Q&A: To sell, sell, and sell without concern. In my humble opinion.
To sell, sell, and sell without concern. In my humble opinion.
Question
Something about those who are stringent regarding the sale of leavened food doesn’t add up for me.
After all, on the Torah level, nullification is enough. One nullifies it and declares it ownerless. But…?
Or perhaps the concern is that he may find an especially nice loaf, or perhaps he did not nullify it wholeheartedly (and if he nullified it verbally, what do we care about what is in his heart? Unexpressed intentions are not legally binding.)
And therefore they decreed that he must actually destroy it.
Leavened food after Passover is prohibited only on the rabbinic level, and the whole problem is that people do not keep away from it, or that he did not mean it wholeheartedly; for that, the sale certainly helps, because he marks it as belonging to the non-Jew and puts up a partition. So in practice there is both keeping away from it and firm intent.
If so, what is the reason to be stringent and not rely on the sale?
And even if it is actual, full-fledged leavened food, הרי this is two rabbinic concerns, and surely one of them is fulfilled, since people keep away from it and there is firm intent?
Can the Rabbi explain the opposition to the sale, at least regarding the leavened food after Passover?
Answer
Leavened food that was nullified is not sold. One sells only leavened food that was not nullified and that one wants after Passover (and therefore does not destroy). The concern about the sale is that the transaction is not valid, because the sale is a legal fiction, and therefore some are stringent not to sell actual leavened food. But in my opinion this concern has no basis. If the sale is valid, then it works even for actual leavened food, and if not, then don’t do it at all. In my opinion it is valid. By the way, according to this, business owners who sell their leavened food (a grocery store or factories producing leavened food) can sell actual leavened food not only because we want to make things easier for them, but because in their case there is no concern that the sale is invalid. They certainly want to sell all their merchandise, so there is no concern that they are not serious. But as stated, there is no room for concern about intention here, since these are unexpressed intentions.
Discussion on Answer
Let me begin by saying that the opinions that a rabbinic acquisition does not help for a Torah-level matter are very puzzling, and in my opinion should not be taken into account at all. There is no logic whatsoever to the claim that a certain object is mine on the rabbinic level and yours on the Torah level. If the Sages transferred it to me, then it is mine in every respect. But that is just an aside. As for the matter itself, the acquisition here is on the Torah level. Where did you come up with a rabbinic acquisition here?
Which one? With a non-Jew, on the Torah level physical pulling is required, and that is not applicable here. Exchange acquisition and symbolic acquisition are subject to a major dispute among the medieval authorities as to whether they are Torah-level or rabbinic.
And regarding a rabbinic acquisition for a Torah-level matter: you understand ownership as a kind of legal affiliation, so you understand that as long as it is affiliated, that affiliation is ownership. But if you understand ownership as a law that points to a certain state of the property, then it makes sense… and all the opinions that a rabbinic acquisition does not help for a Torah-level matter support that, etc.
What about the fact that there are no Torah-level modes of acquisition here (physical pulling is not relevant), and there are plenty of opinions that a rabbinic acquisition does not help for a Torah-level matter?
I’m talking from the standpoint of the prohibitions of owning and having leavened food seen in one’s possession.