712. Moving Things in an Opposite Domain

Shabbos 14:24

If an irrigation channel passes through a public domain and people commonly walk through it, then if it is less than ten handbreadths deep, it is considered a public domain whether it is four cubits wide (6’) or fewer than four handbreadths wide (1’), even though most people would jump over the latter rather than walk through so narrow a channel of water. Since it is not ten handbreadths deep, it is considered a public domain. If it is ten handbreadths deep (30”) or more, it is a carmelis just like other bodies of water. This only applies if the channel is four handbreadths wide because there is no such thing as a carmelis that is smaller than four handbreadths wide.

Shabbos 15:1

One who is standing in a public domain may move things that are in a private domain, and one who is standing in a private domain may move things that are in a public domain so long as he does not transfer them more than four cubits (about six feet). If he does transfer something beyond four cubits, he would not be liable because he is in a different domain. Similarly, one who stands in a private domain may use a key to open a door in a public domain and one who stands in a public domain may use a key to open a door in a private domain. One may force feed an animal whose head is inside its stall and the major portion of whose body is outside. One may not do so with a camel, which has a very long neck, unless both its head and the major portion of its body are within the camel’s stall. [This halacha takes for granted that one may force feed an animal at all. Further discussion of this topic is beyond our current scope.]