Study and Halachic Rulings – Lesson 33
This transcript was produced automatically by means of artificial intelligence. There may be inaccuracies in the transcribed content and in speaker identification.
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Table of Contents
- Halakhic ruling in an extreme situation and testimony from within
- The elevator example: ownership lapsing under a total collapse of reality
- A transgression for its own sake and Yael, wife of Hever the Kenite
- Another planet and K. Tzetnik
- Rabbi Gibraltar, despair, ownerlessness, and the dispute over conceptualization
- Sodom, the commandment of laws, and the distinction between theft and the absence of a legal system
- The people of Shechem, Maimonides, and collective responsibility
- Stalin, public fear, collective guilt, and self-defense
- Kovno Ghetto: no claim against the Jews, and the distinction between Nazi guilt and absence of ownership
- Responsa From the Depths: the question of kitchen work and cooking on the Sabbath
- The surprise at the pilpul: food cooked on the Sabbath and labor not needed for its own sake versus saving a life
- The novel leniency: coercion as defining labor not needed for its own sake
- Two explanations for the move: education toward continued halakhic living versus a shift in the boundaries of saving life within a routine of danger
- Analogies: an outside view of danger zones, prehistoric man, and the bird on the road
- Conclusion: the testimony of the insider and the boundary between ruling and conceptualization
Summary
General Overview
The text presents the claim that in extreme and pathological situations like the Kovno Ghetto, the halakhic worldview changes in a fundamental way, and someone outside the situation cannot really issue a halakhic ruling about it in ordinary terms. The rulings given there, including those of the Dvar Avraham and Rabbi Gibraltar, are understood as testimony from someone living inside that reality, not as a position inviting criticism from outside, while the legitimate debate is over the halakhic conceptualization of those rulings using the regular tools. From the responsa From the Depths by Rabbi Ephraim Oshry, a case is brought about work in a kitchen that requires cooking on the Sabbath, and the lengthy discussion there is presented as a puzzle: why expand into halakhic pilpul when ostensibly saving a life should decide the issue? Two explanations are proposed—an educational one, or a consciousness-and-reality one—connected to the way living for years within danger makes it “normal” and changes the boundaries of saving life in the eyes of those living there.
Halakhic ruling in an extreme situation and testimony from within
The text states that when one is in an extreme reality like the Kovno Ghetto, the halakhic picture of the world can change in a way that someone outside that reality cannot understand or rule on properly. The text attributes to the Dvar Avraham and Rabbi Gibraltar rulings that look surprising by ordinary halakhic standards, and explains that the usual criticism of such rulings stems from a failure to understand the space in which they were given. The text grants someone inside the situation the status of a witness, and presents his ruling as testimony to the question of how Jewish law functions in that place and time.
The text distinguishes between criticism of the ruling itself and criticism of the conceptualization proposed for the ruling, and argues that one may debate the conceptualization using ordinary halakhic tools, but not the ruling itself of someone who lived within the situation. The text suggests that once the conceptualization is defined and the rule is formulated, it may be possible to add it to the halakhic corpus and even to the Shulchan Arukh, and it mentions a disagreement with Haym Soloveitchik on whether a ruling created under such conditions can be transmitted to future generations.
The elevator example: ownership lapsing under a total collapse of reality
The text presents a parable about two people in an elevator whose cable has snapped and which is now in free fall. One asks the other for a pen to write a farewell letter, and the other refuses. The text raises the question whether one may take the pen by force, against the ordinary rules of theft and ownership. It argues that someone living inside “life in a fire” may understand that ownership has no meaning when everything is about to crash immediately, whereas someone looking from outside tends to apply the regular rules of ownership without understanding their application in such a situation.
A transgression for its own sake and Yael, wife of Hever the Kenite
The text gives as an example Yael, wife of Hever the Kenite, who had sexual relations with Sisera in order to kill him, and notes that the Sages praise her in tractate Nazir with the statement “great is a transgression for its own sake.” The text emphasizes that according to the ordinary rules of Jewish law this is forbidden sexual conduct, one of the sins about which one must be killed rather than transgress, and yet the Sages describe the act as a transgression for its own sake. The text explains that the example is similar in that it takes place in an extreme situation where the ordinary rules do not function normally, but also different because Yael is not presented as issuing a halakhic ruling, and therefore there is no necessity that the move can be absorbed into ordinary halakhic routine.
Another planet and K. Tzetnik
The text uses the expression “another planet” to describe an extreme reality unintelligible to those who did not live in it, and attributes the phrase to K. Tzetnik in the broader Holocaust context. The text reports that in a later documentary it was claimed that K. Tzetnik retracted the phrase and saw it as harmful, because it creates the feeling that the events are unrelated to our world and could not happen among us.
Rabbi Gibraltar, despair, ownerlessness, and the dispute over conceptualization
The text presents a proposal to interpret Rabbi Gibraltar’s words as fitting situations in which people’s sense of ownership is undermined due to despair, formulating this as an understanding that a person has, de facto, rendered his property ownerless. The text rejects this proposal and argues that it is a more general principle not dependent on optimism or pessimism, but on a reality in which a legal system has no meaning and therefore there is no ownership even if a person believes he will eventually get out. The text describes the argument here as taking place over the conceptualization of the ruling, not over its validity, and presents the claim that the central problem is the collapse of the possibility of a functioning legal order.
Sodom, the commandment of laws, and the distinction between theft and the absence of a legal system
The text presents the claim that when there is no legal system there is no ownership, and therefore no theft in the ordinary sense, but there still remains a grave claim regarding the very absence of a legal system because of the commandment of laws among the seven Noahide commandments. The text uses Sodom to illustrate a place where the essential problem is the absence of laws and not necessarily a specific prohibition of theft. The text stresses that the absence of theft does not make such a place righteous, because the central failure is the creation of a reality without law and order, and it distinguishes between the claim against creating such a situation and the question of theft within the reality that has already been created.
The people of Shechem, Maimonides, and collective responsibility
The text mentions Maimonides on the people of Shechem and argues that there is collective responsibility of the public for the deeds of its rulers when the public allows a situation without laws. The text emphasizes that even if each individual is coerced and cannot be punished, there still arises a responsibility of the collective that makes it possible to view the public as sustaining a pursuing reality. It distinguishes between punishment that does not apply to a coerced individual and harm for the sake of self-defense when a real danger is created, and applies this within the framework of the law of a pursuer even when the pursuer himself is coerced.
Stalin, public fear, collective guilt, and self-defense
The text describes reading a biography of Stalin and raising the puzzle of how an entire superpower could not depose a single ruler, while emphasizing the fear and danger facing anyone who would try to organize against him. The text argues that on the one hand there is no room to come with complaints against an ordinary citizen who failed to act out of fear, but on the other hand there is collective guilt in the fact that everyone’s failures together enable the regime. The text raises the question whether one may fight Stalin’s coerced soldiers or bomb cities in order to remove a threat, and answers that one may strike for purposes of self-defense because of the law of a pursuer even when the other side is coerced.
Kovno Ghetto: no claim against the Jews, and the distinction between Nazi guilt and absence of ownership
The text states that in the Kovno Ghetto there is no claim against the Jews for the absence of a legal system, because the reality was forced upon them by the Nazis and was not their responsibility. The text directs the claim regarding the absence of laws to the Nazis or the Ukrainians who imposed the norms, and at the same time returns to the argument that when there is no legal system there is no ownership and therefore the question of theft changes. It presents this as two separate planes: failure in the commandment of laws on the part of those who are supposed to establish a system, versus a change in the structure of ownership when such a system does not actually exist.
Responsa From the Depths: the question of kitchen work and cooking on the Sabbath
The text brings, from From the Depths by Rabbi Ephraim Oshry, a question from the period of the Kovno Ghetto about a student named Mr. Yaakov, may God avenge his blood, who is offered work in a kitchen cooking the “black soup” given to the Jews together with one hundred grams of bread per day. The text describes that the questioner prefers this work in order to be spared grueling forced labor at the airport that consumes the soul and breaks the body, and asks whether it is permissible to work at cooking on the Sabbath because of saving a life, and whether he may eat on the Sabbath from the soup he cooked, in light of the prohibition regarding food prepared through Sabbath violation.
The text quotes Rabbi Oshry’s conclusion permitting the cooking on the Sabbath on the grounds that in any case the accursed evildoers will force him to work on the Sabbath, so there is no practical difference in which work he will desecrate the Sabbath, and in addition he sees this as labor not needed for its own sake, which is forbidden only rabbinically because of the coercion. The text also quotes that Rabbi Oshry permits eating the soup on the Sabbath and determines that in such a case, according to all opinions, it is not forbidden as food prepared through Sabbath violation because eating it involves saving life. He adds that all the more so others may eat it, because the prohibition for others is more lenient, while describing exhausted powers of endurance, hunger, and deprivation.
The surprise at the pilpul: food cooked on the Sabbath and labor not needed for its own sake versus saving a life
The text presents a sharp difficulty: if in the end the leniency rests on saving life, which overrides the Sabbath, why does Rabbi Oshry expand into a detailed halakhic analysis of the tannaitic and decisor disputes in the laws of food prepared on the Sabbath, and questions of Torah-level and rabbinic-level prohibition? The text describes how the responsum opens with a review of Hullin 15a, the dispute of Rabbi Meir, Rabbi Yehuda, and Rabbi Yohanan the Sandal-maker, the rulings of Maimonides, the Tur, and the Shulchan Arukh, and a discussion of the time needed “for it to be done” and Rashi’s position, along with the Ritva and practical rulings for someone on whose behalf the food was cooked. The text says the discussion sounds like a normal halakhic inquiry that does not initially mention the ghetto’s distress, and asks what function it serves when the conclusion in any event permits.
