Bava Kamma 6: Categories Determine Damages - Where Does Each Case of Damages Fit?

Punishments are halachically determined for every crime.  And each crime fits into one of the primary categories of damage.  To ensure that the appropriate punishment is meted out, the rabbis must ensure that each crime is placed in its proper category.

Today's daf offers numerous examples of damages.  The rabbis question whether each case belongs to the category of Ox, Pit, Maveh, Fire, or Man.   For example, if someone's property is left on the road and another person trips over it, the owner is responsible for damages.  If a person kicks the property - let's say it's a vessel - and it hits someone, damaging him or her, the 'hit by a moving object' puts damages in a different category.  And if the vessel comes to a stop and then someone trips over it and becomes hurt, damages fall under the category of Pit because the item is considered to be ownerless.

Each category represents qualities that seem almost personified.  Pit incorporates items put into motion by a person, as a person digs a pit and is then responsible for any damages that pit might cause.  Items that are put into motion on their own, causing damage as they go are in the category of Fire.  It is the nature of fire to travel with the wind, lighting things along its way.  

We learn a some fascinating information about ancient plumbing through a case example.  People have permission to open their gutters and release their sewage and water into the public domain only in the rainy season.  Even so, a person who slips and falls on that sewage may turn to the person who opened his/her gutters for full damages.  In the summer months, it was not permitted to empty one's gutters at all.  The rabbis ask: is the sewage ownerless?  Does permission make a difference regarding damages?  My own questions are not legal but practical: where and how was the sewage stored?  How were people able to tolerate the stench of sitting sewage over the summer months?

We learn more examples, including a tree that has fallen in the public domain.  We learn that people are given thirty days to address these damages.  Who should be safekeeping?  What is involved in the safekeeping of different items?  

The Gemara moves forward to explore what is meant by "of the best of his field" and "of the best of his vineyard".  Don't we take teruma from "the best"?  What else do we know about "the best" part of one's field?  Our daf ends with a description of a Treasurer taking one hundred dinars of one's superior quality land if the person should have no money.  A creditor and a Treasurer should be treated similarly, even though we know that Creditors do not often collect from superior but from intermediate quality land.