Q&A: Questions on Tractate Shabbat
Questions on Tractate Shabbat
Question
Hello Rabbi,
If I remember correctly, you once told me that you taught classes on the chapter “All Sacred Writings” in Tractate Shabbat, and I’m currently learning the Mishnah of Shabbat, so I have a few questions about the chapter:
1. Extinguishing is rabbinic according to the view that a labor not needed for its own sake is only rabbinically prohibited, so I don’t understand what the great concern was because of which they enacted decrees lest one extinguish, since a person is anxious about his property, if the prohibition is only rabbinic and not Torah-level.
2. I don’t understand—someone’s house is burning down on the Sabbath, and they start discussing whether he may always save food for three meals or whether it depends on how many meals of the Sabbath he still has left, and how many garments, etc. Is that really what would interest someone whose house is burning down? First of all, he would probably try to save valuable expensive items—(is there a problem of muktzeh in such a situation?). Second, how can he be thinking now about food when his house is burning down, and besides, surely one of the neighbors would agree to host him for the Sabbath—after all, he has to sleep somewhere anyway. So I don’t understand all the focus in several mishnayot around saving food items.
3. In the last chapter of the tractate it says that if someone is walking outside the boundary and the Sabbath begins, he may give his wallet to a non-Jew to carry for him, because there is a presumption that a person cannot stand by while losing his money, and if we do not permit this he himself will carry the wallet. But here it says that in principle they forbade him to save things lest, because he is anxious about his property, he come to extinguish; yet they permitted him several leniencies, like food for three meals and 18 garments. Are all those leniencies also because they were concerned that if they did not permit them, since a person cannot stand by while losing his money, he would save things and extinguish, and therefore they permitted him to save a little? Or is it for a different reason? And if so, what is the distinction between the two situations?
4. There is a dispute between the first tanna and Ben Beteira whether one may save into an alleyway that is not open through both ends, or even into one that is open through both ends. In the explanation to the Mishnah it says that an alleyway open through both ends but enclosed on three sides has a side-post, whereas the open one also has three sides and no side-post. But I always thought that “open through both ends” meant completely open, with only two sides. So what exactly are the correct definitions?
5. It says in the Mishnah: “If they were clever, they make an accounting with him after the Sabbath.” And it says in the explanation from the Talmud that this refers to God-fearing rescuers who do not want to benefit from others, and since they know that the homeowner did not willingly renounce ownership of what they saved, they return everything to him; but they also do not want their effort to be for nothing, and the Mishnah comes to teach that this is not considered Sabbath wages, etc., and therefore it is permitted. But that sounds a bit contradictory to me: on the one hand they are presented as people who do not want to benefit from others, but on the other hand they do not want their effort to be for nothing, so they do take money from him? I would have expected them to do everything for free for the sake of Heaven, especially in such a catastrophic situation where the person’s house is burning down, which is a very great disaster. So who thinks about taking money from him—and all the more so if he is considered God-fearing?
Thank you very much
Answer
I even wrote a book on this chapter (which in the end was never published).
1. The work Kovetz on Maimonides asks this, and cites Pnei Yehoshua (I think Bava Kamma 35), who argues that a labor not needed for its own sake is a Torah prohibition, except that one is not punished for it with stoning or a sin-offering. Of course, according to the other views, the difficulty remains. Still, one could argue that a labor not needed for its own sake is more severe than an ordinary rabbinic prohibition, though it would still be a decree upon a decree. But even regarding this there is a dispute (if I remember correctly, between Maimonides and RiD) whether they do not make decrees for ordinary rabbinic prohibitions, or only not for decrees.
2. I didn’t understand the question. What difference does it make what interests him or doesn’t interest him? The Talmud discusses what is permitted and what is forbidden. If someone isn’t interested in pork, does that mean he may eat pork? And if someone is hosting him, then perhaps indeed it would be forbidden for him to save anything. What exactly is the difficulty?
Still, there is something like this reasoning in Tosafot on Shabbat 3a (regarding removing bread from the oven): they do not enact a decree in a case where a person certainly will not listen to us (not to remove the bread, and then the person who stuck it in the oven would incur the death penalty). This—together with question 1—makes me suspect that perhaps all this is basically declarative Jewish law, without a real expectation that people will actually abide by it. At most, a person would extinguish in an unusual manner.
Moreover, one could ask differently: according to many opinions, one may violate rabbinic prohibitions in a case of major financial loss. If so, the prohibition of extinguishing and the decree not to save lest one extinguish are both rabbinic prohibitions. So why can’t one violate this prohibition itself where there is major loss? But of course that is a clever question, because this itself is what was forbidden here, so here it is clear that it is not overridden by financial loss.
3. As I recall, the commentators ask this too. But it is not similar. At the beginning of the chapter “One Who Became Overtaken by Night,” the reasoning is that when a person is under pressure, that will lead him to commit prohibitions, and therefore they permit him a lighter prohibition so that he not violate a more severe one. Here the situation is different. The concern is that if we permit him to save things, in the course of that activity he may come to extinguish out of panic, not noticing the Sabbath—not that he will deliberately violate it because he wants to save the house as such. In addition, extinguishing is a public action that everyone sees, and a person will not commit a transgression in front of everyone. That is not so with carrying a wallet.
4. On Talmud 117a they ask exactly this, and the amoraim dispute it. But in practical Jewish law, the definition of “open through both ends” here is different from its definition in Eruvin.
5. The people worked for him, and they are paid for their labor. Does a plumber who saves you from trouble not charge money? Their God-fearing quality is that they do not take the food itself from him, because he did not truly renounce ownership of it wholeheartedly.
Moreover, we are not talking about saints, but about people who obey Jewish law. They do not want to benefit from theft, but they do want to be paid for their work.
But beyond all that, the Talmud is discussing a principled question and determines that they have the right to receive payment for their labor, and this is not considered Sabbath wages. If they decide to forgo it, they are blessed. The discussion here is principled—what their rights are. It has nothing to do with the question of what would be recommended for them to do in practice.