Moed Katan 6 What is Permitted? Irrigation, Trapping Moles, and Destroying Anthills

We learn about three topics today.  First, the rabbis discuss gravesite markers such as stones marked with lime.  They consider whether or not fields have been ploughed, the edges of the field, the likelihood of unknown corpses in a field.  All of these considerations help us to determine whether or not we might contract ritual impurity through contact with that field.  

The second topic regards irrigation on intermediate Festival Days and during Sabbatical years.  Their overriding concern is to minimize any damage done to plants.  In particular, they are very concerned about the viability of young trees.  If irrigation might help avoid financial crisis after the intermediate days or after the Sabbatical year, the rabbis find ways to ensure that irrigation is permitted.

Finally, the rabbis take apart a Mishna regarding trapping animals on these special days/years.  They note that trapping moles and mice in orchards and/or fields of grain should be permitted.  However, some rabbis believe that this should be done in an unusual manner when practiced on special days.  I am very fond of this principal in Talmudic thought: the importance of doing things differently on Shabbat and other special days.  Difference in our actions represents our understanding that the days are different from regular weekdays.  Personally, I find this particular halacha very attractive and much more palatable than many other guidelines and laws regarding special days.  It digs down to the meaning of special days: thoughtfulness, conscious awareness of difference, presence in the moment.

One funny and helpful piece of advice was shared by Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel.  He teaches us how to destroy an ant colony - which is permitted on our special days.  We should trade earth from two ant hills and share them with each other.  The ants will then fight with each other and die.  Abaye further elucidates on anthill destruction.  He reminds us to choose anthills that are at a great distance from each other.  If those anthills are somehow connected to each other, the ants will recognize their long lost cousins and continue to thrive.