The novel leniency: coercion as defining labor not needed for its own sake
The text presents section 2 of the responsum as introducing a line of reasoning according to which labor done under coercion is defined as labor not needed for its own sake, and is therefore only rabbinically prohibited. The text cites, in the name of Oshi Yosef, the idea that a person forced to choose between Sabbath desecration and eating carrion would prefer Sabbath desecration, because regarding the Sabbath the coercion turns the labor into labor not needed for its own sake, whereas with carrion there is “after all, he benefits,” and there is no such exemption. The text brings additional disputes and branches from the Pnei Yehoshua, Maharshal, Maharsham, Maharik, Sanhedrin 74, and also a discussion in the Jerusalem Talmud, Hagigah, about two people carrying a burden together in order to avoid a Torah prohibition, with a resolution based on whichever way you look at it with respect to the disputes of Rabbi Yehuda and Rabbi Shimon, and Rabbi Meir and Rabbi Yehuda.
The text summarizes that Rabbi Oshry permits the case at hand both because of danger to life and because of the definition of labor not needed for its own sake, and even brings, in the name of the responsa Yad Shalom, a basis for leniency in Sabbath desecration due to coercion by the government. The text returns and emphasizes that this structure revives the question of why not suffice with the leniency of saving life, and notes that the question of eating also restores complexity regarding the relation between the intention behind the cooking and the benefit derived from it.
Two explanations for the move: education toward continued halakhic living versus a shift in the boundaries of saving life within a routine of danger
The text suggests one possibility according to which Rabbi Oshry elaborates in order to educate and habituate people to the fact that Jewish law still functions and that actions are still examined through halakhic tools, so as not to reach the conclusion that in the Holocaust “there is no Torah” and everything has turned into animal survival. The text suggests a second possibility according to which the very length of the discussion reflects the inner perspective of someone who lived for years within danger, where extreme life becomes normal life and therefore the boundaries of saving life are not invoked automatically in the way that seems obvious to an outsider. The text argues that someone who lived in the ghetto for years may see the question of whether a certain job saves lives as a real question, because one can die both in the kitchen and at the airport, and the entire future is unstable in a way that blunts simple decisions.
Analogies: an outside view of danger zones, prehistoric man, and the bird on the road
The text compares the outsider’s view of the ghetto to the view of someone outside the Land of Israel regarding life in Israel or in certain communities, where reality looks like the “Wild West” even though from within life is relatively routine. The text tells a comedian’s joke about a tiger and a lion at a modern train station in order to illustrate how constant threats can be “normal” for those who live with them. It also brings an example from a popular science article about a bird that waits until the car is very close before flying away, explaining that the bird operates on a different response scale, so the distance that looks dangerous to a person is a safe margin for the bird.
Conclusion: the testimony of the insider and the boundary between ruling and conceptualization
The text concludes that the second possibility fits the broader lesson: situations far removed from the normal world skew the judgment of someone looking from outside, sometimes toward leniency and sometimes toward stringency. The text states that the statement of someone inside the situation is testimony to what Jewish law requires there, and that one may argue about the conceptualization but not present the ruling itself as the mistake of someone who experienced the reality from within. The text ends with a call to note that the external perspective is not always suited to measuring internal reality, and closes with a blessing of Shabbat Shalom.
Full Transcript
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay. Last time I talked a bit about the case of monetary law in the Kovno Ghetto. Rabbi Gibraltar and the Dvar Avraham and others. I described a little of the atmosphere there in the ghetto and the halakhic implications, or halakhic rulings—let’s call them surprising ones—that were given there by the Dvar Avraham and by Rabbi Gibraltar. And all of this was really meant to emphasize how, when we find ourselves in a very extreme or pathological situation, the entire halakhic picture of the world can change. Or in other words, someone outside that situation can’t really issue a halakhic ruling about what is happening there. And when you see rulings of this kind, many times someone who thinks in the usual halakhic patterns criticizes them—he basically says, this doesn’t look right by normal halakhic standards. And what I wanted to argue is that because we’re dealing here with, yes, an edge case—let’s call it another planet—that is, we’re dealing with a situation that is completely unintelligible and unfamiliar to us, not something we understand and feel, then on the one hand we can’t rule on what happens there, and on the other hand someone who is inside the situation has a certain status—I called it the status of a witness. That is, he is basically testifying to us how someone inside the situation sees it. Of course he speaks in the language of Jewish law. Meaning, from his perspective, when he gives a halakhic ruling for that situation, I see that as a kind of testimony that this is the halakhah in that place. I’m not in a position to criticize him. All I can do is try to define his ruling in terms of the ordinary halakhic tools. And then, as I said, maybe that can be added to the Shulchan Arukh and to the general halakhic corpus and be passed down to future generations. Right, I spoke about the disagreement with Haym Soloveitchik, right? Whether something like that can in fact be transmitted to later generations or cannot be transmitted to later generations.
[Speaker B] But I don’t understand what the Rabbi means when he says you can’t criticize him—what does that mean?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I can’t criticize him because even if it doesn’t seem to fit the ordinary halakhic rules to me, he lived inside the situation. And therefore it may be that I simply don’t grasp how those rules should be applied in such a situation. I’ll give you an example. Two people are in an elevator, and the cable snaps, and the elevator—yes, from a height of I don’t know, fifty stories—starts falling down, free fall. Okay? And now these two people know that in, I don’t know, two minutes or two minutes, they’re finishing their career on this planet. Meaning, that’s it, it’s over. Now one of them says to the other: give me a pen, I want to write a farewell letter to my relatives. And he says no, I don’t agree. Is he allowed to take that pen by force? That’s theft—he can’t take that pen, it isn’t his. Now the normal halakhic rules say: that’s theft, you can’t take it, it’s forbidden to take it. But I don’t know—someone who is inside that situation may understand that this is life inside a fire. In life inside a fire, the norms and what is right to do are completely different from what we see from outside. Meaning, it may be that the person inside that situation understands: forget the nonsense, there’s no ownership here at all. There’s no such thing as owning something. In another second, both of us and the pen crash. Meaning, that pen won’t even be passed on to the children as an inheritance, right, nothing is going to happen with it. Meaning, both we and the pen are crashing in another minute. Does ownership have meaning in such a state? According to the ordinary definitions of Jewish law, maybe yes. Now I’m suddenly starting to think there may be some principle that could say no, but on the face of it, it seems yes. But a person can come and say: I’m inside the situation, I lived it. And I’m telling you, as someone inside the situation, there is no ownership of property in such a situation. When you’re in the middle of the fire, don’t tell me that this pen is yours and that if I take it it’s theft. That’s nonsense. The pen isn’t yours, you’re not an owner, there’s no such thing as ownership. These are lives without order—there’s no…
[Speaker B] Yes, but isn’t it possible, the way the Rabbi is doing now, for the Rabbi to define it and say basically: does ownership have any meaning in a world where apparently you’re not really alive, you’re half alive, and then…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] In theory you can disagree with that, but I think it works the other way around. After I give this explanation, and it doesn’t seem right to you, then you’ll disagree with me. But that doesn’t mean you’re disagreeing with the ruling. You’re disagreeing with my conceptualization that I offered for the ruling. But in order to disagree with the ruling, it seems to me—you’re talking about someone qualified, yes, someone who is a halakhic person inside that situation, not just someone who has feelings. If he’s there, he’s the one who can know what Jewish law says in that situation. Someone outside can’t know. You can argue with my conceptualizations, that what I proposed as an explanation of his ruling doesn’t seem right to you. Because that really does operate with ordinary halakhic tools, and there you can say: no, I don’t agree with that conceptualization, it’s not a possible explanation. So look for another explanation, or maybe you won’t find one. But from my standpoint, the assumption is that if that’s what he says, it’s probably correct. Again, never one hundred percent, nothing is one hundred percent, but that’s the strong presumption. Okay? That’s basically the claim: when you are in such a crazy situation, a completely different situation from what I know, then if you say that this is the halakhah, the presumption is that you are probably right. What the conceptualization will be—that can be debated. I’ll suggest one conceptualization, he’ll suggest another. Once we arrive at some kind of conceptualization, you can take it and add it to halakhah. When I can determine, if it’s agreed, if we’ve reached an agreed conclusion that in a situation where you are living inside a fire, yes, or in an elevator falling downward, there is no ownership anymore—it lapses. Once you establish that as some kind of rule and you more or less define what we’re talking about, it can already enter as a section in the Shulchan Arukh. But someone else may come and say: no, I don’t accept that definition. Not that I don’t accept the ruling, but I don’t accept the definition. But the ruling is a ruling; I assume the ruling is a correct ruling. The person inside the situation is the one who knows what has to be done there. Someone outside can’t really understand what is happening there. But I did the conceptualization using halakhic tools, and it may be that I was wrong, and then someone can come and argue with me. It’s somewhat similar to the concept of a transgression for its own sake. That concept too really speaks about a very, very extreme situation. Yael, wife of Hever the Kenite, had sexual relations with Sisera in order to kill him, and the Sages praise her. In Nazir, the Sages praise her with the statement: great is a transgression for its own sake. Now according to the ordinary rules of Jewish law, that’s forbidden sexual conduct—one must be killed rather than transgress. There is no permission to violate sexual prohibitions under any circumstances. But still the Sages say: no, this was a transgression for its own sake. Why? Yael, who was inside the situation, understood that here, even though the law ostensibly says it’s forbidden, here this is what needs to be done. It was clear to her, as someone living inside the situation—and by the way she probably wasn’t some great halakhic decisor—but it was clear to her inside the situation that this is what had to be done in such a case. Afterward maybe one can come and try to define it somehow or other, but at the time when she did it, it was a transgression, only a transgression for its own sake. Not that it was some different halakhic ruling—it was a transgression for its own sake.
[Speaker B] So that’s different, very different.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Correct. I’m only bringing an example because it was different also because she wasn’t a halakhic decisor. So I also don’t know if there’s some conceptualization that really lets me put it into the Shulchan Arukh. But it does describe a situation that in that sense is similar to what I was talking about, in that there is a pathological situation and the ordinary rules of thought don’t apply there. It’s another planet. That really is a wonderful expression of K. Tzetnik, also for the halakhic discussion. Although, yes, there was a documentary about him some time ago, and the claim there was that he retracted that expression. He eventually said it wasn’t correct—not another planet—and that it’s even harmful to say it’s another planet, because that basically says it has nothing to do with our world, it can’t happen among us, it’s some bizarre other world in a place that is neither day nor night and not in normal space. Fine, that’s already something one can debate. In any case, why did I say earlier that I was reminded of the situation? There may be…
[Speaker C] Rabbi, can’t one say that this case of Rabbi Gibraltar is an example of the fact that Jewish law is, once again, something that in a way… it’s basically tailored to each person?
