051b - יש בכור פרק שמיני בכורות דף נ"א, ע"ב

Nor is hekdesh [redeemed] with any of these.^[1]

ולא הקדשות נפדין בכל אלו - With slaves, documents or land. And there [regarding hekdesh] we derive it from pesukim in Toras Kohanim,^[2] in the section of arachin.

If he wrote to the kohen that he owes him five sela’im, he must give [them] to him, etc.^[3]

Ulla said: By Torah law his son is redeemed [once he gives].

What is the reason his son is not redeemed?

It is a decree, lest people say that one may redeem with a document.

שמא יאמרו פודין בשטרות - Even [where] they give nothing at all; alternatively, with a document of a debt he holds against someone else.

A tanna^[4] taught before Rav Nachman: His son is redeemed once he gives [the money].

בנו פדוי לכשיתן - For he has given the redemption.

Rav Nachman said to him: This is [the view of] Rabbi Yosi the son of Rabbi Yehudah, stimta; and some say: this is [the view of] Rabbi Elazar the son of Rabbi Shimon, stimta. But the Sages say: His son is not redeemed.

And the halachah is: his son is not redeemed.

Therefore, if the kohen wishes to give it [back] to him as a gift, he may.^[5]

We have [already] learned^[6] that which the Rabbis taught: If he gave it to ten kohanim at once, he has fulfilled [his obligation]; one after the other, he has fulfilled it; if [the kohen] took it and returned it to him, he has fulfilled it.

בבת אחת - He placed five sela’im before all of them and went away.

בזה אחר זה - And [then gave] to another kohen – so it is taught in the Tosefta – he has fulfilled [his obligation].

נטלן - The kohen [took them] and returned them to him – he has fulfilled it.

And such was the practice of Rabbi Tarfon: he would take and return.

ר' טרפון - He was a kohen.

And when the Sages heard of the matter, they said: This one has fulfilled this halachah.

This halachah^[7] – and no more?

Rather, [say]: This one has fulfilled this halachah as well.

Rabbi Chanina was accustomed to take and return.

ר' חנינא - He was a kohen.

He saw a certain man who kept going and coming before him.

אזיל ויתיב קמיה - So that [Rabbi Chanina] would see him walking and coming before him and would return to him the five sela’im he had given for his son.

He said to him: You did not resolve to give – a bad thing; therefore his son is not redeemed.

א"ל לא גמרת ונתת - [You did not give] a complete giving, but only so that I would return them to you.

מידעם ביש עבדת - You have done a bad thing; therefore your son is not redeemed if I return them. Another version: even if I do not return them, your son is not redeemed.

One who set aside the redemption money for his son and it was lost is responsible for it.^[8]

From where do we know this?

מנלן - That he is responsible for it. And even though [the Tanna] brings a pasuk in our Mishnah, [the Gemara] asks “from where do we know this?”, and further on Rav Pappa challenges this.

Rabbi Shimon ben Lakish said: It is derived [through the gezeirah shavah] “valuation” – “valuation” from arachin.^[9]

אתיא ערך ערך - It is written here regarding the firstborn (Bamidbar 18): “And those to be redeemed, from a month old you shall redeem, according to your valuation”; just as with arachin one is responsible for them until they reach the hands of the treasurer, as it says in the last perek of Shechitas Chullin (139a): “And he shall give the valuation on that day, etc.” (Vayikra 27) – they are chullin in your hand until they reach the hands of the treasurer.

Rav Dimi said in the name of Rabbi Yonasan: (Shemos 34) “Every firstborn of your sons you shall redeem, and they shall not appear before Me empty-handed”; and he derives “empty-handed” – “empty-handed” from the olas re’iyah:^[10] just as one is responsible for the olas re’iyah, so too one is responsible for pidyon haben.

מה עולת ראייה חייב באחריותה - For it is an obligation upon him, and it is no less than a neder,^[11] where if [the animal] died or was stolen he is responsible for it, since it is as if he carries it on his shoulder. And furthermore it is written (Shemos 23): “They shall not appear before Me empty-handed”; and if it died or was stolen and he did not make it good, it turns out that he appeared empty-handed in the Courtyard. But from the “they shall not appear” said about the firstborn we would not have known it, for that one does not mean [appearing before His] face literally, since he does not bring it to the Courtyard but gives it to the kohen; and I would have said that setting it aside suffices.

