Bava Kamma, Chapter 6, Mishnah 5. The Mishnah before us continues to discuss the laws of fire, and it has three parts.
"Hamadlik es hagadish":
The literal meaning is that he burned a stack of straw or grain, but this is not the intention of the Mishnah. We are dealing with a person who lit a fire on his own property, and there were no proper protective measures in place, and the fire spread under normal conditions and burned the stack of grain in his neighbor's field. "Vehayu bo keilim vedaleku" - Inside that stack, utensils and objects were hidden.
The Sages hold that there is no liability for hidden items, and the source of their words is an exposition from the verse stated regarding fire: "If fire breaks out and catches in thorns, and a stack of grain, or the standing grain, or the field is consumed." Three things are enumerated here: the stack of grain, the standing grain (the attached grain), and the field. From "or the standing grain" - the attached grain that stands exposed - the Sages derived that there is no liability except for things that are like standing grain, exposed and visible; however, for a hidden item, for concealed things, one is exempt.
Rabbi Yehudah rejects this exposition: A person is responsible for his fire, and therefore he is liable even for hidden objects that were burned. And this is the language of the Mishnah: "Rabbi Yehudah omer: yeshalem kol mah shebesocho" - not only for the stack of grain that was burned, but even for what was hidden inside it. And in contrast to him: "Vachachamim omerim: eino meshalem ela gadish shel chittin o shel se'orin".
The additional words "of wheat or of barley" teach a fundamental principle in the approach of the Sages: If a person hid a rake inside the stack, even though the damager does not pay for the rake itself, he pays for the stack as if it were completely full - a stack of straw as if full of straw, a stack of wheat as if full of wheat, and a stack of barley as if full of barley. He is not exempt from payment for the empty space: if the volume of the hidden rake was a cubic meter, and a cubic meter of grain is worth one hundred, the damager adds one hundred to the bill, even though grain of this value did not actually burn.
It is proper to distinguish between two types of things that might be hidden in a stack of grain:
Things that are usually hidden there: Agricultural tools - a rake, a pitchfork, a plow, and the like. In those days there were no storehouses, and people used to hide their work tools inside the stack of grain.
Things that are not usually found there: For example, a person who hid his wallet inside the stack so that they would not find it.
Rabbi Yehudah holds that there is no exemption for hidden items at all, for a person is responsible for his fire, and therefore he pays for both types alike. The Sages hold that he does not pay for either of them. These are, therefore, the two ends of the spectrum.
The second part of the Mishnah - a bound kid and an adjacent slave:
Until now, the Mishnah dealt with one who lights a fire on his own property and it spreads to another place. Now the Mishnah turns to another matter: "Hayah gedi kafus lo ve'eved samuch lo venisraf imo - chayav". A kid was tied to the stack, and a slave - a human being - was situated nearby, and although the Mishnah does not state this explicitly, both burned in the fire. In this case, the one who lit the fire is liable.
And why? Even though a person died here, that person was not bound and had the ability to flee. Why did he choose to delay there and get caught in the fire for no good reason? And since he could have escaped and did not do so, the one who lit the fire is not considered responsible for his death. Therefore, he is liable for the stack of grain and even for the kid that died there, but not for the slave.
The liability for the kid is also derived from the verse "or the standing grain," which contains two words that are expounded separately:
"Hakamah" - the standing grain, which teaches about exposed things and not about concealed things.
The extra "O" - which teaches about things that have height, as in the word "komah" (height). This includes standing animals, such as the kid, as well as trees, for which one is liable to pay.
Indeed, the liability for the kid applies whether it was tied to the stack or not, since an animal lacks intelligence; and once it is killed by a person's fire, he is liable to pay for things that have height.
The second part of the Mishnah relies on another principle: the rule of "kam leih b'derabbah mineih" (he is judged with the more severe punishment). When an incident involves a capital offense, such as killing a person, we do not also judge financial punishments and the monetary aspects of the case. Once a person is killed, we do not obligate the killer in damage payments, as we have already seen in other places in the tractate.
Therefore we learned: "Eved kafut lo vegdi samuch lo venisraf imo patur" - if a slave was bound to it and a kid was nearby and was burned with it, he is exempt. The slave was tied to the stack and could not run away, meaning that his death is the fault of the one who lit the fire; and the nearby kid is mentioned only for the sake of the parallel. Once both are burned, the one who lit the fire is exempt from monetary payments due to "kam leih b'derabbah mineih" - since we are faced with capital laws, we do not deal with the monetary aspect.
