Siman קל״ב — Deriving no benefit from yayin nesekh
The price, the wages, the tax and the debt — to discover and understand
יורה דעה · סימן קל״ב
שֶׁלֹּא לֵיהָנוֹת מִיֵּין נֶסֶךְ
🌱 Introductory level · מתחילים
✦ ❖ ✦
A first approach to Siman 132: the 7 seifim of the Mehaber and the glosses of the Rama, Hebrew text with a fluent English translation. The preceding nine simanim asked when wine becomes forbidden; this one closes the block by asking what remains once the wine is lost — what may still be got out of it? Receiving a price, selling a stock, paying a worker, discharging a tax, collecting a debt: seven situations in which the issue is the money, not the wine.
Subject: Benefit from forbidden wine — דמי יין נסך, סמכה דעתו, עכבת יין, מציל מידם, רוצה בקיומו Source: שולחן ערוך יורה דעה סימן קל״ב
Compiled by: הרב יוסף חיים סממה DAAT · daattorah.com
📑 Study plan
1.The text of the Mehaber: the 7 seifim, in thematic groups
2.Background: where these rules come from — three passages of Avodah Zarah, and the Tur
3.Key concepts: דמי יין נסך, פסק ומשך, סמכה דעתו, עכבת יין, מציל מידם, רוצה בקיומו…
4.The summary table: what is permitted, what is forbidden, and to whom
5.The Taz and the Shach: five key entries
6.The Rama’s gloss (הגה): five interventions, one refrain
7.Modern practical cases: the wine merchant, wages in kind, the business dinner, the debt
8.Summary and comprehension questions
1. The text of the Mehaber — the 7 seifim
Siman 132 closes the block on yayin nesekh that opened at siman 123. The preceding simanim asked what makes wine forbidden — which wine, which contact, which lapse of supervision, which seal. This one begins from the opposite situation: the wine is already forbidden, and it is worth money. Wine forbidden in benefit may not be sold, given away, or used to pay for anything — and that is precisely what these seven seifim qualify. The first two deal with the price of the wine itself: what may be claimed from the one who forbade it, and how to sell one’s stock before it becomes forbidden. Seifim 3 and 4 move from wine to labour: wages paid in a barrel, a round bought for workers. The last three examine the detour through a non-Jewish third party — the king’s tax, a lord’s requisition, a debt collected. The Rama intervenes five times, and almost always to say the same thing: בזמן הזה, nowadays, the situation has changed.
Group A — The price of the wine itself (seifim 1-2)
Seif 1 — Claiming the price from the one who forbade the wine
שלא ליהנות מיין נסך. ובו ז׳ סעיפים: עובד כוכבים שנגע ביין שלנו אע״פ שאסור בהנאה מותר ליקח דמיו מאותו העובד כוכבים שאסרו או אותו העובד כוכבים ימכרנו ויתן דמיו לישראל ואם מכרו הישראל לעובד כוכבים אחר אם נתן לו המעות קודם שיתן לו הישראל היין המעות אסורים בהנאה ואם לקח העובד כוכבים היין תחילה ואחר כך נתן המעות לישראל יש מי שאומר שאף על פי שלבעל היין שמכרו אסורים בהנאה לאחרים מותרים: הגה וכל זה לא מיירי אלא בעובדי כוכבים שמנסכין אבל בזמן הזה כל מגע שלהם אינו אוסר רק בשתיה (רש״י בשם הגאונים) כמו שנתבאר לעיל סימן קכ״ג:
Title of the siman:not to derive benefit from yayin nesekh; seven seifim. — A non-Jew who touched our wine: although it is forbidden in benefit, it is permitted to take its price from that very non-Jew who forbade it; or that non-Jew may sell it and give its price to the Jew. And if the Jew sold it to another non-Jew: if he gave him the money before the Jew handed him the wine — the money is forbidden in benefit.And if the non-Jew took the wine first and only afterwards gave the money to the Jew — there is one who says that although to the owner of the wine who sold it they are forbidden in benefit, to others they are permitted.
Gloss of the Rama:and all this speaks only of non-Jews who pour libations; but nowadays no contact of theirs forbids other than for drinking (Rashi in the name of the Geonim), as was explained above in siman 123.
The price of damage is not the price of goods. The wine is forbidden in benefit: to sell it would be to benefit from it. But to claim its value from the one who spoiled it is not a sale — it is compensation. The Taz puts it in a phrase: the Jew is not saying “buy this wine from me”, he is saying “you spilled my wine”. Three cases then diverge, and a single question separates them: who pays, and when. Paying the culprit himself: permitted. Selling to a third party who hands over the money before taking the wine: the money is forbidden, for that is truly a price. Selling to a third party who takes the wine first and pays afterwards: the wine was already his when the money changed hands — forbidden to the seller alone, as a penalty, permitted to anyone else.
