Commentary for Demai 6:6

לא ימכור אדם זיתיו – olives hat became detached from the tree and were not susceptible to receive ritual impurity, as for example, they did not perspire/drip the dripping of the vat/pit where olives are packed until they form a viscid mass where it makes them susceptible to receive ritual impurity.

Bet Shammai says: a man may sell his olives only to a “chaver (an ‘associate’).” Bet Shammai forbids one to sell olives to anyone but a “chaver,” a term which refers to a person who not only tithes, but also observes a high level of purity, eating all of his food while in a state of purity. The problem is that the person who isn’t cautious about the laws of purity will press the olives while impure, thereby causing the terumah which has not yet been separated from the olives to become impure. Since it is forbidden to cause terumah to become impure, a person may not sell his produce to a non-chaver.

אלא לחבר – to separate that which is presumed/adhering to ritual purity and he will not sell them to someone who is not a member of the order for the observance of Levitical laws in daily intercourse/חבר and he will not tread/stamp upon them in ritual impurity.

But Bet Hillel says: [one may sell them] even to one who only] tithes. Bet Hillel agrees that it is forbidden to sell produce to one who doesn’t tithe, but we don’t have to know that the person is fully observant of purity in order to sell them olives. There is a possibility that the purchaser may eat the olives before he presses them, and the olives don’t become receptive to impurity until their oil starts to ooze (food can’t become impure until it comes into contact with one of seven liquids). Since it is not certain that the impure purchaser will end up pressing his olives and then make them impure, the seller can sell them to him. However, he must know that he is going to tithe them.

אף למעשר – even to someone who did not accept upon himself other than to tithe but did not accept upon himself to be presumed/adhering to ritual purity can sell them, for since they yet are not susceptible it can stated that perhaps he ate them prior to their perspiring, for even though most of the olives are not ready to be consumed as such, by pretext, anything that we are able to hang on it, we hang upon it. But Maimonides establishes their dispute of that of the School of Shammai and the School of Hillel, for the School of Shammai holds that it is forbidden to cause ritual impurity to unconsecrated produce that is in the Land of Israel while the School of Hillel holds that it is permissible to cause ritual impurity to unconsecrated produce in the Land of Israel.

And the pious among Bet Hillel used to act in accordance with the words of Bet Shammai. Interestingly, the mishnah concludes by noting that certain more pious members of the Bet Hillel school acted like Bet Shammai. They seem to have believed that the other members of their school were being overly lenient on this issue, since it is almost certain that one who buys olives does so to make olive oil. Therefore, they, like the members of Bet Shammai, refrained from selling olives to those who they knew would make them impure.

וצנועי בית הלל – the conscientiously pious ones who are exacting in observance of the commandments who were in the School of Hillel [and who followed the School of Shammai – who would not sell their olives to anyone other than someone who is a member of the order for the observance of Levitical laws in daily intercourse].