One-Page Learn · The Halachos at a glance
הִלְכוֹת גְּנֵיבָה
Theft · Chapters 1-3
Sefer Nezikin · What Makes a Thief • Where the Fine Stops • Collision and Last Resort
1
Perutah: the smallest
theft that is theft
×2
What witnesses cost
a thief, always
5
Times over for a slaughtered
ox, 4 for a sheep
101
Zuz of worth that
saves him from sale
Ch 1What Makes a Thief, and What Double Means
- Stealth, not force. A thief ganav takes in stealth without the owner's knowing, like an undetected pickpocket; one who takes openly by force is a robber gazlan under different law. An armed bandit is a thief, not a robber, even when the owner sees him do it. (1:3)
- Even a jest is forbidden. Stealing a perutah's worth breaks a negative commandment, with no lashes because there is money to pay. Forbidden even as a joke, even meaning to return it, even meaning to pay for it, lest one become habituated. (1:1-2)
- Double is a mirror, not a multiplier. On the testimony of two witnesses he pays twice the value, so that he loses the amount he desired his colleague to lose. An ox or sheep he slaughtered or sold costs five times or four times. A thief who admits it pays the principal only, as with every Torah fine. (1:4-6)
- What grows on a stolen animal. Offspring and shearings are restored with the animal, but where the owner had already despaired they are not, and fattening the thief paid for is his. A thief who steals from a thief pays double to nobody, since he never took it out of the owner's domain. (1:11, 1:17)
RememberNo fine for a minor and none for a servant, yet the court strikes a child who steals according to his strength, so he will not become accustomed to it.
Ch 2Where the Fine Does Not Reach
- No colleague, no doubling. Theft from a gentile or from consecrated property repays the principal alone, since the verse says he shall pay double "to his colleague." Servants, promissory notes and land carry no double either; a note is not itself worth money, and servants are equated with land. (2:1-2)
- Thin claims and odd animals. Terumah taken from the Israelite who holds it carries no double, since all he owns is the right to pick the priest, and a right is not money. But a firstling donkey before redemption does, since it is fit to be his later; and a half-breed, a lame, blind or part-owned animal still carries four or five times. (2:3, 2:5, 2:9)
- Selling is wider than selling. A gift, an agent's slaughter, a sale on credit, a barter, settling a debt, or an engagement gift sent to the father-in-law's house all count. A slaughter that is not ritually valid, or killing the animal outright, drops him to double. (2:8, 2:10)
- Lifting makes the thief. Nothing is owed where the object never leaves the owner's domain, but lifting it hagbahah creates liability on the spot; drag a lamb that dies in the owner's yard and he is exempt. A court that says "go and give him what you stole" ends the theft; "you are obligated to return it" is not definitive, so a later sale still costs four or five times. (2:15-16)
RememberThe fine needs a neighbor to stand in front of. Stealing from the Temple treasury is worse and carries no fine at all, only the bare debt.
Ch 3Collision, Confession, and the Last Resort
- One deed, one punishment. Where a capital or lashing offense and a money debt arise in the same instant, the money is not collected: an arrow torn through a garment on Shabbat, a grain heap fired on Yom Kippur after a warning. Unwarned or unintentional, he pays and is not lashed. (3:1-2)
- A half second decides it. Drag a wallet out of a private domain on Shabbat and destroy it: nothing owed, since theft and carrying landed together. Lift it inside first, then carry it out: double, because he became a thief before he became a violator. Slaughtering a stolen animal on Shabbat or for idolatry cancels the fourfold and fivefold payment. (3:2-3)
- Where he confessed matters. An admission before a court in session cancels the fine. Made out of session, or before two judges, it does not, and witnesses arriving later make him liable. Admit to one partner in court and deny to the other, and when witnesses come he pays the partner he denied five times half the ox. (3:8-3:10)
- Movables, then land, then the man. Payment comes from movable property, failing that from the finest of his land, and failing that the court sells him and gives the price to the one he robbed. A man may be sold, a woman may not, and only for the principal, never for the fine. (3:11-3:13)
RememberA thief worth 50 against a 100 zuz theft is sold; a thief worth 101 is not sold at all, because his whole worth must fit inside what he took.