Normally I would not say anything unless I had something new to add. But I thought that Rav Shach has such an important point that it is worth mentioning. Laws of the Seventh Year and the Jubilee. 4:24.
I have not actually seen it inside but I think I know what he is getting at.
Just for a general introduction let me say a few basic points: (1) that the fruit called an Estrog can be on a tree for many years. (2) Vegetables you count by when they are picked. (3) Fruit goes by when they get ripe. (4) The Etrog goes by when it is picked.
That means for example you have an Estrog that is picked on the forth year of the seven year cycle before the 15th of the month Shevat, then you give tithes to the poor. If it is picked after the 15th of Shevat then you give the second tithe--which means it has to be taken to Jerusalem.
This is all clear. But then the Rambam says something that seems at first glance very hard to understand. He says an Esrog [or Etrog in modern Hebrew] that grew to the size of an olive on the sixth year even though it is picked on the seventh year if obligated in Trumah and Maasar.
[The Beit Yoseph gives what can only be called a very flaky answer here. And that is not unusual for him as that Shach and Taz have noticed. He says the Rambam is going like both ways in order to be strict. -both by the time of ripening and of picking.]
Now Rav Shach brings a question from the Minchas Chinuch if the fruit of the seventh year one must let go of and abandon (and if one did not an someone takes it it is stealing) or if we say the Torah has already declared it abandoned by law.
The Minchas Chinuch brings as a possible solution the Mishna where you have five women with a basket of fruit of the seventh year and someone walks up and takes a fruit and gives it back to them and says you all are married to me by this fruit, they are married. [Obviously they have to agree to this, but we know women are so desperate to be married so things like this happen every day.]
Without seeing the details what I think Rav Elazar Menachem Shach is getting at is that the law of the seventh year requires a person to abandon his fruit but not that it is automatically abandoned.Therefore the Etrog that grew slightly in the sixth year but picked on the seventh year is in fact fruit of the seventh year but it is not abandoned until it is picked and so it is obligated in Trumah and Maasar.
The way to understand this is thus: When do the fruits become abandoned for all? When they grow or when they are picked? Well that is to some degree the whole idea when we say by normal fruit you go by when it is ripened and by the etrog when it is picked. So when it is picked it becomes a fruit of the seventh year. But that does mean it is abandoned. It still requires an act of abandonment. lacking that it is like what Rav Shach said about halacha 26 that fruits of areas of עולי מצרים are obligated in the seventh year and maasar of the poor all at the same time.
Which makes me think that RaV Shach wrote his book in such a way that the themes interconnect.
I have not actually seen it inside but I think I know what he is getting at.
Just for a general introduction let me say a few basic points: (1) that the fruit called an Estrog can be on a tree for many years. (2) Vegetables you count by when they are picked. (3) Fruit goes by when they get ripe. (4) The Etrog goes by when it is picked.
That means for example you have an Estrog that is picked on the forth year of the seven year cycle before the 15th of the month Shevat, then you give tithes to the poor. If it is picked after the 15th of Shevat then you give the second tithe--which means it has to be taken to Jerusalem.
This is all clear. But then the Rambam says something that seems at first glance very hard to understand. He says an Esrog [or Etrog in modern Hebrew] that grew to the size of an olive on the sixth year even though it is picked on the seventh year if obligated in Trumah and Maasar.
[The Beit Yoseph gives what can only be called a very flaky answer here. And that is not unusual for him as that Shach and Taz have noticed. He says the Rambam is going like both ways in order to be strict. -both by the time of ripening and of picking.]
Now Rav Shach brings a question from the Minchas Chinuch if the fruit of the seventh year one must let go of and abandon (and if one did not an someone takes it it is stealing) or if we say the Torah has already declared it abandoned by law.
The Minchas Chinuch brings as a possible solution the Mishna where you have five women with a basket of fruit of the seventh year and someone walks up and takes a fruit and gives it back to them and says you all are married to me by this fruit, they are married. [Obviously they have to agree to this, but we know women are so desperate to be married so things like this happen every day.]
Without seeing the details what I think Rav Elazar Menachem Shach is getting at is that the law of the seventh year requires a person to abandon his fruit but not that it is automatically abandoned.Therefore the Etrog that grew slightly in the sixth year but picked on the seventh year is in fact fruit of the seventh year but it is not abandoned until it is picked and so it is obligated in Trumah and Maasar.
The way to understand this is thus: When do the fruits become abandoned for all? When they grow or when they are picked? Well that is to some degree the whole idea when we say by normal fruit you go by when it is ripened and by the etrog when it is picked. So when it is picked it becomes a fruit of the seventh year. But that does mean it is abandoned. It still requires an act of abandonment. lacking that it is like what Rav Shach said about halacha 26 that fruits of areas of עולי מצרים are obligated in the seventh year and maasar of the poor all at the same time.
Which makes me think that RaV Shach wrote his book in such a way that the themes interconnect.