[Speaker D] A personal choice for each person?
[Speaker C] Because I don’t understand Rabbi Gibraltar as some general permission. I don’t interpret him as saying that in the present situation monetary law has no meaning—I don’t interpret it that way. I interpret him as meaning that there are certain people for whom the feeling of ownership is so undermined, and they have become so pessimistic and lost hope, that for them… but if you find a person who is optimistic, full of faith, and sure that he’ll get out of this, and he’s already dreaming about the future and everything he has is very important in his eyes, then to say, what matters in your eyes doesn’t interest me, I can steal from you because Rabbi Gibraltar said so—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What you’re basically arguing is—you’re giving a different conceptualization—you’re basically saying the person has rendered his property ownerless. Meaning, if he’s so pessimistic that he won’t get out of this and so on, then he has de facto rendered his property ownerless. In contrast, the optimist who thinks he will get out of this does not render it ownerless because he thinks he’ll get out. So you’re planting this in the field of despair, yes, basically.
[Speaker C] Right, no—I interpret the prohibition of theft from the outset not because there is some holiness attached to the property of some object, some holiness of ownership on it, but because if you steal it, you cause someone pain. But if that person is truly despairing and completely… he doesn’t even feel that it’s his, because there’s no ownership of anything here.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That’s really a scriptural rationale that isn’t even convincing, no? Because even if it were convincing there’d be a problem of deriving the reason of the verse, but to me it’s not even convincing at all, I don’t know, it doesn’t seem right to me in the least. More than that: when you read the report again—it wasn’t a halakhic composition, it was a newspaper article or a series of newspaper articles—and when you read the report, you see that he was speaking about a general principle, not a here-and-now. He said something general there, and that comes out quite clearly from the description.
[Speaker C] If a family or a person would stand up and say: we’re sure we’re getting out of this, we live with the consciousness that we believe, just with simple faith, and we live with that consciousness, and we’re also planning for the future—would Rabbi Gibraltar come and say, excuse me, property here, I have no problem throwing you out of the house because…?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Clearly that isn’t—
[Speaker C] —acceptable.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Entirely acceptable—those people who are optimistic, when they are optimistic—
[Speaker C] Because he evaluates reality in such a way, but that’s a subjective matter—the existence of Nazis who want…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] You assume the issue is optimism or pessimism, but I claim no. Because of the current situation, even if you are optimistic about what will happen in the future—it’s not because you’re certain to die, that’s not the point. The point is that because right now there is no meaning at all to a legal system in a world where everyone does whatever he wants, so there is no ownership right now, even if you’re optimistic and sure that in another year you’ll get out. It’s not connected. The property still isn’t yours. You assume the whole issue is optimism and pessimism; on that I disagree. I think the issue is different. Therefore there is no ownership. Meaning—
[Speaker C] Meaning in Sodom, the Rabbi is saying this: if I come to Sodom, I’m a religious person coming to Sodom, and I find that there there isn’t… and everyone steals from everyone and there’s no… you turn to the legal system and they laugh in your face. Right. So at that moment I can join that system, they can take everything from me, and all is well.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes. What do you mean all is well? There’s no ownership, yes.
[Speaker C] There’s no ownership, so that’s Jewish law? That’s halakhah? It’s not that they’re violating Jewish law—there is no theft there because everyone steals from everyone. Excellent, right. Wonderful—so why did anyone want to wipe them out at all?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] They’re perfectly fine, no one—
[Speaker C] —is stealing, there’s no theft there, they’re more righteous than we are.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Again, a confusion between two things. Why? Because there is a claim against them for the very fact that there is no legal system there—that’s their problem, not the prohibition of theft. Their problem is laws—one of the seven Noahide commandments is the commandment of laws. There has to be a legal system in some place. Now if you didn’t make one, then you’re criminal because you violated the commandment of laws. But practically, if you didn’t make one, then there isn’t one, so if someone takes the property he isn’t a thief because there is no ownership. But that doesn’t mean such a place won’t have a claim against it—of course it will. You are wicked because you did not create a legal system; this is a place that does not function properly.
[Speaker C] Yes, but I’m saying, after… okay, so there’s a problem with the government there that didn’t establish a system, but as far as the people are concerned, everyone is righteous. No? Like the generation of the Flood—“the earth was filled with violence because of them”—but it wasn’t filled with violence at all; they were all like that, and therefore there’s no problem of violence there.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The people are the government—there aren’t people and government. Why did they come with complaints against the people of Shechem? This is the famous Maimonides. Why did they come with complaints against the people of Shechem? What do you want—Shechem stole Dinah; what could the people of Shechem do? If the people had not agreed with the government, it wouldn’t have functioned that way. Rabbi, the government in Gaza that imposes its terror on the poor citizens. No, you didn’t understand. If the whole public doesn’t agree, then the government usually wouldn’t survive. That’s how it is. But there is also a claim against the public for what its government does. You are allowing a situation without laws—that’s exactly what Maimonides says about the people of Shechem. Since they allowed a situation without laws, that is a claim against all the citizens. As for the people of Shechem—excuse me—in the Kovno Ghetto, then clearly there is no claim against the Jews, because it truly wasn’t in their hands. They are not citizens who chose this government. This is a gang that took over them and imposed its warped norms on them. So there clearly there is no claim against the Jews. But in a place where it is the government of the public, and the public basically stands behind that government, then the claim is against the whole public. I spoke about this in other contexts, in other series. I mentioned that I once read a biography of Stalin—there are many biographies of Stalin—in one of them I read, it was by a Russian director, I don’t know, Dzerzhinsky I think his name was, some biography of Stalin. And the feeling that accompanied me throughout the reading was that there was an unbelievable phenomenon there. Meaning, there was this immense superpower, the Soviet Union, that all basically wanted the ruler dead, and they couldn’t prevail against one person. One man held this entire superpower by the throat, and in the end he died in his bed. There are all kinds of—
[Speaker C] And no one tried to kill him the whole time? There wasn’t any attempt, no known attempt?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] There are such conspiracies, that in the end he didn’t die in his bed, but on the face of it, ordinary history says yes. Meaning, he died in his bed in ripe old age. Now what does that mean, basically? What that means, of course, is that there was terrible fear there. And someone who would have tried to assassinate Stalin—you can’t do it alone, you have to organize with a few people. Now each person you turn to, who knows—he might inform on you tomorrow morning, and your head is gone. Stalin takes your head off whether he suspects you, even if he doesn’t suspect you. Meaning, you don’t even get a trial. There’s nothing. It’s terrible fear. Meaning, how can one come with complaints against an ordinary Russian citizen—or yes, from anywhere in the Soviet Union—that he didn’t assassinate Stalin, that he allowed him to do everything he did? That’s on the one hand. And that’s clear. If I were in that situation, I don’t think I’d be more heroic than the others who were there. I assume I would have behaved the way everyone there behaved. On the other hand, let’s say the Soviet Union goes to war and carries out terror around the world and causes immense damage. Am I allowed to kill Stalin’s soldiers? They’re coerced into going out—they act under his orders. What can they do, otherwise he’ll kill them? So am I allowed to bomb Stalin’s cities or fight Stalin’s soldiers? Of course yes. The public bears responsibility for what its leadership does, even though the leadership may have seized power by force and all that is true, and I as a private individual probably also wouldn’t have done anything—an ordinary person can’t do anything in such a situation. But practically, all the failures of each one of us together are what caused Stalin to be there and do whatever he wanted. So the collective guilt exists even though you can’t come with complaints against each individual person. And there’s something a bit tricky here. Okay, I don’t want to get into that whole issue.
[Speaker B] But—
[Speaker C] Rabbi, but he also didn’t appear out of nowhere—he grew from the Russian people, and he was an authentic creation of it.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Correct, and by the point when it became clear who he was, it was no longer like that.
[Speaker C] But do you know how many died at his funeral, crushed by the crowd, willingly? Five hundred people died in the crush.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Crushed by the crowd and willingly are not the same thing, but I know, because my parents were in Hungary, not in the Soviet Union, and from them too I heard how spontaneous the demonstrations there were. But true, by the way, when I said that everyone wanted him dead, I meant everyone who knew what he was doing. Most people in the collective farms and so on didn’t know—they were sure that Stalin was indeed a great scholar and a perfectly righteous man. Meaning, they really thought so. There were also people in this country who thought so too, as is well known, of course. But I’m speaking on the principled level—I’m only trying to illustrate this story of the people of Shechem. The story of the people of Shechem—this wasn’t a democracy either. I assume they didn’t democratically choose Hamor and Shechem to be their kings and delegate to them the authority to do whatever they wanted. But still there is some kind of collective responsibility on the part of the citizens regarding what their government or regime or king does, because in the end, if all the citizens had opposed it, it wouldn’t have happened. Now it’s true that each individual by himself—you can’t come with complaints against him—but practically, all of them together, in the end, this is what they did. There is some sort of collective responsibility here. So I’m not saying I punish them for it—you can’t punish them, the person is coerced, and the Merciful One exempts one under coercion. They don’t deserve punishment. But if, in order to defend myself, I have to harm them—that I can do. They have the status of a pursuer. They are the ones giving power to Stalin or to Shechem, who is pursuing me. And there is a difference between not punishing them because they are coerced—that’s clear, you may not punish them—and, on the other hand, harming them in order to defend oneself. Since they bear responsibility in this matter, one may harm them if one needs that in order to defend oneself.
