כיצד מעברין (how do they extend the city limits -for defining the Sabbath limit) – the language of a pregnant woman whose belly protrudes. And this is what he said, how does she have the extension of the city limits? If one house enters, and another house leaves, etc. And when he comes to put up a marker as a sign of the boundary of the city and he comes to measure two-thousand [cubits] outside it. But if hits wall was not part of it but rather the near-by houses and they were connected, and there is a house that enters into the city more than its neighbor, and its entrance appears defective, and there is house that protrudes and goes out side more than its neighbor.

או פגום נכנס פגום יוצא – there are towers protrude in the wall, sometimes they protrude inwards and sometimes outwards.

או שהיו שם – at one of the corners of the city.

גדודיות גבוהות (ruins/debris – ten handbreadths high) – broken parts of the wall of the destroyed homes, and there are within seventy cubits and remnants of the city.

או נפשות (structure next to or over a tomb) – a building that they make on the grave, and it has within them a dwelling house.

מוציאין את המדה כנגדן – if these protrusions are near the northeastern corner, we see as if there is another protrusion corresponding to it on the southwestern corner, and a chord is stretched from one to the other and measures from the chord and outward, in order that the [Sabbath] limit is equivalent to the two corners, and it won’t be long here and short there.

ועושין אותן – the [Sabbath] limits square, so that there should be two-thousand [cubits] to the sides like there is in the middle. But not round, so that there will be two-thousand [cubits] in the middle, and on the sides, they are reduced in the manner of something round.

נותנים קרפף לעיר (for measuring the Sabbath limits, we allow an area of seventy-square cubits outside the town added to the town – for the purpose of the Sabbath limits) – all who come to measure the [Sabbath] limits leaves to the city/town the air-space of seventy cubits and left-overs, which are seventy cubits and two-thirds of a cubit, and from there, he begins to measure two-thousand cubits, as it states (Numbers 35:4): “[The town pasture that you are to assign to the Levites] shall extend a thousand cubits outside the town wall all around,” the Torah stated that one should give outside [the wall] and afterwards measure, meaning to say, give it an area of seventy-square cubits and remnants outside the town added to the town and afterwards measure from there and beyond/further.

לא אמרו קרפף אלא בין שתי עיירות – two towns that are adjacent/near each other, they given seventy cubits and left-overs to each one in order to attach/combine them through these enclosures to become like one city, and a person who comes to walk from one of them [through] its neighbor measures for himself two-thousand cubits from outside its neighbor, because since both of them are like one town/city through these enclosures that connect between them. And the Halakha is according to the Sages, for we don’t place an enclosure for one town/city, but rather only between two towns/cities.

וכן שלשה כפרים משולשים – on actually a triangle, but the third stands from afar corresponding to between the outer ones (i.e., towns) , and everything, for whereas, the middle [town] enters between them and there isn’t anything between this one and that one other than one-hundred and forty one and one-third cubits , which are seventy cubits and two-thirds [of a cubit] to this one, and seventy and two-thirds [of a cubit] to that one, and similarly, to the side of the other outer city/town. There is nothing between the middle one (i.e., town/city) and it other than one-hundred and forty-one cubits and one-third [of a cubit], all three of them (i.e., the towns/cities) are thought of as one [city/town]. But the person who leaves from one of them to to go through its neighbor counts from the wall of its outer neighbor. And how much should there be between the middle [city/town] to the outer [city/town]? Two-thousand cubits, for since the middle [town/city] is capable of going to the outer one and outer one to the middle one without an Eruv, we state that we see it as if the middle one is placed between them. But if it is further than two-thousand [cubits], we don’t say that we see it.

אין מודדין – two-thousand cubits of the Sabbath limit other than with a flax rope that is fifty cubits long.

לא פחות – that if the rope is short, it is greatly stretched and lengthens [one must say, the measurement].

ולא יותר – when it is too long, it becomes heavy, he doubles it at its middle and shortens it.

אלא כנגד לבו (at level with his heart) – The Sages established for him a place to put the head of the rope, every person level with his heart, for if this person would place it corresponding to his neck and the other corresponding to his feet, the rope would shorten and the [Sabbath] limits would grow shorter.

