3,227. Tithing Produce From Land Owned With a Non-Jewish Partner

Terumos 1:20

One must take terumah and maaser when he owns land jointly with a non-Jewish partner. For example, if a Jew and a non-Jew buy a field together, every stalk of the non-Jew's share is considered a mix of regular and untithed produce (chullin and tevel, respectively). This is the case even if they divide the field while the grain is still standing, and certainly if they divide it after the grain was collected into the pile. This is so even if the non-Jew smoothed the grain pile, making the obligation to tithe rabbinic in nature, as has been discussed.

Terumos 1:21

The preceding halacha applies in Israel, where taking tithes is a Biblical obligation, because the concept of breirah* does not apply to Biblical law. If he bought a field in Syria, where tithing is rabbinic to start with, then even if the Jew and the non-Jew divide a finished grain pile, the non-Jew’s share is completely exempt from tithes.

*Breirah, literally clarification, is a legal principle in which subsequent decisions can be applied retroactively, clarifying the nature of preceding events. In secular law, this is referred to as “relation back.”