.

A clean formulation:

For Rambam-inclusive posqim, “sanctify himself in tashmish” means: do not live at the lowest edge of the permitted zone. It does not mean: every intense or nonstandard permitted act becomes an issur. The difference between din and qedusha is the whole point of the Rambam's wording.

This also answers the non-inclusion side. They can say: no, Rambam's qedusha language plus oh 240 shows that oto maqom is not merely a permitted act needing refinement; it is a specific maase of shiqqutz. But that is no longer the Rambam-only reading. It is the Rambam read through Raavad and oh 240.

14.7. Torot Emet: the hidush proves the inclusion

Source: Torot Emet, Even HaEzer 25

Hebrew text?

Transliteration:

Mid'hutzrakh lhatir nishuq bkhol ever, vaday dla qa'e ela l'oto maqom shezakhar Rabi Yohanan ben Dahavai, d'i lav hakhi mai qa mashma lan? Umi asar ad sheyitztarekh lhatir? Uma hu ha'ever sheyaale al hadaat l'osro ad sheyatir?

Translation:

“Since he needed to permit kissing any limb, it certainly refers only to oto maqom that Rabi Yohanan ben Dahavai mentioned. For if not, what is he teaching us? Who had forbidden it that he needed to permit it? And what limb would enter the mind to forbid, such that he needed to permit it?”

This is the cleanest aharonic formulation of the Rambam-horizontal logic. The phrase “any limb” must be read against the sugya that generated it. The only limb needing permission is oto maqom. Therefore the permission includes it.

This is why Bet Shmuel and Torot Emet are not merely arguing about sexual ethics. They are arguing about the semantics of the Rema/Rambam sentence. Bet Shmuel says “any limb” is lav davqa because oh 240 supplies the exception. Torot Emet says that if “any limb” excludes the one disputed limb, the phrase becomes nearly empty.

14.8. Gra, Atzei Arazim, Levush, and Arukh Hashulhan

The Gra supports the Rambam/Rema track by identifying the Rema's source with the hakhamim who reject Yohanan ben Dahavai. That means the Rema is not merely giving a general marital permission detached from Nedarim. He is codifying the actual Nedarim dispute. Once that is the source, the permission naturally includes what Yohanan ben Dahavai had prohibited.

Atzei Arazim states that the Bet Shmuel did not read the Rema precisely, because the Rema's phrase comes to permit nishuq b'oto maqom. Levush and Arukh Hashulhan are cited as ruling this way lehalakha: the technical din follows the broad Rambam/Rema track, even though qdusha and tzniut remain real values.

This matters for the article because it prevents the strict side from claiming that every post-Shulhan arukh authority reads the Rema through Bet Shmuel. They do not. There is a real aharonic line that says Bet Shmuel over-limited the Rema.

14.9. Yemenite and Rambam-centered posqim

The Yemenite/Rambam-centered tradition is especially important because it does not treat the Rambam as one source among many equal later codes. For a community that paqens primarily like the Rambam, the starting point is the Rambam's own codification: ishto shel adam muteret hi lo; umnasheq bkhol ever v'ever sheyirtze.

Rav Yosef Qafih is cited as explaining the Rambam this way: the phrase “kissing any limb” includes oto maqom. This is not a novelty. It is the normal contextual reading of Rambam. Since Rambam is codifying Nedarim 20b and since Nedarim's disputed case was nishuq b'oto maqom, the inclusive reading is the pshat.

Rav Yishaq Ratzabi, in Olat Yishaq, is also cited among those who understand the Rambam as including oto maqom. However, his practical posture is more cautious; he reportedly treats the matter as a machloqet and is stringent lemaase. That distinction is important. A poseq can say “Rambam means to permit” and still say “lemaase we should be strict because of Shulhan arukh oh 240, Bet Shmuel, tzniut, or public-conduct concerns.”

Rav Ratzon Arusi's responsa show the same caution inside a Rambam-centered Yemenite framework.

Source: Rav Ratzon Arusi, responsum on nishuq b'oto maqom

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Dvarav shel Maran hashulhan arukh Orah Hayim ram, dalet, yduim lkha vramazta alehem, vhem brurim vqashim. Akh ayen shulhan arukh, Even HaEzer, kaf he, bet.

Translation:

“The words of Maran Shulhan arukh, Orah Hayim 240:4, are known to you and you alluded to them, and they are clear and difficult. But see Shulhan arukh, Even HaEzer 25:2.”

This is not a blanket written heter. It is a recognition that both texts matter. Rav Arusi does not say, “oh 240 disappears.” He says the oh text is clear and difficult, but directs the questioner also to Even HaEzer 25:2. That is exactly the two-register problem this article is analyzing.

Source: Rav Ratzon Arusi, responsum on “types of permitted relations”

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Asur ligrom lkhakh shehagever yotzi zaro lvatala. Uvkhol miqre milvad divrei haRambam al midat hasidut shelo yaquel adam rosho lkhakh, vsheyeqadesh atzmo bishat tashmish, dome shevyamenu shehapritzut holekhet umitpashetet, yesh yoter mimidat hahasidut lhit'raheq me'od me'od min hakiur umidarkhe hamkhoarim.