Seif 2 — Selling one’s wine without the price becoming forbidden: פסק and משך
ישראל שמכר יינו לעובד כוכבים פסק עד שלא משך דמיו מותרים שמשפסק סמכה דעתו ומשמשך קנה ויין נסך אינו נעשה עד שיגע בו נמצא בשעת מכירה היה מותר אבל אם משך העובד כוכבים היין עד שלא פסק דמיו אסורים שהרי לא סמכה דעתו אע״פ שמשך (ומאחר שבא לרשות העובד כוכבים אין הישראל נזהר בו ויש לחוש שנגע) ונמצא שכשנגע עדיין לא סמכה דעתו ליקח ונאסר היין בנגיעתו והרי זה כמוכר סתם יינם במה דברים אמורים כשמדד הישראל לכליו (או לכליו של עובד כוכבים שאין בו עכבת יין) (טור) אבל אם מדד לכלי העובד כוכבים שיש בו עכבת (פי׳ מקום שהיין מתעכב בו) יין או לכלי ישראל שביד העובד כוכבים והיה העובד כוכבים מנדנד הכלי אם היה מונח בקרקע או שהיה אוחזו בידו באויר דאז ע״כ הוא מנדנד צריך ליקח הדמים ואח״כ ימדוד: הגה מיהו אם מדד לכלי של עובד כוכבים שיש בו עכבת יין שאינו נאסר רק מכח תערובות מעט יין שהיה בכלי בדיעבד כולו מותר בהנאה חוץ מדמי מעט היין שהיה בכלי ואפילו לכתחילה אינו אסור רק כשהיה מעט מהיין בפי הכלי של עובד כוכבים דנאסר היין מיד אבל אם היה עכבת יין בשולי הכלי והכלי של עובד כוכבים היה עומד בחצירו של עובד כוכבים או שתפסו בידו או שעומד ברשות המוכר ואמר לו המוכר יקנה לך כליך מותר דמיד שבא לאויר הכלי קנאו ולא נאסר היין עד שנגע בעכבת יין שבשולי הכלי העובד כוכבים וכן אם מדדו העובד כוכבים והגביהו תחילה לקנותו הכל מותר דהרי קנאו תחילה קודם שמדד אבל אם לא הגביהו ומדד דינו כשאר יין הבא מכח עובד כוכבים כמו שנתבאר לעיל סימן קכ״ה וכל זה לא מיירי אלא בימיהם שהיו העובדי כוכבים מנסכים ואוסרים בהנאה במגען אבל בזמן הזה שאין העובדי כוכבים מנסכים ואין אוסרין במגען רק בשתייה בכל ענין מותר בהנאה וכן המנהג פשוט למכור יין לעובד כוכבים ואין מקפידים בכל אלו הדינים (הכל בטור):
A Jew who sold his wine to a non-Jew: if he fixed the price before the buyer drew it to himself — the price is permitted, for once he fixed the price his mind relied upon it, and once the buyer drew it he acquired it; and yayin nesekh is not made until he touches it: so it turns out that at the moment of sale it was still permitted. But if the non-Jew drew the wine to himself before the price was fixed — the price is forbidden, for his mind did not rely upon it, even though the buyer drew it — and since it has entered the non-Jew’s domain, the Jew is no longer careful with it, and there is reason to fear he touched it — so it turns out that when he touched it, the seller’s mind had not yet relied on receiving [the price], and the wine became forbidden by his contact: and this is like selling stam yeinam.
In what case is this said? When the Jew measured into his own vessels — or into a vessel of the non-Jew that holds no wine residue; Tur. But if he measured into a vessel of the non-Jew that holds a residue — explanation: the place where wine lingers — of wine, or into a Jew’s vessel that is in the non-Jew’s hand, and the non-Jew was shaking the vessel if it stood on the ground, or was holding it in the air in his hand — for then he necessarily shakes it — he must take the money first and measure afterwards.
Gloss of the Rama:however, if he measured into a vessel of the non-Jew that holds a wine residue — since it becomes forbidden only through the admixture of the little wine that was in the vessel — after the fact the whole is permitted in benefit, except for the value of the little wine that was in it. And even at the outset it is forbidden only where that little wine was at the mouth of the non-Jew’s vessel, for then the wine becomes forbidden at once. But if the wine residue was at the bottom of the vessel, and the non-Jew’s vessel stood in the non-Jew’s courtyard, or he held it in his hand, or it stands in the seller’s domain and the seller said to him “let your vessel acquire for you” — it is permitted, for the instant the wine entered the airspace of the vessel he acquired it, and the wine did not become forbidden until it touched the residue at the bottom of the non-Jew’s vessel. And likewise, if the non-Jew measured and lifted it first in order to acquire it — all is permitted, for he acquired it before he measured; but if he did not lift it and measured, its law is like the rest of wine that comes by the force of a non-Jew, as was explained above in siman 125. And all this speaks only of their days, when the non-Jews poured libations and forbade in benefit by their contact; but nowadays, when non-Jews do not pour libations and their contact forbids only for drinking — in every case it is permitted in benefit, and such is the widespread custom: to sell wine to a non-Jew without being particular about all these laws (all of it in the Tur).
Two acts, and the order in which they are done settles everything.פָּסַק — to fix the price; מָשַׁךְ — to draw the goods to oneself. If the price is fixed first, the seller is at ease: his claim is settled, acquisition takes effect, and the wine was not yet forbidden at that moment. If the buyer draws it before the price is fixed, nothing holds: the seller has relied on no figure, the wine is already in the other’s domain — hence unwatched — and the contact that follows forbids wine that is still his. The seif then adds a finer case: the vessel. A buyer’s cask that retains a film of his own wine forbids the liquid as soon as it reaches it; the Mehaber’s remedy is to take the money before pouring. The Rama closes the seif on actual practice: nowadays one sells, and one is no longer particular about these details.
