Bava Metzia 100b-101 - Olive trees and clods of earth

1) The Mishna at the bottom of Bava Metzia 100b says that a seah produced only a reviit, presumably of oil. There are two ways to understand this. One is as Rashi explains it:

that the olives were not very juicy, so they weren’t able to extract much oil from them. So one seah of olive fruit produced one reviit of oil. Here are some rough calculations I made. Hopefully I have it right.

1 seah = 24 log = 96 reviis. So approx 1%

Typical yield for olive -> olive oil is 10%-30% on a dry weight basis.

So that means that these olives only produced 1/10th of the amount of oil they normally do.

Perhaps endorsing this read is the Mishna in Sheviis:

Mishna Sheviit 4:9:
זיתים משיכניסו רביעית לסאה. פוצע ואוכל בשדה. הכניסו חצי לוג כותש וסך בשדה. הכניסו שליש כותש בשדה וכונס לתוך ביתו. וכן כיוצא בהם בשאר שני שבוע חייבים במעשרות. ושאר כל פירות האילן כעונתן למעשרות כן עונתן לשביעית:

And see Rashi there. In Sheviis, it seems to be addressing different stages of olive growth. So at a quarter log to a seah you can break and eat them in the field. Once they produce half a log, you can crush and anoint yourself in the field. A third of their growth, you can crush in the field and take into your house.

The Meiri, in Meiri, Bet Habechira gives that same explanation, but also an alternative explanation that a seah is not how many olives you have but a measure of the size of the field, that is, a bet seah. Again, some rough calculations:

Bet Seah = 2500 square amos, 50 amot X 50 amot.

If 1 amah = 1.5 feet,

75 feet X 75 feet = 5,625 square feet.

An acre = 43,560 square feet. So bet seah = 1/7 of an acre. Others have defined it as about 1/5 of an acre.

An olive orchard produces about 1 to 9 tons of olives per acre. Further, usual to extract 40 gallons of olive oil per ton of olives. 40 gallons / 7 = 5.7 gallons for a bet seah. A gallon is 128 ounces, so 729.6 ounces. And if a reviis = 3.5 ounces, we are talking about 3.5 / 730 = 1/208, or 0.5%, of the normal yield for a bet seah.

That seems difficult.

Then again, we are dealing in the Mishna with olive trees being sold for their wood, so maybe they are very unproductive.

See also the Mishna in Bava Batra. Could we read rova instead of reviit, or revi’ (with a trailing apostrophe) as some Mishnayot have it:

Mishna Bava Basra:

דף קג,ב משנה  בית כור עפר אני מוכר לך מדה בחבל פיחת כל שהוא ינכה הותיר כל שהוא יחזיר ואם אמר הן חסר הן יתר אפילו פיחת רובע לסאה או הותיר רובע לסאה הגיעו יותר מכאן יעשה חשבון מה הוא מחזיר לו מעות ואם רצה מחזיר לו קרקע ולמה אמרו מחזיר לו מעות לייפות כחו של מוכר שאם שייר בשדה בית תשעה קבין ובגינה בית חצי קב וכדברי ר' עקיבא בית רובע מחזיר לו את הקרקע ולא את הרובע בלבד הוא מחזיר אלא את כל המותר:

MISHNAH. [IF A MAN SAYS TO ANOTHER.] 'I SELL YOU A BETH KOR OF ARABLE LAND, MEASURED WITH THE ROPE',12  [AND] HE GAVE [HIM] LESS, [EVEN IF ONLY BY] A FRACTION, [AN EQUAL SUM] IS TO BE DEDUCTED [FROM THE PRICE]. [IF] HE GAVE MORE, [EVEN IF ONLY BY] A FRACTION, IT IS TO BE RETURNED [TO HIM]. IF, HOWEVER. HE SAID,13  'MORE OR LESS,'14  THE SALE IS VALID EVEN IF HE GAVE [AT THE RATE OF] A QUARTER OF A KAB PER SE'AH15  LESS OR MORE. [IF THE DIFFERENCE IS] GREATER THAN THIS, CALCULATION IS TO BE MADE.16

2) In the gemara, Resh Lakish says that the olive trees transported to another field by a flood comes with the clods of earth surrounding them, and either (Ulla) that we are dealing after the first three years that they split or (Ravin) that we are dealing with the first three years that they split. Tosafot says that the reason for 3 is Orlah considerations. Rambam holds that even Orlah considerations aside, he wouldn’t get any aspect (half) of the oil even during the first three years because of lack of contribution. Even though the trees themselves should be considered a contribution, one would think.

