Q&A: Request to change shifts that will lead people to work on the Sabbath
Request to change shifts that will lead people to work on the Sabbath
Question
Hello,
I work in security, and I’m the only one there who keeps the Sabbath. There are morning, afternoon, and night shifts at the site. On Thursdays-Fridays, the person in charge publishes the schedule for the coming week, and what’s usually done is that people ask for changes because of all kinds of constraints. My question is whether I’m allowed to ask for changes that will cause shifts on the Sabbath to be changed and other people to be affected because of it. For example, if I’m scheduled on Friday morning and I’d prefer to be on Saturday night – if I ask to change it, then someone who wasn’t supposed to work on the Sabbath will work on the Sabbath. Or for example, this week he didn’t schedule me for Saturday night, maybe because he forgot or for some other reason, and if I ask to be on Saturday night then maybe he’ll move the person who is now on Saturday night to Saturday afternoon, and if I hadn’t asked he wouldn’t have moved him and he wouldn’t have worked on the Sabbath. Thank you very much; I hope the question was clear.
Answer
I don’t see a problem with that, assuming the guarding itself is necessary and does not involve desecration of the Sabbath.
Discussion on Answer
If that was a condition, then what’s the question?
Suppose the schedule is like this:
Friday 07:00 – 15:00 me
Friday 15:00 – 23:00 A
Friday 23:00 – 07:00 B
Sabbath 07:00 – 15:00 C
Sabbath 15:00 – 23:00 D
Sabbath 23:00 – 07:00 me
Suppose it works better for me on Friday from 07:00 to 12:00 and not until 15:00, and I ask to make that change. Then the person in charge could change the schedule and put someone in my place from 12:00 to 20:00, and move A, who was supposed to start at 15:00, to 20:00, along with all kinds of other changes.
So it comes out that the person who fills in for me from 12:00 to 20:00 perhaps wouldn’t have done that shift if I hadn’t asked, and A ends up needing to travel on the Sabbath in order to arrive, whereas if I hadn’t asked for the change he would have arrived at 15:00, which is before the Sabbath.
And there are all kinds of other examples where, if I ask for changes over the weekend, it causes others to work on the Sabbath. So the question is whether it’s okay for me to ask for various changes, or whether I’m not allowed to ask for anything so that it won’t happen that, because of me, people will work on the Sabbath.
I didn’t follow all the details here. There’s no problem switching if they are desecrating the Sabbath anyway. But if because of the switch someone does unnecessary Sabbath desecration (that would not have happened without it), then it is forbidden.
Hello,
Thank you for the answer.
The job is in a building of a high-tech company that is also connected to the defense establishment. But it’s not like the army, where there are orders / procedures for keeping the Sabbath and things are adapted for a Sabbath-observant soldier. In the company building, everything is basically like a weekday – the elevators work, the computers work, etc. There are no changes from weekday to Sabbath. Therefore I never work on the Sabbath (I requested that as a condition for working at the company even before my first day).