Group B — Paying for labour, buying a drink (seifim 3-4)
Seif 3 — Wages paid in a barrel
פועלים ישראלים שעשו מלאכה אצל עובד כוכבים ושלח להם חבית של יין בשכרם אם עד שלא קבלוה בשכרם מותר שיאמרו לו עד שאתה שולח לנו חבית זו תהא שלך ותתן לנו דמים כנגדה (ר״ן) ואם משקבלוה בשכרם אסור (ר׳ ירוחם והרא״ש) (וע״ל סימן קכ״ג דאף משקבלה שרי בזמן הזה):
Jewish workers who did work for a non-Jew, and he sent them a barrel of wine as their wages: if it is before they accepted it as their wages — it is permitted, for they may say to him: “rather than sending us this barrel, let it be yours and give us money to its value” (Ran). And if it is after they accepted it as their wages — it is forbidden (Rabbeinu Yeruḥam and the Rosh). Addition of the Rama:and see above siman 123, that even after he accepted it, it is permitted nowadays.
Until the barrel has become their wages, it is not theirs. The Mehaber does not ask where the barrel is, but whether it has been accepted in payment. Before: the workers still hold only a monetary claim; they may therefore send the wine back to its owner and ask for the sum — that is not a sale, it is the refusal of a means of payment. After: the wine is theirs, and turning it into money would be precisely to benefit from it. The Shach notes that the barrel’s merely arriving at their premises changes nothing, for a man’s courtyard does not acquire for him against his will. The Rama adds the line that matters today: at siman 123 it was established that stam yeinam is permitted in benefit where there is loss — so even the barrel already accepted may be converted.
Seif 4 — Giving one’s non-Jewish workers a drink
מי ששכר פועלים עובדי כוכבים ופסק להם מזונות אסור להשקותם יין נסך ואם אמר להם צאו ושתו מחנוני פלוני ואני פורע אם לא הקדים לו דינר מותר אע״פ שייחד לו דינר והוא בעין ביד בעל הבית אבל אם הקדים לו דינר אסור ודוקא כשאמר לו יהא דינר זה בידך עד שתשקה לפועלים ואני אחשוב עמך באחרונה אבל אם נתנו לו להוציאו עכשיו אם יצטרך לו מותר. (וכן מי שמזמן עובד כוכבים אצלו מותר ליתן מעות לעבדו לקנות להם יי״נ) (כל בו):
One who hired non-Jewish workers and stipulated food for them: it is forbidden for him to give them yayin nesekh to drink.And if he said to them “go and drink at such a shopkeeper’s and I will pay”: if he did not advance him a dinar — it is permitted, even though he earmarked a dinar for him and it is still in kind in the householder’s hand. But if he advanced him a dinar — it is forbidden.And that is specifically when he said to him “let this dinar be in your hand until you give the workers to drink, and I will settle with you at the end”; but if he gave it to him to spend now should he need it — it is permitted.Addition of the Rama:and likewise, one who hosts a non-Jew — it is permitted to give money to his servant to buy them yayin nesekh (Kol Bo).
It is not the wine that is at issue, it is the debt it discharges. An employer who promised food owes something; if he settles that debt with forbidden wine, he benefits from it — hence the opening prohibition. Everything that follows turns on one question: when does the wine become his? If he simply tells the shopkeeper “serve them, I will pay”, he buys nothing: the wine passes from the shopkeeper to the workers. But if he has advanced a dinar for it, he has already acquired the wine — and it is from his own that they drink. The Mehaber refines further: a dinar held in deposit until the drinking is an advance payment; a dinar handed over freely, which the shopkeeper may spend as he wishes, buys nothing. The same measure governs the Rama’s addition: money entrusted to a servant on their behalf never makes the wine the householder’s — the Taz writes that since he says to buy on their behalf, it turns out that the wine is not his.
Group C — The detour through a third party: tax, requisition, debt (seifim 5-7)
Seif 5 — The king’s tax discharged in wine
ישראל שיש לו יין וצריך ליתן ממנו חלק ידוע למלך יכול לומר לעובד כוכבים פייס למלך בשבילי אע״פ שהעובדי כוכבים נותן יין נסך והוא חוזר ונותן לו דמים אבל אסור לומר לו היה במקומי ליתן למלך:
A Jew who has wine and must give a set portion of it to the king may say to a non-Jew: “appease the king on my behalf” — even though the non-Jew gives yayin nesekh and the Jew then repays him the money. But it is forbidden to say to him: “stand in my place to give to the king”.
Two formulas, two mandates. “Appease the king for me” does not say with what: the non-Jew will manage as he sees fit, and if he does so with his own wine, that remains his affair. “Stand in my place to give to the king”, by contrast, designates the thing owed — the wine — and makes the non-Jew the bearer of my delivery; then I really am discharging a debt by means of yayin nesekh. The Taz draws the consequence, which was not obvious: the permission holds even if the Jew could not have discharged himself otherwise than with wine, so long as he did not explicitly tell the non-Jew to give any. The whole halakhah here turns on what a sentence designates.
