Moed Katan 3b — the Talmud in English

When Rav Dimi came

from the Land of Israel to Babylonia,

he said:

I heard in the Land of Israel the words of the questioner:

Perhaps one is flogged

for working the land during the Sabbatical Year even

for the

additional period.

And he brought a proof for it,

and he returned and brought

a teaching,

a derivation from the written text,

to exempt

so that one is not liable to lashes for the additional period.

Rav Dimi added:

But I do not know,

I do not know

what

the teaching

is—the derivation that exempts—

and what “additional period”

means, and which additional period the discussion concerns.

The Gemara, the Talmudic discussion of the Mishna, presents two different explanations of what the question was concerning lashes for the “additional period,” and what the derivation from the written text is that exempts:

Rabbi Elazar said:

This “additional period” means

plowing

during the Sabbatical Year. It is called “additional” because it is not stated explicitly in the Torah; rather, it is derived by means of the principle of a generalization, specification, and generalization.

And this is what he said,

this is what the questioner in the Land of Israel said:

Perhaps one is flogged for plowing

during the Sabbatical Year, since

it is derived

that plowing

from

the derivation of

“a generalization, specification, and generalization.”

And he brought

and returned and brought

the teaching for it,

the derivation mentioned above [on the previous page],

to exempt.

Only pruning and harvesting are punishable, but plowing is not.

And this is the derivation mentioned above:

If so,

that one is flogged for every derivative activity—

all these specific activities,

namely sowing, pruning, harvesting, and gathering grapes, are prohibited—

why is it necessary

to write and specify them?

Rather, from here you learn that the verse came to exclude the other derivative activities and exempt them.

And

if

Rabbi Yohanan said:

This “additional period” means

the days that the Sages added

to the prohibition

before Rosh HaShana

of the Sabbatical Year.

And this is what

the questioner in the Land of Israel

said: Perhaps one is flogged for

working during the

additional period

of the Sabbatical Year during the days before

Rosh HaShana,

since

it is derived

that it is learned

from

“You shall desist from plowing and harvesting.”

And he brought a teaching to exempt it, as we will say below.

The additional period was nullified, since it is derived by means of an identical-expression derivation from Shabbat that there is no need to add time before it.

And we raised a question about this:

What are the

“days before Rosh HaShana”?

And we explain:

As we learned

at the beginning of tractate Sheviit:

Until when may one plow an orchard

on

the eve of the Sabbatical Year?

Beit Shammai say: For as long as

plowing

benefits the fruit

of the sixth year. Plowing benefits fruit that grew during the sixth year, and this time is close to the festival of Shavuot. But afterward it is prohibited to plow, because the plowing prepares the ground for growth during the Sabbatical Year and is considered as improving produce of the Sabbatical Year.

And Beit Hillel say:

One may plow

until Atzeret,

until the festival of Shavuot; and they are somewhat more lenient than Beit Shammai.

And these words are close to being like those words,

And the words of these authorities are close to the words of those authorities, since Beit Shammai were more stringent than Beit Hillel only during the brief period before the festival of Shavuot.

And until when may one plow a grain field,

a field of grain,

on the eve of the Sabbatical Year?

Until the moisture has dissipated.

Until the moisture in the ground from the rains of the sixth year has dissipated. For plowing benefits sowing for that same year [the sixth year] only while the rains last.

And

that is,

for as long as people plow

in order

to plant fields of cucumbers and gourds,

which require extra moisture so that they will ripen before the Sabbatical Year. Even if he does not intend to sow them, an observer says that he is plowing in order to plant cucumbers, and it does not appear that he is improving his field for the Sabbatical Year.

But afterward it is prohibited, because it appears that he is plowing for the sake of the Sabbatical Year.

Rabbi Shimon

disagrees, and

says: If so,

if the matter depends on the time when people plow in order to plant fields of cucumbers,

the Torah has given a measure

for the period during which plowing is permitted

to each individual according to his own circumstances.

For not everyone plows for cucumbers at the same time, with the result that one person would be permitted to plow at a time when another person would already be prohibited from plowing.

But the Torah does not give its words a measure that varies for each individual.

Rather,

there is a fixed time even

for a grain field,

and it is

until Passover.

Since he wishes to sow it after plowing and requires considerable moisture, he may not plow after Passover, because the ground is generally lacking moisture then, and observers will think that he is not plowing now for sowing, but for the sake of the Sabbatical Year.

And in an orchard,

one that was planted previously, one may plow

until Atzeret.

An orchard does not require moist soil; the purpose of plowing is to enable water to penetrate deeply, and this is needed for the sixth year.

We therefore learn that the “days before Rosh HaShana” are from Passover onward in a grain field, and from Atzeret onward in an orchard.

