Bava Metzia 106: Regional Calamities and Their Implications

The Gemara begins with a discussion about the meaning of "fields in the region".  In our last Mishna, we learned about calamities that affect the just one field and regional disasters that affect a larger area.  How are these defined?  What if a farmer plants barley after contracting to plant wheat, and the field is blasted?  The barley was destroyed, but the wheat might have survived because of the greater security of its root system.  Is this cultivator truly suffering from a regional disaster?  The Gemara provides other examples where the rabbis are able to consider the more nuanced negotiations regarding agricultural and other dilemmas that are beyond one's control.

The rabbis then consider which are the permitted times for planting, particularly if one's crop was destroyed early in the planting season.  When considering calamities that affect planting, the rabbis note that we should not pay attention to Rabbi Yehuda's earlier ruling regarding the fixed nature of monetary payments.  

A new Mishna teaches us about a field that has been rented for the payment of ten kor of wheat at the end of the season.  If it is a terrible year, the ten kor are provided without concern over the quality of wheat.  If it is a particularly good year, the cultivator cannot buy regular wheat for the owner.  Instead, he must give the owner ten kor of high quality wheat from his own field.

The Gemara reasons that when a person planted barley instead of wheat and then that barley was blighted, the owner should be paid with outside produce.  However, if one contracted to grow grapes or barley and the crop did not grow well, payment can be made from within the field.  This is because it would seem that the land itself was part of the problematic growth.

A final Mishna is introduced at the end of today's daf.  It teaches that Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel is stringent where other rabbis are more lenient.  Generally the rabbis agree that one may not plant wheat in a field where barley was contracted, for wheat might weaken the soil while barley will not do so.  Further, one may not plant legumes when one contracted for grains, for legumes might weaken the soil.  However, it is fine to plant barley in a field contracted for wheat, and it is fine to plant grains where one contracted for legumes.  Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel says that there can be no substitutions in any case.

The Gemara teaches that Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel's concern is based on Zephaniah (3:13).  We learn here that children of Israel are never to tell lies.