Seif 6 — The lord’s requisition: “take my place” or “release me”
שר שהיה מחלק יינו לעם ולוקח מהם דמיו לא יאמר ישראל לעובד כוכבים הא לך ד׳ זוז והכנס תחתי באוצר השר כדי שיקח העובד כוכבים אותו יין שכתבו בשם הישראל וליתן העובד כוכבים הדמים לשר אבל אומר לו הא לך ד׳ זוז ומלטני מן האוצר:
A lord who was distributing his wine to the people and taking its price from them: a Jew shall not say to a non-Jew “here are four zuz, and enter in my place at the lord’s store”, so that the non-Jew take that wine registered in the Jew’s name and the non-Jew give the price to the lord. But he may say to him: “here are four zuz, and rescue me from the store”.
Being replaced, or being excused. The lord imposes on each person a share of his wine, to be paid for. The Jew is therefore the holder of a lot of wine he will have to settle. If he sends a non-Jew to take his place and carry off the lot registered in his name, he has done exactly what he may not do: transfer to a third party, for four zuz, wine allocated to him — a sale. If he pays those same four zuz to be struck off the list, he transfers nothing: he buys an exemption. The wine never reached him and never passed through his hands. Same money, same person, same lord — and two opposite statuses, according to what is being bought.
Seif 7 — A debt collected on a sale of yayin nesekh
ישראל שהיה נושה בעובד כוכבים מנה והלך ומכר אלילים ויין נסך והביא לו דמיהם הרי זה מותר ואם אמר לו קודם שימכור המתן לי עד שאמכור אלילים או יין נסך שיש לי ואביא לך אע״פ שהוא סתם יינם ומכר והביא לו הרי זה אסור מפני שהישראל רוצה בקיומו כדי שיפרע ממנו חובו: הגה ויש אומרים דאין איסור זה של רוצה בקיומו אלא דוקא אם אינו יכול להפרע ממקום אחר אבל אם יוכל להפרע ממקום אחר וכל שכן אם יש לו ערב מותר (כל בו בשם הר״ן וטור בשם ר״י ורא״ש ור׳ ירוחם בשם התוס׳ ומרדכי ריש פ׳ בתרא דעבודת כוכבים) ומיהו בזמן הזה שאין העובדי כוכבים מנסכין אין להחמיר בסתם יינם ובכל ענין שאמר המתן עד שאביא לך שרי (רשב״א לדעת הגאונים ור״ן) וע״ל סימן קמ״ד:
A Jew who was owed a maneh by a non-Jew, and the latter went and sold idols and yayin nesekh and brought him their price — this is permitted. But if he said to him before he sold: “wait for me until I sell the idols or the yayin nesekh that I have, and I will bring it to you” — even though it is stam yeinam — and he sold and brought it to him, this is forbidden, because the Jew wants that thing to remain in being so that he may be paid his debt from it.
Gloss of the Rama:and some say that this prohibition of “wanting its continued existence” applies only if he cannot be paid from elsewhere; but if he can be paid from elsewhere — and all the more so if he holds a guarantor — it is permitted (Kol Bo in the name of the Ran; Tur in the name of the Ri; the Rosh; Rabbeinu Yeruḥam in the name of the Tosafot; the Mordechai at the beginning of the last chapter of Avodah Zarah). However nowadays, when non-Jews do not pour libations, one should not be stringent with stam yeinam, and in any case where he said “wait until I bring it to you”, it is permitted (Rashba according to the view of the Geonim, and the Ran). And see below siman 144.
A prohibition that bears not on an act but on a wish. Receiving the proceeds of a sale already made poses no problem: the Jew asked for nothing, and the money that arrives merely repays his claim. But to say “wait until I sell” places the creditor in a peculiar position — he wants that wine to remain until a buyer is found. This is רוֹצֶה בְּקִיּוּמוֹ: not benefit taken, but an interest held in the continued existence of the forbidden thing. The Rama at once gives its measure: the wish is culpable only if it is needed — if the creditor can be paid elsewhere, or holds a guarantor, he has nothing to wait for. Then, as at seifim 1, 2 and 3, he adds the clause of his own time.
2. Background — where these rules come from
The siman can only really be read with three passages of tractate Avodah Zarah in view. The first is the baraita the Talmud discusses concerning the sale of wine, which gives seif 2 its two key words:
The Gemara refuses to explain the difference by the modes of acquisition, and traces it instead to a state of mind — the seller’s, who has or has not relied on a price. This is the sentence the Mehaber takes over almost word for word:
The second passage is the baraita of the employer who sends his workers to eat and drink on his account — the direct source of seif 4, already placed there, in the Gemara, alongside shemitah and maaser, as one and the same way of paying with what is forbidden:
The Gemara asks what distinguishes the opening of that baraita from its close, and Rav Sheshet answers with the notion that will give the case its name:
The Tur, whom the Mehaber follows closely, states at last the underlying prohibition of which the whole siman is a series of exceptions — the owner himself may neither sell his wine nor derive any benefit whatever from it:
« אבל הוא אסור למוכרן ולהנות ממנו שום הנאה » — טור יורה דעה סימן קל״ב
One piece remains, and it governs the practical reading of the siman: the Rama’s gloss on the first seif of siman 123. It is that gloss which returns here four times under the formula בזמן הזה — and an explicit cross-reference leads from there to here:
« ולכן מותר לגבות בחובו מן עובד כוכבים סתם יינם מפני דהוי כמציל מידם » — שו״ע יו״ד קכ״ג:א
The great questions of the siman
What is left of wine forbidden in benefit? Nothing, in principle. The siman lists what nonetheless escapes that rule: compensation, a price paid after acquisition, a purchased exemption, a payment that never passed through our hands.