[Speaker E] But Rabbi, without getting into that, ostensibly one could say that someone who threatens you, even if he is coerced, you are entitled to harm him, because he threatens your life. Exactly. So without getting into whether they’re responsible or coerced or something like that, even if we say that—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Correct, that is basically the argument. The argument is that he is basically a pursuer—he threatens me. Now the fact that he threatens me against his will, Stalin forces him, fine, but if not for the fact that he surrendered to Stalin this wouldn’t have happened. Meaning, I am under threat because of him. Fine, but that’s a parenthesis, I don’t want to get into this whole story. Since—
[Speaker B] No, but he’s illuminating something, Rabbi, one second—he’s illuminating that apparently even without that, even if there’s no… even if it’s complete coercion, and not as the Rabbi wants to suggest that it is to some extent the citizens’ responsibility—a pursuer under coercion clearly still has the law of a pursuer.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Very true. It’s complete coercion, and still the citizens bear responsibility.
[Speaker B] One second—someone comes and puts some deadly chemical in my blood, let’s say, drugs me completely, and now because of that I become a pursuer, because now I’m driving very dangerously. It’s permitted to kill me even if I’m not a wrongdoer in any way. That’s what he’s arguing, no?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, it’s the same thing. I’m saying again, as I said, with regard to them I don’t need—I’m not killing them as a punishment. I’m killing them because they pose a threat to me, the law of a pursuer. Exactly that. And therefore it doesn’t matter that they are coerced.
[Speaker B] Fine, so Rabbi, then you don’t need these two perspectives.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The concept of collective responsibility is simply another name for saying: this whole collective is pursuing me—even those who are not holding weapons. If I need to bomb Moscow in order to deal with Stalin, none of them is holding a weapon. But I need to bomb Moscow in order to get rid of Stalin—is that permitted?
[Speaker B] Yes, but that’s not Maimonides’ argument in Shechem. There he killed all of Shechem—he didn’t kill all of Shechem because they kidnapped him. I didn’t understand. No, in Shechem—I mean there, Shechem son of Hamor.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Fine, Maimonides argues that since they did not fulfill the commandment of laws, they are liable to death, because a gentile is liable to death for any transgression. I’m not speaking in halakhic language, I’m speaking in moral language. In moral language there is responsibility. It’s not that everyone who has responsibility is liable to death—that’s in halakhah. But right now I’m speaking in moral language, the most amateur moral language there is.
[Speaker C] So in the end…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay, never mind, this really isn’t a discussion that concerns us. I just want to say that regarding what I wanted to say about the Kovno Ghetto, clearly there is no claim against the Jews there. The Jews were not responsible for that situation. It’s not that there was some accusation against them. In the case of the people of Sodom, they were responsible for that situation, because everyone there basically—it was a group, not that someone had taken control over someone else. That was the accepted norm there. And once that was the accepted norm there, even though no individual person probably could have successfully stood up against it, there still is responsibility here, though not in the direct sense. Each individual could be considered coerced, maybe, but that doesn’t matter; together they create Sodom. Sodom is the collection of all the people who live there. That is Sodom. So there too there is responsibility, which is not what happens in the Kovno Ghetto. But what I said had nothing to do with responsibility at all. The claim about why there was no legal system there—I direct that at the Nazis. For that I hold them accountable. But still, even if I hold the Nazis accountable for not establishing a legal system there, or the Ukrainians, still there would be no theft there, because there is no ownership. When there is no legal system, there is no ownership. Those are two different things. You did not fulfill the commandment of establishing laws, but there is no question of theft here. Those are two different things. So that’s regarding what we discussed last time. What I want to do now is take another case, which is really from a somewhat different angle—maybe it’s the same thing and maybe not, we’ll talk about that in a moment—also involving a halakhic story there in the ghetto. This one is from a different source. There is a responsa collection by Rabbi Ephraim Oshry, who was also in the Kovno Ghetto, called Responsa from the Depths. And there he discusses all kinds of questions that arose during the Holocaust—horrifying questions. Really, it’s a shocking responsa collection to read. By the way, the responsa themselves were written after the Holocaust. Meaning, these were answers he gave to questioners during the Holocaust, when he was in the ghetto, but the actual writing he did afterward, and by then he also had sources, I assume he filled in some gaps and so on. But it was written after the Holocaust, even though the answers themselves were given in the ghetto itself. And I want to go through one of his responsa. There are many responsa there, and in many of them you can see the aspects we’re talking about here. I chose one example. It deals with… so this is the question. “These I remember and pour out my soul within me, for in the days of the accursed wanton evildoers we had no hope of survival, and every single day they would take more than a thousand people out of the ghetto to force them into backbreaking labor at the airport and torment them in their suffering. And one of my students, Mr. Yaakov, may God avenge his blood”—you see this was written after the Holocaust, because about Yaakov he already writes “may God avenge his blood”—“came before me with his anguished question: since he has the possibility of entering work in the kitchen, in the place where they cook the black soup made from beans that the Germans would distribute to the Jews together with one hundred grams of bread per day. However, the problem is that there he would be compelled and forced to work at the cooking even on the Sabbath. But since by doing so he would be saved from the harsh forced labor at the airport, which destroys the soul and breaks the body, perhaps this also involves danger to life, because since he would be saved from hard and exhausting labor and would be able to eat and satisfy his hungry soul with as much black soup as he desired, his body would thereby become stronger and he might be able to endure so that the general hunger prevailing in the ghetto would not destroy him. And furthermore he asks whether he himself may eat on the Sabbath from the black soup that he cooks on the Sabbath.” Yes, that’s from the standpoint of an act done on the Sabbath. So the question is whether he is allowed to cook, and even if he is allowed to cook, the question is whether he would be allowed to eat, because it was done on the Sabbath, and so there is the prohibition of deriving benefit from an act done on the Sabbath. So that is basically the question.
[Speaker B] Now on the face of it, he answered the first question already, didn’t he? He answered the first question—only the second he remained in doubt about. What? On the first question he answered: it’s danger, as if he says it’s a possible danger to life.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Wait, we haven’t tasted it yet. We haven’t gotten there yet. One question is whether this counts as danger to life and whether he’s allowed to cook on the Sabbath. The second question is: even if he is allowed to cook on the Sabbath, would he be allowed to eat it himself?
[Speaker B] Why would he be allowed to eat? I didn’t understand the second question. What—seemingly it’s obvious that no, isn’t it?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What, because it’s not danger to life? Yes. No—the prohibition of an act done on the Sabbath is rabbinic.
[Speaker B] Yes, okay, but why should he eat it?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Just in general—on the Sabbath it’s a rabbinic prohibition. After all, clearly there was danger there, at one level of danger or another, and also in the end—we talked about this last time—that ultimately the assumption was that they would die anyway, one way or the other, as the Devar Avraham said. So the definition of danger to life is not a direct, case-by-case definition. So there’s room to say: look, don’t do the Torah prohibition, but the rabbinic prohibition you may violate. There’s room to discuss both questions that way, but yes, the question could be discussed as two questions, both depending on whether this is danger to life or not. You can interpret it this way or that way. In the responsum he doesn’t distinguish between them.
[Speaker D] Isn’t this whole question self-evident?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I’ll get to that in a moment. Yes, it is self-evident. The big question here, of course, is that we’re talking about a situation where “possible danger to life” is an understatement. As the Devar Avraham said: none of us is getting out of here. Meaning, first of all, we are certainly going to die; maybe in one case someone will survive, that would be a miracle, but the simple assumption is that we will die. This is not possible danger to life. So to talk about whether you may cook on the Sabbath—I also don’t see what the question is. But deriving benefit from an act done on the Sabbath, which is only a rabbinic prohibition, when you are in such an extreme situation—what is the discussion even about? What is the question? Okay, so in a moment we’ll see.
[Speaker B] If it’s the other way around—Rabbi, you said before that if I’m in a situation where we are sure to die, then maybe it’s even—maybe the opposite, as it were.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What the rabbi presented, that the Devar Avraham said, is that since in any case we are going to die, then why desecrate the Sabbath? After all, we won’t save the life anyway. Yes, maybe that is the other side of the coin, fair enough. Okay, in any event, he gives a long answer there, but I specifically want to begin from the end, from his conclusion, because his conclusion will cast the answer itself in a different light. “Returning to the legal conclusion, from all the above it appears to me that one should permit the questioner to work at cooking on the Sabbath in the kitchen, for in any event the accursed wanton evildoers will force him to work at forced labor in the airport on the Sabbath. If so, what difference does it make what kind of work he is compelled to desecrate the Sabbath with—whether another kind of work or cooking? In any case he will not violate a Torah prohibition,” etc., “since he desecrates the Sabbath under coercion”—the assumption is that this… the answer, which we’ll see in a moment—“and this is forbidden only rabbinically, and in our case even rabbinically it is not forbidden because of the danger to life involved. Therefore it certainly appears”—second paragraph—“that he is permitted to work at cooking on the Sabbath, since by doing so he will also have a little food to revive himself. And likewise there is no prohibition at all against his eating the black soup that he cooks on the Sabbath, and in such a case everyone agrees that an act done on the Sabbath is not forbidden, since this eating involves danger to life. And all the more so other Jews are permitted to eat this soup that he cooks on the Sabbath for the same reason, for the prohibition for others is lighter than the prohibition for the person himself. For danger to life is so great that it overrides the Sabbath. For the endurance of these poor wretches has already completely failed, and they are literally wasting away from hunger and deprivation. Therefore they are certainly permitted to restore their hungry souls with this soup, even though it was cooked on the Sabbath.” Now, if those really are—the two last paragraphs of the responsum, which I just read; there is more in the middle, which we’ll see in a moment—but if these are the two last paragraphs of the responsum, then what does that actually mean? In the end, what is he saying? Danger to life overrides the Sabbath. Leave it alone; obviously it’s permitted for you. Danger to life—it’s insane, what are you even asking? I mean, he didn’t say that, but I’m adding it. Right? And the prohibition of deriving benefit from an act done on the Sabbath is only rabbinic. What is the question? This whole move is so strange. Now, it would not be strange if he had written only these two paragraphs. He said: yes indeed, this is danger to life, it’s permitted, that’s all, everything is fine. It would still be strange what he was asking in the first place, but okay—he asked, and he answered him. But no, there is a detailed halakhic responsum there, with considerations this way and that way, and part of it—this issue of a labor not needed for its own sake—is mentioned also in the paragraph I read, but there is a whole halakhic discussion from the sources and everything, and he discusses what kind of prohibition it is, rabbinic or Torah-level, labor not needed for its own sake, and so on. And then after finishing all that, he writes these two paragraphs. What on earth is he answering there? Who needs all this halakhic clarification if in the end you say: leave it alone, danger to life overrides the Sabbath? Why are you discussing whether it’s rabbinic or Torah-level? This whole business is bizarre. To amuse oneself with learning? What? To amuse oneself with learning is a good thing, but this is a halakhic responsum, not a general lecture.