And Rabbi Shimon ben Pazi said that Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi said in the name of bar Kappara: Rabban Gamliel and his court deliberated concerning these two periods

of Passover for a grain field and Atzeret for an orchard,

and nullified them,

permitting plowing until Rosh HaShana.

The dispute concerning a grain field parallels the dispute between Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel concerning an orchard. The first tanna—the first sage cited anonymously in the source—who said, “until the moisture has dissipated,” follows Beit Shammai, since the time depends on when plowing benefits the fruit. Rabbi Shimon follows Beit Hillel, who established a fixed time for this season.

Rabbi Zeira said to Rabbi Abbahu—and some say that Reish Lakish said to Rabbi Yohanan: Rabban Gamliel and his court

how could they annul the enactment [

not to plow from Passover and Atzeret onward]

of Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel!?

But we learned: A court cannot annul the words of another court unless

it is

greater than it in wisdom and in number.

He was astonished;

Rabbi Abbahu remained silent and considered

for about an hour

what he would answer Rabbi Zeira’s question.

And afterward

he said to him: Say that this is what Shammai and Hillel stipulated

between

themselves

at the time of the enactment:

Anyone who wishes to annul

the enactment concerning the additional period before the Sabbatical Year

may come and annul it!

And we challenge this: Was the additional period of the Sabbatical Year

their enactment,

so that they could stipulate that it might be annulled?

After all, the prohibition against working the land during the additional period

is a law given to Moses at Sinai,

and it is impossible to stipulate that it could be annulled!

For

after all,

Rabbi Asi said that Rabbi Yohanan said in the name of Rabbi Neḥunya, a man of the valley of Beit Ḥortan:

The source of three laws was asked about in the house of study, and it was answered that they are laws given to Moses at Sinai. And these are they:

“Ten saplings,”

there is a special permission to plow an orchard containing ten young trees until Rosh HaShana [whereas an ordinary orchard may not be plowed until Rosh HaShana, because of the law of the additional period of the Sabbatical Year].

This special permission results from the need to tend to the saplings regularly; without it, they would dry out and die.

But not every field of young trees may be plowed. It is permitted only if it contains ten saplings in an area of a beit se’a [fifty by fifty cubits], distributed evenly throughout the area in length and width.

“Willow,”

the mitzva of circling the altar with a willow branch [as opposed to the willow branch used with the lulav, which is explicitly stated in the Torah].

And

“the water libation,”

the water libation that is performed together with the daily morning offering during the days of the festival of Sukkot.

All three of these are not laws explicitly stated in the Torah; rather,

they are laws given to Moses at Sinai.

The Gemara now assumes that the law given to Moses at Sinai prohibited plowing mature trees but permitted plowing young saplings.

If so, it is proven that the additional period of the Sabbatical Year is not a new enactment instituted by the Sages. Rather, it is a law given to Moses at Sinai, and by virtue of it work was prohibited before the Sabbatical Year. The difficulty therefore remains: How could Rabban Gamliel and his court annul this prohibition?

And we answer:

Rabbi Yitzḥak said: When the law was transmitted

to Moses at Sinai—that one must add time to the Sabbatical Year and that an ordinary orchard may not be plowed until Rosh HaShana—this meant only that one may not plow

during the thirty days before Rosh HaShana.

But before then, plowing is permitted by Torah law.

And these,

Hillel and Shammai,

enacted

a prohibition against plowing beginning

from Passover

in a grain field

and

beginning

from Atzeret

in an orchard.

And they stipulated,

and stipulated only

in

the enactment

that was theirs,

that

anyone who wishes to annul

—

may come and annul it.

When Rabban Gamliel annulled it, the prohibition against plowing during the thirty days before Rosh HaShana, which derives from the law given to Moses at Sinai, still remained.

And we challenge this:

But

is

this thirty-day period before Rosh HaShana from

the

law

given to Moses at Sinai?

Are they

learned from it?

After all,

they are derived from verses!

As it is taught in a beraita, a tannaitic source not included in the Mishna: [Exodus 34:]

Exodus 34] “

“You shall desist from plowing and harvesting.”

This verse begins by discussing Shabbat: “Six days you shall work, but on the seventh day you shall desist.” But the end of the verse, “You shall desist from plowing and harvesting,” the Gemara interprets as referring to the Sabbatical Year.

For if it does not refer to Shabbat, since all forms of labor are prohibited on Shabbat and not only harvesting and plowing, then apply it to the Sabbatical Year.

Rabbi Akiva says: It is not necessary

to use this verse to

teach

the prohibition against

plowing and harvesting during

the

Sabbatical Year.

For it is already stated

concerning the Sabbatical Year: [Leviticus 25:]

“You shall not sow your field, and you shall not prune your vineyard.”

Rather,

the verse “You shall desist from plowing and harvesting” comes to prohibit

plowing on the eve of the Sabbatical Year.