Why does the order of the acts matter so much? Because wine becomes forbidden only upon contact. Everything therefore depends on knowing to whom it belonged at that precise instant — and that is what פסק and משך settle in seif 2.
Can one benefit without receiving anything? Yes: seif 7 forbids the mere fact of wanting the thing to remain in being. The fault does not lie in the money received but in the interest taken in its existence.
What has changed since? The Rama’s gloss at siman 123: the non-Jews of his day no longer pour libations, so their contact no longer forbids in benefit, but only for drinking. Almost the whole siman is thereby eased — and the Rama takes care to say so five times.
This siman deals neither with what makes wine forbidden (simanim 123-126) nor with supervision (simanim 128-131). It deals with what comes afterwards: with the money. That is why it leaves the barrel so quickly — from seif 3 onward there is nothing but wages, taxes, seigneurial stores and debts. The wine is now merely an asset about which one must decide whether it can still pay for anything.
3. The key concepts of this siman
אָסוּר בַּהֲנָאָה — forbidden in benefit. The higher degree of a dietary prohibition: the thing may not merely not be eaten or drunk, it may serve no purpose at all — neither sold, nor given, nor offered in payment. It is this status, applied to libation wine, that makes the whole siman necessary: without it there would be no question at all.
דְּמֵי יֵין נֶסֶךְ — the price of yayin nesekh. Money received in exchange for forbidden wine inherits its status: it is itself forbidden in benefit. Hence the siman’s way of putting things, which never asks “may one sell?” but always “is this money the price of the wine, or something else?”
תַּשְׁלוּמֵי נִזְקוֹ — compensation for damage. The key to seif 1. What the non-Jew pays is not the price of goods but redress for a loss he caused. The Taz stages it in words: the Jew is not selling, he is saying you spilled my wine. The Shach adds a far-reaching precision: this holds even where he forbade it inadvertently, in a case where he would not even be liable to pay.
פָּסַק and מָשַׁךְ — fixing the price, drawing to oneself. The two acts of seif 2. Pasak settles the sum; mashakh is the act of acquisition. Their order determines the status of the money, because it determines to whom the wine belonged at the instant of contact.
סָמְכָה דַּעְתּוֹ — his mind relied upon it. The reason the Gemara substitutes for the modes of acquisition. A seller whose price is settled regards the deal as done and still watches over his goods; a seller who has fixed nothing rests on nothing. This is therefore not a rule about ownership but an observation about people.
עַכֶּבֶת יַיִן — the wine residue. The film of wine that lingers in a vessel — the Mehaber even takes care to define the term within the text. A vessel holding such a residue forbids what is poured into it: if the residue is at the mouth, from the very first trickle; if at the bottom, only when the liquid reaches it, which leaves time to acquire.
יִקְנֶה לְךָ כֶּלְיְךָ — “let your vessel acquire for you”. The formula the seller pronounces so that the buyer’s cask, though standing on his own premises, acquires for its owner. It settles a point of civil law in the service of a question of prohibition: if the vessel has acquired, the wine already belonged to the buyer when it touched the residue.
הִקְדִּים לוֹ דִּינָר — he advanced him a dinar. The pivot of seif 4. A dinar paid in advance to the shopkeeper buys the wine — and the employer is then giving his workers his own wine to drink. The Shach sums it up in a single line: they are now consuming from the householder.
רוֹצֶה בְּקִיּוּמוֹ — he wants it to remain in being. The prohibition of seif 7, and the subtlest in the siman. It presupposes neither possession, nor sale, nor benefit received: it is enough to have an interest in the forbidden thing continuing to exist. The Rama at once limits its reach: one who can be paid elsewhere need wish for nothing.
כְּמַצִּיל מִידָם — like one rescuing his property from their hands. The reason the Rama uses at siman 123 to permit collecting a debt in stam yeinam. It is not a gain, it is a rescue — and it is this reasoning, brought over here, that eases most of the cases in this siman.
בַּזְּמַן הַזֶּה — nowadays. The Rama’s refrain, which returns in four of his five interventions. The non-Jews of his day no longer pour libations; their contact therefore no longer forbids wine in benefit, but only for drinking. The siman keeps all its internal coherence — but its ordinary application is displaced.
4. The summary table — what is permitted, and to whom
The siman never answers simply “permitted” or “forbidden”. Three variables intersect: what the money pays for (goods, damage, an exemption), when it changes hands, and the person for whom the ruling is given — for the same money can be forbidden to the seller and permitted to everyone else. Here are the seven seifim laid flat.