Translation:

“It is forbidden to cause the man to emit his seed in vain. And in any case, aside from the Rambam's words about the measure of hasidut that a person should not make himself lightheaded for this, and should sanctify himself at the time of relations, it seems that in our days, when sexual breach is spreading, there is more than a measure of hasidut to distance oneself very greatly from ugliness and from the ways of the ugly.”

This is the Yemenite/Rambam-centered nuance. The Rambam's text includes the act within the technical heter. Rav Qafih is cited as reading it that way. Rav Ratzabi is cited as recognizing that reading but being stricter lemaase. Rav Arusi acknowledges the tension between oh 240 and Even HaEzer, but does not issue a simple anonymous written heter; he treats the practical question as requiring individual horaa and adds a strong contemporary qdusha warning.

Therefore the Yemenite/Rambam line should be stated as follows:

As pshat in Rambam, “any limb” includes oto maqom.

As shurat hadin in a Rambam-only system, the act is technically included in the hakhamim's heter, absent zera lvatala, coercion, nida, or actual mi'us.

As practical horaa among Yemenite/Rambam-centered posqim, one cannot claim a single uniform permissive ruling. Rav Qafih is cited on the inclusive reading of Rambam. Rav Ratzabi is cited as recognizing the reading but tending to stringency lemaase. Rav Arusi points to the two-code tension and demands case-specific horaa.

The conceptual point remains decisive: the Rambam-horizontal tradition does not read “any limb” as “any limb except the one named in the sugya.” It reads the phrase according to its sugya-context. Oto maqom is included unless the poseq accepts the Raavad/Shulhan arukh oh bal teshaktzu exception.

15. The two legal axes

This looks like one question, but it is really at least four.

Axis one: Does Nedarim 20b leave an issur on nishuq b'oto maqom after saying en halakha kYohanan ben Dahavai?

The Rambam/Rema answer appears to be no. The Raavad/Tur/Bet Shmuel answer is yes, either because the Gemara only rejected the danger, or because it only permitted hafikhat hashulhan, or because the other practices remain independently improper.

Axis two: Even if Nedarim 20b does not leave the issur, can nishuq b'oto maqom be prohibited by bal teshaktzu or tzniut?

The Orah Hayim text answers yes. A lenient analysis can contest the application, especially where the act is mutually desired and not experienced as repulsive, but it must then explain why Maran codified the language as asur.

Axis three: If the act is technically permitted, is it still below the preferred standard of qedusha?

Many lenient Rishonim and aharonim answer yes. That is the Rambam/Rema line: mutar, but not necessarily ideal for one seeking extra perishut. Other lenient sources appear not to see even a qedusha defect. That stronger lenient position is associated with Sefer Yere'im and sources that cite the hakhamim without adding a higher modesty warning.

Axis four: How should the birth-defect warnings in Nedarim 20b be read — as literal causal claims, aggadic rhetoric, ancient biology, or moral-symbolic pedagogy?

The strict conduct stream tends to treat the warnings as practical norms. The meqorist stream says that the Gemara's own structure prevents using those warnings as direct causal halakha: Rabi Yohanan labels them as Yohanan ben Dahavai's view, and then says the halakha does not follow him. A meqorist reading can weaken the birth-defect argument, but it does not automatically defeat the separate oh 240:4 argument from tzniut, boshet, and bal teshaktzu.

These axes must not be collapsed. Saying “the Gemara says it is mutar” answers axis one. It does not automatically remove every possible bal teshaktzu or tzniut argument. Saying “Shulhan arukh says asur” answers axis two in the strict direction. It does not prove that the Gemara's final line itself is prohibitive. Saying “it is not ideal” is not the same as saying “it is assur.” Saying “the birth-defect claim is aggadic” does not by itself erase a later codified issur grounded in a different mechanism.

16. What the Bet Shmuel proves and what it does not prove

The Bet Shmuel proves that a major aharon reads the Rema restrictively and excludes oto maqom from “any limb.” That is enough to make the strict claim serious.

The Bet Shmuel does not prove that the phrase “any limb” naturally means “any limb except the one limb the Gemara was discussing.” That reading is forced against the surface of the Rema.

The Bet Shmuel also does not prove that the Gemara's final maskana directly prohibits nishuq b'oto maqom. His phrase kmo shekatuv bashas is analytically compressed. The Shas contains the negative statement, but it also contains its rejection as halakha.

Therefore the correct citation is not “the Gemara says no.” The correct citation is: “Rabi Yohanan ben Dahavai says no; Rabi Yohanan reports that the hakhamim say the halakha is not like him; the Raavad/Tur/Shulhan arukh Orah Hayim/Bet Shmuel preserve a restrictive issur anyway.”

That is the honest map.

17. Treatment of the Kitzur Shulhan arukh

The phrase being debated, umnasheq bkhol ever sheyirtze, is not primarily a Kitzur Shulhan arukh phrase. It is the Rambam/Tur/Rema formulation rooted in Nedarim 20b.

