Seeds That Were Meant to Grow

About This Talk

Mechirah 16 to 18 extend the sale made in error to what the buyer meant, what the words named and how the goods looked. Chapter 16 holds a seller of garden-vegetable seed that nobody eats responsible when it fails to grow, since he can assume it was bought to sow, unless hail or the like caused the failure, while wheat, barley and even flax seed carry no such duty unless the buyer said he was sowing, and the same applies to medicines and dyes; a buyer who told the seller he would carry the goods to another city and found a voiding blemish there is refunded and the seller bears the trouble, even if the goods were then lost or stolen, while one who said nothing keeps them in his own domain until returned; produce with a known blemish that is lost is the buyer's, produce that spoils from age is the seller's unless the buyer should have warned him; a seller of a goring ox may say he sold it for slaughter unless he knew this buyer buys oxen only to plow; a trefah animal already slaughtered goes back with its price, damage in ordinary use is not charged but damage from a deviation is, a cut garment may be returned in pieces and a sewn cloak with the added value paid, land lived on is returned with rent; the ox with no molars that starved goes back for its price, but a broker who never held it swears a Rabbinic oath and is free; and for firstborn meat, trefah, tevel or idolatrous wine what was eaten is not counted and the money returned, while for a Rabbinic prohibition what was eaten was a benefit. Chapter 17 sets four states of a seller's description, letting only the buyer retract when fine proves poor, only the seller when the buyer's poor proves fine, measuring for a sixth when it is roughly as described, and letting both retract when it is a different kind, red for white or wine for vinegar; wine that sours in the buyer's jars is his even if bought for cooking, unless the seller knew it was turning, while wine in the seller's jars may be returned by a buyer who said he needed it to cook with slowly; beer in the seller's barrel is at his risk for three days, a barrel sold to sell slowly may be returned if half or a third sours unless the buyer moved the spout or let a market day pass; fragrant wine must last until Shavuot, aged is last year's, vintage in its third year lasts until Sukkot, custom governs; a cellar of wine said plainly allows ten turning jugs in a hundred, a barrel of wine must be all good, this cellar of wine means shop wine, and this cellar without the word wine may be all vinegar; and a kneading tray means a finished tray. Chapter 18 forbids deceiving or beguiling anyone in business, Jew or gentile, requires disclosure of a known blemish and forbids misleading flattery; forbids dressing up servants, animals or old utensils as new while allowing new utensils to be polished, forbids bran water, rouge, inflated intestines, soaked meat, non-kosher meat sold to a gentile as kosher and husking only the top of the sack; permits a merchant to give nuts to children and to undersell the market; forbids mixing batches of produce, certainly old with new, permits blending wines while fermenting or when the flavor is distinct, forbids water in wine for sale without notice and never to a merchant, and dregs in wine or oil; and sets allowances: a log and a half of dregs per hundred in plain oil, a quarter kav per se'ah of legumes in wheat, dried kernels in barley and pebbles in lentils, ten wormy figs per hundred, the whole batch to be sifted if exceeded, custom governing, and a stone taken from such a heap paid for as wheat.