מבליעו (takes account only of the horizontal span/includes it) – if it is not fifty cubit wide from border to border from above, even though there is in its sloping going more than one-thousand, we don’t say that he should raise the measurement of his slope to the measurement of the [Sabbath] limit, but rather, this should stand on the border from here, and that should stand on its border from there and absorb (i.e., include) it from the slope with one rope.

וחוזר למדתו – for since it teaches, “continues his measuring” – implying that if its width that corresponded to the town/city was more than fifty [cubits] and he was not able to absorb it/include it there with the rope, and with one of its heads that does not correspond to the town/city, he can absorb it/include it there, and measure and go there from the border and beyond until it corresponds to the place where the the width of the valley ends sin it corresponding to he city/town, and he returns to his measurement corresponding to the town/city and completes the measurement of its [Sabbath] limits.

הגיע להר מבליעו – and this is so that the mountain/hill will not be standing upright a great deal, but rather slanting, for in the walking of five cubits from it, he will not raise it (i.e., the rope) other than ten handbreadths, if it is standing straight up until with at least of the distance of five cubits it is standing upright ten handbreadths, he doesn’t include it/absorb it, but rather, estimates it alone and goes on.

והוא שלא יצא חוץ לתחום – when he measurer goes to include the hill/mountain or the valley, he should not leave outside of the [Sabbath] limit to a a place where the tops of the valley are short – that he is able to absorb them there in order that he can return afterwards to his measurement corresponding to the town/city, as a decree, because a person who sees it measures it and goes there would say that the measurement of the [Sabbath] limit of the sides of the city/town come up to here.

בזו אמר רבי דוסתאי – with this, to exclude the city of refuge and the heifer whose neck is broken that is nearest to the space/cavity that they don’t estimate the level distance between two places separated by mountains (see Talmud Eruvin 58a-b – because they are from the Written Torah).

מקדרין – they perforate, they see as if they perforate them and measure the path of the perforation, to exclude the measurement of its sloping, as we stated in the Gemara (Tractate Eruvin 58b) that they measure it with a rope of four cubits and the bottom they place the rope corresponding to his heart and at the top corresponding to his feet, and similarly they measure it all four cubits by four cubits and they deduct the slope of all four cubits by half the height of a person. And the Halakha is according to Rabbi Dostai.

אין מודדין אלא מן המומחה – a person who is a specialist in measuring, and the Gaon explained that the word מומחה is the language from (Numbers 34:11): “and abut on the eastern [slopes] of the Sea of Chinnereth/Kinneret,” meaning to say that they intent to measure the bottom ab initio from the place that is level and straight, in order that they would not need to perforate.

ריבה למקום אחד ומיעט למקום אחר – that they found signs of this [Sabbath] limit long and protruding corresponding to the signs of the [Sabbath] limit in the corner that is opposite it.

שומעין למקום שריבה – and we remove the shorter measurement, that is corresponding it, because it did not initially stretch the rope all the way. And it is taught in the Tosefta [Eruvin 4:`6 – in the Lieberman edition – but it is in chapter 6 according to the Erfurt manuscript] that he must stretch it with all of his strength [and measure].

ריבה לאחד ומיעט לאחר – this is what he said: if there was a greater distance for one [expert] and a lesser distance for the other [expert], for the two people who measured were experts – this one had a greater distance and the other a lesser distance.

עיר של יחיד – as, for example that one person acquired it all and he rents out all of its houses to the people that are living there, and afterwards, it becomes the property of many.

מערבין את כולה – in the manner that they create a symbolic community of residence (i.e., an Eruv) when it belonged to a single individual that didn’t require a remnant.

אין מערבין את כולה – for it is forbidden to make an Eruv for a city/town belonging to many if he doesn’t leave known houses without an Eruv, for this remnant is a recognition that the reason is because of an Eruv, so that it would not forget the laws of the public domain. And this is the case, since it [belonged] to the group, and required a remnant even though that now it would be judged as that of an individual as at first.

אלא אם כן עשה חוצה לה – a remnant that was not made into a symbolic community of residence with the rest of the city/town, but it something remarkable that comes to teach us that even a remnant of something outside it has an effect on the rest of the city/town.

