Tractate Shabbat, Chapter 1 – Lesson 20
This transcript was produced automatically using artificial intelligence. There may be inaccuracies in the transcribed content and in speaker identification.
🔗 Link to the original lecture
🔗 Link to the transcript on Sofer.AI
Table of Contents
- Reservations about the dichotomous distinction between a global perspective and a personal perspective
- The equivalence of the value of life and rare exceptions
- Organ transplants, brain death, and the gap in the value of life
- The distinction between a third party and one of the parties at risk
- A critique of “the morality of chivalry” and prioritizing women and children
- Framing the issue: a minor sin to prevent a major sin, oneself versus another
- Analysis of the Talmudic passage: placing bread in the oven, an unwitting sinner who later remembers, and liability for a sin-offering
- Building a “Shulchan Arukh” out of four situations: oneself/another and unwitting/deliberate
- The Shulchan Arukh and the precision of the phrase “even deliberately”
- A dispute among later authorities over the axis of decision: guilt versus outcome
- “Negligence,” the unwitting sinner as careless, and the distinction from a sick person as coerced
- The Mishnah Berurah’s approach to cooking: when there is no prohibition in removing it, there is no barrier
- Methodology: simple models, dialectics, and combining approaches
- The continuation of the series and preparation for Birkat Avraham
Summary
General Overview
The lecture takes the theoretical discussion from last time and applies it to the issue of “we do not tell a person to sin so that your fellow may benefit,” while qualifying the presentation of a strict dichotomy between a global perspective and a personal one. The limits of identifying with “the point of view of the Holy One, blessed be He” are presented through the laws of saving life, “your life takes precedence over your fellow’s life,” and Tosafot’s comments about a case of equivalence in which a person may not sacrifice himself. The lecture then examines the issue of removing bread from the oven on the Sabbath and whether a person may violate a minor prohibition in order to save himself or someone else from a more severe prohibition, while distinguishing between an unwitting and deliberate sinner and between saving oneself and saving others. A halakhic picture is then constructed from the Shulchan Arukh and its commentators around the axis of “guilt / negligence” versus the axis of “outcome.”
Reservations about the dichotomous distinction between a global perspective and a personal perspective
The lecturer says that from the point of view of the Holy One, blessed be He, a person is supposed to strive for the optimal picture of the state of the world, but in practice one cannot demand that a person erase himself and ignore the fact that he is one of the parties in the story. The Talmudic passage about two people walking in the desert is brought as proof that “your life takes precedence over your fellow’s life,” and most halakhic decisors imply not only that there is no obligation to hand over the water, but that it is even forbidden to do so. Tosafot in Yevamot 53 is brought in a case of falling onto another person, and the lecturer presents the reasoning that when the two possibilities are equivalent, one should not demand “excessive altruism” in the form of suicide in order to save another, just as one may not kill another in order to save oneself.
The equivalence of the value of life and rare exceptions
It is stated as the default that the value of human life is equal and infinite, and the Talmud explains this with the language, “Who says your blood is redder?” The lecturer notes that halakhic decisors discuss extreme situations in which there is an attempt to build a hierarchy of rescue priorities, but in most cases there is no clear criterion, and therefore the practical assumption is equivalence. The discussion of an old person versus a young person is presented as an example: even if, on the face of it, the younger person will fulfill more commandments and live more years, the tendency of the halakhic decisors is not to derive from that any permission to prefer one life over another to the point of killing or causing harm.
Organ transplants, brain death, and the gap in the value of life
The lecturer describes the ethical-halakhic dispute over the moment of death: brain death versus cardiac death, and the practical implication for taking a heart from someone defined as brain-dead while the heart is still beating. He argues that in the medical world an “academic fashion” has become entrenched that brain death is the moment of death because of the interest in organ transplantation, and he claims this is not a medical determination but an interested one. In his article on organ transplants he argues that even if one determines that cardiac death is decisive and the brain-dead person is still formally “alive,” it is permissible to take his heart in order to save another patient, because the life of the brain-dead person is worth “zero” relative to ordinary life, and in such an extreme case he is prepared to depart from the assumption of equality. He adds that from the religious side it is easier to say yes, because such a person is not conscious and cannot fulfill commandments, and that even if this is a formal halakhic consideration, he is also making a moral claim regarding the value of life. The question of an organ donor card also arises, and the lecturer says that the decision to donate organs when the person was still conscious gives him merit and reward, and that a person in such a state is “worse than an imbecile,” who is exempt from commandments.
The distinction between a third party and one of the parties at risk
The lecturer presents a distinction between a case in which he is a third party rescuing drowning people and a case in which he himself is one of the drowning people. He says that as a third party, where he has no personal connection, he would choose to save the younger person out of a perspective “like” the position of the Holy One, blessed be He; but when he himself is the older drowning person, he is not required to sacrifice himself for the younger one. He connects this to the claim that the demand for global thinking does not erase legitimate personal interest, and the question is how large the gap must be in order to justify self-sacrifice.
A critique of “the morality of chivalry” and prioritizing women and children
A remark is made about norms such as on the Titanic and the idea of giving women and children priority in rescue, and it is said that sometimes this has a practical rationale but also a cultural dimension of “chivalrous manners” and “the morality of helplessness.” The lecturer gives an anecdote from a conference at Tel Aviv University about Spinoza, with a story about Michael Harsegor getting up to offer his place to a woman, and the lecturer describes this critically as “secular nobility” and prefers an egalitarian attitude toward women without paternalism.
Framing the issue: a minor sin to prevent a major sin, oneself versus another
The lecturer defines the context: whether a person may deliberately commit a minor sin in order to save himself or another person from a major sin, from death, or from the expense of bringing a sin-offering. It is said that the question of “saving myself” is different from the question of “saving someone else,” and Tosafot is cited as a possible direction according to which, in order to save himself, a person would violate a minor prohibition, whereas Rashi may not accept such legitimacy. The issue is connected directly to the phrase “we do not tell a person to sin so that your fellow may benefit,” while the lecturer emphasizes that the discussion in Tosafot and in the straightforward reading of the Talmud is “sin versus sin,” and not mainly the money of the sacrifice or the punishment of stoning.
Analysis of the Talmudic passage: placing bread in the oven, an unwitting sinner who later remembers, and liability for a sin-offering
The lecturer reads the passage: Rav Bibi bar Abaye asks whether they permitted removing the bread before one comes to liability for a sin-offering, and Rav Acha clarifies the setup and establishes that the case is one of “he then remembered,” and then they ask, “Is he liable?” because “all those liable for sin-offerings are not liable unless their beginning was unwitting and their end was unwitting.” Two readings are presented of the Talmud’s question: one reading is that the question proves that in the case of an unwitting sinner who remembers, there is no permission to remove the bread, because there is nothing to save him from in terms of a sacrifice or stoning, and therefore one may not violate a rabbinic prohibition; the second reading is that the question is merely linguistic, about fitting Rav Bibi’s words to a case in which there is no liability for a sin-offering, while the law itself may still permit removal in order to prevent the prohibition itself. The lecturer concludes that, in his view, the Talmud itself does not absolutely compel one conclusion about the permissibility of removing the bread in the case of an unwitting sinner who remembers; the decision depends on whether the permission to remove it is meant to prevent the prohibition or to prevent the expense of a sacrifice.
Building a “Shulchan Arukh” out of four situations: oneself/another and unwitting/deliberate
The lecturer formulates four questions that a “Shulchan Arukh” would need to address: may a person sin in order to save himself, may one sin in order to save another, and in each of those cases what is the law for unwitting and deliberate conduct. He argues that the conclusion of the passage permits the person himself to remove the bread when he acted deliberately, so that he should not come to stoning, but the Talmud lacks an explicit law regarding “others” in a case where the one who placed the bread did so deliberately. Therefore there arises the possibility of learning by reasoning or by an a fortiori argument in opposite directions between the axis of “guilt” and the axis of “outcome.”
The Shulchan Arukh and the precision of the phrase “even deliberately”
The Shulchan Arukh is cited: “And if he placed it there on the Sabbath, even deliberately, he is permitted to remove it before it bakes, so that he not come to the prohibition of stoning.” The lecturer infers that the phrase “even deliberately” creates an axis of guilt on which a deliberate sinner is harder to permit, while an unwitting sinner is simpler. Based on this precision he argues that one can extend the rule to the other cases: a person himself is permitted to remove it both when unwitting and when deliberate, but others are forbidden to remove it for him. He presents the Mishnah Berurah, which emphasizes “even deliberately,” brings the initial thought of “feed the wicked and let him die,” and the conclusion that they nevertheless permitted it to him; and it explicitly rules that others are forbidden “whether he placed it deliberately or unwittingly.”
A dispute among later authorities over the axis of decision: guilt versus outcome
The lecturer cites the Atteret Tzvi, who writes “the same applies when unwitting,” and suggests that this reading reflects a balance between the axis of guilt and the axis of outcome. He cites the Magen Avraham in the name of the Maggid Mishneh, who argues that “unwitting is even more of a novelty,” because after he remembered there is no liability for a sin-offering, and nevertheless it is permitted to remove the bread so that he not come to a prohibition. He presents this as an outcome-oriented reading in which the severity of the outcome, or the saving of life / prevention of prohibition, is what determines the law. He then brings the Magen Avraham in the name of Rabbenu Yerucham, who says that “specifically he himself, but others are forbidden to remove it,” because “the prohibition was not done through him” and “his fellow too was negligent,” and the lecturer explains that the concept of “negligence” includes an unwitting sinner in the sense of carelessness, not coercion.
“Negligence,” the unwitting sinner as careless, and the distinction from a sick person as coerced
The lecturer emphasizes that in an unwitting act there is a dimension of carelessness, and therefore one can say “his fellow too was negligent,” unlike a sick person, who was not negligent at all; therefore in issues of saving life we do not calculate who will violate the prohibition. It is said that when a person himself created the situation through a transgression, Jewish law recognizes the question, “Why should I sin for your sake?” whereas when there is no negligence there is more room for a global consideration of preventing prohibition in the world.
The Mishnah Berurah’s approach to cooking: when there is no prohibition in removing it, there is no barrier
The Mishnah Berurah is cited as distinguishing between baking and cooking: in baking, there is a prohibition involved in removing the bread, and therefore others are forbidden to help, whether the act was deliberate or unwitting, because “we do not tell a person, commit a minor sin,” and because “his fellow was negligent.” In cooking, when removing the pot does not itself involve a prohibition, “another person too must remove it,” because “there is a commandment to separate someone from prohibition,” and the lecturer presents this as introducing a global dimension even within a view that limits it when the rescuer must pay the price of a transgression.
Methodology: simple models, dialectics, and combining approaches
The lecturer rejects the claim that mixing the two perspectives destroys the possibility of a model, and presents a dialectical move in which one examines simple models, discovers that they do not explain all the data, and then constructs a more complex model that combines them. He compares this to a scientific method of beginning with a “point-like donkey” for the sake of gradually understanding complexity, and argues that the combination of the global consideration of preventing transgressions with the limits created by personal identity and “negligence” is the key to understanding the issue.
The continuation of the series and preparation for Birkat Avraham
It is said that the discussion is not yet complete and will require another lecture, and that they will still get to Birkat Avraham and significant points there. A participant brings an example from the dispute over how to relate to a public Sabbath desecrator, between “feed the wicked and let him die” and “a child captured among the gentiles” and drawing the distant close, and the lecturer notes that this is a tension that will return later in different forms. At the end, the lecturer asks how far they got on the page and announces that he will continue the discussion, closing with the blessing: Sabbath peace.
