The first chapter discusses who has the responsibility to bring the first fruits and make the declaration, who needs to bring the first fruits but not make the declaration, and who can not bring the first fruits. Among those who bring the first fruits but don't make the declaration are
converts, so other
halakha regarding differences between the obligations of converts and those born Jewish are also discussed here. This difference for converts was disagreed with by
Rabbi Judah bar Ilai and later
Maimonides, and it is their position that has become the practice of the Jewish community. In the second chapter, a comparison (as to legal classification) is made between the
terumah, ''
ma'aser (the second tithe, which had to be brought to Jerusalem and consumed there) and bikkurim
, and makes other legal comparisons between citron, trees, and vegetables; between the blood of human beings and that of cattle and creeping things; and between beast, cattle, and "koy''" (Hebrew: כּוֹי), an intermediate between cattle and beast. The third chapter describes more fully the process of bringing the first fruits to the Temple at the festival of
Shavuot. The fourth chapter, which is only sometimes included, originates from the
Tosefta Bikkurim. It compares the laws relating to men, women, and
those of intermediate sex, including the
tumtum (one with no genitalia) and the
androgynos. There is no
Gemara in the
Babylonian Talmud. The
Jerusalem Talmud has
Gemara on
Bikkurim, in which the laws of the Mishnah are discussed in the usual way, with a few digressions, noteworthy among which is that on
Leviticus "You shall rise before a venerable person and you shall respect the elderly," and on the value of the title "
zaken" (elder) conferred on scholars in the
Land of Israel and outside the Land (
Yerushalmi 3:3, 11a-b or 65c). ==References==