Q&A: Supporting Businesses Open on the Sabbath
Supporting Businesses Open on the Sabbath
Question
Hello Rabbi!
Should one avoid doing business during the week with businesses that are open on the Sabbath, because of aiding a transgression?
Buying from a person who desecrates the Sabbath, or commits some other transgression, in a business that is not open on the Sabbath seems clearly not to count as aiding. Helping with the Sabbath profits themselves seems clearly forbidden to me, but I do not understand exactly where the line is drawn between the person and his business.
In addition, aside from the halakhic issue, I would be happy to hear the Rabbi’s opinion about avoiding purchases in such businesses for other reasons, such as protest, or simply trying to make him lose customers who observe Torah and commandments, because maybe that will cause him to close against his will, or because it will keep him from influencing others, and so on.
Answer
There is no prohibition against buying from such a business. Whatever you decide beyond that is your own decision. I do not see this as protest, and it also will not cause him to close, nor will it influence others. Protest is also not relevant in a place where the person does not understand at all that this is a problematic act. It is not right to copy norms from the Sages of the Talmud and the medieval authorities (Rishonim) and the later authorities (Acharonim) into our times, certainly when they are not halakhic norms, when the reality is different.
Still, if you have two options in two stores, one that is open and one that is closed on the Sabbath, it seems to me right to buy from the Sabbath-observant one, if only in order to compensate him for the losses.
Discussion on Answer
The question is whether the pressure is effective. In any case, being vegetarian is not only a matter of pressure, but something of intrinsic value.
And indeed, in the context of vegetarianism there is a greater chance that both the shop owners and the public understand the value of it (unlike the Sabbath), although of course there are many who do not. If you speak up and explain, it will help more than simply not buying. To some extent that is true regarding the Sabbath as well.
With God's help,
What about the Rabbi’s position regarding vegetarianism? Does the Rabbi think that this kind of pressure on businesses is more productive than pressure regarding Sabbath observance? Or is it that they understand more that it is a problematic act, compared with a secular person regarding the Sabbath?