Full Transcript
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay, let’s begin. So after last time I gave some kind of general introduction about how to look at this kind of dilemma and what basically lies in the background, today we’ll try to bring it down to earth. Meaning, to see how it works in our specific context. I just want to say—I’m still debating this, by the way—just one note: I’m debating whether maybe I should do another session on this. I need to see whether it’s worth doing another session on this matter of “we do not tell a person to sin,” because there are still a few interesting aspects there. I’ll let you know toward this coming Tuesday. In any case, before I get into the issue here, one more short completion regarding the previous lecture. In the previous lecture I spoke a bit about global perspectives and local perspectives, or what I called there spiritual solipsism. I want to make a few comments that slightly qualify that. The picture is of course not a dichotomous or one-dimensional one. When you look from the point of view of the Holy One, blessed be He, then basically somehow I’m supposed to erase myself completely from the picture. I’m supposed to judge it as if it’s not about me at all, or about someone else, but simply to look at the world and see what the optimal state is that can be achieved with respect to the world as a whole. But clearly you can’t demand of a person that he completely ignore the fact that he is not the Holy One, blessed be He—he is himself. And in that sense I brought that Talmudic passage about two people walking in the desert, I only mentioned it briefly, two people walking in the desert where in the end the Jewish law is ruled—this is Ben Petora and Rabbi Akiva—in the end Jewish law is ruled that your life takes precedence over your fellow’s life. Meaning, when they have one flask of water that can save one of them and the other will have to die of thirst, so I have one flask of water, the question is whether to give it to the other. The answer is no. Why not? In principle this is an equivalent situation: either he survives or I survive. One person survives. So in principle one might have said I’m not obligated to give it, but I can also give it, because from the point of view of the Holy One, blessed be He, it doesn’t matter whether he survives or I survive—one person survives. But it seems from most halakhic decisors that not only am I not obligated to give it, but I’m forbidden to give it. In a certain sense there really is some preference of myself over someone else, because with all due respect to the point of view of the Holy One, blessed be He, I am not the Holy One, blessed be He—I am me. And in a certain sense, even according to this global conception, we still do not completely ignore the fact that I am nevertheless one of the parties involved. We spoke about the contribution of this perspective also to the global view. I said that because of the various circles of belonging—if each person takes care of the circles closest to him—it may be that the general state that emerges will also be better. And therefore there isn’t here a complete erasure of my identification with myself. I’m not really supposed to take the position of the Holy One, blessed be He, and completely ignore the fact that it’s about me. Maybe another example of this, which we’re also supposed to get to on page 60: I mentioned this law that a person cannot kill someone else in order to save himself. If they threaten him with a gun and say to me, kill so-and-so or else we’ll kill you, then I’m supposed to die and not kill so-and-so. Why? Because who says my blood is redder than his? I’m not allowed to sacrifice him in order to save myself. It’s forbidden to kill someone else in order to save myself. Now Tosafot asks in Yevamot 53 what happens if, say, they throw me onto an infant from the second floor of a building, for the sake of the discussion? Or onto a person, it doesn’t matter, who’s standing below. Now let’s assume for the sake of discussion that if I fall down onto that person, he cushions my fall, I’m saved but he’s finished. Now while I’m in the air, I’m wondering whether I’m supposed to shift myself to the side and crash onto the sidewalk in order to save him, or whether I can just fall straight onto him, and then I kill him in order to save myself. Seemingly, here too, I’m not allowed to kill him in order to save myself, right? This is a case of be killed rather than transgress. So in such a case I should seemingly have had to shift myself aside. Tosafot writes, based on his own simple reasoning: not true. Why not? Because just as my blood is no redder than his, his blood is no redder than mine.
[Speaker C] That
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] means, in the end, if I shift myself aside, then I killed myself in order to save him. That’s not something that’s any more—it may sound more altruistic and noble—but from the point of view of the Holy One, blessed be He, why in the world would I do such a thing? I haven’t brought about a better state. I’ve brought about an equivalent state. He survives instead of me surviving. From the point of view of the Holy One, blessed be He, there is no difference. So therefore here, of course, Tosafot says I should simply fall straight down, and if he dies, then he dies. What can you do? I’m not supposed to kill myself in order to save him, just as I’m forbidden to kill him in order to save myself. In other words, one has to be careful not to go too far into excessive altruism. Because the point here is that we are not speaking from an altruistic point of view, of loving the other in some sense more than myself, but from the point of view of the Holy One, blessed be He. That is something else; it’s not exactly altruism. It’s a kind of global point of view that says: I’m looking at the state of the world as a whole. But of course, the fact that I am me—if I am not me then who am I at all, as was said. So the fact that I identify with one of the players on the board here cannot be completely ignored, and I am not required to kill myself in order to save him. Of course this is said in cases where there is equivalence. Meaning, if the two possibilities are equivalent—either he survives or I survive—then in a state of equivalence we say: don’t be a crazy altruist, kill yourself so that he survives, because that state is no better than the state in which he dies and you survive. So you’re not supposed to be excessively altruistic. You need to look at the global consideration.
[Speaker C] But Rabbi, the question is, what kind of equivalence is there here? Equivalent in what respect? In terms of kilos of flesh? Because in terms of commandments, in terms of deeds—two people.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Two people who will die, or
[Speaker B] it’s either this one or that one.
[Speaker C] What equivalence? And how do you measure that they’re equivalent, that they’re equal in the same way? If one is wicked and one is righteous, if one is a gentile and one is a Jew, what equivalence is there?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I mentioned this in the previous lecture. In principle the assumption is that the value of life of all human beings is equal. That’s what the Talmud says: who says your blood is redder, perhaps the blood of that man is redder. You cannot know whose blood is redder, and therefore the default is that the value of life is infinite. And when you have infinite values, you can’t compare one to another. They are all equal.
[Speaker C] In the value of life.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The halakhic decisors discuss very extreme or exceptional situations in which one can build some kind of hierarchy of the values of life, and in the previous lecture this issue was mentioned of priority in rescue according to how many commandments a person is obligated to fulfill, and so on. So yes, these things can come up from time to time.
[Speaker C] But like—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Practically speaking, there is no clear definition here, so the assumption is that the values of life are always equal. Right. That’s the starting point. Again, the overwhelming majority of halakhic decisors claim that it’s not even clear whether there is any situation in which we depart from that starting point. Meaning, say, an old person versus a young person. One might have said that the older person has only a few years left, while the younger person has many years left; he’ll keep more Sabbaths, yes, many more Sabbaths than the older person will keep. So am I allowed to kill an older person to save a younger one? Does a younger person take precedence in rescue over an older one? Not a simple question. The tendency of the halakhic decisors is no.
[Speaker C] Exactly, that’s why I was surprised—how can you say there’s equivalence? Like, how do we know they’re all equivalent in the same way? Because we don’t know.
[Speaker B] Because we don’t know. Because we don’t know.
[Speaker C] Because—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Because we don’t know—that’s exactly why the equivalence is created. If we had a criterion by which we could measure the value of lives, then there’d be no need to assume there is always equivalence; rather, each time we would have to decide whose life has greater value. On the contrary, your argument is exactly the reason why we assume there is equivalence.
[Speaker C] Like, from a—
[Speaker D] Theoretically, maybe one could describe a situation—sorry—in which someone’s value would clearly be greater, because maybe he has knowledge or the ability to save many people or something like that.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Definitely. In very extreme situations there are halakhic decisors who make exceptions, who take us out of this starting point, and even that is not agreed upon. For example, there are halakhic decisors who say that it is permissible to kill someone with only temporary life expectancy in order to save someone else for a full life. Or if
[Speaker B] there is
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] some event of a terrorist versus
[Speaker B] a victim, or
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] saving the lives of many people, for example, or all kinds of things of that sort. But that—or a person who is mortally compromised, to kill such a person in order to save the life of a healthy person. I, for example, wanted to argue in an article on organ transplantation that—as is accepted—what happens in certain situations raises the question of what’s called organ harvesting. What do I mean? A person dies brain death. The brain usually dies before the heart. So a person dies brain death; that is, the brain no longer functions. In the brain stem there’s still some residual life that activates the automatic—autonomic, sorry—muscles, but the brain is already dead. After a certain amount of time the heart also dies. Now the question is: what is the decisive moment with respect to death, both in Jewish law and in medical ethics? There are disputes about that. Some want to claim that brain death is the moment of death; some claim that cardiac death is the moment of death. What’s the practical difference? What happens if I want to take the heart of a person who has died brain death but whose heart is still beating—I want to take his heart in order to
[Speaker B] transplant it into a patient.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Then it’s murder. If I take his heart, he will obviously die, and I take it and transplant it into a patient, and then I save the patient’s life. Now, if brain death is the moment of death, then when I took his heart I took a heart from a dead person; I didn’t kill him. So that is permitted in order to save another person’s life. But if the moment of death is cardiac death, then in effect even after brain death he is still considered a living person, and if I take his heart and thereby kill him, then I have murdered a person who is considered alive. I’m not allowed to kill one person in order to save another. And therefore the halakhic decisors are divided on this—by the way, in medical ethics too there once was a dispute, but for some reason in these areas fashions are very, very strong, and today the fashion is that brain death is death, is the decisive moment. The reason for that fashion is simply that people want to transplant organs. Today there is technology to transplant organs, which there wasn’t fifty or a hundred years ago, and therefore fifty or a hundred years ago you could hear debates and there were positions in both directions. Today you won’t hear debates. All the doctors agree that the moment of brain death is the moment of death—which is of course complete nonsense—but because that is not a medical determination; it’s an interested determination. It has nothing to do with medicine. A doctor cannot determine such a thing.
[Speaker E] But doesn’t that mean that in such a condition the person will die anyway?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, he’ll die anyway, but in the meantime he’s alive. What do you mean? Every person will die in the end anyway, you know.
[Speaker E] No, you’re shortening his—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] his death, you’re shortening it.
[Speaker E] No, no, wait—beyond that logic—the person whose brain stem is no longer, who is brain-dead, brain death—clearly, clearly we know it’s only a matter of a few days until he dies, right?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] A few days, but a few days of life is life. What do you mean?
[Speaker C] Every day and every hour, a—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] A person suffering from a terminal illness, and we know that in a few months he’ll die—so then too is it permitted to kill him? No. Life is life. If the value is infinite, then one day of life is like ten years; there is no difference, it’s an infinite value.
[Speaker B] The question is where you put the red line; it’s not really different.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What?
[Speaker E] And sorry for the additional question—what—and how—suppose the heart stopped beating and that is death, but if it stopped beating, then I no longer have the possibility of transplanting it.
[Speaker B] Right,
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] that’s exactly the problem.
[Speaker B] Here you can see the interest: I want to save the other person at the expense of this person’s life.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] If it were possible to transplant the heart after cardiac death, there would be no dilemma; then I would wait and then transplant it. The whole dilemma is that you can’t—you have to take it while the heart is still beating. And at that stage, if the position is that cardiac death is death, then at that stage he is considered alive. You cannot take a heart from a living person because you are killing him, and you do not kill Reuven in order to save Shimon. Now I wrote in that article—and it’s a thesis that really stirred up a lot of argument, people didn’t agree with me, everyone I spoke to among the halakhic decisors in any case didn’t agree, though many ordinary people did agree—I argued that in fact this dispute is a dispute that doesn’t depend at all on determining the moment of death. That even if the moment of death is cardiac death, meaning the person who has died brain death is still considered alive, it is permissible to take his heart and transplant it into another person. Why?
