Tractate Peah, Chapter 3, Tosefta 1

Notes:

1. Mishna Peah 5:5 states that if a poor hired field worker made a deal with the owner of the field that he will receive a part of the harvested crops as wages for his harvesting work then that worker is not allowed to take any of the gifts to the poor from that field on which he is working. However, if the owner did not make this deal with the worker up front, but only gave him a part of the harvested crops after he finished harvesting them then the poor worker is allowed to take Leket (fallen stalks), Shikcha (forgotten sheaves) and Peah (corners of the field) from that field. The reason for this law is that the Torah explicitly says (Vayikra 19:9 and 23:22) that the owner of the produce is not allowed to glean his own produce. But in this case the worker acquired the harvested produce at the moment of cutting it off, which is the same time as the obligation of the gifts to the poor fell on the produce, so if he would glean it then he would be gleaning his own produce. However, if the owner of the field gave a portion of the harvested produce to the worker only after he finished harvesting it then as the produce was cut off it still belonged to the owner of the field and therefore by the time the worker takes it he is gleaning the field owner’s produce and not his own.

   Mishna Peah 5:6 states that the owner of the field is not allowed to hire workers to do harvesting work in his field on condition that one of the worker’s sons will be allowed to take the gifts to the poor from the field where these workers are working before all other poor people and in exchange for that the owner will deduce the amount of the value of these crops that the son takes from the wages of his father. The reason for this law is that the owner of the field ends up profiting at the expense of the poor people, which is considered to be stealing from the poor.

   This Tosefta states a new law regarding gifts to the poor which is a combination of the two cases discussed in the two Mishnayot mentioned above. The owner of the field hires a poor worker to harvest the crops by paying him with a portion of the harvested produce. And at the same time the worker wants the owner of the field to allow his son to glean the produce in return for a deduction of his father’s wages, or in this case harvested crops, for the harvest.

2. The Tosefta must be talking about a case where the worker received the job of harvesting the field on a one time basis. Because if it something that he does regularly that would mean that he is like a renter of the field who receives some kind of wages for his work and that case is explicitly mentioned in the next statement of the Tosefta which says that the law by such a renter is different. Also the word הַמְּקַבֵּל (Hamekabel), “one who received” or “one who accepted” implies that this was done on a one time basis as something that the person normally does not do. I am aware of the fact that in Mishna Peah 5:5 this phrase is not used in this type of connotation, but we have to remember that we are dealing with statements in oral tradition where the original statement’s meaning may have changed depending on who was interpreting it, and therefore the statement that the Mishna recorded could have been clarified by Rebbi Yehuda according to his own interpretation and not according to the original intent of whoever said it earlier.

3. It is assumed by many commentators on the Tosefta, that the obscure expression of the Tosefta “one who receives a field to harvest” is stated in the exact same context as in Mishna Peah 5:5, where it is explicitly stated by Rebbi Yehuda that the case in which the Mishna prohibits a poor worker to glean the field for the gifts to the poor as he is harvesting it, is only if his wages constitute part of the harvest. And it is implied by the Mishna that if his wages will be paid in cash and he must return all of the harvested produce to the owner of the field, then he would be allowed to glean as he harvests, because he is not gleaning his own crops, but rather the field owner’s crops. So therefore our Tosefta must be in agreement with the Mishna regarding the reasoning for this law and therefore it also must be talking about a case where the poor worker is supposed to receive a portion of the harvest as his wages, and not cash. I would like to reject this explanation and suggest that the Tosefta does not specify on purpose what the worker is getting paid for his services in order to teach us that it does not matter what he gets paid, a portion of the harvested crops or cash, because according to the Tanna Kama of our Tosefta in both of these cases his son would not be allowed to glean after his father as his father is harvesting the crops.

