Pesachim 89b (פט:) — the Talmud in English

Mishna:

One who appoints another with him to share in his portion.

One of the members of the group who are partners in the Paschal offering, who went and appointed another person, relying on the fact that he himself had a portion in the offering.

The members of the group are permitted

to separate from him

and give him his portion.

And he eats his own portion

together with the other whom he appointed to share in his portion.

And they eat their own portion,

as a separate group of their own.

The tanna of our Mishna maintains that one Paschal offering may be divided between two groups [as in the anonymous Mishna above, 86a, and unlike Rabbi Shimon in the beraita there]

Gemara:

The issue was raised before them: If, among the members of a group, one of them has greedy hands,

meaning that one of them was a glutton who hastened to snatch and eat a great deal; the tanna used a refined expression.

What is the law regarding whether they may say to him,

that is, whether the other members of the group may say to him:

Take your portion

equal to the amount eaten by each of the other members of the group

and leave!

The sides of the uncertainty are:

Do we say

that we say:

He can say to them: You accepted me—

he can say to them: You accepted me as I am, on the understanding that I would eat to the full extent of my capacity, in exchange for the money I paid to join you.

Or perhaps

perhaps

they can say to him

they may say to him:

When we accepted you, it was to improve the slaughter.

We accepted you to serve the welfare of the offering, since the entire offering must be eaten that night, and we joined you so that none of the Paschal meat would be left over; and we assessed you as eating like the majority of people.

But

on the understanding that you would eat more than we do,

had we known that you would eat more than we eat

we would not have accepted you—

we would not have accepted you.

Come and hear

from what we learned in our Mishna:

One who appoints others with him to share in his portion: The members of the group are permitted to give him his portion, and he eats his portion, while they eat their portion.

What is the reason

that the members of the group are permitted to give him his portion?

Is it not

is it not

because he is comparable to one of them having greedy hands?

Just as when one of them has greedy hands, he eats more than the other members of the group, so too, when one appoints others with him to share in his portion, he causes the two of them together to eat more from his portion than any other individual in the group.

And if it enters your mind

that one should say that when

“

the hands

of one of the members of the group were

greedy,”

he can say to them

he can say to them

:

“You accepted me.”

If so, also in our Mishna, when he appoints another with him to share in his portion—

let this man be

the one who appoints another to share in his portion

like one whose “hands are greedy”!

And since the Mishna says that if he appoints another to share in his portion, the members of the group may say to him, “Leave,” it follows that the same law should apply when his hands are greedy.

The Sages said

in order to reject the proof:

No.

The reason in the case of one who appoints others in our Mishna is not that he causes the two of them to eat an excessive amount together.

Rather, it is because the members of the group do not want many people to participate in the meal, since an increase in the number of people leads to an increase in opinions, and they may thereby delay the meal.

Opinions are different

from excessive eating.

For alternatively,

even if the one who appointed another and the one whom he appointed

both of them

eat together only

the amount that

one member of the group eats,

is what they eat,

and they do not cause excessive eating, nevertheless

they can say to him,

the other members of the group can say to the one who appointed the other

“We do not want a stranger among us,”

we are not comfortable having a stranger with us.

The Gemara brings another proof in order to resolve the issue:

Come and hear:

We learned in a beraita:

An attendant who ate an olive-bulk of meat beside the oven

before serving the meat to the members of the group at the place where they were sitting may not continue eating in the place where the members of the group are sitting. Rather, he must remain in his place and finish eating the Paschal meat there, since one may not eat the Paschal offering in two places.

And

if he was clever,

he fills his stomach with it

from the meat, in the place where he is standing.

And

if the members of the group wished to do him a favor

before they began eating at the place where they were sitting,

they come, sit beside him, and eat; this is the statement of Rabbi Yehuda,

who maintains that one may not eat the Paschal offering in two places [whereas Rabbi Shimon permits it, above 86a].

And we infer from the beraita:

“They wished”

the members of the group wished to do him a favor—

yes.

It follows that if

they did not wish, they did not

do so.

From the words of the beraita we learn that the members of the group may say to the attendant, “We did not accept you on the understanding that we would exert ourselves on your behalf.”

And why?

Let him say to them: “You accepted me!”

The attendant should say to the members of the group: You accepted me as I am, including the effort I would require!

Rather, necessarily, he cannot say, “You accepted me,” and similarly one may say that one whose hands are greedy cannot say, “You accepted me.”