[Speaker E] On that basis.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] His life—even if he is considered alive—is worth much less, in an extreme way, than the life of the ordinary life that I can save, of a person who will live a normal life. And in my view the gap in the values of life in such a case—there are people who define it outright as a state of death. So even someone who defines it as life—that’s a formal dispute—but even he agrees that the value of that life is worth nothing, because the proof is that there are those who define it outright as death. So even if formally you think that it’s not death, you have to admit that in terms of value, that life has dropped to a very, very low value.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So you begin to enter a situation—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] In such a case I argued that “your life takes precedence” no longer applies. Meaning, in such a case one can argue that the life of the one I am saving is worth more than the life of the one from whom I took the heart, because that life is worth nothing, and that is an extreme enough situation in which I am willing to depart from this starting point that lives are equal.
[Speaker B] Nice. But that’s only on the assumption—on the assumption that you’re relating only to the scientific side and not to the religious-spiritual side.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, no, no—why? Why? Religious-spiritual—we’re all the time—
[Speaker B] Because you’re shortening a life here in any case.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] On the religious side it’s even much easier, because on the religious side it’s clear that a person in such a condition cannot fulfill any commandment; he’s not conscious at all, not aware. So in terms of his halakhic value of life it’s literally zero. My claim was not only a halakhic claim but also a moral one. Meaning, I argue that formal definitions are all very nice for a legal world, but on the moral level, if there are intelligent, thoughtful, moral people who define such a person as dead, then even if I disagree with them on the formal level, it is not reasonable that the value of his life, in my eyes, should be significant. So I will define him formally as alive, but alive with a life-value of zero.
[Speaker D] A side question: he can’t fulfill commandments—could it count as a commandment if, say, he signed an organ donor card, agreed to donate his organs—would that be a commandment for him?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Even better, even better. Then obviously I need to help him realize the commandment that he wanted to fulfill. That’s what I’m doing. That certainly won’t stop me.
[Speaker D] Yes, no, I meant it as a side point—if the Rabbi thinks so, that it counts as a commandment. I personally think it does. Even the possibility of fulfilling commandments after death seems amazing to me.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, that’s already not really relevant. Here one could have argued that it would depend on the formal dispute. Because if he is a living person, then he is capable of fulfilling commandments. If he is a dead person, then a dead person does not fulfill commandments—“among the dead one is free,” as it says in Ecclesiastes, “the dead are free from commandments,” as the Talmud expounds. But I don’t think that is correct, because a person in such a condition is worse than an imbecile in terms of his state of awareness. And an imbecile too is exempt from commandments. So I also don’t think—it’s not a formal question. Will the Holy One, blessed be He, give him reward for that? I assume yes, because the decision to donate his organ was made when he was still alive and conscious. So for that he deserves whatever credit is due to him. The question whether formally this counts as a commandment or not—what difference does it make?
[Speaker D] It’s like placing the bread—he put the bread in when he was—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, right. A commandment that is completed after I finished what I had to do in the matter. So that’s one side. Now, what I want to show here is that these global considerations on the one hand really can lead us to all sorts of decisions. On the other hand, if the difference is not an extreme difference, but rather I’m young and he’s old or something like that, that’s not strong enough to permit it. The question is why. Because from a global perspective, what difference does it make? Any even tiny difference makes that state preferable to this state, and since in any case you need to decide which of the two states you want, really which of the two states of the world you will bring about, then bring about the state that’s a little better—why not? And here the solipsistic perspective enters. That’s what I said: the global perspective does not stand in a vacuum. Meaning, there is still significance to the fact that I am me. With all due respect, if the value of my life is, let’s say, seventy, and the value of the other person’s life is a hundred—fine, but I don’t want to donate my heart, because the seventy are my seventy and not somebody else’s. So Jewish law recognizes such a thing. Meaning, even if I look from a global perspective, Jewish law recognizes it. For example, if two people are drowning in a river, one old and one young, I would save the young one, assuming they both have the same chance of survival—because sometimes the young person can save himself and the old person can’t, and then that’s a different consideration—but let’s say both are in a situation where they can’t save themselves, I would save the young one. Why? Because I’m a third party. They are both in the river; I’m a third party. I have no greater connection to one than to the other, so here I really am in the position of the Holy One, blessed be He. But if I am one of the drowning people, then there I would not save the young one—I’m the older one—I would not save the young one and remain there to drown, and that is perfectly fine, and I’m not required to do that either, because I’m one of the sides. In other words, you cannot ignore it completely. The demand for global thinking or for thinking from the point of view of the Holy One, blessed be He, does not erase the individual dimension, my personal interest. I do not ignore the fact that this is still about me—no. Nor am I required to ignore it. So there are limits here, and proportionality, and the question is how large the gap has to be and what is required of me. The picture is not as simple as one might perhaps have understood from the previous lecture. That’s the qualification I wanted to add here.
[Speaker B] That goes against the whole gentleman idea. They let the ladies be saved. What? Again? On the Titanic explicitly. What? Again? I can’t hear. On the Titanic they showed how all the gentlemen let the ladies get into the lifeboats first. What, in the movie?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay.
[Speaker D] Not only that—it’s some kind of moral concept that was created in the Western world, that children and women are supposed to be prioritized in rescue.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Sometimes there is also a substantive side to it. Say, if women are physically weaker than men, or know how to swim less well, then there’s logic to preferring them. But obviously it also took on some direction that goes far beyond that practical consideration of survival chances. Like the prohibition on harming women and children in war. Men who are uninvolved—their blood is ownerless? But women and children must not be harmed. Fine—various chivalric manners.
[Speaker B] A morality of helplessness, like whoever is more helpless.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The morality of chivalry, of the knights of the round table, who run into battle for the honor of the lady. Fine, I’m not talking about that issue, with all due respect to all the ladies sitting here. It reminds me that once I was at a conference at Tel Aviv University many years ago already—I think it was some thirty years ago or something like that. There was a conference during Sukkot called “Spinoza, the First Secular Jew.” It was a fascinating conference because they spoke there really with admiration about Spinoza, and the secularists were looking for themselves a rabbi, in short, and they found that Spinoza was their rabbi. So the conference was really amusing. In any case, there was someone there, a historian named Michael Harsegor—he has since passed away—a well-known historian, and he spoke there, and he was very, very anti-religious, anyway, he spoke. Admired.
[Speaker E] What?
[Speaker C] He’s admired.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I didn’t understand.
[Speaker C] He’s admired—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Michael Harsegor.
[Speaker C] What? He’s admired. She means people admire him.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Ah, admired, okay. Fine, I don’t know. As a historian I don’t know him, but as a person it was horrifying to hear him. In any case, during all that I had an argument with him during the break there. I was a young student; I had an argument with him during the break there. While we were arguing, some young woman came—I just remembered this now because of those comments—it was at lunch. He got up from the table, gave this young woman his seat. He said, look, this is secular nobility or something like that. I told him, you know what, you’re right, I also think that this is secular nobility. The whole thing was so pathetic, some old-time charm—meaning, this sort of chivalrous manners toward women. I don’t know—women should get equal treatment, but they’re not, I don’t know what, soap bubbles. Meaning, they have a status, for better and for worse. Fine, in any case let’s get back to our topic. So I want to enter our issue. To begin with our issue, basically the context is whether I am allowed to commit a minor sin deliberately in order to save myself or someone else from a major sin, whether unwitting or deliberate, or to save him from stoning, or to save him from a sin-offering, or from the expense of bringing a sin-offering. We spoke about the question whether this is saving from a sin, saving from death, or saving from the expense of a sin-offering—a monetary expense, okay? Now here I’m speaking at the moment in the context of the sin.
[Speaker B] And why are you saying that in the same sentence? Like, whether in order to save myself or my fellow? Those are two completely different things. To save myself, I wouldn’t even go ask anyone—I would violate the minor prohibition.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] This is Tosafot’s view, at least, and I’m not sure it’s universally accepted. Rashi, for example, probably wouldn’t accept it. Not that he wouldn’t accept it factually; he wouldn’t accept that it’s legitimate. But never mind. The passage deals with both questions: both the question of whether I sin in order to save myself, and the question of whether I sin in order to save someone else. Right, so really in the background, when I’m talking right now about saving from sin, let’s now focus on that issue. When I talk about saving from sin, basically—and this is the discussion in the Talmud when it moves to “Do we tell a person: sin so that your fellow may benefit?”—because there we’re dealing with a case where the one who stuck it on did so unintentionally, okay? And then someone else, really, he doesn’t even know that he’s about to enter into a prohibition, and therefore the question is whether someone else may remove it for him. And about that the Talmud says that we do not tell a person, “Sin so that your fellow may benefit,” in this context. “So that your fellow may benefit” plainly means the sin, even though I said it could be the price of the sin-offering, but in Tosafot and in other places as well, you really see from the plain meaning of the Talmud that no, we’re talking about the sin itself. Because the fact is that when the Talmud says it, it says, “We do not tell a person: sin so that your fellow may benefit.” Meaning, “so that your fellow may benefit” means we’re talking here about my sin versus your sin. And that’s also what Tosafot assumes, and therefore Tosafot compares this to other passages where we also commit one sin in order to prevent other sins. Meaning, you can see that in Tosafot the discussion is about sin versus sin. The question is not the monetary cost of the sin-offering and not the punishment of stoning, but rather the question is sin versus sin. And that brings us into the issue of the global perspective versus the solipsistic perspective. Right? The question is whether I should make the overall spiritual calculation, and then seemingly I would expect that I should commit a minor sin so that the other person can avoid a major sin. And again, that’s not necessarily for the other person’s sake but for the sake of the Holy One, blessed be He. Meaning, all in all the state of the world will be better, because only a minor sin happened here and not a major one. On the other hand, of course there’s also the question of the price that I pay. It’s not only the question of what state I arrive at, but also what price I pay, and the fact that it’s my price. And we talked about that: after all, here I sin and someone else benefits by being saved from a prohibition. Doesn’t that carry weight? For example, if his prohibition would be equivalent to the prohibition that I would need to violate, then it’s pretty clear that I’m not supposed to violate it. Why? Not only am I not supposed to, but apparently it’s even forbidden for me. Why is it forbidden? After all, all told these are two equivalent situations: either he sins or I sin. Right, but I am me. As I said earlier, I do not ignore my own identity in this matter. Beyond the global perspective, I still don’t forget that I’m not the Holy One, blessed be He, but rather I’m one of the players on the field here. Okay? Another thing: there’s another difference here, namely that the minor sin that I commit is an intentional sin, whereas the sin that I spare the one who stuck it on is an unintentional sin. Now, a minor intentional sin versus a major unintentional sin—I don’t know how to measure that. Where is the state of the world, or of human beings, worse? Is a minor intentional sin lighter than a major unintentional one, or the reverse? I don’t know. Therefore the discussion here, although in the background there is this global perspective, still has other parameters that must be taken into account. First, I myself am a party to the matter, and therefore if it were equivalent, for example—even if it were equivalent—it would be forbidden for me to take that step, because first of all I need to take care of myself; your life takes precedence. Second, even if you take the global consideration, it’s not clear what the global consideration yields here, because the question is what the costs are and how to compare them. A minor intentional sin versus a major unintentional sin—so what exactly is the cost?
