Study Beitzah folio 38B with parallel Hebrew-English text, traditional commentary, and modern study tools. Free access to Babylonian Talmud online.
Text Excerpt
הרי שנתערב לו קב חטין בעשרה קבין חטין של חבירו, יאכל הלה וחדי?! אחיכו עליה. אמר להו: גולתיכו שקלי? הדור אחיכו עליה.
If one’s single kav of wheat became mingled with 10 kav of another’s wheat, should the latter eat all 11 kav and rejoice? One does not allow his property to become nullified into someone else’s property. The same applies to water and salt in dough. The rabbis laughed at him. He said to them: Did I take your cloaks from you that you are putting me to shame? They again laughed at him.
אמר רב אושעיא: שפיר עבוד דאחיכו עליה. מאי שנא חטין בשעורים דלא קאמר להו — דהוה ליה מין בשאינו מינו, ומין בשאינו מינו — בטיל. חטין בחטין נמי, נהי דלרבי יהודה לא בטיל, לרבנן מבטל בטיל.
R' Oshaya said: They did well to laugh at him. They were correct that the two cases are dissimilar, as they reasoned as follows: What is different about a case of wheat belonging to one person that became mingled with barley of another, that R' Abba did not say this case to them as an example? He specifically chose an example of wheat mingling with other wheat and not that case of barley because that is one type mingled with something that is not its same type. The principle is: A type of food mixed with a large amount of food not of its own type becomes nullified, and this principle applies even when the two foods belong to two different people. If so, the same may be said when wheat of one individual is mixed with wheat of another as well. Although, according to R' Yehuda, an item mingled with another item of the same type is not nullified, according to the Rabbis it is certainly nullified.
אמר ליה רב ספרא: משה! שפיר קאמרת?! ולא שמיע להו הא דאמר רבי חייא קטוספאה משמיה דרב: הבורר צרורות מגרנו של חברו — חייב לשלם לו דמי חטים.
Rav Safra said to R' Oshaya: Moses! This is a term of reverence for the leader of the generation. Have you in fact spoken well in defending those who scoffed at R' Abba? But, did those rabbis who scoffed not hear of this teaching that R' Ḥiyya of Ketosfa’a said in the name of Rav: One who removes pebbles from another’s wheat granary is obligated to reimburse him for the loss he has caused and pay him the value of wheat according to the weight of those stones. The latter could have sold those pebbles along with his wheat, as there is always some refuse mixed in with the wheat that is weighed and sold along with it. Therefore, the removal of the pebbles has caused the owner of the granary a monetary loss.