[Speaker F] But for future cases, where he is innovating laws and introducing different sides.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Even if you want to answer future people, fine—then write your answer and leave out the danger-to-life part. I wonder whether one is allowed to do such a thing. Forget the danger-to-life arguments. You write all that and then draw a practical conclusion. You’re answering him a halakhic question. So what is it? Do you want to write a responsum or give a general lecture? Give a general lecture, no problem, or write a book of Talmudic analysis, right? But this is a halakhic responsum. There’s something here that in my view requires explanation—and again, almost all his responsa are like this. I just chose one as an example. Now look, I still want to show you…
[Speaker C] It’s not only that it’s strange that he does this; it also creates a distorted standard in the minds of the listeners. Students will think that danger to life is not such a…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay, fair enough, that only strengthens the question.
[Speaker B] No, and it looks like he’s not really—it looks like he’s not really sure that this is danger to life.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] In a moment, in a moment we’ll see, in a moment we’ll see. So come, let’s look. I now want to show you the responsum itself. I read you the beginning, which is the question, and the two concluding paragraphs. Now look how the responsum proceeds. It’s divided into two parts. A—we’ll do this quickly. “In Hullin 15a we read: We learned in a Mishnah: one who cooks on the Sabbath—if unintentionally, he may eat; if intentionally, he may not eat, the words of Rabbi Meir. Rabbi Yehuda says: if unintentionally, he may eat after the Sabbath; if intentionally, he may never eat. Rabbi Yohanan HaSandlar says: if unintentionally, after the Sabbath others may eat but not he himself; if intentionally, neither he nor others may ever eat.” A three-way tannaitic dispute, well-known matters. In the Shulchan Arukh, section 318, it is brought as law, and the Rema disagrees there, and in short these are ancient matters, I won’t go into all the details now. “And Maimonides in chapter 6 of the Laws of Sabbath, law 23, ruled: ‘A Jew who did labor on the Sabbath—if he transgressed and did it intentionally, he is forbidden to benefit from that labor forever, while other Jews may benefit from it immediately on Saturday night, as it says, “And you shall keep the Sabbath, for it is holy to you”—it is holy, but what is produced by it is not holy. How so? A Jew who intentionally cooked on the Sabbath—on Saturday night others may eat, but he himself may never eat; and if he cooked unintentionally, then on Saturday night both he and others may eat immediately.’” So Maimonides ruled like Rabbi Yehuda, right? “But the Tur, in section 318, ruled in the name of Rabbenu Yitzhak, author of Tosafot, that if unintentionally it is permitted even for him on that very day; if intentionally it is forbidden on that day even to others, but in the evening it is permitted even to him”—that is, he ruled like Rabbi Meir. “And Nachmanides decided in accordance with Maimonides, and so ruled the Geonim, and so too ruled the Shulchan Arukh. See there in section 318, where he wrote: ‘One who cooks on the Sabbath intentionally—it is forbidden to him forever, and to others it is permitted immediately on Saturday night; and if unintentionally, it is forbidden on that day even to others.’” All right? “Now all these great authorities do not mention even the need to wait the time it would take to do it, and this is not like the view of Rashi.” Because the question is: if you’re allowed to eat it after the Sabbath, do you need to wait the amount of time it would have taken to cook it? That is what is called “the time it would take to do it.” So Rashi’s position is that on Saturday night you need to wait. But the other medieval authorities do not mention this. “As he wrote there under the words ‘Rabbi Yehuda,’ etc.: even though there is no liability of stoning, there is nevertheless a transgression, and we require the time it would take to do it so that one not derive benefit from the transgression.” Because Rashi says: why do you need to wait that amount of time? Because if you wait the amount of time it would take, then effectively you have not benefited from the transgression. Suppose cooking takes an hour. If you wait an hour on Saturday night, then basically you could already have cooked it after the Sabbath. So you are not benefiting from the fact that it was cooked on the Sabbath. That neutralizes the problem of benefiting from an act done on the Sabbath. Therefore you need to wait that amount of time. “And in Bava Kamma 71a: What is Rabbi Yohanan HaSandlar’s reason? Because Rabbi Hiyya expounded at the entrance to the house of the Nasi: ‘And you shall keep the Sabbath, for it is holy to you’—just as what is holy is forbidden to eat, so too what is done on the Sabbath is forbidden to eat,” etc. In short, yes, “Rav Aha and Ravina disagreed about it: one said the prohibition of an act done on the Sabbath is Torah-level, and one said it is rabbinic,” etc. And of course we rule that it is rabbinic. He brings the Ritva. In short, you can see he’s working here through the medieval and later authorities and how the law is decided—like Rabbi Yehuda, like Rabbi Meir, Rabbi Yohanan HaSandlar, and so on. And he discusses there, yes, according to whom we rule. Now he says: “However, in the Hagahot Ashri on section 318 it says: I saw that he wrote as follows, that for the one for whom it was cooked, his law is also like the law of the cook himself.” As was written, yes, if I cooked for someone, then the law of the one for whom I cooked is like the law of the cook himself. Yes, in Yoreh De’ah 99 regarding one who transgressed and cooked, etc. In short, that it should be forbidden. “And if it was cooked for a Jew, then the one for whom it was cooked has the same law as the cook himself,” as the Magen Avraham wrote, etc. In short, you see the whole story. So that is the discussion of an act done on the Sabbath. Okay? Now, in section B he introduces a novelty. By the way, I was not familiar with this. He brings various references with an amazing reasoning. Really, for a general lecture it’s wonderful. But he brings there a reasoning that already deals with the cooking itself, not only with the prohibition of deriving benefit. Up to this point he dealt only with the question whether there is a prohibition of an act done on the Sabbath. He did not discuss the question of the cooking itself. Somehow it appears that the whole discussion—whether it is Torah-level, whether it is rabbinic, to whom it is permitted, to whom it is forbidden—the whole discussion is seemingly an ordinary halakhic discussion. He is basically clarifying whether it is permitted or forbidden. Not related to danger to life, not related to the surrounding distress there. He simply conducts a discussion as if they asked this during some vacation Sabbath at, I don’t know, the Kinneret. Okay. The question is whether something happened, whether I’m allowed to eat, forbidden to eat. He discusses the sugya, according to whom we rule, whether it is permitted to him, whether it is permitted to others—nothing. No mention here of danger to life or anything. Clarifying the sugya and deciding the law. In the second part he does enter, yes, into danger to life—but notice: the permission is not based on the fact that it is danger to life; rather, the danger to life turns it into a labor not needed for its own sake. Look, this is a wonderful reasoning. “However, in the book Oshi Yosef”—that is by the author of Pri Megadim on the Talmud, yes?—“in Oshi Yosef on tractate Shabbat 72, he wrote regarding someone who is forced to choose one of two things, either to desecrate the Sabbath or to eat forbidden carrion: he should choose desecration of the Sabbath.” Yes, they force you to commit a prohibition. Which is better—to eat forbidden carrion or to desecrate the Sabbath? So he says: better to choose desecration of the Sabbath. Why? “For desecration of the Sabbath under coercion is considered labor not needed for its own sake, and is only rabbinic. But if he eats carrion, he will violate a Torah prohibition, since he derives pleasure from that eating.” What does that mean? He says this: if they force you to desecrate the Sabbath, then in effect when you desecrated the Sabbath, that labor is labor not needed for its own sake. Why? Because you are doing the labor not because you need the product generated by the labor, but in order to save yourself from the threat. That is labor not needed for its own sake. Like someone who digs a hole and needs only its dirt. I dig a pit in the ground—that violates the prohibition of plowing, or building if it’s in a house; in a field it’s plowing. So I dig a pit, but I dig it not because I need the pit, but because I need the sand I remove from it. So the Talmud says this is labor not needed for its own sake. There is a dispute between Rabbi Shimon and Rabbi Yehuda. Rabbi Yehuda says that this is a Torah prohibition; Rabbi Shimon says labor not needed for its own sake is rabbinically forbidden. There is some opinion that says it is Torah-level only under coercion—no, the plain sense is that it is rabbinically forbidden. Maimonides, by the way, rules like Rabbi Yehuda, but all the decisors rule like Rabbi Shimon, that it is only a rabbinic prohibition. The Shulchan Arukh also rules that it is only rabbinic. And that is the halakhah. So now what happens? If I do labor under threat on the Sabbath, then he says it is the same as digging a hole when one needs only the dirt. Because I am really doing this labor—not because I need… say, I’m cooking under threat. But I’m cooking not because I need the food. I’m cooking in order to save myself from death, if they threaten to kill me if I don’t cook. So if that’s the case, the purpose of the cooking is not the food, but saving myself from death. Exactly as the purpose of digging the pit is not because I need the pit, but because I need the dirt I took out of it. So this is labor not needed for its own sake. Now this is…
[Speaker D] But if you eat… I didn’t understand.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] If you eat the dish, then already… wait, I’m talking about cooking, not eating. The cooking. Afterward we’ll discuss the eating. First of all I’m asking whether one is allowed to cook. So what happens here…
[Speaker G] Is that parallel to a person who cooks because he gets paid for the cooking—for the fact that he cooks?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That’s an interesting question. Seemingly, according to this reasoning, someone who cooks for payment is also doing labor not needed for its own sake. Correct. He says this later on. He later brings views that even under a threat that is not a threat of death, this would still be only a rabbinic prohibition and you would be allowed to do it. Why? Because the permission here—notice—is not because of the threat, because you are in mortal danger, so they permit you to cook. There is a permission here as a matter of the law itself. The prohibition you committed is only rabbinic, because if you cook because of the threat, then it is labor not needed for its own sake. This is not a permission because of coercion; it is a permission because of labor not needed for its own sake. Now if that is so, then even if it is not coercion but I do it for the money, it can be seen as labor not needed for its own sake to the same degree. It doesn’t have to be outright coercion, because the permission is not a permission of coercion.
