Mishnah Eleven

1)      One who harvests by night and binds sheaves [by night] or one who is blind [that which he leaves] is subject to the law of the “forgotten.”

2)      If he intends to remove large leaves first, then the law of “forgotten” does not apply.   

3)      If he said: “Behold, I am reaping on the condition that I take afterwards that which I have forgotten,” the law of “forgotten” still applies.

Explanation

Section one: The laws of “forgotten” still apply to one who can’t see, either because he was harvesting or binding sheaves at night, or because he is blind.  We don’t say that because he couldn’t see what he was doing he can’t forget anything.

Section two:  If a person intends to remove the large sheaves first, and then leaves some of them in the field mixed in with the smaller sheaves, none of the sheaves, neither the small ones nor the large ones, are deemed “forgotten.”  The smaller sheaves are not forgotten because he was not intending to collect them. The larger sheaves are also not forgotten because we assume that since he left the smaller sheaves, his intention was to go back to the field and collect the larger ones later.

Section three:  A person cannot make a blanket statement before he starts harvesting that anything that he leaves in the field he will come back and collect. This does not prevent that which he actually forgets from being considered “forgotten.”  Such a person would be trying to make a stipulation to get around the Torah’s laws and such stipulations are usually invalid.