Me'ilah, Chapter 6, Mishnah 3. This chapter continues to examine me'ilah, the misuse of consecrated property, when it is carried out through a shaliach, an agent. The governing principle established earlier is simple in theory and delicate in application: if the agent carries out his instructions exactly, the liability falls on the one who sent him, because his will was accomplished; if the agent departs from his instructions, the liability shifts onto the agent himself, because what was done was his own doing. Our mishnah pushes that principle into cases where the errand was half fulfilled and half botched.
"Natan lo perutah," a person unwittingly handed his agent a perutah's worth of hekdesh, "amar lo: Havei li bechetzi nerot uvechetzi petilot," and instructed him: bring me lamps with half of it and wicks with the other half. "Halach vehevi lo bekulan nerot o bekulan petilot," the agent went and spent the entire perutah on lamps alone, or on wicks alone.
The mishnah then presents the mirror image. "O she'amar lo: Havei li bekulan nerot o bekulan petilot," the sender said: spend the whole perutah on lamps, or spend the whole perutah on wicks. "Halach vehevi lo bechetzi nerot uvechetzi petilot," and the agent instead split the money, buying lamps with half a perutah and wicks with the other half.
In both of these cases the ruling is "sheneihem lo ma'alu": neither of them has committed me'ilah.
Why Neither One Is Liable
Look closely at what happened in each scenario. In both, the agent carried out the sender's wishes with respect to half of the perutah, and diverged from them with respect to the other half. Where he complied, the expenditure is attributed to the sender. Where he deviated, the expenditure is attributed to the agent. The result is that the sender is charged with a half perutah of hekdesh and the agent is charged with a half perutah of hekdesh.
Since me'ilah requires the misuse of a full perutah's worth, and neither party, taken on his own, misused more than half, there is no me'ilah here at all. The two halves cannot be combined, because they belong to two different people. Neither the sender nor the agent is liable.
When the Agent Deviates Twice
"Aval im amar lo: Havei li bechetzi nerot mimakom peloni uvechetzi petilot mimakom peloni." Now the sender specified not only the items but the vendors: buy me lamps with half a perutah from this particular place, and wicks with half a perutah from that particular place. "Vehalach vehevi lo nerot mibeit petilot upetilot mibeit nerot," the agent reversed them, purchasing the lamps at the shop he had been told to buy the wicks from, and the wicks at the shop he had been told to buy the lamps from.
Here the mishnah rules "hashaliach ma'al": the agent has committed me'ilah and is liable.
The reason is that in this case the agent departed from his instructions in both halves of the errand. Nothing he did was in accordance with the sender's will, so the entire perutah of hekdesh is charged to him, and he has misused a full perutah's worth.
Note how far this reaches. The agent brought back precisely the items that were requested, lamps and wicks, in precisely the requested proportions. Yet because he bought them in the wrong places, he alone becomes the one who is liable. He made two separate expenditures, at two separate times, in two places he had not been authorized to use. Each half was his own act rather than his sender's, and together the two halves add up in his own account to a full perutah of me'ilah.