The Priest Forbade Chametz
‘Acquired By Admission’
(Bava Basra 149a)
The ownership of property is transferable by various means of acquisition and conveyance, some common and some rare: by payment, a bill of sale, chazaka (manifestation of ownership by usage), pulling, lifting, hand-to-hand delivery, chalipin (symbolic acquisition by exchange, picking up some unrelated but agreed-upon substitute article), by secondary acquisition attached to the acquisition of land (kinyan agav), or by the article’s being on a person’s premises (chatzer).
Our sugya mentions still another means of transferal of property known as odaisa, or “admission,” in which the owner of some property admits that it belongs to another, though everyone knows that this has not been so till now. Odaisa is mentioned only in our sugya and it is appropriate, therefore, to devote some discussion to this unusual transfer of property.
An Antisemite
Many years ago, an antisemitic priest directed his parishioners to refuse to buy Jewish chametz on the eve of Pesach. The gentiles were not particularly antisemitic, but they did obey their spiritual leader. Rabbi Meir Arik (1855-1926), author of Imrei Yosher, suggested a novel solution. “Let us all just admit,” he advised, “that the chametz belongs to the gentiles and they will acquire it on the strength of our admission” (Imrei Yosher 1:3). According to this method, the gentiles, including the priest, would never even have to know that they acquired the chametz. To know if the suggestion is practical, though, we must devote some study to the various approaches explaining how odaisa works.
The Strongest Method Of Acquisition
Some maintain that the absolute decision expressed by the owner of the property that “this article belongs to a certain person” evidences his full determination to grant him the item. Odaisa, then, is just as valid as any other transferal of property (Shitah Mekubetzes, Bava Basra, ibid., in the name of Tosafos HaRosh; Ketzos HaChoshen, 40, s.k. 1 and 194, s.k. 4, based on Tosafos at Bava Metzia 46a and Bava Basra, ibid) and Rabbi Yechezkel Landau, author of Noda BiYehudah, calls it “the strongest method of acquisition” (Noda BiYehudah, 1st edition, Choshen Mishpat 30).
According to this opinion, the recipient becomes owner of the property at the moment of the previous owner’s admission (Ritva, Bava Metzia 46a; Rashba 4:50, see also Imrei Binah, Dinei Halvaah 16). Others maintain, however, that odaisa only enables the owner of the property to obligate himself as if the property belongs to another, should that other person put forth such a claim. The article, then, does not immediately or automatically become the recipient’s, but the latter may merely claim its ownership in a beis din on the strength of the former owner’s admission.
Moribund
Moreover, some believe that odaisa is valid only if the owner of the property is moribund (a shechiv mera) and that it differs from other methods of acquisition (Itur 5; Or Zarua 752; Tashbetz, 1:152 and 3:325), but most halachic authorities hold that odaisa is valid even if the owner is healthy (see Shach, Choshen Mishpat 60, s.k. 32, and Ketzos HaChoshen 194).
Avoiding Penury
Thus, according to the opinion that odaisa is just as valid as any other method of conveyance, the Jews of the village, following the advice of Rabbi Meir Arik, were able to circumvent the priest and surreptitiously transfer ownership of the chametz to the peasants. It is important to note that in many European villages, landless Jews were only able to eke out a living by dealing in beer and liquor, and for them to have to completely liquidate their stock every erev Pesach would have left them penniless for the most part.
