Keilim 9:7 - 9:8

סרידה (stuffed matting/ slightly hollow perforated tile used for stoppers of stoves, bags/colander) – like a kind of small kneading trough that the baker uses, and it is stretched and is not susceptible to receive defilement.

שהיא נתונה על פי התנור – and it is crushed in plaster in order to surround it with an airtight lid and the oven will not become defiled in the tent of a corpse.

נסדק מן תנור לסרידה (was cracked from the oven to the colander) – that is, the shaping was cracked.

מלוא פי מרדע שלא נכנס (its measure is the tip of an ox-goad that cannot enter) – the ox-goad is that trains the cattle, and there is in its circumference a handbreadth, and its thickness is three handbreadths, for all that is of one-handbreadth in its thickness, there is in its circumference three handbreadths, and the measure of the crack when the smearing is cracked, according to the Rabbis, its measure is the tip of an ox-goad is equivalent, and even though the incision is not large when the tip of an ox enters, for since the crack is equivalent to the tip of an ox-goad, there isn’t here an airtight lid, but according to Rabbi Yehuda, there always is an airtight lid until the crack will be large enough that the tip of an ox-goad can enter.

נסדקה סרידה עצמה – according to the Rabbis, an enclosure/compartment once the pile of plaster is cracked , but according to Rabbi Yehuda, an enclosure/compartment that when the pile of plaster is cracked, from when the small kneading trough is itself cracked. But the Halakha is not according to Rabbi Yehuda.

שנקב מעינו – the eye of the oven, this is the perforation/incision that one makes in it in order that the smoke can go out, and they seal the eye with plaster and close it up and make a perforation afterwards in the place of the plastering.

נכנס ויוצא דולק – that the perforation is wide and the spindle staff enters and goes out in a wide space.

ניקב מצדו – of the wood.

וכן היה אומר במגופת החבית – and so would Rabbi Shimon say with all of these, that their law is that from the middle one enters, but from the side one does not enter. But the Halakha is not according to Rabbi Shimon.

מלא מיצה שניה של שיפון (is the thickness of the second joint of a stem of oats) – this thickness of the second knot of the reed of oats, that the second is thinner than the first but more thick than the third, that the reed is thick from the bottom and becomes thinner as one ascends. שיפון is VIINEH in the foreign tongue.

לשאר משקין – as for example, oil, honey and milk.

אפילו כל שהן טמאים – even the slightest perforation does not protect with an airtight lid and they are defiled.

שלא נעשו בידי אדם – that they were not perforated with intention, but that it happened on its own.

ניקבו העשוי לאוכלים שיעורו בזיתים – now we are speaking of when the utensil itself was hollowed out/broken through and perforated. And all of these measurements that are above is when the closure/cover was hollowed out in its opening.

שיעורן בזיתים – if it was hollowed out when they remove the olive, it requires plastering/leveling, but less than this, it does not require plastering. And in the Gemara in Tractate Shabbat [96a] it proves that when a large vessel that was perforated when they remove the pomegranate and a small vessel that was hallowed out in its majority, the plastering and closing it up have no effect, and furthermore, it does not protect with an airtight lid since it it no longer has the status of a vessel. But if they plastered it, it becomes like foodstuffs that were kneaded with plaster that the plaster does not protect/save them.

שיעורן במשקין – when one brings in liquids.

העשוי לכך ולכך – for liquids and for foods.

מטילין אותו לחומרו – but if he perforated at the place where the liquids enter, he does not save/protect it with an airtight lid until it is plastered over.