the limits of variety 167
liberal in medium degree, one- fiftieth part; if he is mean, one- sixtieth
part.’ Biblical law referred to giving tithes only of corn, wine and oil,
but some Jews evidently widened the application greatly: ‘A general rule
have they laid down about tithes: whatsoever is used for food and so
kept watch over and grows from the soil is liable to tithes.’
The definition of produce which required tithing left plenty of room
for uncertainty about when a crop had ripened sufficiently to become a
food: ‘When do fruits become liable to tithes? Figs – after their earliest
ripening; grapes and wild grapes – after their stones become visible;
sumach and mulberries – after they become red (and all red fruits [are
liable] after they become red); pomegranates – after they soften; dates –
after they begin to swell; peaches – after they begin to show red veins;
walnuts – after their cells take shape.’ Scrupulous observance of such
rules could be a matter for self- dedication by itself, without necessarily
a particular concern for purity laws:
‘He who undertakes to be trustworthy – tithes what he eats and what he
sells and what he purchases. And he does not accept the hospitality of an
ordinary person,’ the words of R. Meir. And the sages say, ‘One who
accepts the hospitality of an ordinary person is trustworthy.’ Said to them
R. Meir, ‘[If] he is not trustworthy concerning himself, should he be trust-
worthy concerning me?’ They said to him, ‘Householders have never
refrained from eating with one another, nonetheless the produce in their
own homes [that is, the homes of those who have undertaken to be trust-
worthy] is properly tithed.’^13
Dedication to life as a haver seems to have involved some kind of
formal statement before a havurah (‘fellowship’). This was not appar-
ently a vow like the dedication vow of a nazirite. A dispute is recorded in
the name of rabbinic sages from the mid- second century ce over the
possibility of a haver who has reneged on his obligation to be accepted
back into the fellowship: ‘ “And [as for] all those who reneged [after hav-
ing been accepted as haverim ], they never accept them again,” the words
of R. Meir. R. Judah says, “If they reneged in public, they accept them
[again]; in secret, they do not accept them.” R. Simeon and R. Joshua b.
Qorha say, “In either case they accept them, as it is written, ‘Return O
faithless children.’ ” ’ Part of the explanation for such leniency may be
the apparent incompatibility of some occupations with the undertaking
of a haver : ‘At first they would say, “A haver who becomes a tax-
collector – they expel him from his havurah.” They changed their minds