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 Summary 

 Mishna: 

A stolen or dried out aravah is possul. 

If it comes from an Asherah tree or from an ir hanidachas, it is possul. 

If the tip is broken off, or the leaves are broken, or a Tzaftzafah (another similar species), it is possul. 

If it is wilted, missing some leaves, or it is watered by man (it doesn’t grow near a stream), it is kosher.

 Gemara: 

 Beraisa: When the possuk says “Arvei nachal - willow of the streams” it means the species that grow near streams.

A different peshat: A willow whose leaves are elongated like a stream.

 Another Beraisa: “Arvei Nachal” indicates something that grows near a stream, but since “Arvei” [plural] denotes multiple willows, it teaches that aravos which are watered [by man] or grow on mountains are also kosher.

 Abba Shaul: The plural Arvei teaches that there are two mitzvos of aravah, one that is taken with the lulav and one that is taken separately in the Mikdash.

The Chachomim learn about the aravah in the Mikdash by tradition; halacha l’Moshe miSinai. As was taught by Rabbi Asi quoting Rabbi Yochanan: [These three halachos were handed down from Sinai together], The law of ten saplings [in a certain area may be plowed up to shmittah], the law of aravah [the special mitzvah in the Mikdash], and the mitzvah of nisuch hamayim. 

 Beraisa: When the possuk says “ Arvei nachal - willow of the streams” it means the species that grow near streams, this excludes the tzaftzafah - the species that grows in mountainous areas.

 Rabbi Zeira: This is alluded to in the possuk “To take tzaftzafah in place of what grows on the waters”. (It means that when the Jewish people forsake their natural habitat in the mighty waters of Torah, they become an entirely different species, even though they may still look similar).

 Abayye to Rabbi Zeira: Perhaps the possuk is saying that tzaftzafah is the species which grows on mighty waters?

 Response: The wording of the possuk precludes that explanation.

 Rabbi Abahu: Hashem says: I intended for the Jews to be like the aravah dwelling on the mighty waters of Torah, but they have made themselves into the tzaftzafah of the mountains (although they didn’t do any true sins, but a Jew must dwell on copious waters of Torah). 

Some learn this possuk as a beraisa [not a statement of Rabbi Zeira] and then the question was asked by Rabbi Zeira [not Abayye].