Rashbam's Two Leshonot

I gave my regular daf on Sunday, Bava Batra 68, and there’s a lot to think about. A few points.

(1) First, what does Rabbi Chiyya’s brayta teach?

הָהוּא דַּאֲמַר לֵיהּ לְחַבְרֵיהּ: ״בֵּית הַבַּד וְכׇל תַּשְׁמִישָׁיו אֲנִי מוֹכֵר לָךְ״. הֲוַיָא הָנְהוּ חַנְוָאתָא אַבָּרַאי, דַּהֲווֹ שָׁטְחוּ בְּהוּ שׁוּמְשְׁמֵי. אֲתָא לְקַמֵּיהּ דְּרַב יוֹסֵף,

The Gemara relates: There was a certain person who said to another: I am selling you this olive press and all of its accompaniments. There were certain stores outside of the olive press, where, in addition to the ordinary services that these stores provided, sesame seeds would also be spread out to dry before they would be pressed for their oil. The seller and the buyer disagreed about whether these stores were included in the sale, and the buyer came before Rav Yosef, presenting him with his claim to ownership of the stores.

אֲמַר לֵיהּ: תְּנֵינָא, אִם אָמַר: ״בֵּית הַמֶּרְחָץ וְכׇל תַּשְׁמִישָׁיו אֲנִי מוֹכֵר לָךְ״ – הֲרֵי כּוּלָּן מְכוּרִין. אֲמַר לֵיהּ אַבָּיֵי, וְהָא תָּנֵי רַבִּי חִיָּיא: אֵין כּוּלָּן מְכוּרִין! אֶלָּא אָמַר רַב אָשֵׁי: חָזֵינַן – אִי אֲמַר לֵיהּ: ״בֵּית הַבַּד וְכׇל תַּשְׁמִישָׁיו, וְאִלֵּין מִצְרָנַהָא״ – קָנֵי, וְאִי לָא – לָא קָנֵי.

Rav Yosef said to him: We learned in the previously cited baraita that if the seller says to the buyer: I am selling you the bathhouse and all of its accompaniments, all these components are sold. Rav Yosef held that in this case too, the disputed stores were sold. Abaye said to Rav Yosef: But didn’t Rabbi Ḥiyya teach in a baraita: They are not all sold? Rather, the issue should be resolved as Rav Ashi said: We consider the seller’s statement, and if he said to the buyer: I am selling you the olive press and all of its accompaniments, and these are its boundaries, and he included the area of the stores within those boundaries, the buyer has acquired those stores, but if the seller does not say this, he has not acquired them, as they are not actually part of the olive press.

That was the translation from Rav Steinsaltz. Artscroll seemed to frame וְהָא תָּנֵי רַבִּי חִיָּיא: אֵין כּוּלָּן מְכוּרִין! that Abaye said in much more limited fashion, seemingly based on Rashbam’s saying “אין כולן מכורין - שהרי אין מיוחדין לבית הבד:”. That someone selling an olive press doesn’t sell the stores in which they dry sesame for pressing, because they are not singularly designated for that olive-press purpose. This would seem strange, that it targets the particular incident that happened to come up, and directly contradicts Rav Yosef. It would seem more plausible that the brayta was about beit merchatz (not bad) vechol tashmishav, with the opposite conclusion. That is what one gets when contrasting braytot. It would also make Abaye’s objection somewhat weaker, though. Rav Yosef appeals to one brayta, and Abaye appeals to a perhaps somewhat more authoritative (coming from Rabbi Chiyya’s collection) brayta.

(2) Rashbam notes that Rav Ashi’s harmonization differs from the impression we got earlier in the gemara, but since Rav Ashi is the later, sixth-generation Amora, he gets the definitive last word. Thus, Rashbam begins by writing the following:

הכי כתוב בפירושי רבינו חננאל וכן עיקר: אמר רב אשי חזינן אי א"ל בית הבד וכל תשמישיו ואלין מצרנוהי והני בכלל הנהו מצרני קנה להו ואי לא לא קנה
וסוגיא דשמעתא דאמר הכי סלקא וקיימא לן כרב אשי דהוא בתרא ושמעינן מינה בזמן שא"ל בית המרחץ וכל מה שבתוכו אני מוכר אע"פ שמצר לו מצרים החיצונים לא קנה בריכות של מים ולא בית כינוס עצים דקיימא לן מצרים הרחיב אבל אם א"ל מרחץ וכל תשמישיו ומצר לו מצריו והנם בתוך המצר הרי הן מכורין הואיל וחזו פורתא לתשמיש בית הבד
ואע"ג דאמרן לעיל בריש פירקין מצרים הרחיב לו הכא לא אמרינן הכי דכיון דחזי להך בית קצת לתשמיש בית הבד והוא בתוך המצר ודאי מכרו לו דלכך תיחם את המיצר חוצה לו

The correct Talmudic text Rashbam establishes, like Rabbeinu Chananel’s girsa, is effectively what we have in our printed gemaras. That is, Rav Ashi says that if he said to him (perhaps writes in the document of sale) “the olive press and all its accoutrements, and these are its borders”, and these (accoutrements) are within the defined borders, he acquires them, and if not, he doesn’t acquire them.