The Kitzur belongs to the later summary tradition of marital tzniut. It is not the root source of this sugya. If someone says “the Kitzur says no,” the serious source behind that is not the Kitzur as an independent authority; it is Shulhan arukh Orah Hayim 240:4 and the Raavad/Tur/Bet Shmuel line.

The Kitzur may preserve the strict culture of the din. It does not create it.

18. Modern halakhic status through a halakha lens

Modern practice should not be described primarily as “Modern Orthodox versus Haredi” sociology. That is too crude and too easy to falsify. The more accurate description is a split in source hierarchy.

The lenient school privileges the Gemara's maskana, Rambam, Bet Yosef in Even HaEzer, Rema's plain language, and later lenient aharonim who read Rema literally or nearly literally. This line classifies the act as technically permitted when the wife is muteret, the act is mutually desired, no repulsion is present, and there is no separate zera lvatala problem. It may still say that restraint is preferable as midat hasidut or qedusha.

The stringent school privileges Raavad, Tur, Shulhan arukh oh 240:4, Bet Shmuel, and later strict conduct literature. This line classifies nishuq b'oto maqom as outside the permission of umnasheq bkhol ever. Its mechanisms are tzniut, boshet, yetzer hara, and bal teshaktzu.

The haredi or highly conservative presentation generally follows the second hierarchy. It treats oh 240 as binding conduct law and treats qabalistic/musar material as strongly normative in the bedroom. The common sources in that world are not merely the Gemara and Rambam, but oh 240, the Mishna Brura's overall conduct framing in siman 240, Kaf Hahayim, Rav Yosef Hayim's stricter writings, Igrot Moshe where cited strictly, Darkhei Tahara, and private hatan/kala instruction literature. The Mishna Brura must be described carefully: he does not appear to write a direct gloss on oh 240:4 itself, but his treatment of siman 240 reinforces the siman as practical bedroom-conduct halakha rather than optional poetry.

But the statement “all Haredim forbid it” is too broad. Published halakhic literature shows a stricter tendency, not a single uniform sociological rule. The serious halakhic statement is: communities that give controlling force to oh 240, Bet Shmuel, and qabalistic qedusha literature will generally forbid or strongly discourage it; communities that give controlling force to the Rambam/Rema/lenient aharonim will generally permit it in appropriate marital circumstances.

A further asymmetry must be preserved. The classic Raavad/oh 240 discussion targets the husband's looking at or kissing oto maqom. It does not automatically create identical rules for the wife toward the husband. Nevertheless, fellatio raises its own independent issue: whether it causes or involves hotzaat zera lvatala.

That is a different sugya. Therefore, the male-to-female case and female-to-male case should not be mechanically equated.

Peninei Halakha states the contemporary lenient maskana sharply: most Rishonim are lenient; even the forbidding opinions treat the prohibition as rabbinic; therefore it is not prohibited as the baseline din, but because many sources prefer modest restraint, it is proper to account for the strict view. Where one spouse's ona-joy is materially impaired without it, the mitzva of ona strengthens reliance on the lenient majority. Where either spouse experiences the act as repulsive, that itself strengthens the strict side, because repulsion is the very mechanism of bal teshaktzu.

This is a useful modern formulation because it does not pretend that the strict side is imaginary. It also does not let the strict side erase the majority Rishonic reading of Nedarim 20b.

19. The Hafetz Hayim / Mishna Brura position

The pasted summary is directionally right that the Hafetz Hayim belongs to the strict conduct world of oh 240. But it overstates the evidence if it says that the Mishna Brura directly comments on oh 240:4 and independently explains nishuq b'oto maqom. In the standard Mishna Brura text, there is no substantive comment on seifim 4 to 5. That silence matters.

The direct issur against looking and kissing oto maqom is therefore not the Hafetz Hayim's own formulation. It is Maran's formulation in Shulhan arukh oh 240:4, coming from the Raavad/Tur stream. The Hafetz Hayim's contribution is different: he places siman 240 into a strict, practical, Ashkenazic conduct framework and reads the laws of tashmish through restraint, tzniut, qedusha, and caution about the quality of future children.

Source: Mishna Brura, oh 240:1

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Lo yhe ragil byoter — ayen Ramban bahumash parashat Qdoshim brosho.

Translation:

“He should not be excessively habituated — see the Ramban in the humash at the beginning of Parashat Qdoshim.”

This opening note is small but programmatic. The Hafetz Hayim sends the reader to the Ramban on qdoshim tihyu, where the category is perishut within the mutar. The point is not that every nonstandard act automatically becomes assur. The point is that oh 240 is not written as a neutral catalogue of permissions. It is a conduct-siman: how a man should behave in tashmish hamita if he is governed by tzniut and qedusha.

That makes the Hafetz Hayim stricter than a pure Even HaEzer reading. Even where the technical marital heter exists, the oh 240 posture demands restraint.

Source: Mishna Brura, oh 240:21

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Vkhol elu hdvarim hanizkarim kan tzarikh lizaer afilu kshehi muberet o zqena she'ena r'uyá leled.