It should be emphasized, as explained previously: there is no practical difference if we do not have witnesses and forewarning, and we lack the technical details required to put the arsonist on trial for the killing of that person. The very fact that a person died and we are standing in the realm of capital laws, with the potential of a death penalty by the court, removes the discussion from the monetary aspect entirely.
His fire is like his arrows:
In the background stands a fundamental dispute between Rabbi Yochanan and Reish Lakish: a person who used fire and struck his friend with it and he died - how do we define his action? Rabbi Yochanan holds that a person's fire is like his arrows. Just as one who shoots an arrow from his property and the arrow strikes a person in another place and kills him, the shooter is considered responsible as a murderer even though the arrow is far from him, for it is his arrow - it is not his property but rather his very self, a person who damages, who damages with his own force: the arrow plus the force of momentum leading it to the victim.
The same applies to fire: a person who lights a fire in his home without the appropriate safety measures, without walls and without clear space preventing its spread - as we saw in the previous Mishnah - and the fire spreads and strikes a person in another place, it is like shooting arrows over a wall, and therefore he is responsible. And if a person dies, we have an act of murder before us, and this is the case in our Mishnah. According to Rabbi Yochanan, and such is the halachah, even though the fire was lit in the property of the one who ignited it, once it spread he is responsible for the death of that slave who was bound there.
The third part of the Mishnah - "Hamadlik et habirah":
This part returns to the dispute between the Sages and Rabbi Yehudah regarding the law of concealed items. We learned: "Umodim chachamim leRabbi Yehudah bemadlik et habirah, shehu meshalem kol mah shebetochah, sheken derech benei adam lehaniach babatim" - and the Sages concede to Rabbi Yehudah in the case of one who sets fire to a birah (a large building), that he pays for everything inside it, since it is the way of people to leave items in houses. The first part of the Mishnah dealt with one who lights a fire in his own courtyard; here we are discussing someone who sets fire to his friend's property. "Birah" means a large house, and the person before us is an arsonist who sets his neighbor's house on fire. In this case, he pays not only for the structure that was burned, but for everything that was concealed inside it; and similarly, if he set fire to his neighbor's stack, he will pay even for what is inside the stack. And the reason for this: this is the way of people, to store objects in their homes, and for anything that is considered normal - he is liable.
It turns out that according to the Sages, everything that it is the way of people to keep in the house, he is liable for, and even the Sages concede this, since this is not a matter of the exposition of fire and standing grain at all. From the moment a person actively sets fire to his friend's house with his hands, this is not the law of fire but rather the law of a person who damages - he is the direct cause of the fire. In such a situation, anything that can reasonably be expected to be found in the house, he is liable to pay for; and since people keep all sorts of things in their homes, he is liable for everything.
The Gemara notes that, of course, when everything is burned, we cannot know what was inside; however, fundamentally, the homeowner is believed to report the contents. As long as his claims are reasonable - for example, a wealthy person claiming that valuable items were there - he is believed.
From here, we return to the first part of the Mishnah. The Sages maintain that it is normal for people to keep valuables, such as a purse, inside the house, and therefore the arsonist must pay even for the cash that was burned. However, if a person intentionally sets fire to a haystack, Rabbi Yehudah rules that he pays for everything - both for the agricultural tools and for the purse or similar items. The Sages, on the other hand, argue that people do not typically keep purses inside haystacks, as that is not their proper place. This is the rule of "derech benei adam lehaniach babatim" - it is the normal practice of people to leave things in houses: in their houses people keep things like purses, and not in their haystacks.
Therefore, the Sages hold that even an arsonist who intentionally set fire to another person's haystack will indeed pay for everything that was burned which is normally found in a haystack, such as agricultural tools, but he will not be liable for things that do not belong there and are not typically hidden in a haystack, such as a purse. In all these matters, the halachah follows the Sages.
In summary: One who lights a fire on his own property and the fire spreads without proper precautions - he is liable for the exposed items and exempt for the hidden, concealed items. But one who lights a fire on another person's property - he is liable for everything he damaged, including what was hidden there, provided it is the type of item normally hidden in such a place.