[Speaker C] But then if you eat from the dish, then yes, you cooked in order to eat, and then maybe it collapses. But if in the end you eat from the dish—he permits him to eat—then again it becomes labor needed for its own sake. You asked that before.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Leave that for a moment. At this stage he does not eat. All right? So if he does not eat, is it permitted or forbidden? That’s a different discussion. By the way, it may be that this itself explains the second question he asked—whether he may eat. Because once he eats, it could be that this reveals that the cooking itself was labor needed for its own sake. I’m not at all sure that’s correct, but in principle it could perhaps explain the second question of the questioner. But let’s leave that aside for now; at the moment I’m speaking about a case where he did not eat. So now the question is—he says that regarding Sabbath labor there is a permission because it is labor not needed for its own sake. But the permission of labor not needed for its own sake, unlike unintentional action, exists only in the laws of the Sabbath. There is no such category in other prohibitions. Therefore, in other prohibitions, if I do them under coercion, then maybe I will have an exemption of coercion, but there is no exemption there of labor not needed for its own sake. Therefore he says: if they tell me, either eat carrion or do labor on the Sabbath under coercion, it is preferable to do labor on the Sabbath—even though, remember, eating carrion is only an ordinary prohibition, not a severe one. Desecrating the Sabbath carries stoning; one who publicly desecrates the Sabbath is like one who rejects the whole Torah. He says yes, but since on the Sabbath there is this category of labor not needed for its own sake, and on the Sabbath when you do it under coercion that is labor not needed for its own sake, then in effect you did not violate the Sabbath labor prohibition at all. You violated a prohibition—not the prohibition of labor on the Sabbath, sorry—you violated a rabbinic prohibition. In contrast, if you ate carrion under threat, then you may be coerced, but the prohibition you violated because of the coercion is a Torah prohibition. Whereas on the Sabbath the prohibition you violated because of the coercion is rabbinic. Because here the coercion does a double job: first, it is coercion, and second, it turns your labor into a rabbinic prohibition. So bottom line, the coercion caused you to commit only a rabbinic transgression.
[Speaker B] So why does he explain it by saying that there he does derive pleasure? He explains that because when he’s coerced he also derives pleasure, which seemingly belongs more to the category of accidental involvement.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, no, the point is more than that. He says: even with carrion there might perhaps have been room to exempt him—not by the category of labor not needed for its own sake, of course, but by the category of coercion. He says, but under coercion—or at least even if you exempt him because of coercion—the prohibition is certainly still there. Because with a prohibition, even if it were unintentional, say, there is still the principle that he derives benefit. Once he derives benefit, then even if in labor not needed for its own sake you don’t need to get to “he derives benefit,” plainly speaking, in prohibitions that are not Sabbath prohibitions there is no exemption of labor not needed for its own sake. So why should I care whether he derives benefit or not? The issue is that you can also say he is unintentional in some sense; after all, the distinction between unintentional action and labor not needed for its own sake is a very difficult distinction. So he says: even if you say it is unintentional, that won’t help you, because there is the rule of “he derives benefit” in cases like forbidden fats and sexual prohibitions. There, there is no unintentional-action exemption or accidental-involvement exemption, right?
[Speaker B] And again, does the rabbi understand that when someone forces me it could fall under unintentional action? What?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] It could be under…? Yes—accidental involvement, unintentional action, and labor not needed for its own sake are very fine distinctions.
[Speaker B] Fine, yes, but…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So bottom line, he says in short: regarding eating carrion, there is the permission of coercion, but the transgression you commit is a Torah transgression. Even if there were some element of unintentional action or accidental involvement, there is still “he derives benefit,” and labor not needed for its own sake doesn’t exist at all in forbidden foods. Therefore the prohibition here is Torah-level. True, if they were threatening you to eat carrion… carrion certainly would be permitted because of danger to life. But when you ask yourself whether to eat carrion or do labor on the Sabbath, he says it is preferable to do labor on the Sabbath, because the labor on the Sabbath—beyond the coercion—the labor itself is only a rabbinic prohibition, because it is labor not needed for its own sake. Therefore that is preferable. That’s what he claims. And it is an interesting reasoning in itself. I don’t think it’s correct, by the way, but it’s an interesting reasoning. “And he also brings there in Rosh Yosef that the Pnei Yehoshua disputes the words of Tosafot there, who wrote that one who works on the Sabbath because of suffering is liable, whereas the Pnei Yehoshua holds that because of suffering and the like it is labor not needed for its own sake.” You see, that’s what I meant before: it doesn’t have to be mortal danger—even suffering. Why? Because the permission is not because of the suffering. Suffering in itself perhaps does not permit Sabbath desecration; only death does, not suffering. But here, because of the suffering, it is labor not needed for its own sake, so it is only a rabbinic prohibition. So he says: “And likewise he brought what the Maharsha wrote in Bava Batra 119 regarding the gatherer of sticks, that he intended it for the sake of Heaven, and therefore it was labor not needed for its own sake.” Yes, this is a well-known Tosafot in Bava Batra. Tosafot asks there: after all, the midrash says that the stick-gatherer intended it for the sake of Heaven, and he wanted to show the people of Israel that even though it had been decreed that they would not enter the Land of Israel, they were still obligated in all the commandments. So what did he do in order to show all Israel this? He gathered sticks on the Sabbath, hoping there would be two witnesses, they would take him to court and execute him, and thus all Israel would understand that one still has to keep the Sabbath even though it had been decreed that they would not enter the Land of Israel. Strange midrash, but that is the midrash. So Tosafot asks: according to this, why did they execute him? After all, what he did was not because he needed the sticks, but in order to teach Israel that one is liable to death for desecrating the Sabbath. So if so, what he did was labor not needed for its own sake; that does not incur death, it is only rabbinically prohibited. Unless we rule like Rabbi Yehuda.
[Speaker C] No, then he intended specifically—he had an intention also to use the sticks. I didn’t understand. He intended before them; he deliberately made an intention that “I’m taking the sticks so there will be something on which…”
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But the truth is, he doesn’t want the sticks. He intended only…
[Speaker C] No, both. He created for himself a need for the sticks too, so that he could sacrifice himself.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Fine, that’s not the simple reading. The simple reading is that they didn’t know; if they had known, then what have we accomplished? After all, clearly they did not know that he did it for the sake of Heaven, and therefore they executed him—they judged him as a stick-gatherer.
[Speaker C] Moses didn’t know?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Moses also didn’t know. He only asked the Holy One, blessed be He, and asked how the Holy One decreed this judgment. Fine, never mind, that’s another discussion. In any case, the claim of the Pnei Yehoshua is that it need not be mortal danger in order for there to be labor not needed for its own sake, because the permission is not a permission of coercion, but rather of labor not needed for its own sake. So any other purpose—not only escaping a threat, but also escaping suffering, or as we said earlier, for money—that too is labor not needed for its own sake, and that turns it into a rabbinic prohibition.
[Speaker B] Wait, does the rabbi not understand that he wrote there “suffering” specifically? Meaning, if it’s profit, then it’s obvious that it’s… it seems that way from the formulation there, that if it’s profit then maybe it really is labor needed for its own sake? Why? I don’t know, maybe because in the definition of labor needed for its own sake people do labor to profit, but not in order to avoid suffering.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] People do labor in order to profit, but that’s not—it’s also true that people do labor in order to escape suffering. But that’s not the point, and in any case that wasn’t what was done in the Tabernacle.
[Speaker B] In the Tabernacle, no.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] One digs a pit because one needs sand.
[Speaker B] Right, right, the rabbi is correct. But then why did he mention suffering—how does the rabbi understand that? Just as an example?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Because that was the sugya there. There the question was what happens with suffering, so he said suffering is labor not needed for its own sake. Fair enough, maybe he would say the same also for money. I don’t know. I’m saying from logic—why not? Yes. “And on the basis of the words of the Rosh Yosef above, the Maharsham wrote in Orchot Chaim that one can find merit for Jewish soldiers, that their labor is only rabbinic, since they do it under coercion.” Yes, someone who was taken into the army and forced to desecrate the Sabbath, so he says you can find merit for them in that it is only a rabbinic prohibition; they do it under coercion. “And he also brought from the Maharik, root 137, regarding a case where a gentile says to him: ‘If you don’t kill him, I’ll kill you as they killed so-and-so,’ and he said to him: ‘Cook a pot on the Sabbath,’ such that it is only a rabbinic prohibition in this cooking, since in this case we are dealing with one who is doing it so that the gentile not kill him, and therefore it is labor not needed for its own sake. And so too what the Talmud says in Sanhedrin 74, regarding cutting fodder and throwing it to the animals, is labor not needed for its own sake. And see the responsa Beit Yitzhak, Orah Chaim, which explains why this is considered labor not needed for its own sake.” Meaning, there are quite a few important decisors who really say this reasoning—I was not familiar with this reasoning until I saw this responsum—that when you do these things because of some threat, not necessarily a threat of death but any threat, it turns it into labor not needed for its own sake. “However, one could seemingly question this from what appears in the Jerusalem Talmud, chapter 2 of Hagigah, that in the episode of the decree where they decreed upon the Jews to desecrate the Sabbath, when the enemies would load burdens upon them on the Sabbath, the Jews would arrange that two people carry one burden, so that they would not violate the Sabbath prohibition, for two people who do a labor on the Sabbath are exempt. And although the rule that two who do a labor are exempt is only from Torah law, still it is rabbinically forbidden to do so, as explained in Shabbat 3. So what did the Jews gain by carrying one burden with two people? Nevertheless they did so in order to avoid a Torah prohibition, as the Pnei Moshe and Korban HaEdah wrote there.” That is how he quotes it. And now he says: “Now if this law is so, that it is labor not needed for its own sake when gentiles force him to desecrate the Sabbath, then the question returns to its place: why did the Jews need to do this, that two should carry one burden, in order to avoid a Torah prohibition? Even if each one individually carried the burden alone, he would still not come to a Torah prohibition, because since the gentiles are forcing him to do so, it is labor not needed for its own sake, which is not forbidden by Torah law. So why does the Jerusalem Talmud say that the Jews arranged that two should carry one burden?” Yes—what is he asking? Why does the Jerusalem Talmud say that under threat the Jews arranged for themselves to be in a case of “two who did it” so that it would not be a Torah prohibition, to minimize the prohibitions? What’s the problem? In any event, when you do it under threat it’s rabbinic. Rabbinic because it’s labor not needed for its own sake. Fine—a very weak question, because if it’s both “two who did it” and labor not needed for its own sake, what is the problem? It’s even lighter. One always chooses the lighter option first. What’s difficult here? Fine, but that’s what he asks. Then he says: “However, this is no question, because it may be said that those Jews refined their actions so as not to violate a Torah prohibition according to all opinions. For with labor not needed for its own sake there is a dispute between Rabbi Yehuda and Rabbi Shimon: Rabbi Shimon says one is exempt; Rabbi Yehuda says one is liable. And there is also a dispute between Rabbi Meir and Rabbi Yehuda regarding two who do a labor on the Sabbath: Rabbi Meir holds they are liable, and Rabbi Yehuda holds they are exempt.” Yes? “Accordingly, the words of the Jerusalem Talmud fit very well, when it wrote that the Jews arranged for two to carry one burden, because in any event this way they would be saved from a Torah prohibition according to all opinions.” Right? Because according to the one who says labor not needed for its own sake is forbidden by Torah law, then because it’s “two who did it” it will be only rabbinic. And according to Rabbi Shimon, for whom it is rabbinic, then fair enough, it is rabbinic even without that. But they wanted to satisfy all views. And therefore they were also careful to have it be “two who did it.” That is really international-level pilpul.