(I struck through the word דאמר because it is sprurious.) This is the conclusion of our present sugya, and we establish like Rav Ashi, since he’s later. Thus, we deduce that when he says “beit hamerchatz and everything within it I’m selling”, even if he specifies outer boundaries, he does not acquire the supplying water streams nor the woodshed, for we establish that the seller was merely specifying bigger borders for the convenience of the buyer. But, if he said to him (/wrote) “beit hamerchatz and all its accoutrements”, (note the contrast in the two texts I bolded) and specifies boundaries, and these accoutrements are without the boundaries, they are sold, since they are somewhat fit for the use of the beit habad. (Note that here and elsewhere, Rashbam isn’t being so consistent, moving between beit habad as olive press and beit hamerchatz as bathhouse, perhaps based on his drawing on source material. But he conflates the two, perhaps in a correct conflation.)

And even though earlier at the beginning of the perek we said that the seller was merely expanding the borders for convenience, we don’t say this here, because there are multiple factors inclining towards the idea that he intends to actually sell these, namely that these (stores) are somewhat fit for the usage of the olive press, as well as them being within the boundaries. Therefore, he certainly sold it to him, and that was why he specified borders that were outside of them.

In the continuation I am about to quote, the Rashbam then notes a different version of the Talmudic text, where I think there would not be this conflict with the ideas earlier in the perek, so wouldn’t need harmonization. Thus, Rashbam continues:

לשון אחר כתוב בספרים אי אמר לי' בית הבד וכל תשמישיו ואלין מצרנהא לא קני דהשתא לא קאי ואלין מצרנהא אתשמישין אלא אבית הבד קאי הלכך לגבי תשמישין נאמר מצרים הרחיב לו אבל אי אמר אלין מצרני בית הבד וכל תשמישיו קני דהשתא אתרוייהו קאי וכמאן דאמר אלו מצרני בית הבד ואלו מצרני כל תשמישיו דמי ולא נהירא דלא שנא הכי ולא שנא הכי אתרוייהו קאי וראשון עיקר:

That is, another variant is found in sefarim, in which the order of “and these are its boundaries” relative to the list of what is being sold is what matters. If he says “the olive press and all its accoutrements, and these are its boundaries”, he does not acquire. If he says “these are its boundaries” and specifies the boundaries first, followed by the olive press and its accoutrements, he does acquire. The idea being that in the former case, the boundaries only apply to the olive press, while in the latter case, it applies to all that follows. Rashbam doesn’t think this makes sense, and that regardless, this phrase about boundaries should distribute across both olive press and accoutrements.

Let’s explore variant texts, and see how this plays out. The printings match our text:

So does Hamburg:

as well as Paris and Escorial:

However, a few have both, introduced by the phrase lishna acharina. Thus, we have Florence 8-9 and Munich 95,

as well as Oxford 369.

The strange outlier is Vatican 115b, which has this:

It is the closest to a pure second version only, though seems corrupted. If he says “the olive press, its accoutrements; and these are its borders; the olive press and all its accoutrements, he acquires. It seems like “and these are its borders” is doing double duty, and the words לא קני should appear in between. If so, it was lost due to haplography, the scribe skipping from the first instance of the phrase to the second, and thus missed the לא קני. This is Rashbam’s alternative version.

I think that text having both variations is very late. Rashbam seemed to indicate that these variants didn’t coexist in a single manuscript, but that some sefarim had X and others had Y. And, Vatican is an instance of just Y, and Hamburg, Paris and Escorial are instances of just X. Some manuscripts, perhaps based on Rashbam’s mention, decided to integrate both. Indeed, Munich 95 for instance is after Rashbam.

If so, this suggests that lishna acharina may operate differently from ikka de’amrei. It may be extremely late, in the Rishonic era. This is something to keep in mind when we encounter lishna acharina. For instance, we encountered it in the very beginning of Bava Batra, 3a, where there were different suppositions about whether hezek re’iya is really considered hezek, with two variant lishnas. Some brought into play the idea of going after the lishna batra, given that Rav Ashi decided to list it second, effectively giving it the last word. However, if that isn’t was lishna acharina means, but rather rather late scribes bringing in manuscript copies, maybe we should not subject them to such a decisive principle.