Translation:

“And all these matters mentioned here require caution even when she is pregnant or elderly and not fit to bear children.”

This comment concerns the bne tisha midot material. It shows the Mishna Brura's attitude toward the Nedarim-style warnings: they are not dismissed as irrelevant merely because the direct child-result cannot occur. The conduct itself remains regulated. That is a major clue to his general posture.

He does not read bedroom halakha as: “If no child can result, then all the Nedarim warnings are irrelevant.” He reads them as conduct norms that remain operative even outside immediate procreative consequence.

Source: Mishna Brura, oh 240:36

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Katvu hatosafot bshem hamidrash dhaQadosh Barukh Hu sone hameshamesh arom. Vdavqa arom mamash, umishum dyesh lo ladam lihyot tzanua.

Translation:

“Tosafot wrote in the name of the Midrash that the Holy One, blessed is He, hates one who has relations naked. This is specifically fully naked, and the reason is that a person must be modest.”

This again is not a direct comment on nishuq b'oto maqom. It is nevertheless part of the same conduct register. The Mishna Brura treats even hidden marital relations as a place where tzniut applies.

Tzniut is not merely public dress code. It governs the manner of private conduct.

Source: Mishna Brura, oh 240:45

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Vtalmid hakham — shehu tzanua bidrakhav vlo yavo lhistakel, al ken mutar al yde ha'afalat talit; aval mikol maqom en lhaqel bdavar ze ela ltzórekh gadol, dhaynu ksheyitzro mitgaber alav.

Translation:

“And a talmid hakham — since he is modest in his ways and will not come to look, therefore it is permitted by darkening with a garment; nevertheless, one should not be lenient in this matter except for great need, namely when his inclination overpowers him.”

This comment concerns relations by day or with light, not oral sex. But it exposes the same legal psychology. Looking is treated as the core risk.

Modesty is the criterion that allows or restricts leniency. The Mishna Brura's default is not maximal physical freedom; his default is controlled conduct, with concessions where the yetzer hara risk itself creates greater halakhic danger.

This last point is crucial. The Hafetz Hayim is strict, but not mechanical. In several places in siman 240 he allows leniency where excessive restraint may lead to hirhurim, qeri, or hotzaat zera. Therefore his position is not “always be stricter no matter what.” His position is: oh 240 sets a high tzniut baseline, but halakha must also prevent worse outcomes.

This also explains his place in the present sugya. The Hafetz Hayim strengthens the strict oh conduct side. He does not erase the Rambam/Rema/Even HaEzer side by a direct ruling, because his work is on oh, not Even HaEzer, and he does not directly adjudicate the Rema's umnasheq bkhol ever sheyirtze.

But for communities that use the Mishna Brura as the practical oh authority, siman 240 is read as binding tzniut halakha. In that world, oh 240:4 remains active, and nishuq b'oto maqom will generally be treated as assur or at least outside the accepted bedroom-conduct standard.

The correct classification of the Hafetz Hayim's position is therefore:

He is not the root source of the issur. The root source is Raavad/Tur as codified in Shulhan arukh oh 240:4.

He is not the Bet Shmuel. The Bet Shmuel directly limits the Rema in Even HaEzer 25.

He is the major Ashkenazic oh conduct authority whose overall treatment of siman 240 gives practical force to the strict tzniut/qedusha register. His position makes the strict school culturally and practically stronger, but it is not the original legal innovation.

20. A meqorist reading of the Nedarim birth-defect warnings

A strict meqorist reading does not need to dismiss the Nedarim passage as nonsense. The stronger move is more precise: it asks what kind of discourse the sugya is using and whether that discourse can be converted into operative causal halakha.

The relevant text is not a medical statement in the voice of the anonymous Gemara. It is a report in the name of Rabi Yohanan ben Dahavai: arbaa dvarim sahu li malakhe hasharet — “four things the ministering angels told me.” The formulation itself marks the unit as aggadic and admonitory. Immediately afterward, Rabi Yohanan says: zo divrei Yohanan ben Dahavai, aval hakhamim omrim en halakha kYohanan ben Dahavai. That is the decisive meqorist datum. The sugya itself frames the warnings as a rejected view for halakhic purposes.

Therefore the meqorist critique of the strict reading is not: “This is embarrassing, therefore ignore it.” That is not meqorism. The critique is: “The Bavli itself gives this warning a limited legal status, because it places the warning under Yohanan ben Dahavai and then states that the halakha is not like him.”

20.1. Aggadic hyperbole and disciplinary rhetoric

Rabbinic literature often uses extreme consequence-language to discipline conduct without thereby creating the literal legal status implied by the image.

Source: Bavli, Shabat 105b

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Kol hameqare bgadav bahamato, vhameshaber kelav bahamato, vhamefazer motav bahamato — yhe benekha koved avoda zara.

Translation:

“Anyone who tears his garments in anger, or breaks his vessels in anger, or scatters his money in anger — let him be in your eyes like one who worships idolatry.”