[Speaker B] Is the rabbi saying that one could have answered simply that it’s two rabbinic factors?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, two rabbinic factors—easier. After all, in any case it would have been permitted if it was under threat. Even one rabbinic factor would suffice. But still, we are lenient and want it to be rabbinic and not Torah-level. So then we also want it to be two rabbinic factors. “And also in Maharik, in Havot Yair,” etc., “I saw that they concluded that one who desecrates the Sabbath under coercion is considered labor not needed for its own sake and is forbidden only rabbinically, see there. And the coercion they were discussing was only coercion of the body, where they were forcing them to do the king’s labor. And even so they concluded that it is forbidden only rabbinically, because it is labor not needed for its own sake.” Coercion of the body meaning suffering, not death. And that is enough for it to be labor not needed for its own sake. “And according to this, in our case, where the accursed wanton evildoers were forcing the Jews to perform all kinds of backbreaking labor on the Sabbath, and if they did not obey they would put them to death in all kinds of ways and tortures, then certainly this coercion is coercion of death, and certainly one should permit these wretched people to desecrate the Sabbath, because the Merciful One exempts one under coercion. And all the more so where there is literal mortal danger here.” That is aside from labor not needed for its own sake. “And greater still, I saw in the responsa Yad Shalom that one who is coerced by the government to desecrate the Sabbath in a Torah prohibition—there is room to permit him on the basis of what the Meiri wrote, that this is labor not needed for its own sake.” Here is an answer to anyone who says “because of money.” Indeed, the government employs me and wants me to work on the Sabbath—for example, yes, the Sabbath work to fix the Ayalon there, where they stop it. According to Yad Shalom, essentially the workers there are violating only a rabbinic prohibition. “If so, then all the more so in our case, where the coercion is a matter of life and death, one should permit them to desecrate the Sabbath.” And then he goes on to the concluding paragraph with which I began: “Returning to the legal conclusion, from all the above it appears…” Let me just remind you of the beginning: “that one should permit the questioner to work at cooking,” because “in any event the accursed wanton evildoers will force him to work at forced labor at the airport on the Sabbath. So what difference does it make whether he works at cooking or at the airport? In any case he will not violate a Torah prohibition, because since he desecrates the Sabbath under coercion, it is labor not needed for its own sake, which is forbidden only rabbinically. And in our case even rabbinically it is not forbidden because of the mortal danger involved.” So why did you discuss this whole rabbinic-prohibition issue if in the end you come to mortal danger? This whole great pilpul—and by the way, fascinating, I’m glad he did it, because I truly learned a new line of reasoning here—but why did he do all this pilpul if in the end he says: leave it alone, what do I care whether it is labor not needed for its own sake? After all, it is danger to life. Danger to life permits everything. So why do you start this whole story? So I think there are two things here, but…
[Speaker C] Still, if in the end he also permitted eating it, then from the standpoint of labor not needed for its own sake, at least one cannot derive benefit from it.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] He says that really the permission is double. First of all, one may cook because it is labor not needed for its own sake and because of coercion. Why?
[Speaker C] No—labor not needed for its own sake doesn’t exist here, because you’re going to eat from it. You’re cooking in order to eat.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That’s first of all. Then the question arises what happens if I can eat. So he says that from the standpoint of eating, you can also eat. You ask: fine, he can eat, but then the issue of labor not needed for its own sake comes back. But of course the coercion remains. After all, the permission is double: both coercion and labor not needed for its own sake. What you’re saying really only strengthens even more what I asked against him earlier—so why all this pilpul about labor not needed for its own sake?
[Speaker C] Exactly, exactly.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] In any case it’s difficult here regardless. I’m only saying parenthetically that I’m not sure you’re right. Meaning, even if in the end I eat, after all, were it not for the threat I would not have cooked and would not have eaten either. So the fact that in the end I eat—fine, it’s already cooked, why shouldn’t I eat? But the cooking I did in order to save myself, not in order to eat. So here it still may be that it is labor not…
[Speaker C] …needed for its own sake, even if I eat. That’s really a novelty, Rabbi, I don’t really understand. A person does an action, knows he will benefit from it, and wants that result.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But who says he knows?
[Speaker C] In the end he decided to eat. Who says he decided in the end to eat? He knows he’ll eat.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What do you mean “decided in the end”? If only not. I’m saying even if that is his intention from the outset, since were it not for the threat he would not have done it, would not do it. Meaning, in this cooking he is not interested for the sake of eating. True, after he already cooked it, he’ll also eat. But practically, he did not do the cooking in order to eat; he did it in order to save himself. So here too it could still be labor not needed for its own sake. But it doesn’t matter; whether I’m right or not, there is of course still the permission because of danger to life. But really, this also…
[Speaker B] It seems that the rabbi’s words are also straightforward, no?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] And what is the essence of labor not needed for its own sake? It’s danger to life, and that’s it.
[Speaker B] Obviously, seemingly according to Rabbi Meir it is permitted to dig a pit for the sake of the sand. So would it then be forbidden to use that pit afterward?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What—I didn’t understand.
[Speaker B] No, I’m saying that the rabbi’s words are quite understandable. Because obviously according to Rabbi Meir, if I’m now digging a pit for the sake of the sand, surely I can use the pit afterward.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I don’t know. Here Shmuel is telling you maybe not. If you use the pit, what do you mean “permitted”? If you use the pit, then it will be revealed retroactively that this was not labor not needed for its own sake. So it’s an interesting question—what happens if, say, I want to eat an apple? There is a Ritva in Hullin. I want to eat an apple, I said the blessing “who creates the fruit of the tree,” and now I changed my mind, I don’t feel like it. Am I obligated to eat in order to save the blessing? So the Ritva says no. But the reasoning of the Ritva is a point people pay less attention to. His reasoning is that he doesn’t need to save the blessing because from the outset it was not a blessing in vain. If you intended to eat, there is justification for the blessing even if in the end you didn’t eat. Meaning, there is nothing to save. But you can’t infer from him that if it really would save the blessing—if there were a need to save the blessing—then there would still be no obligation to eat. Fine, that’s another discussion. There is a long responsum of Rabbi Kook on this matter. There are various interesting sources about saving blessings.
