People are often left with items that they find and nobody comes to claim. What should be done with these items?
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Yoni walked along the gravel path of his bungalow colony early in the morning. Lying alongside the path was a blue plastic bag, damp from the dew of the night.
"Here's a chance for hashavas aveidah," Yoni thought. He picked up the bag and found inside a well-used leather-bound siddur, a bathing suit, and a towel.
Yoni opened the siddur, hoping to find a name, and saw a handwritten inscription: "Dear Eli, Mazal Tov on the occasion of your bar-mitzvah. We hope you will use this siddur well and that all your prayers will be answered. With lots of love, Bubby and Zayde."
Yoni checked the bathing suit, and saw "Eli G." written on the tag. He racked his brains, "Who is Eli G.?" He couldn't think of anyone in the bungalow colony by that name.
"Do you know who 'Eli G.' might be here?" Yoni asked his mother when he came home.
"Goldberg... Green... Ganz... None of then have an Eli," she replied. "Why do you ask?"
"I found a bag this morning containing a siddur, bathing suit and towel, with 'Eli G.' written on the bathing suit," Yoni explained. "I'd like to return it, but don't know to whom."
"Make signs with your name and number on it," she told him, "and put them up in public places like the shul, the pool, and the bulletin board near the grocery store"
Yoni printed out signs, saying: "Found: Bag with siddur, bathing suit and towel. To claim, please call Yoni at 516-567-5788 with identifying features." He hung the signs in the shul, grocery store and pool.
Shabbos passed, and nobody called for the bag. Another week passed, and still no one called. Yoni checked that the signs were still posted. The bungalow was emptying, and his family was going back to the city in two days.
Yoni was sitting with his friends one afternoon. "I don't know what I'm going to do with that bag I found," he said.
"If no one claimed it yet, just keep it," one of his friends said.
"You can't take it," another one argued. "It's a lost item, and you have to hold it until the owner comes."
"Maybe donate it to charity," a third friend suggested.
When Yoni came home, he asked his father, "What should I do with that bag I found? Most people already left, and it's not likely that anyone will claim it anymore."
"The Gemara (Ta'anis 25a) relates that R. Chanina b. Dosa's wife found some hens," Yoni's father said. "He raised them and tended to them until the owner came back long afterwards. I don't think he was required to do so, though. The best thing to do is to speak with Rabbi Tzedek." He pulled out his Blackberry and gave Yoni the number.
Yoni called Rabbi Tzedek and asked: "I found a bag with an inscribed siddur, a bathing suit and a towel two weeks ago. I put up proper notices, but nobody has come to claim it. What should I do with them?"
Rabbi Tzedek said: "You must hold on the inscribed siddur indefinitely. Regarding the bathing suit and towel, though, you should evaluate them and record all the relevant details in a special "found items" pad. Afterwards, you may use (or sell) them. If the owner ever comes to claim them - give him their value."
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Rabbi Tzedek then explained: "When a person finds an identifiable lost object, he is supposed to hold it securely until the owner comes to claim it. However, the Gemara indicates that when something is readily available and replaceable, the person who finds it may use it, and pay the owner its value when he comes. The Rambam seems to limit this leniency to mitzvah items, such as regular seforim, but the Shulchan Aruch does not seem to." (C.M. 267:21, SM"A 267:30)
Nowadays, most items are readily available, and the owner usually does not care about receiving his particular item, only its value. Furthermore, people often do not even bother to claim lost items. Therefore, current poskim write that it is possible to use an item that is not claimed if you will be able to return its value. To do so, you must keep a proper record of the lost item, its identifying features and value." (Chasam Sofer C.M. #122; Igros Moshe C.M. II:45.4)
"However, items that are not easily replaceable – e.g., works of art, artistic jewelry, antique seforim, or the siddur that has special semantic value – you cannot use or sell. It must be put away in a safe place until either the owner comes or Eliyahu Hanavi - whoever comes first!"