We now begin the ninth chapter, which deals with the relationship between a landowner and the sharecroppers who live on his land and work it. This relationship - owning land and allowing another person to cultivate the soil on behalf of the owner - can take one of three basic forms within the economic framework discussed in the Mishnah.
The three forms of engagement:
Sharecropping: A farmer who works for a percentage. The two divide the crop between them according to a fixed, predetermined ratio - half and half, a third and two thirds, and so on. Both the landowner and the farmer take on risk, and they share in the profits that arrive. Sometimes this agreement is also called contracting, since the farmer comes to "receive" the land.
Leasing for produce: A farmer who rents land. He lives on the land and cultivates it, paying rent - but not a fixed sum of money; rather, a fixed amount of the land's crop, since this person lives hand to mouth and has no cash. He says to the landowner: At the end of the season I will give you ten measures of wheat in exchange for the right to live on the land and work it, and all the profit beyond that is mine. If the land yields a hundred measures or a thousand - everything stays in my hands, while you receive ten under any circumstance, and therefore all the risk rests on me. Theoretically, if it does not rain and the land produces nothing, the lessee would be required to spend money out of pocket, purchase ten measures of wheat, and deliver them to the landowner.
Renting for cash: This is also renting, but in a more conventional form. The one sitting in the field pays a fixed sum of money in exchange for residing on the farm, and all the profits and losses stemming from the agricultural activity itself belong entirely to the renter.
In practice, the one leasing for produce and the one renting for cash are exactly alike, and the only difference between them is the method of payment - with money or with the land's produce. In contrast, the sharecropper who shares in the crop is fundamentally different: he is a partner in percentages, akin to a joint venture, who shares in the profits and losses proportionately with the landowner.
The first Mishnah: "Hamekabel sadeh mechaveiro" - One who receives a field from another:
The first case in the Mishnah deals with all the types enumerated above, whether leasing for produce, renting for cash, or sharecropping. The Mishnah opens with the language "Hamekabel sadeh mechaveiro" - One who receives a field from another, and in most places this term denotes contracting, meaning a sharecropper; but here, and similarly in other places, it is a general term for all types of relationships between the farmer and the landowner. And when they did not stipulate the details of how the agricultural work would be performed between them - everything is determined according to the accepted custom in that place.
For example, reaping the grain can be done in two ways:
Reaping with a cutting tool (a sickle or scythe) - a convenient and quick method, but it leaves a lot of stubble and a big mess in the field.
Uprooting from the roots - more labor-intensive, but the field is left clean, and afterward it can be properly plowed to ensure there are no weeds.
The question, therefore, is whether the landowner is permitted to demand from the sharecropper that he harvest in a specific manner: to insist that he harvest with a sickle and leave stubble, or to insist that he uproot from the roots so that nothing remains.
The Mishnah's answer is that everything depends on custom. If there was a prior agreement between them - "You may work in my field, but I insist that you uproot from the roots" - the condition is binding, as they agreed upon it. And if they did not make an agreement between them, everything is determined according to the accepted custom: a place where it is customary to harvest with a cutting tool - he is obligated to cut; a place where it is customary to uproot and pluck the grain from the roots - he is obligated to uproot; and if it is customary in those places to plow the field after the harvest to kill the weeds - he is obligated to do that as well.
Seemingly, it is obvious that at some point one must plow and remove the weeds, and the Gemara asks what this comes to add. The Mishnah concludes and states, "Hakol keminhag hamedinah" - Everything goes according to the regional custom, and with this it comes to teach a novel point: Even if the farmer weeded before the harvest in order to get a clean crop with nothing mixed in during the harvesting time, the landowner is permitted to demand that he weed again after the work is finished. And the sharecropper cannot claim "I already weeded once", as long as the accepted custom in that place is to weed after the end of the harvest.
The second part of the Mishnah: Dividing the byproducts in sharecropping:
This section deals with a specific and defined subject: a person who works the land in exchange for a portion of the crop is an aris (a sharecropper). Sharecropping is essentially a joint venture, a kind of partnership agreement: the two parties share in the profits, and they also share in the losses and expenses.
"Keshem shecholkin batevuah - kach cholkin bateven uvakash" - just as they divide the grain, so too they divide the straw and the stubble - using the same fixed ratio established for dividing the grain that comes from the field, for example, half and half, they also divide the harvest's byproducts. The teven is the stalks left on the threshing floor after threshing, the labor of dash; and the kash is left in the field, and can be used to line an animal pen, feed animals, and the like. Regarding the exact definition of kash and teven, namely what each of them actually is, Rashi and Tosafos disagree, but either way, it refers to both of these things together.
"Keshem shecholkin bayayin, kach cholkin bazemoros uvakanim, ushneihem mesapkin es hakanim" - just as they divide the wine, so too they divide the branches and the reeds, and both of them provide the reeds - this is the equivalent rule in the realm of the vineyard: just as the byproducts of the grain harvest are divided in the same ratio, so too are the byproducts of the wine production process. If the wine is divided half and half, the branches removed during the preparation of the wine are also divided equally.
The reeds are the stakes and poles driven into the ground in order to suspend the vines upon them. In a vineyard, the vines are raised from the ground and lean on strings, and for this purpose, stakes are driven into the ground, strings are stretched between them, and the vines are suspended upon them. The question is who provides these wooden stakes, and the answer is that the two parties divide the cost according to the same ratio, as the Mishnah states: "ushneihem mesapkin es hakanim".
And this is the reason for this: the stakes that they pull out of the ground are divided between them proportionally because both of them shared the cost of buying them. If one hundred reeds were needed to set up the vineyard, and they cost one hundred dollars, each of them invested fifty dollars, and therefore the reeds are then divided between them half and half. From here we see that if the landowner alone paid the full one hundred dollars for the reeds, he would take all of them for himself; and vice versa, if for some reason the sharecropper paid the entire cost of the poles, the sharecropper would take all of them back for himself.