Halakhah sur L’Exode 22:9

Ralbag may, however, be understood as asserting that any natural act performed in common with lower animals does not constitute a form of labor provided that the act is final rather than instrumental in nature. Eating is clearly such an act. Capturing an animal, when carried out by a human being, is far different from capture of one animal by another. The animal consumes its prey immediately; a man does not. For man, the normal way for obtaining milk is by a process of manual milking, an act that is only preparatory to drinking the milk, as opposed to an act of suckling in which the purpose is achieved immediately.³²This understanding of Ralbag is reflected in a note by R. Ya’akov Leib Levy on Exodus 22:9 in the Mossad Harav Kook edition of Ralbag’s commentary on the Torah, Perushei ha-Torah le-Rabbenu Levi ben Gershom (Ralbag) (Jerusalem, 5755) edited by Rabbi Levy. It therefore stands to reason that activities yielding effects produced as a result of entirely usual human and animal function, e.g., locomotion and the giving off of body heat, and not designed for any further purpose should not be among activities forbidden on Shabbat.

The commandment on the court to judge the case of one who takes a wage and of a renter: To judge the case of one who takes a wage and a renter. And the understanding of one who takes a wage is someone who guards a deposited item for a wage they give to him for guarding [it]; and [of] a renter is like its simple meaning, that he rented an animal from his fellow to ride or to do work, or he rented movable objects from him. And [if a] disagreement arose between the renter and the owner or between the owner of the deposited item and the one guarding it for a wage, it is a commandment upon us to adjudicate between them, as it is written in this section (Exodus 22:9), "If a man gives to another a donkey, an ox, a sheep or any animal to guard, etc."