Gittin 49 – Why does land quality matter?

"If one's animal damage his fellow's field, he must pay with the best of his field," tells us that there are damage payments. However, we started discussing that it is not clear what "his field" means.

Rabbi Ishmael says, "His field was damaged, and his field is now used to measure the quality." That is, the damaged party's best field determines the quality of the land to be collected. Rabbi Akiva says the phrase "He must pay with the best of his field," clearly tells that the one who pays is the one whose field we are discussing.

But why all this talk about the best land, medium or bad one? Rabbi Shimon, the only one who explained the reasons behind Torah laws, said: why does the damager pay from his best land? – So that people would think thus: "What's the point of robbing or stealing? Tomorrow the courts will take it all away from me, and they will do it by taking my best land!"

Now, why is a debt repaid with medium-quality land? So that a rich person would not think thus: "I will advance a loan to this fellow of mine, and then when he cannot repay, I will collect his best vineyard!" But according to this logic, he should collect the worst land!? – If you do this, will people refrain from giving loans altogether?

Finally, the Ketubah of a woman (after all, we are studying divorces) is paid from the worst land of the husband; why is that? – Because the various advantages a woman derives from marriage are significant, women will not refrain from getting married just because they know that their Ketubah payment will be paid from bad-quality land.

Art: Le prêteur et sa femme (The moneylender and his wife) by Quentin METSYS