   Also it is assumed by many commentators that the Tosefta is talking about either a son who is a minor (below the age of 13) and therefore anything that he acquires automatically belongs to his father or a son who is an adult but relies on his father to support him and therefore anything that he acquires automatically belongs to his father. And since his father is not allowed to glean the crops that he is harvesting and getting paid with, because they belong to him, then also his dependent son is not allowed to glean after his father since then the father will end up acquiring those gleanings for himself. The reason they explain the Tosefta this way is because Talmud Bavli (Bava Metzia 12a-b) quotes a Beraita similar in context to this Tosefta and explains that that Beraita must be talking about a son who is either a minor or is supported by his father, because if the son was an adult and not supported by his father then he would acquire the gleanings himself and that would not be a problem since the son himself is poor he is not any different from any other poor person, even if his father is rich and is not eligible for gifts to the poor.

   I would like to reject all of these explanations and suggest that the Tosefta does not need to be limited to any of the above mentioned cases. The Tosefta could be even talking about a worker who is getting paid in cash and his son who is poor and is gleaning after him is an adult and does not depend in anyway on his father. The reason that the Tosefta prohibits the son to glean after his father is not because the father ends up acquiring gleanings from his own produce, but rather because this situation constitutes a conflict of interest in a case which involves a not poor person trying to benefit his own family. And the Tosefta is quoting an argument between the Rabbis all of whom tried to protect the poor in a dire situation. It has nothing to do with legal ramifications of who acquires what and when as is the case of the Mishna or as the Talmud Bavli explains the Beraita. In order to understand what the Rabbis were trying to do by enacting these laws it is important to know the background of agricultural situation during the times of the Tosefta. As I already mentioned earlier (see Tosefta Peah 2:17, note 1) the financial situation in the 3rd century CE of farmers was rapidly degrading. Many people could not afford to farm their own fields and therefore were forced to either rent a rich person’s field for a share of the crops or a set rent payment, or had to sell their farming skills as day laborers. In all of these cases these farmers were poor people whose livelihood was very unstable. Therefore if such a farmer, even if he himself did not need gleanings, had a son who was so poor that he had to rely on gleanings, prohibiting his son from getting first dibs on the gleanings could undermine the financial stability of the whole family. The rabbis were very sensitive to this situation and tried to ameliorate it in any way possible. In order to get a better feel for the agricultural and financial situation of Jews in the 3rd century CE in the Land of Israel I strongly recommend to the reader to read Daniel Sperber’s book, “Roman Palestine, 200-400, The Land.”, Bar-Ilan University, 1978, because without a clear understanding the background of the times it is pointless to try to understand the severity of the laws discussed in this Tosefta.

   It should be noted that harvesting fields by hand is a back breaking job and was usually done by the poor sector of society, since if anyone who was rich enough that he could afford not to do it would not do it. In our case, since the father received this job on a one time basis, as opposed to doing this as his regular job, it is assumed by the Tanna Kama that he himself is not a poor person. We do not know why he accepted to do it in this particular case, but whatever that reason may be it is not because he needs the money or the crops. If that is true then it would constitute a conflict of interest for a so-called “rich” father to push forward his poor son to collect the gleanings and by doing so diminish the amount of gleanings from the other poor people. In this case the Rabbis felt that if the father is well off then he can at least provide something to his poor son that it is not necessary to give the son a privilege to glean first before the other poor people. And therefore the Tanna Kama prohibits the son from gleaning after his father’s harvest, before all other poor people, in this particular case. However, on other cases, where it is clear that the father himself is also poor, since he is renting the field or he does not even have a field under any conditions and he has to buy standing crops from a field owner and harvest them himself, then even the Tanna Kama was lenient and allowed the poor son to glean after his father’s harvest, since it was clear that these gleanings are crucial to the financial stability of the whole family, and if the son would not get first dibs on the gleanings then it is very possible that the next day the father will have to support him completely, something that he cannot afford to do, and therefore the whole family will collapse.

4. Rebbi Yossi disagrees with the Tanna Kama, because he feels that there is no way that a well to do person will agree to harvest someone’s field without being desperate for the income, which makes him poor. And therefore even in this odd case the son may glean after the father’s harvest based on the reasoning explained in the previous note.

