This Mishnah talks about two people who have vegetable gardens, one inner and one outer. This kind of partnership could really exist because, let’s say, two people jointly owned one big field and then decided to split the field—the garden—so that one person would receive the back of it and the other would receive the front. But the person in the back could only access it through a path in the front garden, and the person who had the front garden agreed to it. So the Mishnah says there are some ground rules for this type of access on that path.
Mi sheyesh lo ginah lefaním mi-ginato shel chavero: Somebody has a vegetable garden behind the vegetable garden of his friend. The owner of the outer garden allows the owner of the inner garden to access his garden through the middle of the outer garden.
Nichnas b'sha'ah she-derech bnei adam nichnasin v'yotzei b'sha'ah she-derech bnei adam yotz'in. He, the owner of the inner garden, could only access his garden through the outer vegetable garden owned by somebody else only during the time when it’s normal for people to enter during the daytime, and he can’t linger there. He has to leave when normal people leave the garden.
V'eino machnis letocha tagarin. He also can’t bring people who want to buy the vegetables all the way into his garden. They don’t have access through the other person’s outer garden. Rather, the owner of the inner garden has to take vegetables out and bring them to the merchants.
V'lo yikanes mitocha letoch sadeh acheret. He’s only allowed to access his friend’s garden in order to enter his own garden and do what he needs to do there. But he’s not allowed to enter his friend’s garden to use it as a shortcut to get to other places. Basically, he only has rights to this path and he needs to get to his own garden. But he can’t use it for any other purpose.
Ve-hachitzon zorea et haderech. The owner of the outer garden, who allows his friend to use this path, is still allowed to plant vegetables on that path, even though that makes it harder for the person to walk through. We’re talking about the center of the field, and the owner is not giving up his rights to the center of the field. He lets the owner of the inner garden walk through, but that doesn’t mean he’s waiving his right to plant on that spot.
But when the path is on the outer part of the garden, not the center, the laws are a little bit different.
Natnu lo derech min hatzad, mida'at shneihem: If the path was given to him on the side of the field and everyone agreed that the path was going to run on the outer part of the garden.
Nichnas b'sha'ah shehu rotzeh, v'yotzei b'sha'ah shehu rotzeh. He’s allowed to enter the garden when he wants to, and he’s allowed to leave whenever he wants to.
Umachnis letocha tagarin. He’s also allowed to bring merchants into the garden. Since the path here is on the outside of the garden, the owner of that garden is not going to be makpid. He’s not going to care if people are over there, if they’re going through it. It’s understood that since it’s just on the side, he would be okay with other people coming in, and he would be okay with the owner of the inner garden coming in outside of business hours.
V'lo yikanes mitocha letoch sadeh acheret. But he’s still not allowed to enter that path in order to cut through and use it as a shortcut to get to other places. Even though the path is on the side of the field, the only rights he has to use that path are to access his garden, which is inaccessible in any other way. But he can’t use this path as a shortcut to other places.
V'zeh va-zeh einan rashain l'zor'ah. Neither one of these people, the owner of the inner garden or the owner of the outer garden, is allowed to plant on the path. The owner of the outer garden is not allowed to plant because it’s not in the center of the field. And if it’s not in the center of the field, he would have given up his rights to that. The owner of the inner garden is not allowed to plant on the path because he doesn’t own it. It’s not considered to be his land.