For the source text click/tap here: Bava Batra 69
To download, click/tap here: PDF
The mishna teaches that one who sells a field has not sold the cluster of reeds that occupy a beit rova. The Gemara comments: And this is so even though they are thin, as since they occupy the area of a beit rova they are considered a separate entity and are not part of the field.
Concerning this ruling, Rabbi Ḥiyya bar Abba says that Rabbi Yoḥanan says: It is not only a cluster of reeds that is considered a separate entity, and therefore not included in the sale; rather, even a small garden bed of spices that does not occupy the area of a beit rova but has a distinct name is not sold along with the field.
Rav Pappa said: What this means is that people call it the roses [vardda] of so-and-so,thereby establishing for it a name of its own.
The Mishna also says: And not the grafted carob tree and the sycamore tree that has been cut back.
The Gemora asks: How do we know this (that they are not included in the sale even when the seller stated that he was selling everything in the field)?
Rav Yehudah says in the name of Rav: The verse states, “And the field of Efron that was in Machpeilah went up etc.” This teaches that the trees that require mentioning the surrounding boundaries (in order to ascertain its owner) are included in the sale.
All this mention of roses allows us to explore the history of the sale of Machpelah from Ephron as well as the cultural significance of the book “you never promised me a Rose garden” and the psychiatric theory (sic) underpinning it.