[Speaker B] What did the Sages accomplish with their enactment, so to speak? What did I gain? What did I save? Right, exactly.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Meaning, it could be that a minor intentional sin lowers the world more than a major unintentional sin. And so one can also discuss here whether there’s any spiritual gain at all, not only whether one looks from a consequentialist perspective, right? That all in all there’s spiritual gain. Even if I look from a consequentialist perspective, the question is still how to do the calculation. In the calculation of a minor intentional sin versus a major unintentional sin, is that equivalent or not? That too is a question that needs discussion. That’s why I say that the discussion in the previous class serves as background for the discussion here, but only partial background. Meaning, the discussion here has various additional parameters that have to be taken into account. Now, the first step I want to take is: let’s look for a moment at our passage and try to summarize the laws that emerge from it. As I asked you on the sheet, this is not trivial. Not trivial at all. Because I’m really asking the following questions: first, may I sin in order to save myself? Second, may I sin in order to save someone else? That’s the first question. The second question: in both of those cases, do we discuss them when the other person acted intentionally or unintentionally, or when I acted intentionally or unintentionally? Okay? There are really four laws here that I need to check from the Talmud: what does the Talmud say, what is the practical Jewish law. When I want to write a Shulchan Arukh after finishing the passage, I’d want to write a Shulchan Arukh structured like this: a person may remove the bread if he stuck it on intentionally in order to save himself from an intentional prohibition—for example, a prohibition punishable by stoning if done intentionally. That really is the conclusion of this passage. Second: what happens when I want to remove it in order to save myself from sticking it on unintentionally? Is that permitted or not? Now of course, if I’m still acting unintentionally and I haven’t remembered yet, then it’s a hypothetical question, because I don’t know I need to save myself, so the discussion doesn’t arise. But if I remembered after sticking it on, okay? The sticking was unintentional and I remembered afterward—that’s what the Talmud says. I remembered after sticking it on. And now I ask whether, at this point, I’m allowed to remove it so that I myself do not come to a prohibition that began unintentionally but now I can remove it because I’m aware of the situation. Is that permitted or forbidden? What comes out of the Talmud?
[Speaker B] Here it’s only being saved from the prohibition, because there’s no punishment really.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Not only is there no punishment, there’s also no sin-offering. Here there’s no financial cost, right? After all, here there’s also no financial cost, because I remembered. The moment I remembered, I’m no longer liable for a sin-offering either. So if I’m not liable for a sin-offering and not liable for stoning, then here it’s purely a question about the prohibition. One transgression versus another transgression. Exactly. And now the question is: what does the Talmud say? What do you say? Is it permitted for me or forbidden for me?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] From the Talmud not everything is clear. Regarding the unintentional case there is a dispute, and regarding the intentional case they don’t address it at all.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I didn’t understand. As for the intentional case, there is a clear law. In the intentional case it is forbidden. About himself—that is the conclusion of the passage. I’m asking what happens if the sticking was unintentional and then he remembered. Now he asks himself whether to remove it or not. Is he allowed to or forbidden to?
[Speaker B] It depends whom you follow. According to Rashi, no. Why? The transgression has already, so to speak, been done—basically it’s been done—so you won’t be undoing or saving anything here…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] You’re talking about the reasoning. I’m first asking what the Talmud says. If it says anything. Does the Talmud say something about this? Let’s extract this law from the Talmud.
[Speaker E] It says in general that… Rav Bibi bar Abaye said: if one stuck bread to the oven, they permitted him to remove it on the Sabbath before he comes to stoning, meaning…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, but now the Talmud starts discussing it—that’s a general statement. Now, what case are we talking about? Suppose he stuck it on intentionally—then there’s nothing to talk about. But from the give-and-take in the Talmud we can try to extract what the law would be when he stuck it on unintentionally. Let’s see. Right, so the Talmud says: “Returning to the matter itself: Rav Bibi bar Abaye asked: If one stuck bread to the oven, did they permit him to remove it before he comes to liability for a sin-offering, or did they not permit it? Rav Acha bar Abaye said to Ravina: What are the circumstances? If we say it was unintentionally and he did not remember—right?—what does ‘they permitted him’ mean?”
[Speaker C] If he…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] If he didn’t remember, then he isn’t deliberating whether to remove it or not, because he doesn’t know that he stuck it on. “Rather, is it not that he returned and remembered?” Right? But then the Talmud asks: “Is he liable? But didn’t we learn: all those liable for sin-offerings are not liable unless their beginning was in error and their end was in error.” That’s the important line for our purposes. What is written here?
[Speaker B] That as far as punishment or the offering is concerned, he’s exempt anyway the second he remembers.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] As far as removing it goes, is he allowed to remove it or forbidden to remove it?
[Speaker B] Forbidden to remove it.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That…
[Speaker C] It’s no longer considered unintentional, since he already remembered.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So if he remembered, then there’s no punishment of stoning because the sticking was unintentional, but there’s also no sin-offering, and therefore what?
[Speaker B] So it’s forbidden to violate a rabbinic prohibition.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Stoning or an offering… so there’s no reason to violate the prohibition, and therefore it’s forbidden. You’re not saving him either from an offering or from stoning. Seemingly that’s what the Talmud says.
[Speaker B] But here we have a minor prohibition in order to save oneself from a major prohibition.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But the Talmud says no, that this is certainly forbidden. Therefore it’s not talking about when he remembered, because if he remembered then he isn’t liable for a sin-offering at all, so why in the world would we permit him to remove it? That’s what the Talmud says, right? Before the reasoning, first of all: what does it say?
[Speaker B] Right, that it is forbidden for him.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Forbidden, right? But that’s not necessarily certain. The question is what exactly the Talmud is objecting to here—I pointed this out when we read the Talmud. The Talmud can object here in one of two ways. Either the Talmud objects and says: if we’re talking about a case where he remembered, then there is no liability for a sin-offering, and certainly no stoning because the sticking was unintentional, so why would one permit him to remove it? There’s no point. What are you saving him from? And then the assumption of the Talmud is that certainly we do not permit him to remove it in order to save himself from the prohibition; the permission to remove it is in order to save himself from the financial cost of the sin-offering. Right? That’s according to this reading of the Talmud. But I said there’s another way to read the Talmud. What the Talmud asks is that if he remembered, then he isn’t liable for a sin-offering, and therefore what? Not that because of that it would be forbidden for him to remove it—he may remove it. It’s only that what Rav Bibi bar Abaye asked was whether they permitted him to remove it before he comes to liability for a sin-offering, but here there is no liability for a sin-offering, so it cannot be that Rav Bibi was speaking about this case. Not because the law is incorrect, but because as an interpretation of Rav Bibi’s words it doesn’t fit, because Rav Bibi is speaking about a situation where I am liable for a sin-offering, and therefore obviously he was not speaking about this situation, because in this situation I am not liable for a sin-offering. What is the law in this situation? Maybe he may remove it—who said not? The Talmud does not necessarily say that it is forbidden to remove it. Rather, it rejects the possibility of explaining Rav Bibi’s words in this case, because Rav Bibi speaks about liability for a sin-offering, and here there is no liability for a sin-offering. But not because halakhically it would be forbidden here to remove it; it could be that it would be permitted to remove it. Do you understand what I’m saying? Right.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I’d be happy if you repeated that.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Again. I assumed earlier that when you said—the Talmud is trying to understand to what Rav Bibi’s query was referring, right? What case is he talking about? So the Talmud says maybe it’s talking about a case where he stuck it on unintentionally and then remembered. And now he’s wondering whether to remove it or not, and that’s what Rav Bibi asked: is he allowed to remove it or is he forbidden to remove it? The Talmud says: it cannot be that Rav Bibi was talking about this case. Why not? Because in this case there is no liability for a sin-offering. Because one who remembered is not liable for a sin-offering. Wait, the conclusion…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] One second. The conclusion from that would be that if there is no liability for a sin-offering, then it is forbidden for him to remove it.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, that’s my next sentence. What is written here is that there is no liability for a sin-offering. Now you can split that in two ways, two different understandings. The fact that there’s no sin-offering here—why does that prove that Rav Bibi definitely was not talking about this? Is it because when there is no liability for a sin-offering, then clearly it is forbidden to remove it, and therefore Rav Bibi has nothing to deliberate about here? That’s the option Hani suggested just now. But there is also another option. It could be that one may remove it even in such a case—who said not? But Rav Bibi himself certainly was not talking about this case, because Rav Bibi speaks about a case where one comes to liability for a sin-offering, and in this case he does not come to liability for a sin-offering. So that’s simply proof that Rav Bibi was not talking about this. What is the law in such a case? Maybe one may remove it—who said not? Do you understand what I’m saying? Meaning, here the problem is linguistic; the problem is not halakhic. The question is whether the objection here is based on a halakhic objection—meaning, it cannot be that Rav Bibi spoke about this because halakhically it doesn’t work—or whether it cannot be that Rav Bibi spoke about this because linguistically it doesn’t work, because Rav Bibi is speaking about a situation where one comes to liability for a sin-offering, and here one does not come to liability for a sin-offering. But halakhically it still could be that Rav Bibi would say one may remove it. Okay? So now the assumption here is: what will this depend on? Exactly on what we discussed in the first class. It will depend on the question whether the permission to remove it is aimed at saving the other person from a prohibition, or aimed at saving the other person from the financial cost of a sin-offering. If the goal is to save him from a prohibition, then obviously even if he remembered and there is no liability for a sin-offering, still he is going to violate a prohibition. So if they permitted him to remove it in order to be saved from a prohibition, then here too they permitted him to remove it. Rav Bibi wasn’t talking about this, never mind—but the law, if we ask what the law is, would be that he may remove it in this situation. But if the permission to remove it is only in order to save him from the financial cost of the sin-offering, then here there is no financial cost, and therefore here it is clearly forbidden to remove it. That is what the debate will be. And the question whether the permission to remove it is because of the financial cost of the offering, or whether the permission to remove it is because of the prohibition, the prevention of the prohibition—and of course all this is in the unintentional case. In the unintentional case there is room to discuss whether the permission to remove it is in order to save from the prohibition or in order to save from the financial cost of the sin-offering. And on that will depend how we read the Talmud’s objection here. Therefore what I want to claim is that from the Talmud here one cannot learn what the law is in the case of a person who acted unintentionally: whether a person may remove it in order to save himself from an unintentional prohibition. From the Talmud there is no necessity either way. It remains an open question in the Talmud. Okay? What about others?
[Speaker B] If he acted intentionally, then it’s forbidden for me—forbidden for me to remove it.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, that’s not written here. Where is that written?
[Speaker B] It only says…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] In the unintentional case—but let’s start with the unintentional case. In the unintentional case there is a dispute. When a person removes it to save himself, then in the intentional case he certainly may—that’s the conclusion of the passage, right? To save himself from a prohibition punishable by stoning, then certainly he may. In the unintentional case it will depend on how we read the Talmud’s objection here.
[Speaker B] Okay,
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Now let’s talk about this: a person saving himself. What happens when a person comes to save someone else? So first of all let’s start with the unintentional case. What happens in the unintentional case?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] There is a dispute in the Talmud.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What does the Talmud say?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Rav Sheila says that we do not say, “Sin so that your fellow may benefit,” and Rav Sheshet—was that the other one? Rav Sheshet says yes. Rav Sheshet says that we do say it.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, the other way around. Rav Sheshet says that we do not say it, and Rav Sheila says that we do. Right? So there is a dispute between Rav Sheila and Rav Sheshet, and over the course of the Talmud it seems that Rav Sheshet is right. Because Rav Sheshet objects to Rav Sheila, and then the Talmud retreats from that and shifts it to a discussion of the intentional case. Right? Meaning, the Talmud does not say, “Yes, so Rav Bibi held like Rav Sheila—what’s the problem?” The Talmud apparently understands that Rav Sheshet’s objection is conclusive, meaning Rav Sheila’s words were mistaken. So from the Talmud I would learn that in the unintentional case others are forbidden to remove it in order to save you. That is what comes out of the Talmud. Okay.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What about the intentional case?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Regarding wickedness and death? It says nothing about that. It says nothing, right? It says that the person himself may remove it to save himself, okay? What if others may remove it to save him?
