Q&A: A Can Stuck in a Drink Machine
A Can Stuck in a Drink Machine
Question
Hello Rabbi!
A. A can got stuck for my friends in the army in the drink machine. The question is: if I know how to do some trick to get the can out, is it permitted for me to do that?
1. On the basis of “this one benefits and the other does not lose” (though it could be that in the future it really would cause him a loss).
2. Or on the basis of a person taking the law into his own hands?
B. In the Torah portion of Toldot, regarding the birthright, it does not make sense to me how it is possible to sell a birthright. It is like a person selling his fatherhood to his son — impossible; it is something fixed in reality.
Answer
A. Why shouldn’t you get the can out? That helps both your friends and the company that owns the machine (that way they will be able to get out more cans). But of course you should pay them for the can. (Usually there is a phone number on the machine and you can check there how to do that.)
B. This is not a sale in the legal sense, but rather an act whose purpose is to transfer the birthright. Some of the commentators there do deal with your question (such as Nachmanides and others), and you can look for answers in them. As I said, I do not think this is a sale, so there is no point discussing the laws of monetary jurisprudence here. But the problem is not the one you raised. It is obvious that we are not talking about selling the factual firstborn status itself. As you rightly wrote, that is a fact and cannot be changed. We are speaking about the rights associated with the birthright.
Discussion on Answer
In principle, one should act according to their instructions, but of course demand the money back. There is room to depart from this formalism in a case where it is completely clear that no damage whatsoever will be caused to the machine or to the company (a person takes the law into his own hands). I don’t know how certain you can be about such a thing.
And regarding the birthright, how can you sell birthright rights if you’re not the firstborn? It depends on the father, doesn’t it?
Regarding the birthright, that is not correct. Suppose I inherit some money from my father, and now I sell it to someone else. Is it really the case that I cannot sell it? (I am not talking about issues of something merely expected, or something not yet in existence, or something unspecified, but in principle.) Of course I can. As long as I am the owner, and it makes no difference at all by virtue of what I am the owner, I can sell it.
The Talmud in Makkot 5a speaks about a woman who sells her doubtful entitlement in her ketubah. The buyer acquires her rights in the ketubah if and when they come to her. The buyer is not married to the woman’s husband, and the ketubah rights belong to the woman by virtue of her marriage. And nevertheless, the rights granted to that man’s wife can be sold by her.
And doesn’t the rule of “this one benefits and the other does not lose” apply here (the owner of the machine)?
“This one benefits and the other does not lose” is an exemption from payment for using someone else’s property. Here that is not the issue, but rather taking the law into one’s own hands. Obviously, the fact that no damage will be caused to the owner of the machine is relevant — that he will not suffer a loss — as I wrote.
Hello Rabbi!
On the topic we discussed earlier about the can machine, you wrote that if no damage will be caused to the machine, then it would be permitted on the basis of a person taking the law into his own hands. But the whole plain meaning of the Talmudic passage about a person taking the law into his own hands applies when something was stolen from him directly, and then there is a distinction between a case of loss and a case where there is no loss. But here, with the can machine, it is clear that if you tell him about the can he will say, “Wait for me until I arrive,” and there is no theft here. That is how I understand the Talmud, and that is also how the Rosh understood it.
I am speaking about a case where it is clear to you that no damage will be caused. In that situation there is no need for special permissions.
Hello Rabbi!
A. If you ask the company that owns the cans, they will say: don’t touch the machine and don’t do any trick until I arrive — and that will take time. In such a case, what is the law? Even though they say not to, would it still be permitted? And on what legal basis?