And we reject this:

That case is different,

the case of the attendant is different, because

they say to him,

the other members of the group say to him:

When we accepted you,

the reason we accepted you was

on the understanding that you would exert yourself before us,

on the understanding that you would stand before us and serve us. But

that we should exert ourselves for your sake,

that we should trouble ourselves on your account,

we did not accept you.

This is not so in the case of one whose hands are greedy, since the other members of the group cannot know how he customarily eats; they should have investigated whether he was a glutton, and since they did not investigate, it is evident that they accepted all of his eating.

Come and hear:

We learned in the Tosefta:

The members of a group in which one of them had greedy hands are permitted to say, “Take your portion and leave. And not only that, but even

if there were

five

people

and they made a joint meal,

a shared meal during the rest of the year, and one of them had greedy hands,

the other four are permitted

the other four

to say to him: “Take your portion and leave” [as will be explained below].

And in this beraita it is explicitly stated, with regard to one whose hands are greedy, that they are permitted to tell him to leave. Therefore we conclude:

This beraita explicitly says that, when one of them has generous hands, they are permitted to tell him to leave. Therefore we conclude:

Learn from this

that this is indeed the law.

The Gemara now returns to explain the end of the beraita: “And not only that, but even if there were five who made a joint meal, they are permitted to say to him, ‘Take your portion and leave.’”

And we raise a difficulty:

What is the meaning of “and not only that”?

Why is there a greater novelty in the case of a joint meal than in the case of a group formed for the Paschal offering?

And we answer:

It is not necessary

not only

is this what it says:

It is not necessary to state this with regard to the Paschal offering,

there is no need to state that, with regard to the Paschal offering, the members of the group may say to him, “Take your portion.” Because

they can say to him

the members of the group can say to the glutton:

When we accepted you—

to improve the slaughter!

When we accepted you, our intention was to improve the offering, so that no notar would remain; we needed only the amount eaten by one ordinary person, and no more.

Rather, even in the case of a joint meal as well, since it is merely companionship,

since they all participated in one meal out of affection and friendship, and it might have been said that, out of affection and friendship, they accepted upon themselves that he would eat according to the full extent of his capacity.

Nevertheless,

they are permitted to say to him, “Take your portion, and leave.”

For they accepted upon themselves only an amount corresponding to the eating of the majority of people.

Some say: This

the case of members of a group in which one of them had greedy hands

was not the issue raised for us.

In that case, it is obvious that they may say to him, “Take your portion and leave.”

Rather, this is the issue that was raised for us:

whether

the members of a group are permitted to divide

the Paschal offering and give each person his portion,

or are not permitted to divide it,

but must eat together.

Come and hear:

It was taught in the Tosefta:

The members of a group in which one of them had greedy hands are permitted to say to him, “Take your portion and leave.”

Since the beraita spoke specifically of a case in which one of them had greedy hands, and did not speak of every person, it implies that when

his hands are greedy, yes,

they are permitted to say to him, “Take your portion and leave.” But if

his hands are not greedy, no.

And we conclude:

Learn from this

that the members of a group are not permitted to divide.

Rav Pappa and Rav Huna, son of Rav Yehoshua, combined their bread with each other.

They joined together and combined their meal.

By the time

Rav Huna, son of Rav Yehoshua, had eaten

one

loaf,

Rav Pappa had eaten four.

He said to him,

Rav Huna, son of Rav Yehoshua, said to Rav Pappa:

Divide it for me,

give me my portion.

Rav Pappa said to him: “You accepted me,”

you accepted me as I am, including the way I eat.

He raised against him

Rav Huna, son of Rav Yehoshua, raised against Rav Pappa

all these refutations,

all the questions raised above against the reasoning of “You accepted me”:

A. From our Mishna, concerning one who appoints others to share in his portion, where the members of the group are permitted to give him his portion; and he cannot say, “You accepted me.”

B. The attendant who ate an olive-bulk of meat beside the oven: only if they wish do they do him a favor, and the attendant cannot say, “You accepted me.”

And he answered,

Rav Pappa answered him

as we answered,

as we answered above.

And again

he raised against him

Rav Huna, son of Rav Yehoshua, raised against Rav Pappa from the beraita:

The members of a group

in which one of them had greedy hands are permitted to say, “Take what is yours and leave.”

He said to him,

Rav Pappa said

there

the reason in that beraita is because

they say to him,

the members of the group say to the glutton:

“When we accepted you, it was to improve the slaughter.”

