Sheviis 2:3 - 2:4

מסלקין – they remove the stones.

מקרסמין (trim trees) – like מכרסמין with a KAF (trimming) from the language of (Psalms 80:14): “Wild boars gnaw at it [and creatures of the field feed on it],” meaning to say, they sever and cut the dry branches from the tree.

מזרדין (trim, nip shoots off) – themoist branches when they are many, it is customary to cu them and leave some of them and that is trimming/cutting shoots off/thinning.

מפסלין (cut off dry dwigs/trim)- that he takes the refuse, and there are those who interpret [the word] מפסלין as the language of (Exodus 34:1): “Carve [two tablets of stone like the first,]” that they cut all the branches that are on the tree in order that they would become thick.

כזירודה וכפיסולה של חמישית וכו' – the first Tanna/teacher did not permit it other than until Rosh Hashanah of the Seventh Yeaer. But Rabbi Yehoshua held that the Fifth Year is like the Sixth [Year]; just as the Fifth Year enters into the Sixth [Year], so, the Sixth [Year] enters into the Seventh [Year], and just as they trim/nip shoos off of the Fifth [Year] in the Sixth [Year], so they trim/nip shoots off of the Sixth [Year] in the Seventh [Year]

ור' שמעון אומר – From Atzeret/Shavuot and onwards, working of (the Land0 is prohibited [the Tree] is prohibited also in trimming and cutting off dry twigs, and there are three disputes in the matter, and the Halakha is according to the first Tanna/teacher.

מזהמין את הנטיעות (smear plants with rancid oil for keeping off vermin – or – covring a wound in a tree with dung and tie it up) – when the husk/skin of a tree falls off, they attach there manure to heal it in order that the tree won’t die. And there are those who explain [the word] מזהמין – that they smear/anoint the trees with something that its odor is bad in order that the worms will be chased away from the odor or that they would die.

וכורכין – there are those who explain it that they wrap something around the tee in the summer because of the heat and in the winter because of the cold. And there are those who explain it that they wrap the branches one with the other and tie them above at their tops so that they will not be sink to the ground.

וקוטמין אותן (cover them with powder) – there are those who explain to put powder on their roots, and the Aramaic Targum/translation of אפר is ashes/powder. And there are those who explain that they break their heads, like (Sukkah 29b): “their heads are lopped off/broken.”

ועושים להם בתלים – it is customary to make for the tree a fence a cubit around it and they will it with dust. And there are those who explain that they make for it a Sukkah from above to protect it from the heat or from the cold.

על הנוף (on the boughs of the tree) – of the tree, but not upon the root so that he should not do in the Seventh Year in the manner that he does in the rest of the years. But the Halakha is not according to Rabbi Eliezer B’Rabbi Tzadok, but rather it is forbidden to water the tree in the Seventh Year, whether on the boughs or on the root.