Study Bava Metzia folio 109B with parallel Hebrew-English text, traditional commentary, and modern study tools. Free access to Babylonian Talmud online.
and a town scribe who drafts documents on behalf on the local residents, all of these are considered forewarned. Therefore, any loss incurred due to them is deducted from their wages, and they are fined without the need for prior warning. The principle of this matter is: With regard to any loss tha
§ The Talmud relates: There was a certain planter who said to the owner of the field: Give me the value of my enhancement because I wish to ascend to Eretz Yisrael. The owner came for a ruling before Rav Pappa bar Shmuel, who said to him: Give the planter the value of his enhancement. Rava said to
Rav Ashi thought to say that when he referred to 1/4th he meant 1/4th that is 1/6th, i.e., 1/4th of the sum due to the owner, as the sum due to the owner is 2/3rds of the entire yield. This payment would therefore amount to 1/6th of the total. As Rav Minyumi, son of Rav Naḥumi, said: In a location
Granted, if you say that he meant 1/4th that is 1/6th, this is well and the calculations are in order, but if you say he referred to an actual quarter, the homeowner suffers the loss of half of 1/6th. This is because if the owner had paid the planter initially he would have given him only one-half
Rav Aḥa, son of Rav Yosef, said to Rav Ashi: Let the planter say to the owner: You give your portion to the sharecropper, and I will do what I wish with my portion. I performed my half of the work properly, so why should I suffer a loss because you want to pay the sharecropper? Rav Ashi said to him