Commentaire sur Kil'ayim 6:5
אֵיזֶהוּ אִילַן סְרָק. כָּל שֶׁאֵינוֹ עוֹשֶׂה פֵרוֹת. רַבִּי מֵאִיר אוֹמֵר, הַכֹּל אִילַן סְרָק, חוּץ מִן הַזַּיִת וְהַתְּאֵנָה. רַבִּי יוֹסֵי אוֹמֵר, כָּל שֶׁאֵין כָּמוֹהוּ נוֹטְעִין שָׂדוֹת שְׁלֵמוֹת, הֲרֵי זֶה אִילַן סְרָק:
Qu'est-ce qu'un arbre serak ? Tout arbre qui ne porte pas de fruit. Rabbi Meir dit, [concernant le palissage de la vigne] tous les arbres sont [considérés] des arbres serak [parce qu'ils sont considérés comme insignifiants au vu de la vigne], à l'exception de l'olivier [arbre] et du figuier [arbre]. Le rabbin Yosi dit: Tous les arbres similaires qui ne sont normalement pas plantés exclusivement comme des champs entiers sont des arbres serak .
English Explanation of Mishnah Kilayim
Introduction Our mishnah defines what is a non-fruit bearing tree, termed in Hebrew serak, with regard to the halakhot which we learned above in mishnayot three and four.
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English Explanation of Mishnah Kilayim
What is a serak (non-fruit bearing) tree?
Any tree which does not yield fruit. The first opinion simply holds that all trees that do not bear fruit are considered to be serak trees, and all of the rules in mishnah three above apply to them.
Any tree which does not yield fruit. The first opinion simply holds that all trees that do not bear fruit are considered to be serak trees, and all of the rules in mishnah three above apply to them.
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English Explanation of Mishnah Kilayim
Rabbi Meir says: all trees are serak, except the olive and the fig tree. Rabbi Meir holds that the only non-serak trees, meaning the only trees whose fruit are significant, are the olive and fig trees. All other trees are considered “serak,” non-fruit bearing. We should probably remember that the wide variety of trees that we now have certainly did not exist in the ancient near east. The one significant tree that Rabbi Meir does seem to be excluding is the date palm. Perhaps date palms were not used in training grape vines and hence Rabbi Meir just doesn’t consider them in this context. Alternatively, Rabbi Meir holds that grapes were more valuable than dates, and hence compared to the vine, the date palm is non-fruit bearing.
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English Explanation of Mishnah Kilayim
Rabbi Yose says: all trees that are not planted in whole fields, are serak trees. Rabbi Yose says that a tree is considered to be a fruit-bearing tree if people will plant a whole field of that type of tree. For instance, if people will plant a whole field of etrog trees, then an etrog tree would be considered fruit bearing in the context of the rule above in mishnayot three and four. If not, then it is considered to be serak tree.
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