One-Page Learn · The Halachos at a glance
גניבה
Geneivah 4-6
Sefer Nezikin · Theft · The treatise turns from the thief to everyone around him: the watchman who swears, the market that absorbs the stolen article, and the purchase that is forbidden before any theft is proven.
2x
The value, for a refuted oath
4
Sheep buyable from a small herd
3
Strands the launderer may keep
100
Hands the law reaches back through
Ch 4The Watchman Who Swears
- The false oath is the theft. A watchman who claims an entrusted article was stolen, swears to it, and is then discredited by witnesses pays twice its worth, "for the watchman is himself a thief," and four or five times for a stolen animal he slaughtered or sold after that oath. No guilt offering and no added fifth, since a fifth is never paid alongside a double payment; witnesses arriving before he swears leave him owing the principal alone (4:1)
- Every refuted oath doubles again. Discredited, he swears again, and again, "even if this sequence repeats itself 100 times," each claim carrying its own double payment, so five false oaths cost six times the article's value. Two partners who both swore, one confessing and one refuted, each pay the principal, and seized property is not expropriated (4:5, 4:7)
- A child's deposit generates nothing. From "when a man will give his colleague articles to watch," the owner must be past majority both when he entrusts the article and when he demands it back. A boy who deposits and claims as an adult collects no double payment. A watchman who found a lost article and falsely claims armed robbery does pay double, from "any lost article" (4:4, 4:9)
- Returning it quietly is not enough. Stealing a lamb from the flock or a coin from the wallet he guards ends his watch, so he stays liable even after replacing it until he tells the owner. Counting the wallet or the herd clears him if the owner knew; if the owner never knew, money returned to its place closes the matter, but a live animal does not, for "the thief taught it a way other than that followed by the other sheep in this herd" (4:10-12)
RememberThe object came back and the lamb still knows the way out. Only telling the owner restarts the watch.
Ch 5Buying From a Thief
- The buyer sustains the theft. Purchasing a stolen article is forbidden and "a severe sin, for it reinforces a transgressor and motivates him to steal in the future. For if he did not find a person who would purchase a stolen article from him, he would not steal," on Proverbs 29:24, "a person who shares profits with a thief hates his own soul" (5:1)
- The market ordinance, and who forfeits it. Before the owner despairs, the article goes home and the owner reimburses the purchaser what he paid the thief, then sues the thief, all "to enable uninhibited trade in the marketplace." But where the thief's reputation was public knowledge the Sages ordained no leniency at all: the owner pays nothing and the purchaser chases the thief himself (5:2)
- Despair flips the ownership. Once the owner despairs, whether before or after the sale, the purchaser acquires the article through the despair plus the change of domain. He reimburses the owner its value if he bought from a notorious thief, and owes nothing at all if the thief was not known to steal (5:3)
- The price paid is the measure, not the worth. A purchaser from a thief whose reputation was not public collects what he actually paid before returning the article, whether he paid 100 for an article worth 200 or 200 for one worth 100. With no witnesses to the price he swears while holding a sacred article and collects (5:4, 5:7)
- When a man may reclaim what he recognizes. If he was not known to sell his belongings, or the objects were made to be lent or rented, witnesses to ownership let him reclaim them after the holder swears to the price. The night of the lodgers, the tunnel and the bundles on shoulders is believed; a known thief leaving a house with goods under his cloak is not believed even when he claims purchase (5:10-12)
RememberThe ordinance protects the buyer who did not know. The standard is not the thief's crimes but his reputation.
Ch 6Presumed Stolen
- Probability forbids the purchase. Wherever the prevailing assumption is that an article is stolen, or most of that substance is stolen, buying it is forbidden with nothing proven against anyone. So no wool, milk or kids from shepherds inside a settled community, though milk and cheese may be bought from them in the desert, and four sheep or four fleeces from a small herd's shepherd, five from a large one (6:1)
- The test is whether the owner would notice. Whatever a shepherd sells that the owner would notice may be bought from him; whatever the owner would not notice is presumed stolen. Produce watchmen may be sold from only when they sit openly with baskets and scales before them, "the matter is overt and will be spoken about." Buy at a garden's entrance, not its rear; a sharecropper may sell, since he holds a share (6:2-3)
- "Hide the goods" ends the matter. Whenever a seller says to conceal the sale it is forbidden to buy from him, and the rule is repeated for women, servants and minors, from whom one may not buy unless the local assumption is an owner's gift, as with Galilee linen and Sharon calves. Eggs and roosters may be bought anywhere from anyone, until he says to hide what was sold. A large measure of oil from a press owner, never a small one (6:3-5)
- The craftsman's allowance is measured. A launderer keeps the fluff off a new woolen garment and three strands, no more, though all black strands off a white garment; the comber's strands are the owner's. A tailor returns thread beyond a needle's need and any offcut over three fingerbreadths by three, keeping anything smaller. In all of it the prevailing local custom is followed, and a craftsman selling what custom does not grant him may not be bought from, for we assume it is stolen (6:6-9)
RememberNo receipt, no witness, no investigation. A seller who asks you to hide it has already told you what he thinks of his own title.