Rav Pappa objected: [Is] a pasuk [needed] for a pasuk?

קרא לקרא - A pasuk need[s] to be brought to support a pasuk? But the Tanna of our Mishnah derives it from a different pasuk!

Rather, Rav Pappa said: It is as [the Mishnah] teaches the reason: (Bamidbar 18) “It shall be yours … but you shall surely redeem.”^[12]

And when [the statement] of Reish Lakish was said, it was said about the earlier clause: If [the son] died after thirty days, even though [the father] has not given, he must give.^[13]

From where do we know this?

מנלן - That he must give after [the son’s] death.

Rabbi Shimon ben Lakish said: It is derived [through] “valuation” – “valuation” from arachin.

ערך ערך מערכין - For it says in Maseches Arachin (20a): If one said “My valuation is upon me” and died, the heirs must give; [if] he said “The valuation of so-and-so is upon me” and [so-and-so] died, it is upon the one who vowed to give; and he derives it from a pasuk in Maseches Arachin and in Toras Kohanim: I might think that if he said “The valuation of so-and-so is upon me” and [so-and-so] died, he would be exempt – the Torah says, “he shall value him” – even if he died. And so too here: when [the son] died after thirty [days], the father had [already] become obligated in his redemption.

Rav Dimi said in the name of Rabbi Yonasan: “Every firstborn of your sons you shall redeem, and they shall not appear before Me empty-handed” – just as there the heirs are obligated, so too here the heirs are obligated.

מה עולת ראייה יורשין חייבין - For it is an obligatory olah. So too here, when [the son] died after thirty [days], the father had become obligated in his redemption. And regarding an obligatory olah we learned: A woman who brought her chatas and died – the heirs bring her olah.^[14]

אף כאן יורשין חייבים - After the death of the father and the son, since they had been obligated and [then] died.

Mishnah

The firstborn takes a double portion in the father’s property,^[15] but does not take a double portion in the mother’s property.

מתני' בנכסי האם - Nichsei melog.^[16]

And he does not take [a double portion] in the improvement,

בשבח - If the property increased in value after the father’s death, before they divided it, the firstborn does not take a double portion in the improvement; rather, they assess what it was worth at the time of their father’s death, and the firstborn, who took two shares of the land, gives money according to the value of the improvement on the second share he took on account of the birthright, and that money is divided among all of them.

nor in what is due [to come] as in what is held.^[17]

בראוי - Property that their father did not hold at the time of his death, but that was due to fall to him as an inheritance and fell to them later – the firstborn does not take a double portion in it.

Tosfos

אמר עולא דבר תורה בנו פדוי לכשיתן - It seems at first glance from the beginning of [Perek] HaNosei (Kesubos 101b)^[18] that Ulla’s [ruling] holds only according to Reish Lakish; but one can settle it so that it holds even according to Rabbi Yochanan.

אבל חכמים אומרים אין בנו פדוי - It is difficult: our Mishnah too teaches “he must give it to him” and his son is not redeemed! One can deflect: [the Mishnah] means that he is not redeemed until he gives it to him, and the Mishnah comes to teach that even if he converted [the sela’im] into a loan against himself,^[19] it is not as though the kohen received them and then lent them back to him; and if the kohen forgave them, he is not redeemed until he gives.

אמר ליה לא גמרת ויהבת מידעם ביש עבדת - One may explain מידעם as meaning “anything,” for that is how we render [מאומה] in Targum; that is: you did not resolve to give anything. And one may further explain מידעם ביש עבדת thus: “you did a bad thing,” for דבר רע is rendered in Targum (Melachim II 4) כל מידעם ביש. And there are texts in which עבדת is not written, but only מידעם ביש and no more – that is, it is a bad thing, i.e. this is a bad business.