המקרה
Situation
Status
Seif
ליקח דמיו מאותו העובד כוכבים שאסרו
Claiming the price from the one who forbade the wine
מותר — compensation, not a sale
1
ימכרנו ויתן דמיו לישראל
The non-Jew sells the wine and hands the price to the Jew
מותר
1
נתן המעות קודם שיתן לו היין
Another non-Jew pays before receiving the wine
המעות אסורים בהנאה
1
לקח היין תחילה ואחר כך נתן המעות
He takes the wine first and pays afterwards
לבעל היין אסורים · לאחרים מותרים
1
בזמן הזה · אינו אוסר רק בשתיה
Nowadays, according to the Rama
Contact forbids only for drinking
1 (Rama)
פסק עד שלא משך
The price is fixed before the buyer draws the wine
דמיו מותרים — סמכה דעתו
2
משך עד שלא פסק
He draws it before the price is fixed
דמיו אסורים
2
מדד הישראל לכליו
The Jew measures into his own vessels
The ordinary case of the seif
2
כלי שיש בו עכבת יין
The buyer’s cask retains a film of his wine
צריך ליקח הדמים ואח״כ ימדוד
2
עכבת יין בשולי הכלי · יקנה לך כליך
The residue is at the bottom and the vessel has acquired
Rama: מותר
2 (Rama)
הגביהו תחילה לקנותו
The non-Jew lifts the cask to acquire it before measuring
Rama: הכל מותר
2 (Rama)
המנהג פשוט למכור יין לעובד כוכבים
The widespread custom in the Rama’s day
Rama: בכל ענין מותר בהנאה
2 (Rama)
עד שלא קבלוה בשכרם
The barrel has not yet been accepted as wages
מותר — they claim the money instead
3
משקבלוה בשכרם
The barrel has been accepted as wages
אסור
3
אף משקבלה שרי בזמן הזה
The same case, nowadays
Rama: שרי
3 (Rama)
פסק להם מזונות
He stipulated food for his non-Jewish workers
אסור להשקותם יין נסך
4
צאו ושתו · לא הקדים לו דינר
“Drink at his shop, I will pay”, with no advance
מותר
4
הקדים לו דינר
He advanced the shopkeeper a dinar
אסור — the wine has become his
4
נתנו לו להוציאו עכשיו
The dinar is handed over freely, to be spent
מותר
4
ליתן מעות לעבדו לקנות להם
Money to the servant, to buy on their behalf
Rama: מותר
4 (Rama)
פייס למלך בשבילי
“Appease the king on my behalf”
יכול לומר — the means is not designated
5
היה במקומי ליתן למלך
“Stand in my place to give to the king”
אסור
5
הא לך ד׳ זוז והכנס תחתי באוצר
“Take my place at the lord’s store”
לא יאמר — that is a sale
6
הא לך ד׳ זוז ומלטני מן האוצר
“Rescue me from the store”
אומר לו — he buys an exemption
6
מכר והביא לו דמיהם
The debtor sold of his own accord and brought the money
הרי זה מותר
7
המתן לי עד שאמכור
“Wait until I sell, and I will bring it to you”
אסור — רוצה בקיומו
7
יוכל להפרע ממקום אחר · יש לו ערב
He can be paid elsewhere, or holds a guarantor
Rama: מותר
7 (Rama)
בזמן הזה · בכל ענין שרי
Nowadays, for stam yeinam
Rama: אין להחמיר
7 (Rama)
Read from top to bottom, the middle column tells the story of the siman: it begins with a barrel and ends with a debt. The first lines still hold the wine in hand — it is touched, measured, poured. From seif 4 onward it is never in our possession: we pay for someone else to serve it, we ask a third party to take it to the king, we wait for a debtor to sell it. The turning point is the line הקדים לו דינר: from there on the question is no longer “is this wine mine?” but “did my money buy it?”
5. The Taz and the Shach — five key entries
The two great commentaries printed around the Shulḥan Arukh of Yoreh De‘ah are the Taz (Turei Zahav, Rabbi David haLevi Segal, 1586-1667) and the Shach (Siftei Kohen, Rabbi Shabtai haKohen, 1621-1662). On this siman the Taz writes eleven entries and the Shach forty: the disproportion is due to seif 2, whose cases of vessels take up half of both apparatuses on their own.
Two key entries from the Taz
Taz s.k. 1 — this is not a sale, it is compensation
« דלאו מכר הוא אלא אומר לו שפכת ייני ואבדת ממוני ודמי יין כשר קא שקיל » — ט״ז יו״ד קל״ב ס״ק א
For this is not a sale; rather he says to him: “you spilled my wine and destroyed my property” — and it is the price of kosher wine that he is collecting.
The whole permission of seif 1 rests on this requalification. The Jew is not transferring forbidden wine: he is claiming the value of the kosher wine he owned before the contact. What is being paid for is therefore not the goods but the loss — and a loss is never forbidden in benefit. The Taz adds that the permission holds even where the non-Jew refuses to pay unless the wine is handed over: the scene looks like a sale, the classification remains that of compensation.
Taz s.k. 9 — money that does not buy for me
« והטעם בכל בו כיון שהוא אומר לקנות בעבורם נמצא שהיין אינו שלו » — ט״ז יו״ד קל״ב ס״ק ט
And the reason, in the Kol Bo: since he says to buy on their behalf, it turns out that the wine is not his.
The key to the Rama’s addition at seif 4, and the exact counterpart of the advanced dinar. What makes the employer culpable is not that he paid, but that he acquired. Let the order be placed on their behalf, and the money never makes the wine his: it merely passes through. The Shach, at entry 32, marks the limit of the device, however — it works for a servant, not for another Jew, who would himself end up wanting the wine to remain in being.
It follows that even if he forbade it inadvertently — a case in which he is exempt from paying.
The Shach reads into the word שֶׁאֲסָרוֹ a scope the phrase did not suggest. Under the civil rules, one who causes this damage unintentionally is not liable to pay; one might have thought the permission falls together with the obligation. The Shach answers that it does not: what matters is not that the payment be owed, but that it be received on account of the damage. He concludes that the non-Jew did damage him all the same — and that suffices to rule out the classification of a sale.