   It should be noted that this is the end of Rebbi Yossi’s statement. The following statement is made by the Tanna Kama, which not disputed by anyone. This is evident from the way Rebbi Yossi’s statement is phrased. If he would have made the following statement also then the next phrase would not begin with the word “but” and would not repeat the phrase “his son may glean after him”. The reason I have pointed this out is in order to refute the explanation of the Minchat Yitzchak who attributed the following statement to Rebbi Yossi as well and changed the text of the Tosefta without any reason in order to avoid the problems with his explanation that I have pointed out.

5. An Aris, spelled in Hebrew either אריס or עריס, is a sharecropper. There is some dispute to the etymology of the Hebrew word Aris. It is possible that it comes from the Greek word ούρος (Uros), meaning “guardian” or “overseer”, and has been adopted into Hebrew with a more precise meaning. Perhaps this is also the reason why the spelling of this word varies eithers with an Aleph or with an Ayin, since it is a foreign word and it was never clear how it should be pronounced and spelled. However, others dispute that idea and claim that it is an original Hebrew word. For a discussion of this matter see Eliezer Ben Yehuda, “Milon Halashon Haivrit Hayeshana Vehachadasha”, Vol. 1, p. 391, footnote 1, entry אריס, and Alexander Kohut, “Aruch Hashalem”, Vol. 1, pp. 297-298, entry אריס.

A sharecropper is a tenant laborer who rents another person’s field and instead of paying rent and keeping all of the produce, gets to keep a part of the produce for himself and return a part of the produce to the landowner. This type of an arrangement was safer for the tenant and involved more risk for the landlord. During a bad year when the crop yield is very low, the tenant would give away a percentage of the crops to the landlord, but at least he would get to keep some of the crops for himself. If he was to pay a set sum of money as rent, it would be possible for him to owe the landlord more money than the crop that he harvested that year, which would put him into great debt. At the same time the landlord took a risk that although in a good year he may end up with a large profit from the percentage of the crops that he gets, in a bad year he may end up with almost nothing, if the yield of the crops is really low. However, during the 3rd century CE the financial and agricultural situation in the Land of Israel was so bad that many landlords did not have a choice, but to agree to a sharecropping deal with their tenants, since doing it any other way would simply make the tenant become in such debt that he would have to sell himself into slavery.

6. A חָכוֹר (Chachor), or sometimes spelled חָכוּר (Chachur), or חָכיִר (Chachir), is a regular tenant who pays rent to the landlord using money. In this case, since he is renting a field he pays a set amount of money as rent and gets to keep the entire crop for better or for worse. This word is an original Hebrew word meaning “tenant” or “renter” and comes from the root חכר (Chakar) which means “to rent”.

7. “Friend” is a common way in Talmudic literature to refer to another Jew.

8. The reason why a field owner would sell standing crop is essentially to minimize his risk during the harvest. There are multiple problems that can go wrong with the crops during the harvest and storage of harvested crops, such as sudden bad weather and bug infestations. So in order to minimize his risk the field owner would sell his standing crops to someone else who will deal with the harvest. This technique is even implemented today by some farmers. For example, see fact sheet “Selling Standing Barley as Greenfeed or Silage”, Saskatchewan Agriculture and Food, July 2008, http://www.agriculture.gov.sk.ca/Default.aspx?DN=ead45559-907f-4d09-b601-467b65c10f04, Last accessed on September 27, 2010.

9. As was already mentioned above in note 3 the reason that the Rabbis have allowed the son to glean after his father’s harvest is because in all of these cases the father is considered to be a poor individual and compromising his even poorer son’s livelihood may throw the father into even greater poverty where the father would have to glean and beg himself.

10. It is not clear from the Tosefta why some poor people would not be eligible to glean. Minchat Yitzchak explains that this is talking about Non-Jewish poor people who are not eligible to collect the gifts to the poor prescribed by the Torah. However, that seems to be incorrect, because Tosefta Peah 3:3 implies that all gifts to the poor that do not have any holiness to them, which would include Leket, Shikcha and Peah (unlike Maaser Ani, which has holiness to it), can be given to poor Non-Jews. Also if the Tosefta would have been talking about Non-Jews then it would have stated so explicitly as it does in various places. Chazon Yechezkel explains that it is talking about Jewish poor who are suspected of theft and therefore the owner does not want to allow them to glean in his field, because he is afraid that they will steal some of his crops. This explanation also does not fit very well, because the fact that a poor person is a suspected thief does not make him not eligible to collect the gifts to the poor. Also, if that was the meaning of the Tosefta it should not have used the expression “not eligible”, but rather should have said “if the field owner is concerned that they will steal from him”.

