Let us move on to another Mishnah in chapter 6, Mishnah 2. The Mishnah continues to elaborate on the cases listed in the previous Mishnah regarding animals that are unfit to be brought as offerings, and now it deals with esnan zonah - the payment given to a harlot.
Defining "esnan zonah":
The term is difficult to translate precisely. It is commonly rendered as a payment to a harlot, which is roughly correct but not exact. A "zonah" is a woman who is forbidden to marry a kohen, generally because she took part in an act that the Torah forbids. The Rishonim disagree about the scope of these prohibitions:
The view of the Rambam: Any Torah prohibition, whether an offense punishable by kares or a simple negative commandment.
The view of Tosafos: According to the conclusion of Tosafos, not every Torah prohibition is included, but only the more severe ones.
In any event, a kohen cannot marry such a woman, and this includes any woman who had relations with a man forbidden to her, as well as a non-Jewish woman. The esnan, then, is the payment given for such forbidden relations.
The straightforward case:
Let us consider the basic case: a non-Jewish woman standing on the street corner engaged in harlotry, and the client says to her: "Heilach taleh zeh bis'charech" - here is this lamb as your payment. That lamb is an esnan zonah, and it can no longer be used as an offering.
The Mishnah adds: "Va'afilu me'ah - kulan asurin". That is, if he gave her a hundred lambs, all of them are forbidden. The case is that the fee agreed upon with her was a single lamb, and he decided to add another ninety-nine. One might have thought that only the one lamb constitutes the payment, while the additional ninety-nine are nothing more than gifts, and are therefore not esnan and not forbidden. But the conclusion is that they all come as part of a single transaction, they are all given for that same act, and therefore they are all equally forbidden.
The novel teaching of the Mishnah - an esnan involving no act by the giver or the receiver:
The next section of the Mishnah teaches something quite fascinating: the law of esnan does not necessarily apply to the man who paid for the services, nor necessarily to the harlot who receives the money. There can be a situation in which Reuven pays Shimon for forbidden relations, and neither of them took direct part in the act itself.
The law of a Hebrew slave and a Canaanite maidservant:
The case involves Reuven, who owns a Hebrew slave - an indentured Jewish servant. The Hebrew slave is a Jew in every respect and keeps all the halachos like any other Jew, with one exception: his master is permitted, and may even compel him, to cohabit with a Canaanite maidservant, a non-Jewish maidservant, in order to produce children who will themselves be slaves.
Under what circumstances is this permitted? This is the subject of a dispute in the Mishnah:
The view of the Sages (and this is the halachah): It is permitted only when the slave already has a wife and children - and whether a wife alone or children from her alone is sufficient is a dispute among the Rishonim in understanding the word "or." In such a case one may bring him to cohabit with the Canaanite maidservant in order to produce additional offspring.
The view of Rabbi: It is permitted in every case, and there is no need for him to have been married beforehand.
From here the picture becomes clear: suppose this Hebrew slave never had a wife and children, so that he is forbidden to cohabit with the Canaanite maidservant, and nevertheless they made him available for this in a forbidden manner. In such a case Reuven, the owner of the slave, makes the payment, and Shimon, the owner of the maidservant, receives the money - and neither of them took part in the forbidden act directly. Even so, it is considered a harlot's hire, since this is payment for that act.
The Wording of the Mishnah:
This is the language of the Mishnah: "Vechen ha'omer lachaveiro: heilach taleh zeh usalin shifchasecha eitzel avdi" - Reuven says to Shimon: I am giving you this lamb as payment, and you let your Canaanite maidservant spend the night with my Hebrew slave, so that they produce offspring.
"Rabbi omer: eino esnan" - according to Rabbi, since it is permitted to compel a Hebrew slave to cohabit with a Canaanite maidservant in all circumstances, there is no harlotry here at all, and therefore this is not called a harlot's hire.
"Vachachamim omrim: esnan" - according to the Sages this is a harlot's hire, since it is payment for a forbidden union, in a case where that Hebrew slave was not permitted to cohabit with this woman because he had not had a wife and children beforehand.
In summary: In this Mishnah we learned the definition of a harlot's hire as payment for a forbidden relationship, and the ruling that even if he gave a hundred lambs - all of them are forbidden, because they all come in exchange for that one act. We also learned the novel teaching of the Mishnah, that the law of a harlot's hire applies even when the giver and the receiver are not the parties to the act itself, as in the case of the owner of the Hebrew slave and the owner of the Canaanite maidservant, along with the dispute between Rabbi and the Sages on the matter.