Oholos 18:4 - 18:5

שדה בוכים – a place far from the cemetery that they place there the pier of the corpse and [people] gather there and weep.

לא ניטעת ולא נזרעת – in the first chapter of [Tractate] Moed Katan [5b] in the Gemara, it explains that because of the despair of the owners that came in contact with it, for since this is the situation, the owners despair from it and it is like he is in distress because many took possession/hold of it and it is forbidden to be upset over it. And specifically, when the owners became despaired that many took possession of it according to law. But if they did not despair, for now, it is not according to the law that they took possession of it, it is permissible to be upset over it.

ועפרה טהור – for we don’t presume defilement to it at all.

ועושים ממנו תנורים לקודש – which is not the case in the first two fields of crushed bones carried over from a ploughed area.

שבודקים לעושה פסח – it refers to a field that a grave was ploughed up. For if a person goes there, he needs to slaughter his Passover sacrifice, they examine it as it is explained in the concluding clause [of this Mishnah], but if there is not found there a bone the size of a barleycorn, he goes and makes his Passover sacrifice.

ואין בודקין לתרומה – that specifically for Passover that he relies upon this examination, because the defilement of a Bet HaPras/an area containing crushed bones carried over from a ploughed field which is Rabbinic. But the Sages did not stand by their words with regard to extirpation, for whomever does not offer the Passover sacrifice at the appropriate time is liable to extirpation. But regarding the heave-offering, that its consumption is not anything but a positive commandment, the Rabbis stood by their words in the place of a positive commandment and an examination is not effective to permit it for heave-offering.

ולנזיר – [and to a Nazirite] that went there.

בית שמאין אומרים בודקין – and if a bone the size of a barleycorn was not found there, he does not shave his head.

ובית הלל אומרים אין בודקין – that whether it (i.e., a bone the size of a barleycorn) is found or not found, he shaves his head and brings a sacrifice.

העפר שהוא יכול להסיטו – as for example, crushed, loose earth.

וממחה (and crumbles it) – make it very fine in his hand so that he can see if has a bone-fragment the size of a barley corn.

כיצד מטהרין בית הפרס – it (i.e., the Mishnah) refers to the first area of a square Pras declared unclean on account of crushed bones carried over it from a ploughed grave, which is a field in which a grave was ploughed.

נוטלין ממנו שלשה טפחים – like the measure of the depth of the plough that rolls/turns over the bones.

ר' שמעון אומר כו' – but the Halakha is not according to Rabbi Shimon.

הרוצף(if one paves) - the language of a floor of stones.

טהור – since he is not able to move them, for if he would walk on top of them and, and they would be moved, there is a concern regarding movement (even without actually coming into contact with it) of a human bone that is underneath them.

אף העוזק (even someone who beaks clods suspected of containing human bones – and levels it) – he who digs and casts away the stones, if he did this in all of the Bet HaPras/a square Pras declared unclean on account of crushed bones carried over it from a ploughed grave, it is pure. [The word] עוזק – is the language of (Isaiah 5:2): “He broke the ground, cleared it of stones.” But the Halakha is not according to Rabbi Shimon.