Study Menachot folio 85B with parallel Hebrew-English text, traditional commentary, and modern study tools. Free access to Babylonian Talmud online.
it is only the baraita that teaches that he plows and then repeats the plowing. It would appear, then, that the Mishnah and baraita express different opinions, and it may be that according to the Mishnah one does not need to plow in the 2nd year at all.
The Talmud dismisses this suggestion: This is not difficult; it is possible that the Mishnah and the baraita do not disagree, and here, the Mishnah, which does not require plowing a second time, is referring to a cultivated field, whereas there, the baraita is referring to an uncultivated field,
The Talmud concludes: What halakhic conclusion was reached about this matter? Come and hear the resolution from that which is taught in a baraita: For the 1st year, one plows the entire field during the first half of the year, and then he sows half of the field, leaving the other half fallow. For th
§ R' Yoḥanan says: One brings the omer only from the southern fields of Eretz Yisrael, as upon those fields, the sun rises and shines, and from those fields, the sun also sets. Those fields are exposed to abundant sunlight, and so they produce a superior-quality crop.
This is also taught in a baraita: Abba Shaul says that the omer would come from grain grown in the valley of Beit Mikle. The field there was about 3 se’a, and it was a southern field, and the sun would rise and shine upon it, and the sun would set from it. During the 1st year, the farmer plowed th