Pe'ah 054

נושא: Pe'ah

Pe'ah 054

BET MIDRASH VIRTUALI

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If someone does an exchange with the poor, his is excused that of the poor is liable. When two people receive a field in tenancy each one gives the other the "indigent's tithe" from his own part. When someone accepts a field to reap he is forbidden to take gleanings, forgotten sheaf, pe'ah and indigent's tithe. Rabbi Yehudah says: When is this? – when he accepted it for half, third or quarter, but if he said to him, "A third of what you reap will be yours" he is permitted [to take] gleanings, forgotten sheaf and pe'ah, but is forbidden [to take] the indigent's tithe.

1:
Our mishnah consists of rulings on three different matters. The common thread which links them together is the question of the legitimacy of taking from produce dues which belong to the poor when the status of the taker may well be that of an owner of the field from which the crops came.

2:
Let us start with the reisha of our mishnah. For unknown reasons a farmer does a 'swap' with the poor waiting outside his field: he will glean his own field, collect for himself any forgotten sheaves and so forth, and he will compensate the indigent for their loss by giving them an estimated equivalent amount from already processed produce. (We saw in Pe'ah 049 that this is permissible.) The farmer's reasons for proposing this could be selfish (he does not want a large body of people trampling all over his field) or they could be magnanimous (he wants to spare the aged and the infirm the physical effort involved in obtaining the produce). Whatever his reason may be such a 'swap' is permitted.

3:
The halakhic question that arises is concerned with the matter of tithes. We have already seen on numerous occasions in our study so far of this tractate that produce under the 'poor law' is not liable to tithing. In Pe'ah 051, only recently I wrote:

On several occasions … we have mentioned that all produce which becomes the property of the poor under the 'poor law' [matnot aniyyim] is free from the duty of tithing: why should the poor have to give up ten percent of their produce?

The reisha of our mishnah states that the produce which the farmer takes from his field which rightly belongs to the poor is free from the liability of tithing. But the produce which he reaped himself is not free from that liability. However, since the poor recipients would not agree to this 'swap' if they had to give away ten percent of what they receive, the farmer must tithe the produce himself before he gives it to them.

4:
Now we come to the emtza'ita [middle clause] of our mishnah. A farmer leases out one of his fields to two poverty–stricken people. During the period of the lease they are technically the owners of the field; however, they are both still poor 'in real life'. We have a dilemma here: since they are poverty–stricken, ethically both are entitled to whatever dues are available from this field; legally they may not do so since (unless he recompenses the poor) the owner may not take these poor man's dues: gleanings, pe'ah etc. The Gemara [Pe'ah 19a] quotes the following baraita:

Father and son, person and relative, two brothers and two partners may redeem via each other the Second Tithe and give each other the Indigent's Tithe.

The Torah [Deuteronomy 14:22–29] says:

You shall set aside every year a tenth part of all the yield of your sowing that is brought from the field. You shall consume the tithes of your new grain … in God's presence, in the place where He will choose to establish His name… Should the distance be too great for you, should you be unable to transport them, because the place where God has chosen to establish His name is far from you… you may convert them into money. Wrap up the money and take it with you to the place that God has chosen, and spend the money on anything you want – cattle, sheep, wine, or other intoxicant, or anything you may desire. And you shall feast there, in God's presence, and rejoice with your household… Every third year you shall bring out the full tithe of your yield of that year, but leave it within your settlements. Then the Levite, who has no hereditary portion as you have, and the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow in your settlements shall come and eat their fill…

Thus, during every cycle of seven years an extra tithe was due, except during the seventh Shemittah year when the land lay fallow. During the first, second, fourth and fifth years of the cycle this tithe was to be taken to Jerusalem and eaten there; and during the third and sixth year it was to be given to the poor (the Indigent's Tithe). The Torah makes provision for exchanging the produce for its value in money, for reasons of convenience. When this exchange, called 'redemption of the Second Tithe', is made by the individual he must add an additional 20 percent onto the value. (The sages, by hermeneutic interpretation, increased this to 25 percent.)

5:
The baraita quoted above states that the people mentioned may 'redeem' these tithes among themselves without paying the additional amount. However, the Gemara quoted this baraita for a different purpose. It implies the solution to the problem of the poverty–stricken lessees of a field: each one gives the other the dues from his part of the field. In other words, the partners are not considered to be joint owners of the field but that each is owner of his half. He is thus able to receive the poor man's dues from the area 'owned' by his partner.

6:
The seifa of our mishnah is concerned with a situation in which a poor person is employed to reap a field. Instead of being paid in cash he is told that a certain percentage of the yield will be his recompense. Rabbi Yehudah explains that if the agreement is that the produce is given to the worker in advance, so that he can feel that in at least part of the field he is 'working his own', then he is not entitled to the poor man's dues. But, if the agreement was that when the work is done he would receive a certain percentage of the reaped crop then he is entitled to all the dues except the indigent's tithe since he had no proprietary rights over the produce while it was as yet unreaped.

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