Zuto Shel Yam

 An every day occurence, a person finds something most banal - a pen, a forgotten package of pasta, in my case, yesterday, pizza spice), and he or she doesn't know to whom it belongs. Something that nobody would come back and claim, or seek to find (well, at least almost nobody). 

Yesterday, while waiting for an intercity bus, I saw a package of pizza seasoning - brand name "Pereg" in case you lost it, behind the bus stop, 1540 (to be exact), and didn't know what to do with it. It had clearly fallen from somebody's shopping bag, plastic perhaps, or maybe it was flannel, but lo and behold, it had found its resting spot, on the floor, sideways at the foot of a highly trafficked bus stop, where no fewer than 5,000 people pass on a given day. 

So what do you do, halachically? What does Jewish law dictate? 

I've been trying to get a clear answer, and so I asked three different rabbis. Now, the gut response is it's yours. What, then, if it were a diamond ring? Or, a brand new lawyer's briefcase? Or a pocketknife, still in the original package, likewise askance, ever-so lonely, comfortably esconsed beneath a busy bus stop at a busy intersection. 

Do you infer that if it's cheap it's yours - and if not - you should return it? Do you put up signs? Do you have to frequent the bus stop to see if others have put up signs? Really, what's the clear demarcation between when your responsibility ends, and the other's begins. Furthermore, is it a matter of probability? If it's highly improbable the person will return, it belongs to you; and otherwise, not? How long do you have to wait if you put up a poster, or notice? And do you have to ensure it stays up?

In my case, yesterday, I took a red marker out of my bag - sometimes it's good to be a teacher! - and scribbled something with my number on an already existing sign, something to the effect of "Pizza Spice Found": Call Yoav, 054-393-4713); I will report back if anyone calls. 

On the face of it, the opinions I heard were as follows:

1. There's something called Zuto Shel Yam. Something that is found on the seashore after having been swept by the waves into the sea. The salient point here is that for a brief second, at minimum, no person under the face of the sun could have ever laid claim to it, because it was ownerless vis a vis the entirety of mankind - maybe a tuna could have found it! No, no person could have called it his own for a brief second, so because of that, everyone, uncategorically, indiscriminately, lost the ability to lay claim to it, for even a brief second, and because of that, even if it's swept on to shore thereafter, and even if the person's name is clearly written on it - and even if the said person is standing next to you when you find it and implores you to give it back to him, you have no halachic obligation whatsoever to do so, because in every sense of the word, it is yours. 

What stems from that approach is that there's a very high bar that needs to be reached because most things are not swept undersea, but that notwithstanding, were such a bar - admittedly, a high one - not to be reached, a finder would have no right to lay claim to anything found unless he or she knew that the person had despaired about the prospects of finding the lost object. 

2. It belongs to you. The pizza spice is all yours, so throw a party. Why? In halacha, when a person despairs - mityaesh - about the prospects of finding something, he no longer can claim ownership rights on an object, or possession he once had. But, what that means is that transactionally, the moment at which the rightful owner ceases to lay any ownership claim is that very moment at which he realizes that the object he once had in his possession, is no longer in his possession. For example, the pizza spice has fallen. The person gets onto the bus, takes the long bus ride home, and only at 8PM that evening realizes - Oh no, it must have fallen! At that very moment, when the realization is made, the owner loses his right to lay claim to the seasoning. Before that, no! In halachic terms, yeush she'lo me'da'at lo koneh. Only when a person realizes that he's lost something does he renege, or retract any ownership claim. That would seem to the principle on the face of it - but I asked an important rabbi yesterday, who told me that were there to be absolute certainty that the person would retract his ownership rights, then, at the moment the object/item is found by another, it would already enter the finder's possession. Transactionally, the change of ownership would already be effectuated. Interesting!

3. Lastly, the rabbi who admitted not to know. But, he did say that there were a set of cases in the Talmud about lost objects/animals where were a person to be made aware of the fact that he had lost something, something of minor value, respectively, and were to be told that such and such an object can be found at such and such a place, and the person were to show no inclination whatsoever to go back and claim the object/item lost, then at that point, he has foregone his ownership rights. In essence, ownership is a claim - not automatic - according to this approach, and were ownership rights to be consciously removed, however abstract, one could no longer lay claim to the said object anymore. 

According to the last approach, were an item to be highly valuable and to have been forgotten in a public place were there to be little chance of re-attaining the object, then, despite it all, the original owner would still be allowed to lay claim to the object he or she has lost. Maybe she would hold out in the hopes of somehow retrieving it.

To be perfectly honest, I think the halachic literature lacks in this realm, and one really needs to reassess how we can apply norms at the time of Talmud to our current bustling, busy society, where cities are highly populated and often there is little chance of returning lost objects, however valuable. 

For the time being, I'm waiting for the call on the pizza seasoning.