הלכך אין בנו פדוי - It is difficult: how is this different from a gift on condition that it be returned,^[20] of which we say in the first perek of Kiddushin (6b) that his son is redeemed, since [the Gemara] concludes that in all of them he acquires? One can answer: here Rabbi Chanina wished to acquire only through a complete gift, for there [in Kiddushin] we forbid doing [so], because it looks like a kohen who helps at the threshing floors,^[21] as we derived above in Perek Ad Kamah (26b), because it says “you have corrupted the covenant of Levi”. And even though that [man] gave to him without stipulation, it is as if he had explicitly said “on condition that you return it to me,” since there is a clear indication of the matter, and this is not [a case of] unspoken intentions,^[22] like [the case of] one who sold and then did not need the money in Perek Almanah (Kesubos 97a). However, it is somewhat difficult: since Rabbi Tarfon and Rabbi Chanina would always return [the money], they turn out to be corrupting the covenant of Levi, for they cause loss to the other kohanim, since [people] would give only to them, because they are accustomed to return. One can answer: the giver does not know at the time he gives whether they will return it to him, and “you have corrupted the covenant of Levi” does not apply, for what concern is it of ours what he returns to him afterwards? And also, perhaps they returned only to the poor, and not to those who were like them, to the rich.

ולא בראוי כבמוחזק ולא האשה בכתובתה - In Perek Yesh Nochalin (Bava Basra 125b) we rule that the firstborn does not take a double portion in a loan [owed to the father], whether [the heirs] collected money or did not collect money; and from this it would seem that [a widow] does not collect her kesubah from a loan, as we learned here: she has no [share] in what is due. But Rabbi [my teacher] explained: even though the power of the husband and of the firstborn is weakened with regard to a loan, which we regard for them as “due,” with regard to a woman’s kesubah it is at any rate considered “held,” and a woman collects her kesubah from a loan, as we learned in Kesubos in [Perek] HaKoseiv (84a): One who died and left a wife, a creditor and heirs, and he had a loan or a deposit in the hands of others – Rabbi Tarfon says: it is given to the weakest of them; Rabbi Akiva says: it is given to the heirs, for all of them need an oath, and the heirs do not need an oath. Evidently, even according to Rabbi Akiva, were it not that she needs an oath she would collect; but since she needs an oath, the heirs collect, and then the woman can no longer collect from them, for it has become movables of orphans, which are not liened;^[23] but if they collected land for their father’s debt, she in turn collects it from them with an oath, like the law of a creditor; or if he exempted her from the oath, she collects the loan. And it is not that for them a loan is “due,” for no Sage there ventures to establish it as Rebbi’s view alone; rather, it implies that no one disagrees, but everyone, both Rebbi and the Rabbis, holds that a loan is “held” with regard to a widow’s kesubah. And even according to the Rabbis who say that movables are not liened to a kesubah at all, even during [the husband’s] lifetime, it appears from this Mishnah of HaKoseiv that they agree that loans of orphans are liened to a kesubah. For one cannot say that it is [the view of] Rabbi Meir, and that is why that Mishnah holds that a woman’s kesubah applies to a loan even though it is movables of orphans. First, because Rabbeinu Tam explains that even according to Rabbi Meir, movables of orphans are not liened to a kesubah, only the movables of the yavam, of which he speaks in Perek HaIshah Shenaflu (Kesubos 81b, and there s.v. Rabbi Meir); for it is not reasonable that Rabbi Meir would empower the kesubah to collect from movables of orphans more than a creditor – the opposite of the Rabbis, who weaken her power more than a creditor’s, so that she does not collect from movables even from [the husband] himself, as is implied in Perek HaOmer in Kiddushin (65b) regarding two who came from overseas with a woman and a bundle, etc. And the case where [she collects] from movables that fell before the yavam, in the Mishnah of HaIshah Shenaflu (Kesubos 80b), is because the yavam stands in place of the husband, and is therefore considered like [the husband] himself, since she is bound to him by virtue of her marriage to the husband. And the words of Rabbeinu Tam appear [correct], for otherwise, if the yavam is like [the husband] himself, from where would the Rabbis who disagree with Rabbi Meir know that movables are not liened