Mishnah: If there is a city in which the taxes charged to the sellers during the fair are used for idol worship, one may not do business in the city, but with the idolaters outside of the city, it is permitted, as they are not charged this tax.

If the fair is made outside the city, inside the city is permitted.

Question: Is it permitted to go to the city on the day of a fair, if one's intention is merely to speak to someone there?

Answer: When the approach road is specifically for that city, it is prohibited (as it appears as he is going to celebrate the festival); if it is road that also leads to other places, it is permitted.

Question: What is the rule regarding a city that contains an idol and some of the shops are adorned (indicating that taxes are taken from those shops for the purposes of idol worship) and some shops are not adorned?

Answer: There was such a case in Beis Shean and the Chachamim said that the adorned shops are prohibited and those not adorned are permitted.

Gemara - Question: (When the Mishnah said that inside the city it is prohibited to do business) it is (always) prohibited, (even when it is not the time of their festival.) Just because there is an idol in the city, is it prohibited to enter?

Answer (Reish Lakish): The Mishnah is referring to the time of the fair.

Question: Why is inside prohibited and outside permitted?

Answer: Inside it, the idol worship benefits from the taxes, outside it they do not. And if the outside benefits from the taxes, it is prohibited even outside.

Beraisa: One may go to the fair and buy slaves, slave women and animals.

(Reish Lakish): Not only if he is buying a Jewish slave from an idolater, but even if he is buying a gentile slave, it is permitted, as he brings them close to their Creator.

Question (Beraisa): If he bought there a garment, he must burn it; if he bought an animal, he must injure it below the knee that it cannot work for him; if he had money, he must throw it into the Dead Sea...

Garments and merchandise are understandable (so that he does not cause the idolater to make money); similarly money, he is penalized for doing business there;

But as for animals, doesn't a Beraisa teach that it is permitted to go there and buy slaves, slave women and animals?

Conclusion of question: And Raish Lakish said that not only may one buy Jewish slaves, but even gentile slaves, since he brings them closer to their Creator...?

Answer: The prohibition in the first Beraisa is for a Jew to buy a Jewish slave in order to sell him on for profit.

Question (Beraisa): If a person sells his slave at a fair, the money is prohibited...?

Answer: This also refers to when he sold it to a Jew (but to sell to an idolater, even without a fair is prohibited).

If a Jew is on the way to the fair (of idolatry, in order to sell there his wares), other Jews may buy them from him, as by buying them, it is as if they are merely stopping those items from causing sin if he would sell them to the idolaters. But if he is returning from the fair, they may not buy from him because the money in his possession is from idolatry. If the sellers are gentiles, whether they are going or coming back, it is permitted.

(R. Ba son of R. Chiya bar Ba citing R. Yochanan): If the seller is a gentile innkeeper, it is permitted.

Question (R. Zeira): If it is prohibited to buy from the fair, why is permitted to buy from an innkeeper?

Answer: Perhaps R. Yochanan was referring to when the priests take taxes from sales made in the market of the fair, but not from sales in an inn.

(R. Ba son of R. Chiya bar Ba citing R. Yochanan): When R. Yochanan permitted buying from an innkeeper, it was because the priests do not take taxes from them. (This supports the above answer.)

(R. Abahu citing R. Yochanan): If an idolater exchanged his animal for his friend's idol, that animal is prohibited to a Jew.

Question (Rav Chisda): If he would have bowed down to it, he would not have prohibited it, so why does he prohibit it if he exchanged it?

Answer: Perhaps R. Yochanan was only referring to them exchanging it on the day of their festival.

(R. Zeira citing R. Abahu in the name of R. Yochanan): An exchange prohibits on the day of their festival. (This supports the answer above.)

(R. Abahu): It is prohibited to go to the fair in a group to buy there, as it shows honor to the idol when many people go there, as the Beraisa teaches...

(Beraisa): One should not greet an idolater on the day of his festival if in a place that will give importance to the idol. However, if he happened to meet the idolater, he may greet him in a serious tone.

R. Chiya bar Vava sent someone on his behalf to buy a shoe from the fair in Tzur (made to honor the idol).

(R. Yaakov bar Acha to R. Chiya): Do you buy from that fair?

(R. Chiya to R. Yaakov): Haven't you ever bought a loaf of bread from there?

(R. Yaakov): That is no proof, as R. Yochanan said that they did not prohibit buying bread there since it is basic sustenance.

Question (R. Shimon ben Yochanan to R. Shimon ben Yehutzedek): Do you know whether the fair in Tzur is (for idolatry and) prohibited, or (income for the government and) permitted?

Response (R. Shimon ben Yehutzedek): If you give a messenger two litra of peppers as payment to travel there, I will clarify it.

The messenger went there and found that at the entrance to the fair was written, 'I, King Diklatianus, ordered the establishment of a fair in Tzur, in order to serve for eight days the constellation in which my brother Arkalis was born.'

Question (R. Yitzchak bar Nachman to R. Chaninah): What is the status of the fair in Gaza?

(R. Chaninah): Did you ever go to Tzur and see a Jew and an idolater that share a pot and the Jew is not concerned that the idolater might do something to prohibit it for him (because of food cooked by a idolater)?

He asked him one thing (about the fair in Gaza) and R. Chaninah answered him with a different subject of food cooked by an idolater)! Rather, since R. Chaninah would never teach over something that he had not heard from his teachers, this is why he answered in this way.

(R. Yosi bei R. Bun/ Aba bar Bar Chanah citing R. Yochanan): They only prohibited a fair that is for idolatry such as the fair of Butnah.

Support (Beraisa): There are three fairs, in Gaza, in Acco and in Butnah and the fair in Butnah is the one that is most clearly for idolatry.

The Mishnah (daf 12-1 (c)) asked - is it permitted to go to the city (on the day of a fair, if one's intention is merely to speak to someone there)? (The Mishnah answered that when the approach road is specifically for that city, it is prohibited; if it is road that also leads to other places, it is permitted.)

However, a guest to the city is prohibited to take that road. An inhabitant of the city is permitted to return to his home via that road (as it does not appear that he is going for idolatry). A caravan of travellers is permitted, as it is the way of caravans to travel to any place.