Pe'ah may not be reaped with scythes and may not be uprooted with hatchets, so that they will not attack each other.
There are three periods in the day: morning, noon and afternoon. Rabban Gamli'el says that they only said this so that there would not be less; Rabbi Akiva says that they only said this so that there would not be more. They would take it from Bet Namer by the rope and give it from each row.
1:
I have combined mishnayot 4 and 5 since they are thematically connected. The Gemara of Eretz-Israel [
Pe'ah 18b] also joins them together, probably for the same reason. (In many cases – but certainly not in all cases – the differences between the presentation of the
mishnayot in the mishnah codices, the Talmud of Eretz-Israel and the Babylonian Talmud are due to regional variation. This is possibly why the Babylonian Talmud is always referring to 'our mishnah': 'our Babylonian version of the Mishnah' as opposed to that prevailing in Eretz-Israel.)
2:
One thing worried me and it has happened; that which I feared has come upon me [Job 3:25]. The hints that we have gleaned from previous mishnayot in this chapter are now made explicit: at the time of the reaping of pe'ah violence was to be feared. On the purely human level we can understand this. In most cases many poor and needy people were all trying to get their share of what was probably not very much produce. Add to this the great probability that among the many poor and needy could be found many who were not so 'poor and needy' but had been lured to the site by greed.
3:
Mishnah 4 brings a regulation that was obviously introduced in order to minimalize the possibility of mayhem during the period of the reaping of the pe'ah. Agricultural implements that could also be used for more sinister purposes were banned from the farmer's field. The indigent were not allowed to bring with them scythes and hatchets to help them in their harvesting, because scythes and hatchets (and so forth) could be used to inflict great physical harm to a fellow reaper.
4:
I translated the term used to describe these possible actions of violence as "attack"; the original Hebrew usually has the connotation 'to smite' – especially in biblical translations of passages with contextual similarity. For instance, Exodus 21:18 reads:
Our mishnah possibly uses this language in order to hint at what is made explicit in Mishnah Sanhedrin 9:1 – that such situations could ultimately involve the death penalty.
5:
Mishnah 5 states that during harvest time there were three periods of the day when the indigent could expect the farmer to allow access to his field for the purposes of reaping pe'ah. The Gemara [Pe'ah 18b] states that the reason for this three-fold access was to cater for the needs of certain populations: the morning period was introduced for the benefit of nursing mothers: they have to rise early in any case to nurse their child so this would be convenient for them. The noon period was introduced for the benefit of those families that had to send children to harvest their Pe'ah. The afternoon period was for 'the weaklings' – the aged and the infirm.
6:
One great commentator, Rabbi Asher ben-Yeĥi'el [1250-1328], makes a valiant effort to explain why mishnah 5 is suggesting three periods of the day from which the farmer may choose one for his convenience. However, almost all the other commentators reject this explanation – mainly because it goes directly against the express explanation given by the Gemara, that these three periods of the day were in order to benefit three separate segments of the population. However, neither the mishnah nor the Gemara indicate whether each of these periods was reserved for these specific segments of the population (which does not seem to be the case) or whether they were just introduced for their benefit even though anyone could come at each of these times (which does seem to be the case).
7:
The convenience of these periods for the farmer himself was not only that he would not have people tramping over his fields at all times of the day: he was also expected to station guards at the entrance to the field so it was convenient for him that his guards would have specific times when they had to be present and not all the hours of the day. These guards would not only ensure that the field could be accessed only at certain times. They would also see that all segments of the population were given a fair opportunity to reap some of the produce of the field: controlled access. Also, of course, they would do their best to prevent and control possible acts of violence.
To be continued.