to a kesubah even from [the husband] himself? And further, if so, how could [Rabbi Akiva] give it to the heirs because all of them need an oath and the heirs do not? Even when they give it to the heirs, the woman would collect from them, since you would say he holds that movables of orphans are liened to a kesubah! And further: granted for a woman’s kesubah, but what is there to say about a creditor? We have not found a Tanna who holds that movables of orphans are liened to a creditor! Rather, perforce, because the loan is not in the hands of the heirs, the power of the woman and the creditor is greater than with movables that are in the hands of the orphans. And “two stringencies in a kesubah” do not apply here, as I explained at the end of HaIshah Shenaflu (Kesubos 82a): for Rabbi Meir’s stringency is not present here, as I explained, since the loan is in the hands of others and is not movables of orphans; and if so, Rabbi Nasan’s stringency is not present here either,^[24] for the statement of Rabbi Tarfon, who said “it is given to the weakest of them” – and Rabbi Akiva too would agree with him, were it not for the reason that all of them need an oath and the heirs do not need an oath – it is reasonable that it follows even the Rabbis who disagree with Rabbi Nasan. And this is the reason that [the rule] of Rabbi Nasan is not at issue: since this money was never in the hands of the orphans, but now they come to take it by virtue of inheritance and it has not yet come into their hands, therefore the Rabbis agree with Rabbi Nasan in this, that it is given to the creditor and to the woman’s kesubah, even though they do not hold like Rabbi Nasan during the lender’s lifetime, when they say that one does not take out a loan he has in the hands of others for a creditor or for his divorcee’s kesubah, because he has greater power in this money that is in another’s hand than the orphans have in what their father left in the hands of others, which was never in their hands and did not pass from their hands into the hands of those others. And [as for] the detached produce he left, which is also taught there – whoever is first to [seize] it acquires it – and about which Rabbi Tarfon and Rabbi Akiva disagree at the beginning of the Mishnah regarding a loan and a deposit in the hands of others (Kesubos 84a): that too speaks of produce that is not in the hands of the orphans, as it teaches “whoever is first acquires it,” which implies that whether heirs, a woman or a creditor, whoever is first acquires it, because in them the orphans do not have more power than the woman and the creditor, unlike other movables of orphans. And now that our masters the Geonim enacted that a woman and a creditor collect from movables of orphans,^[25] a woman collects even from a loan owed to the orphans’ father, whether they collected land or collected money, for a loan is not considered “due” with regard to a kesubah but “held,” as I explained. And even without this Mishnah of HaKoseiv (ibid. 84a), from which I proved that a loan is “held” with regard to a kesubah, a woman collects her kesubah from a loan of orphans in our time, even if they collected money, by virtue of the enactment of the Geonim: since they made movables like land, movables that orphans collected for their father’s debt are liened to their father’s creditor by [the rule of] Rabbi Nasan, for by this reason we regard land that orphans collected as liened – by this reason, as if their father had collected it in his lifetime; and therefore one cannot say that it should be “due” with regard to the kesubah as it is for other matters. However, it is difficult: in any case these are two stringencies in a kesubah – that the Geonim enacted that a woman collect from movables of orphans, and if you claim that she collects even from the husband’s loan when the orphans collected money, by [the rule of] Rabbi Nasan. One can say: the Geonim made [movables] completely like land. And further, according to Rabbeinu Tam, who says that the enactment of the Geonim [has the force of] Torah law, they are not two stringencies at all. And although I said that even without a loan of orphans, by virtue of the enactment of the Geonim, one cannot prove so conclusively that movables orphans collected for their father’s debt are liened to a creditor and to a woman’s kesubah by Rabbi Nasan’s reason, as with land when they collected land, since the lien on land is stronger than the lien on movables with regard to seizing from buyers – nevertheless one can prove that a woman collects from a loan from that [Mishnah] of HaKoseiv, as I explained. And so is the practice: to have women collect from their husbands’ loans.