Shach s.k. 11 — why seif 2 does not enjoy the leniency of seif 1
« דהכא כיון שהיו עסוקין במכירה קודם שנאסר גרע טפי והדבר נראה דמשום מכירה לוקח המעות ולא משום היזקו » — ש״ך יו״ד קל״ב ס״ק י״א
For here, since they were engaged in a sale before the wine became forbidden, it is worse; and the matter looks as though he is taking the money on account of the sale, and not on account of the damage.
This is the difficulty the Beit Yosef had left open, and the Shach answers it. At seif 1 a non-Jew’s contact forbids the wine and one may claim its price from him; at seif 2 a non-Jew likewise touches the wine, and yet the price is forbidden. Why? Because in the second case a sale was under way: the payment that follows can no longer be read as compensation, it reads as a price. The classification, once again, depends not on the act but on what it looks like — on the relationship in which it is set.
Shach s.k. 26 — the limit of “nowadays”
« דבמקום שאין הפסד אף בזמן הזה אין להתיר בהנאה » — ש״ך יו״ד קל״ב ס״ק כ״ו
For where there is no loss, even nowadays one is not to permit benefit.
The indispensable counterweight to the Rama’s refrain — without it the whole siman would be read askew. The permission nowadays is not an abrogation: it operates where there is a loss to be averted. Outside that frame — where nothing is at stake, where it is simply a matter of making money on wine — the Shach maintains the prohibition of benefit. The Rama’s gloss at siman 123 said exactly this already: where there is loss, it is permitted; but buying and selling in order to profit, no.
6. The Rama’s gloss (הגה) — five interventions, one refrain
The Rama intervenes on five of the seven seifim: seifim 1, 2, 3, 4 and 7. Three of these interventions carry the word הגה (seifim 1, 2 and 7); the other two are simple parenthetical additions (seifim 3 and 4). Seifim 5 and 6 — the king’s tax and the lord’s requisition — are the Mehaber’s alone.
On seif 1 — the clause that governs everything else
One sentence, and it changes the scale of the entire siman: all this speaks only of non-Jews who pour libations; nowadays their contact forbids only for drinking. The Rama disputes nothing: he historicises. The siman keeps its coherence for wine genuinely poured in libation; but the ordinary case of his own time — wine touched by a non-Jew who is not an idolater — falls outside the regime of prohibited benefit. The cross-reference to siman 123 is not decorative: that is where the rule is laid down, and it is from there that a reference points to here.
On seif 2 — the longest and the most technical
It takes up the Mehaber’s cases of vessels one by one and eases them. First after the fact: wine poured into a cask retaining a film of wine is not lost — all of it remains permitted in benefit, apart from the value of the residue. Then at the outset: the prohibition applies only if the residue is at the mouth, since then the very first trickle already reaches it; if it is at the bottom, the buyer has time to acquire. The Rama then lists the ways of acquiring in time — the vessel in one’s own courtyard, held in hand, or the formula יקנה לך כליך — and concludes on practice: one sells, and one no longer dwells on these distinctions. The Shach, at entry 26, will immediately recall that a loss is still required to get that far.
On seif 3 — seven words, and the case turns around
The Mehaber has just forbidden converting into money a barrel already accepted. The Rama adds: and see above siman 123, that even after he accepted it, it is permitted nowadays. The Shach explains the shorthand — at siman 123 it was established that stam yeinam is permitted in benefit where there is loss, and a worker who would forfeit his wages is precisely such a case.
On seif 4 — a practical way out
The addition is brief and wholly practical: one who hosts a non-Jew may give money to his servant to buy wine for them. The device does not circumvent the seif; it observes its criterion exactly: the money is handed over to buy on their behalf, so the wine never enters the host’s estate.
On seif 7 — two successive mitigations
The first is substantive: the prohibition of rotzeh bekiyumo presupposes that the creditor needs that sale; if he can be paid elsewhere, or holds a guarantor, he desires nothing and the prohibition lapses. The second is the clause of his own time, for the fourth occasion. And the Rama closes the siman as he opened it: with a cross-reference — this time to siman 144, where the question of the proceeds of idols is treated in its own right.
One line runs through all five glosses: the Rama never disputes the Mehaber’s rule, he dates its application. The siman remains true for wine genuinely poured in libation; it ceases to govern the ordinary wine trade of Christian Europe. It is one of the most characteristic of the Rama’s interventions in all of Yoreh De‘ah — and one of those with the widest practical effect.
7. Modern practical cases
Case 1 — A vat spoiled by an outside handler
This is seif 1 in its most direct form. A non-Jewish outside contractor handles a vat of kosher wine and renders it unusable: the producer may claim its value from him, not as the price of wine he would be selling him, but as תשלומי נזקו. The classification is decisive for the producer: an indemnity is not the price of forbidden goods. The Shach adds the point of greatest practical use — the permission holds even if the act was unintentional, where civil law might not require compensation at all.
Case 2 — Selling a stock of wine to a non-Jewish customer
Seif 2 transposed: the question is not whether one may sell, but in what order to conclude. Price settled and then delivery: the sale is done, the money is clean. Delivery first, price discussed afterwards: the seller had settled on nothing, the goods are already with the buyer, and what happens there is beyond his supervision. The seif’s operational lesson is simple and has not aged: take the money before pouring. The Rama then recalls that, for ordinary wine today, these precautions no longer govern practice — but the Shach, at entry 26, adds the condition one forgets: there must still be a loss at stake.
