3,992. Bringing a Sheretz Into the Mikdash

Hilchos Bias HaMikdash 3:15

If someone touched utensils that touched a corpse, or if he touched a person who is touching such utensils, he is exempt from punishment for entering the Temple even though he is first degree of impurity when it comes to terumah and to conveying impurity to the meat of sacrifices. These laws were transmitted via our oral tradition. Even though such a person is exempt, he is given stripes for acting rebelliously.

Hilchos Bias HaMikdash 3:16

If someone brings a dead swarming thing (sheretz) or something similar into the Temple, or if he brings a ritually unclean person into the Temple, he is subject to the penalty of kareis (excision) for rendering God’s Temple unclean. If he threw unclean utensils into the Temple, he is exempt from kareis but subject to lashes, even if the utensils touched a corpse. This is derived from Leviticus 17:16: “If he does not launder....” Our oral tradition explains that entering the Temple without washing one’s body renders him liable to kareis, but entering without laundering his clothes incurs forty lashes.