No halakhic system treats the angry man as literally requiring conversion or as having the full legal status of an oved avoda zara. The phrase is a moral equivalence, not a status transfer. The point is severity, not taxonomy.

A meqorist would read the Nedarim warnings in that family of rabbinic rhetoric unless the sugya itself forces a literal causal reading. Here the sugya forces the opposite, because it says en halakha kYohanan ben Dahavai.

This does not mean the passage has no meaning. It means its primary function is pedagogic and admonitory: private sexual conduct shapes shame, restraint, and the moral texture of the home. It is not a clinical claim that a specific act mechanically generates a specific congenital defect.

20.2. Ancient biology and visual impression

A second meqorist move is historical-contextual. Ancient and late-antique biological thought often assumed that sight, imagination, and surrounding images at conception could affect the fetus. Tanakh itself contains a famous example in Yaaqov's sheep-breeding episode.

Source: Bereshit 30:37 to 39

Hebrew text.

Transliteration:

Vayiqah lo Yaaqov maqal livne lah vluz varmon, vayfatztzel bahen ptzalot lvanot… vayehemu hatzon el hamaqelot, vateladna hatzon aqudim nqudim utluyim.

Translation:

“Yaaqov took for himself fresh rods of poplar, almond, and plane, and peeled white streaks in them… The flock came into heat by the rods, and the flock gave birth to ringed, speckled, and spotted animals.”

A meqorist may say: the Nedarim passage operates within a world where visual impression and mental state at conception were culturally plausible causal categories. Looking at a “hidden” or “dark” place causing blindness is intelligible inside that ancient symbolic biology. It is not intelligible as modern genetics.

That argument is powerful against turning the passage into a medical law. But it has a limit. Halakha can preserve a rule even after the original science is not accepted if the rule has been codified under a legal mechanism independent of the science. Here the separate mechanisms are oh 240:4's tzniut, boshet, yetzer hara, and bal teshaktzu. Therefore the collapse of ancient biology weakens the birth-defect proof; it does not automatically collapse the Raavad/Shulhan arukh issur.

20.3. Moral-symbolic reading of blindness and muteness

A third meqorist reading treats the defects as moral-symbolic language. Blindness can signify failure of moral vision. Muteness can signify damaged speech, inability to speak in tora, or a home culture where elevated speech is absent. Lameness can signify a crooked walk, meaning unstable moral movement. This is a plausible derash reading, and it preserves the ethical force of the passage without forcing biological literalism.

But a serious meqorist should not overclaim. It is one thing to say that the passage can be used as moral symbolism. It is another thing to assert that this is certainly the original peshat. The safer formulation is: whether one reads the passage as hyperbole, ancient biology, or moral-symbolic pedagogy, the passage should not be converted into direct medical-causal halakha against the Gemara's own statement that the halakha is not like Yohanan ben Dahavai.

20.4. The meqorist critique of the Hafetz Hayim's use

The Hafetz Hayim's Mishna Brura treats siman 240 as practical conduct law and gives real force to the warnings associated with tashmish conduct. That is an oh conduct posture. It is not a pure peshat reading of Nedarim 20b.

From a meqorist standpoint, the problem is not that the Hafetz Hayim cares about tzniut. The problem is methodological: when the Bavli says a warning belongs to Yohanan ben Dahavai and then says en halakha kYohanan ben Dahavai, one cannot cite the warning as if it were the Bavli's own halakhic conclusion.

Therefore the meqorist would say: the Hafetz Hayim may support a strict conduct regime through oh 240, Ramban-style perishut, and the general halakhic value of tzniut. But the birth-defect warning itself is weak as a direct proof. It belongs to aggada, ancient causal imagination, or moral pedagogy; and in any case the Gemara's own maskana does not accept it as halakha.

This is the clean distinction:

The Nedarim warning can still teach that sexual conduct has moral consequences.

It should not be treated as a mechanical supernatural rule that a private marital act causes congenital disability.

It also should not be used to override the Gemara's own line: en halakha kYohanan ben Dahavai.

But none of this alone proves a heter against oh 240:4. To reach a heter, one must still answer bal teshaktzu, tzniut, and the Bet Shmuel's limitation of the Rema. The meqorist section only removes one bad proof. It does not decide the entire sugya.

21. Application to the narrow case

In the narrow case stated above, the act under discussion maps to the classical category of nishuq b'oto maqom, not merely ordinary kissing of the body. The sources do not use modern clinical vocabulary. They speak of nishuq, histaklut, oto maqom, derekh evarim, and zera lvatala. Therefore the halakhic analysis should use the classical terms and only then translate them into the modern case.

If one follows the strict stream, the answer is: assur. The controlling source is Shulhan arukh Orah Hayim 240:4, strengthened by the Bet Shmuel's reading of Even HaEzer 25:2. The act is excluded from “any limb,” and the issur is framed through tzniut, boshet, yetzer hara, and bal teshaktzu.