[Speaker G] The discussion of others is basically mentioned only in the context of the unintentional case. Later they also ask about the intentional case, but the commentators… right, but in the Talmud the answer is about the unintentional case.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right, therefore I’m saying that from the Talmud, what…
[Speaker E] What does that mean?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What it means is that in the intentional case the law regarding others is missing. It’s not written.
[Speaker G] Okay,
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Now, what happens here is that since the person himself, if he stuck it on intentionally, was permitted—what would you infer regarding others, from the standpoint of reasoning?
[Speaker E] Seemingly they would be allowed, seemingly. Why?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Why?
[Speaker B] I don’t know if you can say that.
[Speaker E] If it’s permitted…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] For him—if it’s permitted for him to save himself… who said it’s permitted for others?
[Speaker B] Why should I sin in order to save someone else?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] He did it intentionally; this is intentional…
[Speaker B] Of course, fully intentional.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] There is certainly reason to say that others may not… I understand. There is certainly reason to say that others are forbidden to save him from an intentional transgression. The fact that they permitted him himself, that means…
[Speaker C] That he regretted it, so if I save him while he’s still intentional, then what exactly have we done? I don’t understand. I’m saying: they permitted him to save himself when he acted intentionally, so maybe one can infer from that that he regretted it, apparently, and therefore he saves himself.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Otherwise he wouldn’t save…
[Speaker C] Himself. He just doesn’t want to die—what do you mean, he regretted it? Okay, so he wanted to save himself from death, never mind. But if he doesn’t even want to save himself from death, why should I be the one to save him?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, it’s not that he doesn’t want to; he’s abroad, he can’t—it doesn’t matter right now, that’s not the point.
[Speaker C] Obviously he wants to, he just can’t. Okay.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] There are two issues here. On one hand, the unintentional and intentional distinction—the issue is that if in the unintentional case I’m forbidden, then why in the intentional case would I be allowed to help him even more so? And then there’s the reverse issue, of a minor transgression versus a major transgression. If this is indeed “sin so that your fellow may benefit,” are we talking about a minor transgression and a major one, or is this a general statement?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So now here we get into the beginning of the story. Because this law that is missing in the Talmud, where the Talmud does not state the law, is the case where others come to save me from an intentional transgression. You can try to draw a conclusion from the permission for me to save myself from an intentional transgression, or from the permission for me to save others from an unintentional transgression, and try to see whether I can make some a fortiori argument or analogy or something like that and try to learn from it. So let’s see. Let’s start, first of all, with the permission for a person to save himself from an intentional transgression. Does the fact that they permitted a person to save himself tell us anything about permitting others to save him from an intentional transgression? Here I would say: not really, not necessarily. Because they permitted him because his life is on the line, but why should I commit a transgression on behalf of someone who got himself into this mess and brought himself into a capital prohibition? He has a problem. Right?
[Speaker E] Isn’t there an issue of mutual responsibility here, to say…?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] If I look from a global perspective—here the broad perspective comes in—then I’m only making a profit-and-loss calculation, and I’m looking at where the state of the world will be better. And since in a major intentional transgression the state of the world will be worse, then certainly others too can commit a minor intentional transgression, because all in all the world will look better. But if you introduce my personal involvement, then I say: with all due respect, true, I’ll commit only a minor transgression, but it’s my transgression. And you dragged us into this whole situation. Why should I commit a minor transgression in order to save you from a major transgression that you did intentionally? You got yourself into it. Therefore it is far from unequivocal whether one can learn that others may save him from an intentional sin. Let’s now try the comparison from others. If others save him in the unintentional case—if others save him in the unintentional case—and then we’ll say that we assume that others can save him, can save him in… sorry, others cannot save him in the unintentional case, right? That’s what the Talmud says. Now the question is whether from that I can learn what the law is regarding others when they come to save someone from an intentional transgression.
[Speaker B] Seemingly that would be an a fortiori argument.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Seemingly it would be an a fortiori argument. Why?
[Speaker B] Because if in the unintentional case it was forbidden, then all the more so in the intentional case.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] When he’s not at fault, it is forbidden for me to save him, so when he is at fault, all the more so it should be forbidden for me to save him, right?
[Speaker B] On the other hand, though, here there is death, here there is a severe punishment.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Exactly. Here, precisely, is the question of the global perspective. If I look from the global perspective, then it could be that the reason others are forbidden to save him from an unintentional transgression is because an unintentional transgression is not some terrible spiritual blemish, but intentional Sabbath desecration is an awful state, so for something like that they did permit me to save him. From a consequential standpoint there is room to say that only in the unintentional case they did not permit me to save him, but in the intentional case they did. From the standpoint of the person’s guilt, it’s the opposite. Because from the standpoint of the person’s guilt, it could be that if in the unintentional case they did not permit me to save him, then when he is also guilty they certainly did not permit me to save him. And then the question is: on which of the two axes do I make the comparison? On the axis of the guilt of the person I’m going to save, or on the axis of the result? Or in other words, I ask myself whether I’m looking from a global perspective, in which case what determines it is the result—and the better result, of course, is that I remove it now so that there won’t be an intentional Sabbath desecration—or whether the discussion is person-focused, not global. It’s an obligation between one person and another, and if my fellow is guilty, then I have no obligation to pay the price of even a minor transgression in order to save him. He has a problem. That’s…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Doesn’t it seem from the plain meaning of the Talmud that “we do not tell a person: sin so that your fellow may benefit” is just a general statement, and they don’t get into calculations of minor and major? And in fact the passage also doesn’t continue dealing with that afterward. Meaning, it seems clear that the answer is simply no, and that’s that.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, it’s not clear. The Talmud doesn’t continue dealing with it afterward because the Talmud is not trying to cover all the cases. The Talmud came to clarify what Avimi bar Chama was talking about. The discussion simply proceeds in order to clarify that, and once they reached a conclusion about what he was talking about, they stopped the discussion. They don’t need to cover all the cases, because that isn’t the goal here. After the discussion, I’m trying to build a Shulchan Arukh that covers all the cases, but the Talmud itself—that wasn’t its goal here. So the fact that it didn’t speak about others coming to save an intentional sinner is simply because that didn’t come up here, that’s all. There’s no necessity. Therefore this remains an open question, and not a simple one. Okay, now look in the Shulchan Arukh and you’ll see that the fingerprints of this issue are already there. Let’s look. I got stuck here once, not again, sorry. I’m sharing my file now. Shulchan Arukh: “And if one placed it on the Sabbath, even intentionally, he is permitted”—“he” means the one who himself stuck it on—
[Speaker C] To remove it.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] “Before it bakes, so that he will not come to the prohibition punishable by stoning.” What about… so first of all he speaks only about the person himself and not about others. Second, he speaks here about the unintentional case. What about the intentional case?
[Speaker B] Permitted—he says “even intentionally.” What do you mean?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What about the unintentional case?
[Speaker B] Permitted, because if he says even intentionally, then I assume that in the unintentional case it’s permitted.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] From the wording of the Shulchan Arukh you can see that they permitted it even intentionally, which implies all the more so unintentionally, right? So the Shulchan Arukh covers two of the four cases we’re looking for. If the person stuck it on intentionally or unintentionally, may he himself remove it? As for others, that’s not discussed here. But regarding his own removing it, when he stuck it on intentionally and when he stuck it on unintentionally, there is an answer in the Shulchan Arukh, right? But more than that, notice—this is an important point. Many times you can learn from the Shulchan Arukh and from Maimonides, who are ostensibly just ruling practical Jewish law, and understand from them some of the conceptual dimensions of the passage as well.
[Speaker B] So he was speaking from the standpoint of the person?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Because the expression “even intentionally” is an expression that calls for interpretation. What does “even intentionally” mean? It means… that this is an a fortiori case; it’s easier to permit, right?
[Speaker B] In the unintentional case.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] It is easier to permit in the unintentional case than in the intentional case. Therefore he says that even in the intentional case they permitted him to remove it. In the unintentional case, it goes without saying that they permitted him to remove it, right? Meaning, what is the relevant parameter from his standpoint?
[Speaker B] The sinner and not the world?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Guilt and not result. Do you agree? Yes.
[Speaker B] That…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Meaning, the decisive axis is guilt. If the person who is not guilty, in the unintentional case, was permitted to remove it, that still does not mean that in the intentional case, where he is guilty, he was also permitted to remove it. The Shulchan Arukh says: true, but as a matter of fact even in the intentional case they permitted it. Okay? But clearly in the unintentional case it is more permissible than in the intentional case. Because the parameter, the important axis here—and we said these are two axes that work in opposite directions. In terms of guilt, the unintentional case is lighter. In terms of the intentional case—well, in terms of the result, the intentional case is easier to permit. Because the intentional case has a more dramatic result, so of course it is easier to permit there in order to prevent that result. So if I were looking at the results, it would make no sense to say “even intentionally.” It wouldn’t be “even intentionally”; it should say “even unintentionally,” not “even intentionally.” Right? If the Shulchan Arukh says “even intentionally,” that means he is looking at the plane of guilt, not the plane of results. Agreed? Yes. Now let’s move to the next two laws. We asked in the Talmud, we wanted to know what the four laws are. So if others can save him in the unintentional case—can they or not? So we said we rule like Rav Sheshet: no. We do not tell a person, “Sin so that your fellow may benefit,” right? That is stated in the Talmud. According to the Shulchan Arukh, can I infer a conclusion about the intentional case? Maybe since he didn’t write it, then apparently it is forbidden. Think about the reasoning. Obviously yes.