[Speaker B] Yes, Rabbi Moshe Levi also discusses this regarding someone who before prayer wants to—he made a blessing, forgot that he still hadn’t prayed, so he says—he brings that reasoning there in order to say that it is preferable not to violate the rabbinic prohibition of a blessing in vain, and maybe also like the Ritva and this, and in order not to violate the view of Maimonides that it is really as if…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] On a Torah level, that eating before prayer is a Torah prohibition. Yes, this is a strange Maimonides, this Maimonides. They say that there in the ninth principle. Anyway, for our purposes, so I’m saying also in this context, yes, regarding Shmuel’s question: if I now use… use the pit, am I forbidden to use the pit? After all, even if that turns the digging itself into a labor done for its own sake, fine, so regarding the digging maybe it turns it into something done for its own sake, but that doesn’t mean I’m now forbidden to use the pit. It only reveals retroactively that the digging was prohibited. But using the pit in itself is not necessarily prohibited. I once wrote something about that; I won’t get into it here, but it’s not important for our purposes. I want to go back to the responsum. What is this responsum actually saying? So look, I think it can be understood in two ways. One way doesn’t really relate to us, to our topic, and it basically says this: really, what should he have asked according to what I—what should he have answered according to what I would have thought? Obviously saving a life overrides everything; why are you asking questions? There are no questions to ask. In the Holocaust there are no questions. Meaning, whatever you need to do, do. That’s basically what he should have answered, right? But if he had answered that, then you understand that when you’re inside that situation, you’re basically saying okay, so there is no Torah, no Jewish law, nothing. There’s nothing. All there is is survival. We’ve turned into animals. And it could be that he conducts this whole discussion, even though it’s obvious to him that in the end he’ll permit it because of saving a life. It’s obvious that the discussion is unnecessary; it seems like a bizarre discussion. But he does it in order to teach, to educate the people that we still think in terms of Jewish law, we still operate with Jewish law, we still try to understand what is permitted and what is forbidden. Fine, in the end he’ll permit it for them, but to get used to the fact that we still evaluate our actions by halakhic standards. The Torah has not disappeared from the world. And when you live for years in such a situation, you need to understand that this is a halakhic policy with a lot of sense to it. Well, what do you mean, it’s not a halakhic policy—it’s the Jewish law; in the end he permitted what needed to be permitted. And this doesn’t come to expression in what he ruled; it comes to expression in how he justified what he ruled. And he made an effort to justify what he ruled and to give a halakhic analysis of the matter in order to accustom people to the fact that we still operate with Jewish law. Meaning, Jewish law has not ceased from the world, even though in the end he gives the obvious answer. That’s one possibility, but then it doesn’t really concern us; it’s just an interesting remark. But I thought of another possibility for looking at this situation. It could be that what he is actually saying is—look, think about what it’s like when you are inside… I’ll start differently. When, say, people abroad look at someone who lives in Israel, or sometimes, you know, someone who lives in some city and looks at what’s happening in Eli or in Yitzhar or I don’t know where. Surely it’s the Wild West there. Right? Everyone has weapons, they’re shooting, changing positions all the time. They’re constantly at war. Of course, nothing of the sort. Someone who lives in those places lives a normal life. Children, women, people walking around, everything is fine. Every now and then there are attacks, there’s gunfire, you have to defend yourself, all true. But in the end, these are normal lives. To someone looking from the outside it seems as if these people are living in the Wild West, taking their children into certain death, crazy people, a bunch of lunatics. And yes, I know quite a few people who see the situation that way. Think about someone looking from abroad at what’s happening in Israel—if he doesn’t know it well enough from the inside, then it also looks like that. We are all basically under fire, in wars all the time, people getting killed here and there—it’s insane. Someone who values his life should stay away. Who would set foot in this country? Look at what happens with athletes, foreign players. Many of them flee the country even though—what? You live in Tel Aviv, what will happen to you? Nothing. What are the odds? Something could happen, but the odds are very low. I think in the United States your chances of getting hurt are greater. But no, they flee, because the feeling is that these are not normal lives. You are functioning under fire, living under fire. That’s what it looks like when you look from the outside. Now I’m trying to take this one step further and ask myself what would happen if I lived in Kovno for several years—I don’t know how many years the ghetto existed, but it existed for several years. Understand: a year is a very long time. A very long time. It becomes your normal life. You are basically living two or three years in such a life. Constantly in danger that some Ukrainian could shoot you in the head. Tomorrow morning you might not find your child, your wife may die of hunger, you don’t know, you might get dysentery, someone else may be taken to a concentration camp, an extermination camp. Completely insane lives. To us it looks like the previous example I gave, like living inside a fire. But someone living inside it—for years, this isn’t an elevator falling and after a minute it crashes. You live for years in that situation. When you live for years in that situation, those are your normal lives. That’s how you live. While someone looking from the outside says these are not normal lives. This is a crazy place. These are not normal lives—there’s nothing to discuss there, everything is saving a life, there’s nothing to ask and nothing at all. No. He lives in that life, he is in that situation for years. Yes, from his perspective this is not a simple halakhic question. We’re here, you can work in the airport, you can work in the kitchen with the cooking. The question is whether something like that is called saving a life. By the standards in which we live, this is not certain death. It’s not death that will happen to me tomorrow. And after all, death within a month or so—at some point it comes to all of us sooner or later. So what counts as the parameters of saving a life in such a situation at all? When we look at it from the outside, the discussion seems bizarre. What do you mean—saving a life on a level beyond anything imaginable? To live in the ghetto means you are in daily danger, every moment, of dying. So who would ask halakhic questions at all? But look at the example: when you look at it through the eyes of someone who is inside the situation, he lives there. He lives there for three years, four years, I don’t know how long that ghetto existed. This is his daily life, this is how he lives. Every morning he goes out, gathers food, is afraid they’ll kill him, he hides, comes back—yes, that’s normal life. It reminds me of some American stand-up comedian, a redhead, I forgot his name, and he has this scene that absolutely killed me with laughter. He says: think what the ancient world was like. Imagine you take your James Bond briefcase, go to the train station, and suddenly a tiger pounces on you. You run—what do you do with this tiger? You go over there, boom, a lion falls on you. Think what that means in the ancient world; prehistoric man looks—he describes it so vividly. It’s a crazy world. He inserts these ancient, primitive threats into our modern city, inside the train station with your James Bond briefcase and a lion pounces on you. You can’t even process the situation. But the people of that world lived constantly under threats of lions and bears and tigers. That was life. You go out to work in the morning with your James Bond briefcase, and you have to be careful a lion doesn’t devour you. You look right and left, dodge the lion, and go turn on your computer. Yes, there weren’t computers then, never mind, but those were their normal lives. Same thing here in the Holocaust. In the Holocaust that’s how they lived. For years they lived like that. It seems to me not far-fetched to think that the person who asked, and the one who answered—yes, Rabbi Oshry as well who answered him—actually treated it as a completely serious question. It’s a serious question, and it doesn’t have such a simple answer as it seems to us. The question is: what are the parameters of saving a life in such daily life? I don’t know—who says this is saving a life? So I’m going to work at the airport; you can die there. In the kitchen you can also die. Tomorrow morning they can take me from the kitchen and kill me. The officer may not like the look of me, or some Ukrainian may shoot me in the head in the kitchen because the soup didn’t come out tasty. That can happen just as easily. So it’s not at all obvious that we have some simple situation of saving a life and there’s nothing to discuss. Therefore, it could be that this discussion is a serious one. It’s not meant to educate, as I suggested in the previous proposal. It is a serious discussion. He wants to check whether this is a Torah prohibition or a rabbinic prohibition. Why? Because saving a life is a function of the circumstances. In our lives, if someone ended up in such a situation, obviously it’s saving a life, no question at all. But when you live for years inside a situation that is like this all the time, day after day, who says such a situation counts as saving a life? The parameters of saving a life change according to the circumstances in which you act. And your way of seeing what counts as saving a life and what doesn’t depends very much on the situation, on the circumstances in which you live. And suddenly you can see—maybe this is a wonderful illustration, that’s why I brought up this whole thing—of just how biased our outside perspective is, or how captive it is, and how often we simply don’t understand at all what is happening for the person who lives inside the situation, how he perceives the situation. To the point that what he says seems completely absurd to us. But think about it: after I present this possibility to you, it seems to me not an unreasonable possibility. True, in the end the conclusion is that yes, this is saving a life, but that is a conclusion. Meaning, it’s not something you can just pull out immediately at the beginning and say, okay, there’s no point discussing it. No, no. I discuss it, and true, saving a life is also an additional ground for permission, but I’m not sure about it, so I also say this is only a rabbinic prohibition, so I have additional branches supporting the permission. It’s not such an automatic and simple permission. And this reminds me of an example a good friend of mine once brought me. He said, think about this—he once read in some popular science article. Very often we drive in a car and there’s a bird on the road. And we’re driving, approaching the bird, and you don’t know whether to brake or not because you’re already two meters from the bird and then it flies away. So he asks: why does the bird—he says, after all, we think about it as human beings. Human beings, if they wait until they are one meter from a car, there’s a good chance they’re not getting out of that. Because the speed at which we react requires a distance of at least ten meters. One meter is already impossible—you’re run over. You have no reaction time to respond when you’re one meter away. But the bird reacts much more quickly. On its scale, when the car is one meter away, that’s like thirty meters for me. The same thing. Because its reaction speed is incredibly fast. So it’s not taking any risk at all, but when I look at that bird, I don’t understand at all what it’s doing. Why doesn’t it fly away earlier? Why? Because I’m looking at it through my own lenses, from within my own situation, my own constraints, from how I see the world. But if I looked at it from the way the bird sees the world, then what’s the problem? It took a wonderful safety margin. One meter is a huge margin. It could have waited until ten centimeters and still survived. One meter is ten times that—there’s no problem at all, it’s an excellent margin. To us it looks like insane risk. It’s a nice example of a perspective that interprets a situation through the situation in which I live and act. But you have to notice that this is not always correct. When the situation is very distant from my world, then only someone who lives inside that situation really understands what’s going on there and what the right considerations are there and how one should decide there, halakhically and in general. Okay.
[Speaker B] This interpretation also seems much more fitting, Rabbi, because apparently the analogy the Rabbi gave with education and all that is a little problematic in Jewish law, because there’s a Jewish law like that which says that when it’s a matter of saving a life, it’s forbidden to delay over what prohibition is involved.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] He didn’t delay. Obviously when he gave the answer, I assume he didn’t delay; he gave the answer. Or let’s say, maybe the person who asked him had a quarter of an hour to sit and hear the reasoning too; time wasn’t the problem. It’s not a matter of delay; I don’t think that’s the point.
[Speaker B] No, just, what the Rabbi is suggesting here in the second possibility really does seem more plausible to me.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Could be. I’m saying maybe like this, maybe like that; these are two suggestions. The second suggestion connects to the lesson I’m trying to illustrate. This whole point that when you look at a situation that is pathological, very far from the situation you know, you can’t really judge it. You don’t really understand what is happening there. And in this case, by the way, it’s for stringency, not leniency. Because we would have permitted it easily—what, obviously, this is extreme saving a life. No. Someone living inside the situation would actually tend toward stringency. He’d say no, no, what do you mean, this is not saving a life under these circumstances. You can’t define such a thing as saving a life, at least not automatically. It can go toward leniency, it can go toward stringency, but it is simply a different perspective. And therefore, from my point of view, as I said earlier, someone who tells me something from within the situation—for me that’s testimony. What he said is the Jewish law. I can try to ask why that is the Jewish law or what that means, to conceptualize it, but I won’t argue with him. I’ll argue with him if he were here and we were trying to understand. But if not, then no—obviously he’s right. I have nothing to argue about; I can only try to understand. Okay, that’s it for now. Any comments or questions?
[Speaker C] What’s interesting is that today this exact case with the bird actually happened to me. I really asked myself why it was waiting, but the result was that it made me stop and delay.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Exactly, we’re always afraid so we slow down like that, because what, it’s taking a crazy risk. But no, it isn’t taking any risk, everything is fine, you can keep driving normally. Okay, fine, Sabbath peace. Sabbath peace, thank you.
[Speaker D] All the best.