Notes

1. 1. This line continues from the previous amud [Bechoros 51a], where the Gemara asked about the Mishnah’s clause “nor with consecrated property” – obviously it is not his to redeem with! – and answered “Say:”. That is, read the Mishnah as: nor is hekdesh redeemed with any of these – consecrated property is not redeemed with slaves, documents or land (Rashi).
2. 2. Toras Kohanim (the Sifra) is the Tannaitic midrash on Vayikra. In its section on arachin (Vayikra 27) it also expounds how consecrated property is redeemed.
3. 3. A clause of the Mishnah [Bechoros 51a]. Pidyon haben: a father must redeem his firstborn son from a kohen with five sela’im when the child is thirty days old (Bamidbar 18:15–16). If he wrote the kohen a document saying he owes him five sela’im, he must pay, but the document itself does not redeem his son.
4. 4. A tanna here is a reciter who knew the beraisos by heart and recited them in the study hall before the Amoraim.
5. 5. A clause of the Mishnah: since the father is obligated to pay, once the kohen has received the money he may give it back to him as a gift.
6. 6. “We have learned this”: our Mishnah already teaches what the following beraisa states.
7. 7. The beraisa reports that the Sages praised R’ Tarfon’s practice of taking and returning, saying that he had fulfilled “this halachah” – the ruling that if the kohen took the money and returned it, the father has fulfilled his obligation.
8. 8. A clause of the Mishnah [Bechoros 51a]. Being responsible (achrayus) means that if the money he set aside for the redemption is lost, he must give the kohen other money.
9. 9. A gezeirah shavah links two passages that share a word: “by your valuation” in pidyon haben (Bamidbar 18:16) and the arachin of Vayikra 27, the vow to give the Temple the fixed “value” of a person. One who vows arachin is responsible for the money until it reaches the Temple treasurer (Rashi).
10. 10. The olas re’iyah is the burnt-offering every pilgrim brings when he appears in the Beis HaMikdash on the festivals; of it the Torah says “they shall not appear before Me empty-handed” (Shemos 23:15). The same word, “empty-handed,” appears with the redemption of the firstborn (Shemos 34:20).
11. 11. A neder is a pledge such as “I take upon myself an olah”: if the animal he set aside dies or is stolen, he must bring another. A nedavah (“this animal is an olah”) carries no such responsibility.
12. 12. Bamidbar 18:15. The Mishnah itself already gave the source for the father’s responsibility, so no further derivation is needed.
13. 13. A clause of the Mishnah [Bechoros 49a]: if the son died after thirty days, the father must still pay the kohen even though he had not yet paid, since the obligation had already fallen on him (Rashi).
14. 14. After childbirth a woman brings a chatas and an olah. If she brought her chatas and died, her heirs bring her olah, since it is an obligatory offering (Mishnah Kinnim 2:5).
15. 15. The firstborn takes two shares of his father’s estate, as it says, “to give him a double portion of all that is found with him” (Devarim 21:17).
16. 16. Nichsei melog are a wife’s own assets: the principal stays hers while her husband eats the produce. When her sons inherit these from her, the firstborn gets no double portion.
17. 17. The Mishnah continues on the next amud [Bechoros 52a]: “nor a woman for her kesubah…”
18. 18. In Kesubos (101b–102a) R’ Yochanan and Reish Lakish disagree whether writing “I owe you a maneh” in a document makes one liable, and our Mishnah is cited there.
19. 19. Converting it into a loan: treating the debt as if it had been paid and the kohen had then lent the money back to him.
20. 20. A gift given on condition that it be returned counts as a gift; Kiddushin 6b rules that a son redeemed this way is redeemed.
21. 21. A kohen who helps at the threshing floor so that the owner will give him the priestly gifts is forbidden to do so, under “you have corrupted the covenant of Levi” (Malachi 2:8) [Bechoros 26b].
22. 22. Devarim shebalev: an intention that was never spoken does not undo a transaction (Kesubos 97a).
23. 23. Movables of orphans: by Talmudic law a creditor, or a widow for her kesubah, cannot collect from movable property the heirs inherited, only from land.
24. 24. Rabbi Nasan’s lien: if Reuven owes Shimon and Shimon owes Levi, Levi may collect directly from Reuven.
25. 25. The Geonim enacted that a creditor, and a woman for her kesubah, may collect from the orphans’ movables as well.