[Speaker E] If in the unintentional case they did not permit it, then in the intentional case they certainly did not permit it. Because the Shulchan Arukh says that the important parameter is guilt, not result. So if in the unintentional case, where he is not guilty, they did not permit it for him, then in the intentional case, where he is guilty, it goes without saying that they would not permit others—not him, right?—others, to save him. Meaning, notice how from the Shulchan Arukh, which writes only one law, I extracted all four. Do you understand? The Shulchan Arukh seemingly speaks only about one law: what is the law for the person himself who comes to save himself from an intentional transgression? And from that I want to learn what the law is for saving oneself from an unintentional transgression, and what the law is for others saving him from an unintentional transgression and from an intentional transgression. And from the Shulchan Arukh, if you read his language carefully, you can derive all four laws, even though he wrote only one of them. And in fact, if you look, you’ll see why the Shulchan Arukh really doesn’t bring the law about others—because that’s what he writes here: “He is permitted to remove it before it bakes.” Others are forbidden. Others are forbidden whether in the unintentional case or in the intentional case. Therefore he doesn’t write that. Okay? Meaning, it comes out that for the person himself, he may remove it whether he stuck it on unintentionally or intentionally. For others, it is forbidden to remove it whether the other person stuck it on unintentionally or intentionally. That is what comes out of the Shulchan Arukh. And that is exactly how I understood the Talmud. What I told you, that this is the plain meaning of the Talmud—that’s how it seemed to me.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But I’m saying that in the Talmudic text itself, that’s not correct. It’s not necessary. In the Talmudic text itself, really not. Because the Shulchan Arukh assumes that the relevant axis is the axis of culpability. And I’m claiming that it could be that the relevant axis is the axis of outcome. And then the fact that they didn’t permit, in the unintentional case, removing it in order to save the other person, that’s only because an unintentional transgression is not such a big deal. But in order to prevent an intentional transgression, maybe they did permit it. So therefore, in the Shulchan Arukh, because it assumes that the relevant axis is the axis of culpability and not the axis of outcome, you can derive the laws the way I said before. From the Talmudic text itself, that’s not necessarily true. Look at the Mishnah Berurah. The Mishnah Berurah says: even in the intentional case, where I might have thought, “Feed the wicked man and let him die,” nevertheless it teaches us—he brings this in the name of the Bach—it teaches us that it is permitted. And all the more so when he stuck it on unintentionally, that it is permitted, so that he not come to a sin requiring a sin-offering. Look what he says. This is an all-the-more-so argument about the unintentional case. The intentional case is harder to permit than the unintentional one. If they permitted it in the intentional case, then all the more so they permitted it in the unintentional case. That is exactly what we inferred above. He also explains what the novelty is. What’s the novelty—that they permitted saving him when the transgression was intentional? Because I would have thought: “Feed the wicked man and let him die.” He stuck it on intentionally, and he knows he’s getting himself entangled in a prohibition punishable by stoning. Why should I have to violate a minor prohibition in order to save him? He got himself into it—let him eat the porridge he cooked. “Feed the wicked man and let him die.” A wicked man who stuck it on intentionally—let him die. Why should I have to save him? The Shulchan Arukh says no—that was only the initial assumption. The novelty is that no, even if he stuck it on intentionally, he is allowed to remove it. He, himself. He is allowed. But “feed the wicked man and let him die”—we don’t say that with regard to a second person? Right. He says it about that very person himself. We do not. We would not permit him to remove it even if that would bring him to liability for death. Okay. “Feed the wicked man and let him die.” By the way, from here it somewhat sounds like it really would bring him to liability for death, even though we forbade him to remove it. Do you remember that discussion? Right. Yes. But that’s how it seems from the Mishnah Berurah. So here the question is even about a rabbinic prohibition, where they forbade him to remove it, and not only about his fellow coming and removing it. No, no, here we’re talking about him himself, only him himself, because the Shulchan Arukh is talking only about him himself. Okay? Now, in Ateret Tzvi there he writes: even in the intentional case it is permitted to remove it with a peel, yes—the question is whether it is permitted to remove it with the tool, or by hand, or with an unusual method. The same applies in the unintentional case, so that he not come to a sin requiring a sin-offering. Here the wording is more moderate, do you notice? Yes. In the Mishnah Berurah it says, “all the more so when he stuck it on unintentionally.” In Ateret Tzvi it says, “the same applies in the unintentional case.” “The same applies” is not necessarily “all the more so”; rather, it’s the same thing. He also says explicitly, “so that he not come to a prohibition requiring a sin-offering,” not to the punishment of a sin-offering. No, that is true in any case. So that there won’t come into the world some transgression, some prohibition. Clearly, because after all, if he remembered—we’re talking about him himself removing it—if he remembered, then there is no sin-offering, only a prohibition. Ah, so it’s only a prohibition. Yes. So what is Ateret Tzvi basically claiming here? It seems from his language that the unintentional and intentional cases are on the same level; there’s no all-the-more-so here as in the Mishnah Berurah, right? “The same applies in the unintentional case”—just as in the intentional case, so too in the unintentional case. In the Shulchan Arukh it says “even.” “Even” implies that in the intentional case it is harder to permit, as the Mishnah Berurah is apparently right to say, yes? But in Ateret Tzvi it seems that it’s on the same level. Why? What is the idea behind that? Apparently he takes both axes into account: the axis of culpability and the axis of outcome. From the standpoint of culpability, then yes, it makes sense to say “even in the intentional case,” but from the standpoint of outcome it’s the opposite. Therefore Ateret Tzvi says: in the Shulchan Arukh it says “even in the intentional case” because it is speaking on the axis of culpability, but clearly there is also the axis of outcome, and therefore I can’t simply say “even”; rather I say “the same applies.” It’s the same in the unintentional case as in the intentional case, when there is no clear hierarchy between unintentional and intentional— which one is easier to permit and which one is harder to permit—because both axes can play a role here. Maybe it could be that Ateret Tzvi simply wrote “the same applies” and meant to say “all the more so” as well. The next sentence I was about to say is: one has to be careful not to overdo these fine linguistic inferences in such later authorities, but that doesn’t matter to me. I’m not really troubled by what exactly Ateret Tzvi means; rather, I’m only trying to show the different options here for reading it, even if he himself didn’t mean it. It still could be correct that the Shulchan Arukh says “even” because it is talking on the axis of culpability, but that does not mean that the Shulchan Arukh denies that the axis of outcome is also relevant, in which case it could be that in the final analysis it really is analogous—there is no hierarchy here between the two things. Now look at the Magen Avraham: “even in the intentional case.” The Mishnah Berurah there is really writing in the name of the Magen Avraham. Wait, no, not that—the Magen Avraham, sorry, it’s the Magen Avraham. “Even in the intentional case.” The Magen Avraham says as follows: but the Maggid Mishneh in chapter 9 wrote—Maggid Mishneh is a commentary on Maimonides, yes—in chapter 9 he wrote that the unintentional case is actually the greater novelty, because once he remembers, there is no liability for a sin-offering, since we require that the beginning and the end both be unintentional; and even so, it is permitted to remove it before he comes to a prohibition requiring a sin-offering—see there. So here this is really the second axis. What do I mean? First of all, he adopts a third approach. The Mishnah Berurah says, like the plain meaning of the Shulchan Arukh, right? Meaning what? That permitting it in the intentional case is harder than permitting it in the unintentional case—apparently the axis of culpability, right? In Ateret Tzvi it seems balanced. Again, even if that’s not what he means, I’m offering that possibility: it’s balanced because on the axis of culpability the intentional case is harder to permit, while on the axis of outcome the intentional case is easier to permit. Okay? And the Maggid Mishneh takes only the axis of outcome. He says that the unintentional case is the greater novelty. But notice his reasoning—why is the unintentional case the greater novelty? The fact that they permitted him to remove it in the unintentional case is a bigger novelty; in the intentional case it is obvious that they permitted him. Why? Because in any event he is not liable for a sin-offering. Because he isn’t liable for a sin-offering, but there is still a prohibition. Exactly. We want to save him so that there not exist in the world the prohibition, the outcome of his act. And then it is still a greater novelty compared to the intentional case—why? Because saving someone from a prohibition is less than saving him from stoning. Two possible ways to understand this. One possibility: when there is stoning, that means saving him from an intentional prohibition, which is more severe than an unintentional prohibition. The outcome is more severe. A second possibility: the stoning is not because of the severity of the prohibition, but because he is going to die—it is simply saving his life. So that is a stronger motivation than saving him from a prohibition. Do you understand? Two ways to read it. Can you say the first option again? The first option says that if I permit him to remove it in order to save him from an intentional prohibition, and the stoning is only an indication that he committed an intentional prohibition, and in the unintentional case I permit him to remove it in order to escape an unintentional prohibition—an intentional prohibition is more severe than an unintentional prohibition. So there is more motivation to permit him in the intentional case than in the unintentional case. Therefore the unintentional case is the greater novelty. That’s one possibility. The second possibility is that in the intentional case, the problem is not the intentional prohibition. The problem is that he is going to die—that is, stoning. So in order to save his life, I permit him to remove it. But in the unintentional case, after all, there is no sin-offering and there is no danger to his life; it is only a prohibition. So it is a greater novelty that he is allowed to remove it in order to be saved from a prohibition, and not only to save his life. The comparison is not to an intentional prohibition, but to saving a life. The question is why, in the intentional case, the outcome is more fateful than in the unintentional case. Is it because of the transgression, or because of the punishment? Or because I am going to die. Okay? Yes. In any case, in the Magen Avraham we see—in the Maggid Mishneh as quoted by the Magen Avraham we see—that the relevant axis is the axis of outcome. What will the outcome be? An intentional prohibition, stoning—it doesn’t matter—but the relevant axis is the axis of outcome. Which is, of course, against the Shulchan Arukh. Therefore the Magen Avraham says—notice his very first word—“but the Maggid Mishneh.” What does “but” mean? Because in the Shulchan Arukh it says “even in the intentional case.” That implies that the novelty in the intentional case is the greater novelty—that they permitted it in the intentional case. But the Maggid Mishneh wrote that the unintentional case is even the greater novelty, that the novelty is greater in the unintentional case. Do you understand that this is against the Shulchan Arukh? Meaning, in the Shulchan Arukh there are only two ways to read it. But in the topic as a whole there are three methods of relating to it. Where will the practical difference be? Regarding other people. The whole discussion here is whether he himself was permitted to remove it in order to save himself, right? Yes. But what about others? So let’s do the calculation. In the Talmudic text they forbade others to remove it in order to save him from an unintentional prohibition. That is given; it is written in the Talmudic text. Right? What happens in the intentional case? It depends. According to the Magen Avraham and the Maggid Mishneh, the intentional case is a more severe outcome, and since the relevant plane is the plane of outcome, it could be that in the intentional case they permitted it. It’s only in the unintentional case that they forbade it, because there the outcome is not so terrible—an unintentional transgression. But in the intentional case, where the outcome is so bad—either he will die, or it is an intentional transgression—but the outcome is more fateful, there they might have permitted it. According to the Magen Avraham and the Maggid Mishneh, you cannot infer anything from the Talmudic text. Right? Wait, where did we see the Maggid Mishneh, sorry? The Magen Avraham brings him. But the Maggid Mishneh—the opening words in the Magen Avraham. You see? The darkened section. The opening words there say, “But the Maggid Mishneh in chapter 9 wrote.” So the Magen Avraham and the Maggid Mishneh are the same position. The Magen Avraham is simply quoting the Maggid Mishneh. Okay? No, wait, wait, I want to understand regarding others. We are starting from the assumption that the Talmudic text said that others cannot do it in the unintentional case. Right, that’s written in the Talmudic text. The question is what about the intentional case. Right. So now it depends. If you go by the axis of culpability, then if it is forbidden to save him in the unintentional case, then in the intentional case all the more so it will be forbidden. Right? That is the Shulchan Arukh and the Mishnah Berurah. According to Ateret Tzvi, in the simple reading it seems to be on the same level. So just as they forbade it in the unintentional case, so too they forbade it in the intentional case. Not all the more so, but the same. So still, in practice, they forbade it even in the intentional case. But according to the Magen Avraham and the Maggid Mishneh, that is not true. Because according to the Magen Avraham and the Maggid Mishneh, what they forbade was for others to save him in the unintentional case, because the unintentional case is not such a terrible outcome—an unintentional transgression. So I have no motivation to permit a person to commit a transgression in order to prevent that outcome. But the outcome of an intentional transgression is a very severe outcome. There, others may have been permitted. Not necessarily, by