Pesachim

Is it not because it stands in the presumption of having been searched, [the Tanna] holding, All are haberim1 in respect to the searching of leaven.2 For it was taught: If a haber dies and leaves a store-house full of produce [crops], even if they are but one day old,3 they stand in the presumption of having been tithed.4 How so: perhaps it is different here5 because they [the woman, slave or minor] state it? — Has then the statement of these any substance?6 What then [will you assume]? It stands in the presumption of having been searched? Then it should state, ‘All houses stand on the fourteenth in the presumption of having been searched’? — What then [will you assume]? It is because of the statement of these7 [that the house is assumed to have been searched], but if these did not say [that it had been searched], it is not so? Then solve from this [teaching] that it does not stand in the presumption of having been searched! — No. In truth I may tell you [that generally]8 it does stand in the presumption of having been searched; but what we discuss here5 is a case where we know for certain that he [the owner] did not search, but these7 affirm. We searched it. You might say, Let not the Rabbis believe them. Therefore it informs us [that] since the search for leaven is [required only] by Rabbinical law, for by Scriptural law mere nullificationl suffices for it, the Rabbis gave them9 credence in [respect to] a Rabbinical [enactment]. The scholars asked: What if one rents a house to his neighbour in the presumption of its having been searched, and he [the tenant] finds that it has not been searched? Is it as an erroneous bargain10 or not? — Come and hear! For Abaye said: It is unnecessary [to say] of a town, where payment is not made [to others] for searching that a person is pleased to fulfil a precept personally;11 but even in a town where payment is made for searching [it is not an erroneous bargain], because [it is to be assumed that] one is pleased to fulfil a precept with his money.12 We learned elsewhere: R. Meir said: one may eat [leaven] the whole of the five [hours]13 and must burn [it] at the beginning of the sixth.14 R. Judah said: one may eat until four [hours],15 hold it in suspense the whole of the fifth,16 and must burn it at the beginning of the sixth.17 Thus incidentally all agree that leaven is [Scripturally] forbidden from six hours [i.e., noon] and onwards: whence do we know it? — Said Abaye, Two verses are written: Seven days shall there be no leaven found in your houses;18 and it is written, even [ak] the first day ye shall put away leaven out of your houses:19 how is this [to be understood]?20 It must include the fourteenth [as the day] for removal.21 Yet say that it includes the night of the fifteenth [as the time] for removal; for one might argue, ‘days’ is written, [implying] only days but not nights: hence it [the verse] informs us that even nights [are included in the interdict]?22 — That is unnecessary, in their religious observance, particularly in regard to uncleanness and tithes. produce is stacked up. to be presumed that the landlord had searched the house before renting it. null and has no value whatsoever in his eyes. to fulfil personally a religious obligation. hence he cannot retract now. the house), because one can err in the time. leaven, as is intimated by the former verse. fifteenth, all leaven must be removed, but there is no prohibition for any part of the fourteenth.