If one follows the permissive stream, the answer is: technically mutar within permitted marriage, subject to zera lvatala, nida, mutual desire, lack of repulsion, and ordinary qedusha considerations. The controlling source is Nedarim 20b as read by the Rambam and Rema: en halakha kYohanan ben Dahavai, ela kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh. On that reading, “any limb” is literal, and the closing admonition is hameqadesh atzmo bmutar lo, not an issur.

For Sephardic Maran-based pesaq, the strict Orah Hayim 240:4 text is weighty. A simple Sephardic answer cannot ignore it. But the Bet Yosef and Shulhan arukh in Even HaEzer also matter. Therefore the Sephardic analysis is not cleanly reducible to one sentence.

For an Ashkenazic Rema-based answer, the plain Rema is permissive, but the Bet Shmuel and later strict aharonim limit him. Therefore even under Rema, there is a real later restrictive tradition.

The cleanest technical classification is this: the prohibition is not a simple uncontested hazal conclusion. It is a Rishonic and codified restrictive development built out of one rejected hazal statement plus independent tzniut and bal teshaktzu arguments. The heter is not a modern invention; it is also rooted in the Gemara's final language and codified in the Rambam/Rema formulation.

22. Maskana

The precise question is not whether hazal ever mention nishuq b'oto maqom negatively. They do. Rabi Yohanan ben Dahavai says that mute children come from men who kiss oto maqom.

The precise question is whether that negative statement is the halakha. On the face of Nedarim 20b, Rabi Yohanan says it is not: zo divrei Yohanan ben Dahavai, aval hakhamim omrim en halakha kYohanan ben Dahavai, ela kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh.

The Rambam and Rema preserve that permissive rule in legal form: a husband may kiss any limb he wishes, with the legal boundary of zera lvatala and the ethical boundary of hameqadesh atzmo bmutar lo.

The Raavad/Tur/Shulhan arukh Orah Hayim 240 4 Bet Shmuel line preserves a restriction: nishuq b'oto maqom is asur. The Bet Shmuel explicitly says that “any limb” is lav davqa and excludes oto maqom.

Therefore the strict view is not merely a late aharonic invention. It has Rishonic roots and is codified in Shulhan arukh Orah Hayim. But it is also not the simple final statement of the Gemara. It is a restrictive reading and development of the sugya against the broad Rambam/Rema formulation.

The ikar hadin language must be disciplined. According to the Bavli/Rambam/majority-Rishonim track, the ikar hadin is mutar. According to plain Maran Shulhan arukh oh 240:4, the ikar hadin is assur. According to the later lenient reconstruction, oh 240 is limited through the majority Rishonim, Bet Yosef Even HaEzer, Rema, and mi'us analysis, and the act can again be described as mutar miiqar hadin in a clean, mutually desired, non-repulsive, ona-serving case. Those are three different readings, not one reading with two opposite ikarim.

The most accurate one-sentence formulation is:

“B.S.h means Bet Shmuel. He says the Rema's 'any limb' excludes oto maqom. His source stream is Raavad/Tur and Shulhan arukh Orah Hayim 240:4; under plain Maran and the strict aharonim, nishuq b'oto maqom is assur miiqar hadin. But the Gemara in Nedarim 20b itself says the halakha is not like Yohanan ben Dahavai and gives the broad rule kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh; therefore, according to the Bavli/Rambam/majority-Rishonim and later lenient reconstruction, the ikar hasugya is heter, and oh 240 must be limited rather than ignored.”

23. Source index

Bavli, Nedarim 20b — supplies both the negative source and the permissive maskana. Rabi Yohanan ben Dahavai says nishuq b'oto maqom causes mute children. Rabi Yohanan then says the halakha does not follow him, and the hakhamim allow kol ma sheadam rotze laasot b'ishto oseh. This is the main sugya.

Bavli, Nedarim 20b, stories of arakhti lo shulhan vahafakho — confirms the sugya's broad permissive tone regarding nonstandard marital relations, though the stories concern hafikhat hashulhan, not necessarily nishuq b'oto maqom.

Vayiqra 11:43 — the verse al teshaktzu et nafshotekhem. Its literal context is sheratzim, but it becomes the textual anchor for the broader bal teshaktzu category.

Bavli, Makot 16b — supplies the general bal teshaktzu category through the case of drinking from the bloodletter's horn. It does not itself discuss marital intimacy; the Raavad/Orah Hayim line applies it to nishuq b'oto maqom. This is the Raavad's primary analogy for repulsive mouth-contact.

Rambam, Mishne Tora, Hilkhot Ma'akhalot Asurot 17:29, and Shulhan arukh, Yore Dea 116:6 — define the normal bal teshaktzu field: foods and drinks mixed with vomit, feces, foul mucus, filthy vessels, toilet vessels, and bloodletting vessels. These sources explain the general category of mi'us, but they are not the Raavad's explicit anatomical explanation for nishuq b'oto maqom.

Bavli, Shabat 90b — another bal teshaktzu-associated source used in the Raavad's cluster, showing that the category can extend to repulsive conduct beyond the verse's literal sheretz case.