the way, but maybe. You cannot infer from the Talmudic text that others are forbidden to save him in the intentional case as well. According to the Magen Avraham and the Maggid Mishneh, that remains open. Right? Yes. Okay. Fine. Now let’s move on to others. Look, the Magen Avraham continues and writes as follows: and specifically he himself—that’s the same passage; I just split it into two halves—specifically he himself, but others are forbidden to remove it. In whose name does he bring this? Rabbeinu Yerucham. For we do not say to a person—sorry—we do not say to a person: commit a minor transgression so that your fellow will not commit a severe transgression, since the transgression was not done through him, and also his fellow was negligent in what he stuck on. And in truth the main point depends on whether he was negligent. So he returns to the Shulchan Arukh. That’s it. Now here we have to pay very close attention. First of all, he now moves to discussing others. Do you remember the calculation I made in light of what we saw regarding the person himself—what law emerges regarding others? So he says—this is a continuation, yes—that others are forbidden to remove it because we do not say to a person, commit a minor transgression so that your fellow will not commit a severe transgression. The reasoning implies that this is true both in the unintentional and in the intentional case, right? Yes. He is not speaking specifically here about unintentional and intentional; he doesn’t distinguish, and you can see from the reasoning as well: he says a minor transgression so that your fellow will not commit a severe transgression—we do not say that. It doesn’t matter how severe the other prohibition is. Therefore, whether unintentional or intentional, others are forbidden to remove it. Okay? Even though this is not necessary from the Talmudic text, because from the Talmudic text, according to the Magen Avraham and the Maggid Mishneh—according to their approach—you could have said that in the intentional case others are allowed to remove it. Because what the Talmudic text says—that it is forbidden to remove it—is because of producing the outcome, right? Right. But on the plane of outcome, in the intentional case the outcome is more severe—maybe there they did permit others to remove it. But yes, it could also be that they did not. So this can still be a continuation of the Maggid Mishneh’s approach. But look at the continuation: since the transgression was not done through him—I did not commit the transgression, so why should I sin in order to save you? Notice the non-global perspective. They say, in other words: he committed the transgression, so why should I sin? Exactly what we did not find—do you remember?—in the Raavad, regarding whether I should slaughter so that the sick person will be saved. I said that what we see in the medieval authorities (Rishonim) there is that they don’t care who commits the transgression; what matters is the outcome. Right? Yes. Here he is making a different consideration. He says: no, the transgression was not done through him, so why should he sin? Why should he pay the price of a sin if I did not commit the transgression? But that does not contradict what we saw there. Do you know why? Because there we are talking about a sick person who is not to blame; the sick person is sick. There the question is who should do the transgression. The Talmudic text says: what difference does it make who does it—the main thing is that the sick person be saved. But here we are talking about a person who was negligent, and “his fellow too was negligent in what he stuck on.” So if he was negligent, then in such a situation it definitely matters who commits the transgression. He himself can commit a transgression in order to correct his own negligence. But what justification is there for me to commit a transgression because he was negligent? He was negligent—let him eat the porridge he cooked. What about the unintentional case? If he did it unintentionally, should he eat the porridge? Exactly. Now here, since he does not distinguish between the unintentional and intentional case, it seems he views both the unintentional and intentional case as a kind of negligence. And by the way, you see this explicitly in Tosafot. Why? Because the unintentional case is not coercion. An unintentional act is also—why do they bring a sin-offering for an unintentional act? Because there is some kind of… negligence. Negligence. You are doing something—pay attention to what you are doing. An unintentional act is a kind of negligence. If you are under compulsion, compulsion does not make you liable for a sin-offering; an unintentional act does make you liable for a sin-offering. The medieval authorities explain why: because inadvertence is not compulsion. Inadvertence is not full blame, but there is an element of negligence here, lack of attention. When you are doing things on the Sabbath, pay attention to whether there is a prohibition here or not. You cannot just do things without paying attention. So even inadvertence has some dimension of negligence. Therefore I say: the Magen Avraham, in the simple reading, does not distinguish here between the unintentional and intentional case. When he writes here that “his fellow too was negligent,” he probably means both the unintentional case and the intentional case. The one who stuck it on was negligent. This is unlike, for example, a sick person, where I need to slaughter for him in order to save his life—the sick person was not negligent in anything; he became sick. In such a situation we do not calculate who will slaughter. But if you were negligent, then you may sin in order to save yourself, but why on earth should I sin if you were negligent? You were negligent, you have a problem—save yourself if you want. Is the sick person considered under compulsion? What? Is the sick person considered under compulsion? Yes, of course—an illness happened to him, what can he do. Fine. And indeed the Magen Avraham adds: “the main point depends on whether he was negligent.” What does that mean? If he causes the sin, then certainly the blame is his. It seems to me that he means to say: and therefore, in truth, until now, Magen Avraham, I brought you the Maggid Mishneh, but really the truth is like the Shulchan Arukh—that the main point depends on negligence and not on the severity of the outcome. Okay? Yes. I didn’t quite understand; I think one can understand the Magen Avraham differently as well. Okay. He says here: we do not say to a person, commit a minor transgression so that your fellow will not commit a severe transgression—that means he is talking here only about the intentional case, because then it’s the severe transgression. Since the transgression was not done through him, and also his fellow was negligent—meaning, he acted intentionally. What you are saying definitely cannot be. If anything, he could only be talking about the unintentional case; to speak only about the intentional case doesn’t work. Because then according to your reading, it would come out that others are forbidden to remove the bread when that person stuck it on intentionally, but if he stuck it on unintentionally, then others are allowed to remove the bread. But that is against the Talmudic text. The Talmudic text says that in the unintentional case others are forbidden to remove the bread. The whole question is only whether that is also true in the intentional case or not. But in the unintentional case, the Talmudic text explicitly says it is forbidden. Fine, but maybe he—the Magen Avraham—is not addressing that… I mean, it seemed to me that the Magen Avraham here is addressing only the intentional case; he is not addressing the unintentional case at all. No, no, no, I don’t agree. First of all, that can’t be because it doesn’t fit the Talmudic text. But second, when we see Tosafot—and I see this is taking us a very long time—but when we see Tosafot, then we’ll see that Tosafot also talks about the other person having been negligent. Do you remember Tosafot? You saw it, right? Tosafot too speaks about the second person having been negligent, but he is speaking about… but our Talmudic passage deals with the unintentional case, not the intentional case. So how can he say that he was negligent? Do you remember? Tosafot asks questions there on our Talmudic passage, and then the Talmudic text says, well, in our case he was negligent. It’s unrelated. Therefore it is forbidden for him… We do not say to another person: sin in order to save him. What does “he was negligent” mean? After all, in our case, when we say we do not tell others to sin in order to save him, we are talking about the stage where we thought he had stuck it on unintentionally. So how can Tosafot say about that that we are talking about a case where he was negligent? You see from this that according to Tosafot too, sticking it on unintentionally is a kind of negligence. Unlike, for example, a sick person. That is why the background from the previous lesson is important, because there we saw that if the person is sick, then it is neither unintentional nor intentional—it is nothing; it just happened to him, he got sick, what can you do. In such a situation it is clear that we do tell a person to sin in order to save him. But in a situation where he himself committed a transgression, whether unintentionally or intentionally, then he was negligent. Why should I sin in order to save him? Therefore there is no necessity in the Magen Avraham, and since it is also against the Talmudic text there is no reason to say that that is what the Magen Avraham means. The Magen Avraham’s words apply both to the unintentional case and to the intentional case. Rather, what is interesting here is that after he brings the Maggid Mishneh regarding the person himself, and then says “specifically he himself, but others are forbidden to remove it,” here he is probably stating his own view; this is not a continuation of the Maggid Mishneh. Yes, because “we do not say to a person, commit a minor transgression so that your fellow will not commit a severe transgression,” and I claim that this is true both in the unintentional and intentional case. And therefore he says that the main point depends on whether he was negligent. So then what? Then if in the unintentional case they do not permit others to remove it, where the negligence is smaller, then in the intentional case, where the negligence is greater, certainly we do not tell others to sin. That is what the Magen Avraham intends to say. Since the main point depends on the axis of negligence, it is therefore clear that the law of the Talmudic text, which was said about the unintentional case, is also true of the intentional case, all the more so. And therefore, others are forbidden to remove the bread whether you stuck it on unintentionally or intentionally. But why? Because the main point depends on whether he was negligent. Which implies that according to the Maggid Mishneh, who disagrees with the Shulchan Arukh, and argues that the main point is the outcome and not the negligence, it definitely could be that the law of the Talmudic text, which was said about sticking it on unintentionally—there indeed they forbid others to remove it—but in the case of sticking it on intentionally, they permit others to remove it. That is the Maggid Mishneh. According to the Maggid Mishneh, since the outcome there is a very severe outcome, that does justify my committing a minor transgression in order to prevent an intentional transgression. It is only when the Magen Avraham wants to say not so that he finds it necessary to explain. So he says: since the main point is the negligence, therefore I do not go with the Maggid Mishneh but with the Shulchan Arukh. This is extremely binary. Is there no room for some kind of synthesis? There is. I already said—for example in Ateret Tzvi, or what I attributed to Ateret Tzvi—there really is some kind of view that takes both axes together. And therefore he says: one cannot establish a hierarchy between unintentional and intentional. In terms of negligence, the unintentional case is obviously lighter, but in terms of outcome the intentional case is easier, because the outcome is more severe and therefore it is easier to permit in the intentional case. Okay? Now Tosafot in our passage, for example, assumes as something simple that even in the intentional case they did not permit it. There is no difference between the intentional and unintentional case, right? Because Tosafot there makes comparisons—whether we say to a person “sin so that your fellow may benefit” or we do not say “sin so that your fellow may benefit”—and here we are talking both about intentional transgressions and unintentional transgressions, and he does not distinguish. Tosafot understood that when the Talmudic text says that others may not sin in order to save you from an unintentional transgression, the same applies to saving you from an intentional transgression. There is no difference. Therefore he compares to other passages and makes comparisons, distinctions, and so on. But Tosafot too assumes, like the Magen Avraham and like the Shulchan Arukh, that if they forbade it in the unintentional case, then certainly they also forbade it in the intentional case. What you just said—“certainly”—already assumes the axis of culpability. Correct. I said that in Tosafot, because Tosafot did not find it necessary to comment that in the Talmudic text this is written about the unintentional case; I assume it applies to the intentional case as well. It seems obvious to him. If it’s true in the unintentional case, then it’s also true in the intentional case. Why is that obvious? Apparently he assumes the axis of culpability and not the axis of outcome. Okay? Yes. So it comes out that according to most positions, except for the Maggid Mishneh and what the Magen Avraham brings, what really determines things is the axis of culpability. According to the Maggid Mishneh, what determines things is the axis of outcome. Now, what lies behind all this? The axis of outcome is basically a reflection of what I called a global perspective, right? Because a global perspective basically says: I’m not interested in me, you, whoever it may be; let’s see what the best outcome is from the perspective of the Holy One, blessed be He. Right? That is basically the translation of the concept “axis of outcome.” Okay? Fine. The axis of culpability takes it this way: I don’t know what the final situation is from the perspective of the Holy One, blessed be He—that is not the consideration. My consideration is whether I have to suffer because you got yourself into this mess. If you are to blame, that’s your problem. That is exactly the solipsistic perspective. Right? In other words, the dispute here is really over the question of a solipsistic perspective versus a global perspective. And again I say: this is not egoism versus non-egoism, but rather the question of what the Holy One, blessed be He, expects from us. What should I be concerned with? Should each person be concerned with his own spiritual state, or should each person be concerned with the spiritual state of the world? That is the dispute. And according to this, it really comes out here that at least most decisors and medieval authorities took the main axis here to be the solipsistic one and not the global one. Although of course one has to pay close attention that this whole discussion begins from the fact that there is nevertheless some concern to prevent the worse outcome. For example, the person himself is allowed to remove it in order to save himself, right? Why? He