כעיר חדשה שביהודה – there was a city in Judah and its name was Hadasha, and there not there other than two temporary residents/inhabitants , and this is the smallest city/town that is in all of land of Judea and it was the remnant to a larger city that is adjacent to it, and this is measurement of the remnant that one needs to leave over in a city/own that they did not make into a symbolic community of residence (i.e., Eruv) with the others because of recognition.

רבי שמעון אומר שלש חצירות כו' – and the Halakhic decision is that even one house in one courtyard is a remnant. But a city that doesn’t have other than only one opening even if was of many [people], there is no need for remnant.

מי שהיה במזרח – in the field, and he sanctified for himself the [Sabbath] day and he was far from his Eruv more than two-thousand [cubits], for his Eruv is not an Eruv, since he is not able to walk and to carry, it would be for him a Sabbath camp in his house when his Eruv is not an Eruv.

בעיבורה של עיר (within the outskirts of the city) – in one of the houses that stands within seventy cubits and left-overs.

לא עשה ולא כלום – for without an Eruv also, he has from the city/town two-thousand cubits in every direction, and the entire city/town with its outskirts are considered to him as four cubits.

נתנו חוץ לתחום – outside of the outskirts of the city/town. And this is explained in the Gemara (Tractate Eruvin 60b).

מה שנשכר –[what he gains] in this direction, he loses in the direction that is opposite it. For he counts from the Eruv two-thousand [cubits] in every direction if it and if he placed [something] at the end of one-thousand [cubits] to the east, it is found that the two-thousand [cubits] of the east end at the conclusion of three-thousand [cubits] of the city and he has gained one-thousand, but the two-thousand [cubits] of the west end at the end of one-thousand [cubits] of the west of the city, and he lost one-thousand [cubits]. And this comes to tell us that the city does not count in the total of the two-thousand [cubits] of the west but rather all of it is like four cubits. And these words [apply] when the two-thousand [cubits] do not end from the Eruv to the side of the city/town, but rather, at the end of the city/town or outside of it, but if they end in the middle or the city or at whatever place within it, he cannot walk within the city/town other than up to the point where the two-thousand cubits of the Eruv end, and not further, as it is taught nearby (in the next Mishnah).

אנשי איש גדולה – that they (i.e., the residents of a large town) had a small town within the two-thousand [cubits] and they depart from their city and count and walk the path of the small [city/town] that is adjacent/nearby, they walk through all of the small town/city that is adjacent to them like four cubits and complete their measurement outside of it.

ואין אנשי עיר קטנה מהלכין את הגדולה – [the large town/city] in its entirety like four cubits, because the measurement of the [Sabbath] limits ended in the middle of the large city/town, therefore, the large city/town is not considered for them like four cubits and they don’t go there, but rather only until the end of their [Sabbath] limits.

כיצד מי שהיה מעיר גדולה – Our Mishnah is deficient and should be read as follows: The people of a large town/city walk through the entire small town/city but the people of a small town/city do not walk through all of the large city/town; in what case are these words said? When he measures two-thousand cubits. But, a person who places his Eruv within the city/town, whether the people of a large town/city placed it in a small town/city or whether the people of a small town/city placed it in a small town/city, they walk all the city/town that the Eruv is placed in it like four cubits. How so? He who was from a large city/town and placed his Eruv in a small town/city etc.

ור' עקיבא – disputes on the first Tanna/teacher and holds that the Eruv does not make the city/town in which it is placed like four cubits, and we don’t count two-thousand cubits other than from the place of the Eruv. But the Halakha is not according to Rabbi Akiva.

אימתי בזמן שאין בה דיורים – that their partitions were torn down and are not fit for inhabitants, for if it were fit for residents, even though there are none in it now, inhabitants are not considered everything like four cubits, and even if it is large like Antioch.

נמצא קל תוכה מעל גבה – for whereas the [Eruv] on top of the cave , if he placed there his Eruv, he does not have anything other than two-thousand cubits from the place of his Eruv, for on top of it is not fit for inhabitants, but inside , he walks throughout and outside of it two-thousand cubits.

ולמודד שאמרו – even though that the Sages dispute on Rabbi Akiva when placing his Eruv in the city/town to state that the entire city is to him like four cubits, they admit that someone who comes from the place of his Sabbath camp and his measurement of two-thousand cubits ended, even in a cave where there are inhabitants, that he doesn’t enter further from his measurement at all.