Raavad, Baalei Hanefesh, Shaar haqedusha — the principal Rishonic strict stream for this article. The relevant passages do three things: limit Rabi Yohanan's broad heter to hafikhat hashulhan alone; prohibit histaklut b'oto maqom through tzniut, boshet, and minhag hefqer; and prohibit nishuq b'oto maqom through bal teshaktzu. The Raavad does not explicitly explain the shiqqutz as smell, feces, urine, or proximity to the anus; he proves it by analogy to repulsive mouth-contact cases, the bloodletter's horn and the shushiva. Broader Raavad material about consent and the four kavanot in tashmish is important in its own sugya, but it is not necessary for this article's narrow mechanism.

Rambam, Mishne Tora, Hilkhot Issure Bia 21:9 — codifies the broad permissive rule and states umnasheq bkhol ever v'ever sheyirtze. His legal limit is zera lvatala. His additional restraint is midat hasidut, not the core issur. The Rambam-horizontal reading holds that “any and every limb” includes oto maqom because that is the disputed limb in Nedarim 20b.

Geonim cited in Shita Mqubetzet, Nedarim 20b — major pre-Rambam support for the broad reading. They list the Yohanan ben Dahavai restrictions, including looking, and then say the hakhamim reject that rule and allow whatever a man wishes to do with his wife.

Sefer Yere'im, cited in Shita Mqubetzet, Nedarim 20b — the strongest permissive formulation, saying not only that the act is permitted but that there is “no deficiency of qedusha.” This is stronger than Rambam's mutar-plus-midat-hasidut model.

Tur, Orah Hayim 240 and Even HaEzer 25 — transmits both the broad marital-permission language and the restrictive tzniut stream, creating the later tension codified across Even HaEzer and Orah Hayim.

Bet Yosef, Even HaEzer 25 — functions as the editorial bridge for the Rambam/Rema permissive formulation and ties it back to Nedarim 20b. It also helps expose the tension between the permissive Even HaEzer stream and the restrictive Orah Hayim stream.

Shulhan arukh, Even HaEzer 25:2, Hagat Rema — codifies the broad permissive rule in Ashkenazic pesaq language and says umnasheq bkhol ever sheyirtze. The Rema closes with hameqadesh atzmo bmutar lo, preserving the distinction between mutar and qedusha.

Shulhan arukh, Orah Hayim 240:4 — the strongest strict codification. It prohibits looking at oto maqom and says all the more so kissing there, adding bal teshaktzu. Its structure is layered: histaklut is prohibited through tzniut, boshet, and girui hayetzer; nishuq includes those problems and adds shiqqutz. This source is central for Maran-based strict pesaq.

Shulhan arukh, Even HaEzer 25 with Bet Yosef Even HaEzer 25 — the permissive Maran-side evidence. Maran's Shulhan arukh in Even HaEzer does not explicitly state “nishuq b'oto maqom is permitted,” but the Bet Yosef there quotes the Rambam's broad rule and ties it to Nedarim 20b, and Maran does not bring the oh 240 prohibition in Even HaEzer. This omission is used by lenient posqim as evidence that the baseline marital register follows the Rambam.

Bet Shmuel, Even HaEzer 25:1 — limits the Rema. He says “any limb” is lav davqa and that oto maqom is forbidden. This is the likely source meant by “B.S.h says no.” It is the strict-specific resolution of Maran: oh 240 is the exception that limits the general Even HaEzer language.

Atzei Arazim, Torot Emet, Ezer Miqodesh, Yeshuot Yaaqov, Levush, and Arukh Hashulhan, Even HaEzer 25 — later sources associated with the technical-heter resolution. They read the Rema/Rambam/Nedarim register as the baseline din, while preserving restraint, qedusha, and tzniut concerns.

Kala Rabati and Menorat Hama'or — sources for the danger/conception resolution. They read the defect-warning material as tied to conception from that act, not necessarily as a blanket issur on every instance. This helps with the Nedarim danger language, but does not by itself answer the separate bal teshaktzu mechanism.

Bet Shmuel, Even HaEzer 25:1 — limits the Rema. He says “any limb” is lav davqa and that oto maqom is forbidden. This is the likely source meant by “B.S.h says no.”

Pri Hadash, Yore Dea 84:3 — central for the general bal teshaktzu mechanism. He distinguishes between what is universally repulsive, what is repulsive only to the individual, and what many people dislike but this person does not. He weakens the Raavad's argument if nishuq b'oto maqom is not universally/objectively ma'us in a clean, mutually desired marital context. He does not by himself decide the sugya, because he is not directly adjudicating oh 240:4.

R. Yosef Messas, Mayim Hayim, volume 1, p. 92, as cited by Peninei Halakha — the most direct modern explanation of the factual basis of the concern. He explains the concern about looking as shema titganeh alav, lest she become repulsive to him, and says that in an era of regular washing and showers the concern is removed. Peninei Halakha extends this logic to nishuq because its strict mechanism is bal teshaktzu.