In one of the two articles linked above, I found this:

So the earth itself is not so important. Water is more important. Though other growth surrounding it can undermine it.

Maybe we can say that the clods themselves would suffice to sustain the trees for those first three years or longer, and the other land is not really so important as much as water is important and the trees themselves as factories are important.

3) The parallel Yerushalmi is interesting:

ירושלמי

דף לא, א פרק ח הלכה ה משנה  המוכר זיתיו לעצים ועשו פחות מרביעית לסאה הרי הן לבעל הזיתים עשו רביעית לסאה זה אומר זיתיו גידילו וזה אומר ארצי גידלה יחלוקו שטף הנהר את זיתיו ונתנן לתוך שדה חבירו זה אומר זיתיי גידילו וזה אומר ארצי גידילה יחלוקו:

דף לא, א פרק ח הלכה ה גמרא  ר' יוחנן בעי הרטיבו מה הן.  רב הונא אמר בששטפן בגושיהן ר' יוסי בן חנינא אומר שני ערלה ביניהן:

We would have expected Resh Lakish to surface here, since we have a statement from both Ulla and Ravin as to Resh Lakish’s position. Instead, we have a statement from a Babylonian Amora, Rav Huna.

Note also that the statement in Yerushalmi is just begusheihen, and no mention of within 3 or out of three. Bring the orlah aspect of it is Rabbi Yossi ben Chanina, who is a student / colleague of Rabbi Yochanan.  So maybe what happened is Resh Lakish taught something explicitly similar to Rav Huna, and there were two ways of understanding it, as it relates to orlah. And so Ulla and Ravin both came with an expansion of the original statement, and our gemara is coming to determine which works out better.

4) The arguments put forth by the various parties are entirely the setama degemara. You can see the distinction between the primary text of the Amoraic statement in Hebrew, which uses she to mean that, and the Aramaic arguments, which use de to mean that.

Interesting about the plantings underneath the tree. That would have undermined the growth, but then again, if it would have been orlah during those three years, then there would be no care about the growth. Someone this morning raised the point that, according to someone who grew up in Italy, olive trees don’t produce anything for the first X years. He thought it was five to seven, but a google search mentioned three.

Aside from what the competing claimants can advance, we could say that the concern is really what each party is really contributing, given that olive trees don’t need fertile ground and that they have been transported with their clods. Maybe we should not be so quick to reject Ulla’s account of Resh Lakish.

4) An interesting Tosafot at the bottom of 101a, d”h סברוה, about who exactly is being forced, and Rabbenu Chananel’s girsa.

5) The Mishna at the top of 101b is really being kvetched from its primary meaning. The simple meaning is that there are two cases - (a) rental in the rainy season and (b) rental in the sunny season. To kvetch it into a single can, and so reread the words as if it says “in the rainy season unless notice was given in the sunny season 30 days” is difficult.

It is made more difficult if we look at various manuscript Mishnayot which have a leading vav for the sunny season, that is, ובימות החמה שלשים יום.

I don’t like the gemara’s rejection. The concern is that one cannot readily find a new rental in the rainy season. So you object that, in the sefa, the 12 month period in the big city will expire in the middle of the rainy season?! The ready answer to that is that since he has prior notice, he can plan in advance and then have a house to move into even in the middle of the rainy season. Indeed, the thirty days, just like the 12 months, are talking about giving notice prior to eviction. But once you enter into the rainy season itself, for the duration of the rainy season (that is, from Succot until Pesach) notice doesn’t help, because all the rental properties have been grabbed.

We see that Rav Assi reads it similarly, that there are two clauses, and that even one day into the rainy season, now that it has commenced, he cannot be evicted. The gemara has a problem with Rav Assi and rereads, that is kvetches, his words, to accord with the kvetch of the Mishna.

6) In the story of the man with the boatload of wine, see the Rif, who has a slightly different version of the story. The Rif has the woman explicitly ask that the man marry her if he wants to store his wine in her property.