Q&A: A Secular Person Cooking on the Sabbath
Originally published:
This is an English translation (via GPT-5.4). Read the original Hebrew version.
A Secular Person Cooking on the Sabbath
Question
Honorable Rabbi, greetings,
It is stated according to Rabbi Meir: “If one cooks on the Sabbath unintentionally, he may eat it; if intentionally, he may not eat it” (Shabbat 38a).
Some define a secular person as unintentional with respect to the entire Torah.
According to Rabbi Meir, if a secular person is considered unintentional regarding the entire Torah, is it permitted to eat food he cooked on the Sabbath on that very Sabbath? Does it make sense to rule this way in Jewish law? If not, why?
Thank you very much,
Ofir
Answer
Why not? He is indeed, at most, acting unintentionally (in my view he is usually under compulsion).
If he is doing it for me, that is of course a different story.