Ezer Miqodesh, Even HaEzer 25:1 — narrows the strict visual/tzniut side by treating the problem as focused looking in light; a fleeting glance or dim light is not necessarily included. This supports the claim that the issur may depend on the degraded mode of encounter, not every contact with the body.

Kneset Hagdola, Hagahot Tur, Yore Dea 84 — stricter than the Pri Hadash on the threshold of mi'us. If most people are disgusted, even one who is not disgusted may not do it. This supports the strict side against an overly subjective bal teshaktzu heter.

Pri Mgadim, Mishbetzot Zahav, Yore Dea 84:2 — reads the bal teshaktzu test more subjectively: if to him it is not repulsive, even if most people are repulsed, it can be permitted; if to him it is repulsive, even if others are not repulsed, it is forbidden. This supports the lenient side more than Pri Hadash himself, but it does not erase Pri Hadash's universal-repulsiveness category.

Levush and Arukh Hashulhan, Even HaEzer 25 — important later lenient readings of the Rema/Rambam stream, treating the baseline as technically permitted while preserving modesty language.

Gra, Even HaEzer 25; Atzei Arazim, Torot Emet, Ezer Miqodesh, Yeshuot Yaaqov — later aharonim associated with the lenient reading of Rema's formulation, especially the claim that the act is technically permitted even if restraint may be preferred. Torot Emet gives the sharpest linguistic argument: if “any limb” does not include oto maqom, what hidush did the poseq need to teach? The strict answer is that the hidush permits erotic affection with ordinary permitted limbs and excludes only an act independently classified as shiqqutz. The lenient answer is that this is forced; the natural hidush is the disputed limb itself. Torot Emet also gives the sharpest bal teshaktzu critique: bal teshaktzu applies to eating an external ma'us object, while nishuq vhiba in marriage is not obviously in that category.

Rav Yosef Qafih, commentary to Rambam, Hilkhot Issure Bia 21 — Yemenite/Rambam-centered source cited as reading the Rambam's “any limb” as including oto maqom. His importance is interpretive: he confirms that the pshat in Rambam is inclusion, not Bet Shmuel's exclusion.

Rav Yishaq Ratzabi, Olat Yishaq 2:182 — cited as recognizing the inclusive reading of Rambam, but also as practically cautious/stringent. This distinction is important: explaining Rambam's pshat does not always equal a simple permissive practical horaa.

Rav Ratzon Arusi, responsa on nishuq b'oto maqom and permitted forms of bia — a contemporary Yemenite/Rambam-centered example of caution. He points the questioner from oh 240:4 to Even HaEzer 25:2, showing that both registers matter, but does not give an anonymous blanket written heter; he insists on case-specific horaa and stresses zera lvatala and contemporary qdusha concerns.

Mishna Brura, oh 240 — important for the strict oh conduct register. The Hafetz Hayim does not appear to write a direct gloss on oh 240:4 itself, but his siman 240 framework cites Ramban on qdoshim tihyu, treats the Nedarim-style conduct warnings as practical even when no child can result, and repeatedly frames tashmish through tzniut and restraint. He strengthens the practical force of oh 240 in communities that treat oh conduct law as controlling, but he is not the original source of the nishuq b'oto maqom issur.

Rav Yosef Hayim, especially Od Yosef Hai, Shoftim 16 — part of the stricter Sephardic/qabalistic conduct stream, emphasizing the negative spiritual impact of immodest tashmish conduct.

Igrot Moshe, Yore Dea 2:75 — later strict citation in the conduct literature. It belongs in the strict-source map, not as the root of the sugya.

Darkhei Tahara 22:4 — later strict practical guide. Its importance is in contemporary instruction and conduct framing, not in defining the Gemara's original maskana.

Peninei Halakha, Simhat Habayit Uvirkhato 2:19 — useful modern synthesis. It maps the Rishonim, states that most are lenient, records the Raavad/Tur strict line, cites Shulhan arukh oh 240 and Bet Shmuel for the strict side, and frames practical reliance on the lenient majority where ona and marital joy require it.

Bavli, Shabat 105b — methodological parallel for aggadic hyperbole. The Gemara says one who destroys property in anger should be in one's eyes like an idolater. This does not create literal idolatry status; it shows how hazal use severe images to discipline conduct.

Bereshit 30:37 to 39 — contextual background for ancient visual-impression biology. Yaaqov's rods before the sheep show a biblical world in which visual conditions at conception can be narrated as affecting offspring. A meqorist can use this to contextualize Nedarim's birth-defect warnings without treating them as modern medical claims.

Meqorist reading of Nedarim 20b — not an independent poseq, but a methodological layer. It argues that the birth-defect warnings belong to Yohanan ben Dahavai's rejected view or to aggadic/ancient-science/moral-symbolic discourse. This weakens the strict side's direct causal proof but does not itself defeat oh 240:4's separate mechanisms of tzniut, boshet, yetzer hara, and bal teshaktzu.

Aharonim after the Bet Shmuel — divide over whether the Rema's “any limb” should be taken literally or limited. The strict line reads Rema through Bet Shmuel. The lenient line reads Rema through Rambam and the plain Gemara.

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