    I would like to suggest that the Tosefta is talking about Jewish poor people who are really not eligible to collect the gifts to the poor, because they are simply not poor enough. Mishna Peah 8:8 explicitly states that a person who has in his possession at least 200 Zuz (זוז) cannot collect gifts to the poor, because he is just not poor enough. However, that does not mean that he is rich by any means. In order to understand how much money that really was we have to convert it into today’s terms. A Zuz is a general Aramaic term for the main coin of the day. It comes from the Akkadian word Zuzu, which is a reference to a weight called Zuzu or as it was called later in Aramaic Zuz. The name for the weight seems to originate from the Akkadian word Zazu meaning “to divide”, perhaps because weights were used to divide the measured produce into specific amounts. After have been replaced by coins the word Zuz became a general reference to a common coin. See Michael Sokoloff, “A Dictionary of Jewish Palestinian Aramaic,” Bar Ilan University Press, 2002, pp. 173-174, entry זוז, and “The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language”, 4th ed., Houghton Mifflin, 2006, entry zuz. So when it is used in the Mishna it is referring to the Roman Denarius since all of the rabbis of the Mishna lived in the Roman Empire. When it is used in the Talmud Bavli in statements of Babylonian Amoraim it is referring to a Sassanian Drachma which was the money of Sassanian Persian Empire. See Daniel Sperber, “Roman Palestine 200-400 Money and Prices”, Bar Ilan University Press, 1991, p. 31 and p. 145.  A daily wage for a grain silo worker in the Land of Israel in the 2nd century CE was 1 Denarius (or as it is known in Talmudic literature “Dinar”)  per day. See Tosefta Bava Metzia 6:5. That means that 200 Denarii was a wage for 200 days, which is about 8 months worth of work if we assume a 6 day work week. Judging by today’s standard a silo worker earns the minimum wage or close to it, so 1 Denarius per day was a sort of accepted minimum wage of the 2nd century CE Roman Palestine. If we would convert that into today’s terms the Federal Minimum Wage in the United States as of July 24, 2009 is $7.25 per hour, which would be $7.25 * 9 work hours per day = $65.25 per day. In 200 days a silo worker nowadays would earn $13,050. According to the Mishna this would be the threshold of poverty that would make a poor person eligible to collect the gifts to the poor. It should be noted that the Mishna requires that this money has to be in the person’s possession and not just be his salary, since in ancient times job security was non-existent and a day laborer did not know if he will be working the next day or not or if he will actually get paid. Whether the same would apply in today’s standards is debatable since many people who are employed have some sort of job security and assume that they will retain their job for the near future with all kinds of protections in place, such as severance pay. Also it is not that common to find a person today who would have $13,050 in cash as his savings. For all practical purposes we can compare the threshold of the Mishna of possession of 200 Zuz to an individual today in the United States who has a steady job earning $7.25 per hour and has more than one mouth to feed.  I have ignored taxes from my calculation on purpose since a resident of the Roman Empire also had to pay taxes which greatly varied by locality and therefore it is simply not fare to compare tax rates from then to today.

11. The Tosefta does not specify in what way the owner is able or not to prevent these non-eligible poor people from gleaning. However, I am convinced that it is referring to a peaceful method, since it concludes its statement that for the sake of peace the owner should not prevent them. The Tosefta must be referring to a simple verbal protest by the owner against these people collecting and if they ignore him then he just should let them glean anyway.

12. The 200 Zuz threshold that the Rabbis have enacted was intended to make sure that there will be enough gifts to the poor for the real poor. It is the same as today the government not allowing people whose income is above a certain threshold to collect food stamps. However, the Rabbis were not interested in causing fights between people in order to enforce this law. Therefore if non-eligible poor simply ignored the owner’s verbal request not to glean the owner had to let them glean anyway and not put up any resistance.