202 Selected Reform Responsa

conception. Whether the latter is, according to modern medical science, an effective contraceptive or not, is not our concern; the Rabbis believed it to be such.

It is evident that according to R. Tam, the use of a douche or any other means of removing or destroying the sperm would be the same as meshameshot bemoch. Likewise, according to Rashi, the use of other contraceptives on the part of the woman would be the same as meshameshot bemoch. Possibly R. Tam would permit the use of chemical contraceptives, even if employed before cohabitation. For his objection to the cotton put in before cohabitation is that when the semen is discharged upon the cotton, it does not touch the mucous membrane of the vagina. This he considers“no real sexual intercourse, but like scattering the semen upon wood and stone”(De-ein derech tashmish bechach, vaharei hu metil zera al ha-etsim veha-avanim keshemetil al hamoch)— a practice which. according to the Midrash (Genesis R. XXV1.6), was indulged in by the“generation of the flood”(dor hamabul). This objection, then, would not hold good when chemical contraceptives are used.

Again, according to Rashi,(Yevamot 100b) the phrase meshameshot bemoch means mutarot leiten moch be-oto makom, shelo yit-aberu, that is, that in these three conditions women are allowed to use this contra between R. Meir and the other teachers on the question of whether a pregnant or a nursing woman must take this precaution. For this is what the baraita says:“There are three women who, when having intercourse with their husbands, must take the precaution of using an absorbent to prevent conception: a minor, a pregnant woman, and a woman nursing her baby. In the case of the minor, lest she become pregnant and die when giving birth to the child.”[It was believed by some of the Rabbis that if a girl became pregnant before having reached the age of puberty, she and her child would both die at the moment of childbirth. Compare the saying of Rabba b. Livai in Yevamot 12b and 7osafot ad loc., s.v. shema tit-aber; also saying in Yer., Pesachim, VIIL.1, 35c: Iberah veyaleda,