daf bit: Bava Batra 90

[cellio]

The rabbis consider hoarding of food (specifically fruit) to be in the same category as lending money on usury and reducing the size of one's measures (to cheat the buyer). Rab said that a person may store produce he grew himself (rather than buying); however, he may not hoard life's necessities (wine, oil, flour). Even so there is a limit; in Eretz Yisrael one may store produce for three years, to cover the current year, the sabbatical year to follow, and the year folowing that. And in years of famine one may not hoard even carob. (90b)

(If you have never eaten carob, let me just say that your theoretical understanding of the last sentence is limited. :-) )

Comments

[geekosaur]

Something like that. It's mentioned that the priests were not required to share their grain, and strongly implied that they were hoarding. (Although it's not explained how they were able to grow anything during the famine.)

FWIW, a number of commentaries I've read claim that Yosef's actions were in fact contrary to Torah, but with the specific goal of revealing Pharaoh and the priests as corrupt. ("The plural of anecdote is not data" warning: they're all of the liberal Jewish strain, and quite possibly all derived from a single source.)