is committing a transgression now—why is that permitted? Because overall the outcome will be better. So even here there is still weight to the consequential consideration. Why does he want to save himself—why not save the world? Come on—even in the unintentional case too. In that sense, if many individuals save themselves, then the world will be better. Yes. Therefore I say: there is some consequential element here. It’s true that it is from the person toward himself. Now regarding others, we also need to understand: why do they say to me, listen, he was negligent—and if he was not negligent, as in the case of the sick person we saw in the Raavad’s passage? There, regarding a sick person, it is clear that I may sin, right? Why? Because it’s global—there is a better outcome here if he benefits. The answer is: a global perspective. Wait, here Avner… Again I can’t hear? What I asked about the sick person is exactly what I meant, about the possibility of combining the two approaches. Yes, I’m saying, that’s what I’m trying to show now. Superficially, the dispute is whether we look in a solipsistic way or a global way, right? Superficially. But when you look a bit more deeply, you see that it’s not so simple. In the Maggid Mishneh it is clear that the perspective is global. But in most decisors we saw that they do not go that way—Shulchan Arukh and Tosafot and Magen Avraham, Mishnah Berurah, do not go that way. They apparently hold that the main point is the negligence. But even there, notice that this is not pure solipsism, because we are speaking about the axis of negligence only on the second level. First of all, there is a transgression here, and I have to be concerned that it not be committed. That is already a global perspective. They only tell me that where the one about to commit the transgression was negligent, then the responsibility is on him; I am not supposed to commit a transgression in order to save him. But if he was not negligent—if he is sick, he is under compulsion or something, and he is going to commit the transgression—there certainly I have to sin in order to save him, right, if he was not negligent? If he was not negligent, then that is seemingly unintentional too, also the sick person. No, no—we didn’t say that. A sick person is a complete absence of negligence. An unintentional act is also negligence. But to derive a worldview from here, it seems to me—if it split neatly in two, then fine, but it splits in two and then when you look more deeply it starts mixing together; maybe we shouldn’t derive conclusions about worldview from here at all. In the end these are legal discussions, like the Birkat Avraham writes. In section 2 toward the end he writes there that his conclusion is that this is not a matter of mutual responsibility. There is no issue of mutual responsibility here. So this whole matter of a kind of view of the world doesn’t seem exactly right; Birkat Avraham writes that too. Wait, wait. First of all, we’ll get to that Birkat Avraham. Right now I’m only preparing the ground. I’m trying to show you the connection to the previous lesson and to the decisors here, and then we’ll enter his discussions and see that really behind what he says are the things we talked about here. I’m simply trying to illuminate it for you in a different light. But one second—for that I already won’t get there today. I can already see I need to give at least one more lesson here. But as for your actual question, I don’t agree. Because first of all, there are indeed two such perspectives, and those two perspectives yield different outcomes. Even when I see—wait—even when I see that the halakhic outcomes do not express one of these perspectives in a pure, isolated way, that does not mean they have no significance. It means they appear in a more complex form. But the logical analysis still stands. And what we see here—why? If they mix together, that means there is nothing clear here. Once those two perspectives mix together, in the end there is nothing clear here. But as an essential question—why derive a worldview from a halakhic discussion? So I’ll explain. This is a common mistake. Because Birkat Avraham also writes… I’ll explain, I’ll explain. Leave Birkat Avraham for now; wait, it’s not exactly like that. One second, I want to explain. There is a very important methodological point here. Look, this is a common mistake in many arguments, by the way not only in the Talmudic text. Let’s say I’m trying to define what poetry is. I have a series of columns on my website trying to define the concept of poetry. People tell me: well, it’s a complex phenomenon, so it can’t be defined. And then I say: look, there is one way to define it like this, another way like that, and I show that it is some complex combination of the two possibilities. Then they tell me: there, you see—it got mixed together, so you can’t talk about the possibilities. That’s a mistake. There is a difference between saying that what you see does not fit option A and also does not fit option B, and therefore neither option is correct, לבין seeing that what you see is a construction made of option A plus option B. When we do this kind of analysis, we are basically making a dialectical move. We try perspective A, and we see that perspective A doesn’t work. We try perspective B, and we see that it also doesn’t work. Now I say, okay, let’s build a model that combines perspective A and perspective B. If that explains all the data, then apparently I did arrive at a model—only the model I arrived at is not one of the simple models but a complex model. And what you are suggesting—wait, wait—what you are suggesting is to infer from here the conclusion that there is no model. But that’s not correct. Why infer that there is no model when I’m showing you that there is? And I’m showing you this, because look: if, for example, the other person was not negligent, am I allowed to sin? If the other person was not negligent, to save him—yes? Why? I’m asking why. Because it wasn’t his fault. So what if it wasn’t his fault? Why should I care that it wasn’t his fault? Why should I sin? I’m not to blame either. No, one need not sin, because that is ultimately the halakhic conclusion. I understand the halakhic conclusion. I’m asking what stands behind it. I don’t know, maybe also… I understand the halakhic conclusion. I’m asking what stands behind it. Why do I need to sin? He’s the one suffering it—what can I do? Why should I sin? Because of a global perspective. Because I say that I have an obligation to prevent transgressions in the world. That is the first thing. Only after that do I see that the global perspective here is not taken all the way, because the proof is that if the other person was negligent, then we introduce additional considerations. But Rabbi, if I have an obligation, that means there is a commandment in it. If I have an obligation, then again there is my own concern here—I have a commandment in saving him from the transgression. No—what do you mean “again” here? It just means there is an obligation, that’s all. There is no commandment here at all. There is preventing the other person’s prohibition, that’s all; there is no commandment here. You will not find such a commandment among the 613 commandments. There isn’t one. There is no such commandment. You are obligated to commit a transgression—why? In order to prevent his prohibition. So the commandment is to prevent his prohibition, meaning the commandment concerns what he will do—or rather not a commandment. And therefore I say: there is a model behind this, and all those Brisk-style conceptual investigations are always built this way. There is perspective A, there is alternative perspective B, and then they start constructing some kind of model that combines the two. So why did you begin with the two perspectives? Because if I had not begun with the two perspectives, I would not be able to build the more complex model either. That is how one does it in a didactically and logically correct way. One starts with simple perspectives, sees that they don’t work, and then tries to combine them. Like in the sciences—physicists always have a joke that when you want to know how a donkey works, start with a point-donkey. Let’s begin by imagining a hypothetical donkey constructed as a point. It has no tail, no legs, nothing. Then we’ll attach a tail, then we’ll grow legs for it. And little by little we can understand complex reality through simple perspectives. That is what we do on the intellectual plane too. We look at simple perspectives, see that in reality none of them can explain reality in full, because reality is more complex, and then we build a more complex model that combines the two simple perspectives in one way or another. That is how an intellectual analysis of a topic is built. So from here we need the two perspectives on the world. Correct. And that is what comes out of here—not that neither of them is relevant. Right. A combination of the two perspectives. And what we are saying here, basically, is that on a fundamental level I have a goal of preventing transgressions in the world. Therefore the global perspective exists in the background even according to most decisors, not only in the Maggid Mishneh where that is obvious, but also according to most decisors it exists. They only claim those qualifications with which I opened the lesson. Do you remember what I opened with? I said that one must qualify the global perspective and say: yes, but don’t forget that I am still me. I have some kind of standing. That is what these decisors are saying. What they are basically saying is: with all due respect to the global perspective, first of all there is, of course, a primary obligation on me not to sin. Where do you see that in the Maggid Mishneh? For me to sin, the global obligation by itself is not sufficient. Where do you see that in the Maggid Mishneh? Obviously. What? I understood the point that most authorities rule according to the solipsistic approach, but that it is limited, for example in a situation where someone was not negligent at all, like a sick person. But I didn’t understand the reverse. The Maggid Mishneh seemingly goes by the global approach, so where in him is the solipsistic side? Who said it is there? Maybe it isn’t. Because you said that in each of them the approach is limited, and I don’t see that in the Maggid Mishneh. I didn’t say that in each of them. I said that in each of them there is a global element. In the Maggid Mishneh it is only the global element. And in the Maggid Mishneh the solipsistic side does not exist? Not necessarily. We’d have to work it out and see—maybe in an extreme case yes, but not necessarily. I tend to think yes, but not in our discussion. That’s what Birkat Avraham brings, do you hear? Whether my default is always that one must sin in order to save another—the two directions in Tosafot. We’ll see that in Tosafot. The opposite. Yes, exactly. All those things we’ll get to later. Right now I’m only trying to show you the connection to the discussion we had in the previous lesson. So that you understand that this is really the subtext in this topic. If we had not done the previous lesson, then we would learn this topic and not understand what the underlying principles are that stand behind it. Here he was negligent, there he wasn’t negligent, and so on, and you can learn all of it without being aware of the philosophical or meta-halakhic background that stands behind these discussions. And that background is very, very fundamental. Can I give an example? I’m writing now about a public Sabbath desecrator. How the approach changed from “feed the wicked man and let him die,” because that whole view that he sinned and that he needs to be cut off from the Jewish people, as opposed to the view of a child captured among non-Jews and people under compulsion and all that, where there is a commandment to draw them close. It’s really the complete opposite, a hundred and eighty degrees from the first approach. Okay. Why? Because this is exactly that tension between looking at the person as a person and looking at the world. This will come later. It will still come up here later in various forms. Therefore this whole thing is preparation for all the distinctions and differentiations we are going to make later. There is… okay, I see our time is already up. Look, look at the Mishnah Berurah. Maybe just two more minutes if you’ll allow me—I just want to at least establish this passage. Mishnah Berurah in subsection 40: “This means, ‘they permitted him to remove it.’” Meaning, specifically he himself is allowed to remove it. But others are forbidden to remove it for him, whether he stuck it on intentionally or unintentionally. This is exactly the inference I made in the Shulchan Arukh, that the Shulchan Arukh apparently spoke about one case out of the four, and hinted to the law in all four cases. Because when it says “they permitted him,” it means they permitted only him. And not others. Others may not do it, whether intentional or unintentional. And you remember, the Mishnah Berurah follows the Magen Avraham and the Shulchan Arukh, and therefore it is very clear that this is the conclusion: that others are forbidden, whether in the unintentional or intentional case. For we do not say to a person, “commit a minor transgression so that your fellow not come to a severe prohibition,” since his fellow was negligent in what he stuck on. Notice, he says explicitly: whether in the intentional or unintentional case, and his reasoning is “since his fellow was negligent.” Do you see? A sign that even the unintentional case counts as negligence. Okay, you see that here explicitly. After that, later in the passage, he says: “And all this is with regard to baking, but with regard to cooking it is obvious that if someone forgot or transgressed and placed a pot near the fire, another person too must remove it.” So that his fellow not come to a prohibition, because in removing the pot there is no prohibition at all, and therefore there is a commandment to separate someone from prohibition. Again, do you see the expression of the global aspect? Here is the Mishnah Berurah, which goes with the solipsistic perspective. He says yes, but all this is only because in removing the bread there is a transgression, a rabbinic prohibition. But removing the pot from the fire involves no transgression at all—this is in cooking, not in baking. In cooking there is no transgression at all, and there, according to all opinions, others must remove the pot from the fire in order to save the cook from prohibition, whether in the unintentional or intentional case. Our whole discussion is only where I myself commit a transgression. Then the solipsistic dimension enters. But if I am not paying any price, then obviously I have to look at the overall spiritual situation and make sure it is as good as possible. This is the Mishnah Berurah itself introducing the global dimension into its solipsistic doctrine. Okay? Yes. Fine. Thank you very, very much. We’ll continue. Just tell me in one sentence—how far did you get on the page? Did you finish? Most of it. All of you? Who finished everything? I finished. Thanks, goodbye. Which doesn’t mean we can’t keep discussing it. No, I’m going to keep discussing it in any case, because we haven’t finished. I just want to know what to prepare for you for the next study session. But we need to go back over Birkat Avraham, because there are very significant things there. We’ll still get there, don’t worry. But we need a new page, yes. Fine. Okay. Thank you very much. Sabbath peace. Thank you very much.