Case 3 — Wages or a bonus paid in kind
Seif 3, with almost no transposition: an employer offers his Jewish employees bottles as remuneration or as a bonus. So long as they have not accepted them in payment, they may ask for the equivalent in money — they are selling nothing, they are declining a means of settlement. Once the lot is accepted as wages it is theirs, and turning it into money would be to benefit from it. The Rama, with the Shach, brings the case under the regime of siman 123: where there is a real loss to the employee, the conversion is permitted again nowadays.
Case 4 — The business dinner and the open tab
Seif 4 is strikingly current. Hosting non-Jewish partners and settling the bill does not raise the same question depending on the mechanism. Paying the bill afterwards — “serve them, I will settle” — is the Mehaber’s permitted case: the host never acquired the wine. Opening a prepaid account against which the drinks are charged is the הקדים לו דינר: the money was paid in advance and it is the host’s wine they are drinking. The Rama’s solution keeps all its flexibility: hand the money over explicitly so that he may buy on their behalf.
Case 5 — A tax or an obligation settled by a third party
Seifim 5 and 6 answer one another, and their common lesson reaches far beyond medieval taxes. Asking a third party to discharge an obligation in my place, without designating the means, leaves the means to him. Designating it — or charging him to deliver my share — makes him my bearer, and then it is I who pay with forbidden wine. Seif 6 adds the twin distinction: paying to be excused from a lot is not the same as paying a third party to take my place and carry off that lot. In the first case I buy an exemption; in the second I sell goods.
Case 6 — Collecting a debt from a debtor who deals in wine
Seif 7, and the most delicate, because nothing here is visible. A non-Jewish debtor settles his debt with the proceeds of a wine sale: nothing to say — the money that arrives repays a claim. But asking him to wait for that sale in order to be paid is to take an interest in that wine finding a buyer — רוצה בקיומו. The Rama defuses the case in two steps: first by limiting it to the creditor who has no other route to recovery; then, for the stam yeinam of his own day, by setting the stringency aside. The principle itself remains instructive: one can be at fault through an interest, having received nothing at all.
8. Summary of Siman 132
In one sentence: wine forbidden in benefit may neither be sold nor offered in payment, yet seven situations escape that rule — the indemnity claimed from the one who spoiled it (seif 1), the sale whose price was settled before delivery (seif 2), the barrel declined before being accepted as wages (seif 3), drinks paid for afterwards rather than bought in advance (seif 4), a debt discharged by a third party to whom nothing was prescribed (seif 5), an exemption bought rather than a lot transferred (seif 6) and a repayment one did not ask to wait for (seif 7) — with the Rama adding each time that nowadays the question no longer arises in the same way.
Memory table
The question
The criterion
Where
May one charge the one who spoiled the wine?
Yes: this is תשלומי נזקו, not a price
seif 1
And if another non-Jew buys it?
According as he pays before or after taking the wine
seif 1
Forbidden to whom, exactly?
To the seller, as a penalty; permitted to others
seif 1
How to sell safely?
פסק before משך — the price first
seif 2
Why that order?
סמכה דעתו: a seller watches over what he has priced
seif 2
And the buyer’s cask?
עכבת יין: take the money before pouring
seif 2
Wages in wine?
So long as it is not accepted in payment, one may claim the money
seif 3
Buying one’s workers a drink?
Advance nothing: the wine must never become mine
seif 4
May a third party pay for me?
Yes, if I do not designate the means
seif 5
Being replaced?
Buying an exemption, yes; transferring one’s lot, no
seif 6
Waiting for a sale in order to be paid?
No: רוצה בקיומו — unless recovery lies elsewhere
seif 7
And today?
Rama: בזמן הזה, eased — but only where there is loss
seifim 1, 2, 3, 7
Comprehension questions
Seif 1 permits receiving money for wine forbidden in benefit. How does the Taz reclassify that payment, and why does the reclassification suffice?
In the third case of seif 1 the money is forbidden to the seller and permitted to everyone else. On what does this difference rest, and what word of the Shach names it?
Seif 2 makes the status of the money depend on the order of two acts. Name them, and say what the Gemara substitutes for the modes of acquisition in explaining it.
Why does the Mehaber require taking the money before measuring, when the buyer’s vessel holds a wine residue?
The Shach, at entry 11, resolves a difficulty the Beit Yosef had left open: seif 1 permits what seif 2 forbids. Restate the question and the answer.
Seif 4 distinguishes two ways of handing a dinar to the shopkeeper. Which are they, and what changes in each?
Seifim 5 and 6 turn entirely on the choice of a formula. Show, in each, what separates the permitted sentence from the forbidden one.
Seif 7 forbids something that is neither an act nor a gain. What is it, and on what conditions does the Rama restrict its reach?
Going further
If you wish to go deeper into this siman:
📚 Level 2 — Lamdan: the pilpul — the maḥloket between the Tur and the Rashba on the dinar advanced to the shopkeeper, the Beit Yosef’s question on the gap between seifim 1 and 2, and the exact nature of rotzeh bekiyumo
✨ Level 3 — Synthesis: the comparative tables (what the money pays for, the order of the acts, the cases of vessels) and rapid revision of the 7 seifim