Menachot 71

The city of Jericho, located just 38 kilometers northeast of Jerusalem, dates back over 11,000 years and is one of the world’s oldest continuously inhabited settlements. Topologically, it’s the lowest city on earth, sitting at 250 meters below sea level. During the rabbinic period, it was home to a thriving Jewish community that sometimes did things a little differently – including in ways that weren’t always perfectly sanctioned by the sages.

As we learned previously, one may not harvest new produce before the omer offering has been brought. Today, the mishnah records exceptions to this rule:

One may (first) reap a crop that grows in an irrigated field in the valleys, but one may not arrange the reaped stalks in a pile. The residents of Jericho reaped the crops with the approval of the sages and arranged the crops in a pile without the approval of the sages, but the sages did not reprimand them.

The mishnah allows a practical accommodation for farmers whose fields are located in a potential flood plain, allowing them to harvest crops earlier to avoid spoilage. However, that dispensation doesn’t extend to allowing those farmers to stack the grain in piles. In Jericho, though, the farmers also stack their crops — despite rabbinic disapproval. The Gemara broadens the discussion to additional liberties taken by Jews in Jericho:

And these are the actions they performed with the approval of the sages: They would graft palm trees the entire day of the 14th of Nisan, and they would bundle Shema, and they would reap grain before the omer offering was brought. All of these were with the approval of the sages. 

Pesachim 50a says that one should cease work at midday on the eve of Passover to prepare for the holiday. But in Jericho, Jews continued grafting palm trees until sundown with rabbinic approval. Bundling the Shema, according to Rashi, means that the people of Jericho didn’t pause between reciting the first line of the Shema and the start of the Veahavta paragraph — a practice also approved by the sages.

It turns out, however, that the Jews in Jericho also had special practices for which they did not receive approval from the sages:

And these are the actions they performed without the approval of the sages: They would pile the harvest before the omer, and they would permit the use of consecrated branches of carob and of sycamore trees, and they would make breaches in the walls of their gardens and in their orchards to feed fallen fruit to the poor during drought years, even on Shabbat and festivals. 

In addition to the prohibition of stacking grain that we learned in the mishnah, the Gemara adds that the rabbis also disapproved of the Jericho farmers using the branches of trees consecrated to the Temple. Rashi explains that only the tree trunks were consecrated as they were used to make furniture, but the branches and their fruits were not. Nevertheless, the sages didn’t approve of using them. The prohibition on feeding fallen produce to poor people seems strange given the foundational mitzvah to provide for them, but according to Rashi the rabbis were concerned that those overtaken by hunger would climb the trees and pick fruit in violation of Shabbat, or that they’d fail to tithe it properly. Despite rabbinic objections, though, these Jericho-specific practices continued. In and of itself, that is not terribly surprising — the rabbis’ power to enforce their rulings was very limited. The more interesting question is why the rabbis are writing about this in the Talmud at all. 

I think there are two things going on here. First, as I argued nearly six years ago in my essay for Shabbat 148, sometimes the rabbis realize that it’s smart to acknowledge there are some fights they aren’t going to win, and it’s better to just leave the Jewish people alone. Perhaps more importantly, if we examine the Jericho exceptions, it seems that many of them are related to the ability of people to feed themselves and their communities. If the grain that they just harvested sits out rather than being stacked to dry, it would be just as ruined in a flood as if it was left unharvested. If the Temple isn’t using the carob and sycamore branches and fruit, why waste it? And if people are starving in a drought, isn’t it better to provide them with access to food without thinking beyond that to what they might or might not do afterwards? The rabbis were nothing if not practical. And so, with regard to Jericho, they leave it alone.

Read all of Menachot 71 on Sefaria.

This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on March 23, 2026. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.