But you joined me for an optional meal out of companionship and friendship, and you wished to eat with me as companions; therefore, you accepted upon yourself all of my eating.

And again

he raised against him

Rav Huna raised against him from the end of the beraita: “And not only that, but even if there were five who made

a joint meal

a shared meal, they are permitted to say to him, ‘Take your portion and leave.’”

Rav Pappa reconsidered,

and divided it for him,

giving Rav Huna, son of Rav Yehoshua, his portion.

He went,

Rav Huna went,

and combined his meal with Ravina.

He participated in a meal together with Ravina.

By the time Rav Huna, son of Rav Yehoshua, had eaten one

loaf,

Ravina had eaten eight

eight.

Rav Huna, son of Rav Yehoshua, said:

Rav Huna, son of Rav Yehoshua, said:

“One hundred Rav Pappas,”

it is preferable to participate with one hundred people resembling Rav Pappa

and not

to participate with

one Ravina.”

The Sages taught: One who appoints others with him to share in his Paschal offering

a person who set aside a sheep for the Paschal offering, and afterward appointed additional people to share in his offering in exchange for payment, which they gave him from money they had set aside to purchase a Paschal offering—

and

likewise one who appoints others

to share in his festival offering

who appointed them to share in a sheep that he consecrated as a festival peace-offering [which they would sacrifice on Passover eve on behalf of all those registered for it, so that they would eat the Paschal offering when satisfied]—

the money in his possession,

which those people paid him in order to be registered with him, becomes consecrated upon the offering for which he registered them, and the money

is non-sacred.

And although the one who registered them had already consecrated the sheep for his Paschal offering, nevertheless, now that they are registered for the Paschal offering or for the festival offering, the money becomes consecrated upon it and leaves the realm of consecrated property for the realm of non-sacred property. The Gemara below explains the reason for this.

And one who sells his burnt-offering or his peace-offerings,

if, after he had already consecrated an animal to offer as a burnt-offering or peace-offering, he sold it so that another person might achieve atonement through it

has accomplished nothing.

For a person's burnt-offering cannot be sacrificed to provide atonement for another person; it may be sacrificed only so that its original owners achieve atonement through it.

And the money

that the purchaser paid for the burnt-offering and the peace-offerings,

whatever it may be,

whatever price he paid, even if the purchaser paid more than the value of the animal

shall be allocated for freewill offerings.

It is placed in the collection boxes [containers resembling a shofar, broad at the bottom and narrow at the top] that were in the Temple; from the money in them, “public burnt-offerings for freewill offerings” were brought when the altar was idle, when there was nothing else to offer on it. And we raise a difficulty:

But since he has accomplished nothing,

the money

that the purchaser gave

why should it be allocated for freewill offerings?

Rava said

as an answer:

It is a penalty.

The Sages penalized the purchaser so that he would not again purchase another person's burnt-offering or peace-offerings in order to achieve atonement through them.

And we raise a difficulty:

And what

is the meaning of the money

“whatever it may be,”

what does the tanna intend to teach us by this?

And we answer:

Even though

the burnt-offering and the peace-offerings

were not worth

were worth nothing

but four

and they gave him

and paid him for them

five,

even with regard to that extra amount,

even the additional fifth zuz,

they also penalized him.

Lest you say that the purchaser gave the fifth zuz to the seller merely as a gift and not as payment for the purchase, since the burnt-offering and the peace-offerings were worth only four, and therefore he should not be penalized with regard to that amount, the tanna teaches us that he is penalized in this case as well.

Ulla said, and some say

said this:

Rabbi Oshaya [

both were from the Land of Israel]:

Perhaps our Babylonian colleagues know

would that our Babylonian colleagues know

the reason for this matter,

the reason for this matter and inform us: For they taught in a baraita: “One who designates others to join him for his Pesah and for his festival offering—the money in his possession is unconsecrated.” And why did they say this? For

this

one who designated others with him

set aside a lamb for his Pesah. And this

one who was counted with him

had set aside

earlier the

money for his Pesah.

And if so,

how

how did the

consecration

that was in the money

take effect

and become transferred

onto

the lamb, which was also

consecrated?

The transfer of consecrated money can take place only if the purchaser gives money in exchange for an unconsecrated animal; in that case, the sanctity in the money is transferred to the unconsecrated animal, and the money becomes unconsecrated.

But here, since the animal had already been consecrated for the sake of the Pesah, where did the sanctity that had been in the money go?

And since this is so, what is the reason for the matter

that it teaches: “The money in his possession is unconsecrated”?