034a – המוכר שדהו – פרק תשיעי – ערכין, דף לד ע”א

Houses and their courtyards^[1]

הן ומגרשיהן - When they are surrounded by a wall^[2].

The houses and the courtyard are there for concealing.

והא למיסתרינהו קיימי - But they are there for concealing! As stated above (33b), one may not make them into towers or cities.

Rav Ashi said: it was necessary (to state this).

One might have said: while they are hidden, they are hidden.

סד"א אדמסתתרי - As long as they have not been concealed (demolished), if he sold them before their demolition they would become the buyer's permanently; this teaches otherwise.

If they were sold, they would become the buyer's permanently^[3].

This teaches us.

The Sages taught (Leviticus 27:21): like a field of herem, it shall be the priest's holding^[4].

What does the verse come to teach by saying this?

מה ת"ל כשדה החרם - What is the field of herem coming to teach about a field that goes out to the priests at the Jubilee?

From where do we know that a priest who dedicated his field of herem^[5],

שדה חרמו - A field that an Israelite designated as herem, and which came into his share.

lest one say: since it goes out to the priests,

הואיל ויוצאה לכהנים - If he does not redeem it, it is his like an ancestral field; and now it is under my hand, etc.

And it is under my hand; let it be mine.

And it is a logical argument: if I acquire from others, do I not all the more acquire from myself?^[6]

בשל אחרים אני זוכה - If an Israelite's ancestral field went out to the priests at the Jubilee, I would have a share in it.

The verse teaches: And the field, when it goes out in the Jubilee, shall be holy to the LORD like a field of herem^[7].

And what did we learn from the field of herem?

Now this (verse) comes to teach, and so it teaches.

It equates a field of herem with an Israelite's ancestral field^[8].

Just as an Israelite's ancestral field^[9] goes out from his hand and is divided among the priests,

מה שדה אחוזה של ישראל - If a priest redeemed it from the Temple treasury, it goes out of his hand at the Jubilee and is divided among all his fellow priests, as stated in the chapter "Ein Mekadishin" (above, 25a); so too this one, etc. Here he takes it, etc.

So too the field of herem goes out of his hand and is divided among his fellow priests.

The master said: I acquire from others^[10]. Is that comparable? There he merely acquires; here he takes it.

Rami bar Chama said: it was needed.

One might have said: since it is written (Numbers 5:10), And each man's holy things shall be his, this too is like his holy things^[11].

ואיש את קדשיו לו יהיו - We expound it in Bava Kamma (109b), in the chapter on the one who robs: from where (do we know) that a priest who comes to offer his sacrifices at any time and any hour he wishes, if he must bring a sin-offering or volunteers an olah or shelamim, need not give them to the priestly watch, but he himself offers them, takes the hide^[12] and eats the meat. The verse teaches: And each man's holy things shall be his.

Are his holy things comparable? They are not in his possession^[13].

קדשיו לאו ברשותו - And not by his own right does he take them, but he offers up their fats.

Here it is in his possession.

הכא ברשותו - That is, he takes them by his own right, and not from the table on high as wages for service.

But Rav Nachman said: it was needed. One might have said: since it is written (Leviticus 25:34), for it is their perpetual holding, this too is his holding^[14].

אלא אמר ר"נ להכי איצטריך למכתב החרם דסד"א כו' - And this too is his holding; if he dedicated it and did not redeem it, it would not go out to the priests at the Jubilee, but he would have the right to redeem it forever.

This teaches: his holding, his holding — but herem is not^[15].

קמ"ל - An analogy: the field of herem is compared to an Israelite's ancestral field, so that it goes out from his hand and is divided among the priests, since an ancestral field has eternal redemption; but a herem field is not like an ancestral holding that can be redeemed forever.

Hadran: we have completed the chapter "HaMocher Sadeho", and the tractate Arakhin is concluded.

הן ומגרשיהן למיסתרינהו קיימי - And if you ask: what difference does it make whether they were demolished, since they were walled from the outset? For it is taught above: "a house that has a wall", even though it no longer has one but had one earlier. One can answer that this follows R. Elazar b. R. Yose; here, since they are such that they will never have a wall, the holiness of the wall they had earlier does not help them, as though it had never been.

מי דמי התם זוכה - Here too one could have objected: when he acquires from others' property, it is in his own watch; but here he wishes to acquire another watch's share, and it does not go out to the priests of another watch, as explained above (25a). Rather he objects by an a-fortiori: even if it comes into his own watch when it goes out to the priests, one may not acquire it by this a-fortiori argument.

אמר רמי בר חמא איצטריך כו' [אלא] אמר רב נחמן [איצטריך] ס"ד כו' - And if you ask: what is the "and it is logical" argument based on? We cannot say he acquires by a kal vachomer alone; rather it is from the verses: "a man, when he dedicates" (for Rami bar Chama) and "a perpetual holding" (for Rav Nachman). One can answer that he nevertheless wants to bring the kal vachomer, by reason.

הא קא משמע לן אחוזתו אחוזתו אין חרמו לא - And if you ask: above we derived from the hekesh that the herem field is compared to an ancestral field, so why derive it here from "his holding"? One can answer that this is its meaning: it teaches, from the priest's "his holding", that an ancestral holding alone has eternal redemption and is not divided to the priests at the Jubilee; but a herem field is divided to the priests at the Jubilee by the analogy, and it is not like a field of his holding that can be redeemed forever. So Rashi explains.

Notes

1. 1. Mishnah: houses in a walled city and their courtyards do not return at the Jubilee; they may be redeemed only within a year of sale (Lev 25:29-30).
2. 2. A walled city: its houses may be redeemed within a year of sale, after which they stay with the buyer permanently (Lev 25:29-30).
3. 3. Become the buyer's permanently: a walled-city house that was sold and not redeemed within the year (Lev 25:30).
4. 4. Herem: property irrevocably dedicated to God. A field of herem goes to the priests at the Jubilee (Lev 27:21, 28).
5. 5. Dedicated (hikdish): set apart as holy. Here the priest himself dedicated his field as herem.
6. 6. Kal vachomer: an a-fortiori inference, from the lighter case to the weightier one: if he acquires from others' property, all the more so from his own.
7. 7. Yovel (Jubilee): the fiftieth year, when an ancestral field returns to its family (Lev 25:10-13).
8. 8. Hekesh: an analogy linking two verses through a shared word, so that a ruling from one applies to the other.
9. 9. Ancestral holding (achuzah): family land, sold only until the Jubilee, when it returns (Lev 25:23-28).
10. 10. The Gemara quotes its own earlier phrase, "I acquire from others" (above), and asks whether the comparison holds.
11. 11. Holy things (kodashim): the portions of the offerings given to the priests (Num 5:9-10).
12. 12. The priests received the hides of the offerings (Lev 7:8).
13. 13. The priest holds his holy portions by right of the priesthood, not as property of his own, so they are not in his possession.
14. 14. Rav Nachman, a Babylonian Amora. Lev 25:34 concerns the fields of the Levites' cities, which may not be sold permanently.
15. 15. A herem field is not an ancestral holding with eternal redemption, so it goes to the priests at the Jubilee.