HESED: YESHIVAT HAVERIM יְשִׁיבָה חברים – BABYLONIAN TALMUD p71

R. Itz’hak b. Abhdimi said: “I once followed Rabbi into the bath-house (on the Sabbath). I
wanted to put a bottle of oil for him into the tank (that contained hot spring water). Said he unto
me: “Take out some warm water from the tank and put it into another vessel (to warm the oil in).
From this we have inferred three things–viz.: First, that oil improves by warming, and it is a
prohibited act; second, that if anything is put into a second vessel (not directly into the boiling
vessel) it is not considered cooking; third, that the mere tempering of oil is analogous to cooking
it.
Said Rabhina: From this story it may be inferred that if one cooks in the hot spring water of
Tiberias on the Sabbath he is culpable, for the case happened after the rabbis had imposed the
precautionary measure, and yet Rabbi would not allow him (R. Itz’hak) to put the oil directly
into the tank. Is that so? Did not R. Hisda say that he who has cooked in the hot spring water of
Tiberias is not culpable? The culpability to be inferred (from the case of Rabbi) extends only as
far as blows of correction 1 are concerned.
R. Zera said: “I have seen R. Abuhu swimming in a tank, and I know not whether he raised (his
feet from the ground) or not. Is it not self-evident that he did not raise them, as there is a
Boraitha: One shall not swim about in a pond, even if (that pond) is stationed in a yard. This
presents no difficulty. In a pond it is prohibited, because it is similar to a river, while in a tank it
is allowed, because it is similar to a vessel. 2
R. Zera once found R. Jehudah in the bath. He (R. Jehudah) ordered his servant (in the Hebrew
Aramaic tongue): “Bring me the comb; hand me the soap; open your mouths, and exhale the
warm air from within you; drink of the (warm) water of the bath.” Said R. Zera: “If I had not
come but to hear this, it were enough for me.”
It is correct that he ordered things in the Hebrew language, as private affairs may be said in the
same language. The same is with the second order, for Samuel said that heat (from without)
drives out heat (from within). But what good is in the order, “Drink of the water of the bath”? It
is also correct, as we have learned in the following Boraitha: “If one washed
himself with warm water and did not drink of it, he is like an oven that was heated from without
but not from within.”