UPN announced the date of the premiere of Enterprise (the new Star Trek series). When is it, you may ask? Sept. 26. It just so happens that that night is Yom Kippur! I won’t be able to watch it!
Why does UPN have it in for me? Why would they do this to me? What sins have I done that God caused this to happen? [Tevya] Would it spoil some vast eternal plan, if Enterprise was on a Thursday night?![/Tevya]
I can only hope that UPN will re-run it on Sunday night (as they did with ST:Voyager). I am majorly bummed!!
Zev my friend. I am not certain of the applicable restrictions of your religion, but, is it possible if some one, not of your faith tapes the broadcast for you, you can then see it?
You are absolutely correct, Max Tourque. The ancients did not prohibit one from setting his/her VCR before the holiday to tape on the holiday.
However, I, personally, have never done that. I always took it as a sign that if something was on Shabbos, then I was simply not meant to watch it. So, while, there is nothing wrong (letter of the law) against taping it or watching a tape that others provide, it is (strictly IMHO) against the spirit of the law.
If UPN repeats it on Sunday, however, then all bets are off…
ok, work with me here. Shabbos is a specific period of time, right? So while it may be Shabbos for you wherever you are, it might not be at that point for some one else.
So, for example, if the tape is made during a time when in your time zone it’s not Shabbos, would that still be against your principles? (note that I admire that you have such strong principles, and the fact that I’m trying to finagle a way out of it for you should not detract from that, just chalk it up to admiration)
Considering that the whole problem is not caused so much by Jewish Law (since, technically, it is permitted to set one’s VCR to record on Shabbos), but by my own self-imposed stringencies, I don’t have a clear answer on your solution. I never really thought of it.
Can’t you just ask God to hold the sun up in the sky for 24 hours? That way Yom Kippur can come and go and ST goes on as planned.
Or, um, can’t you tell your synagogue that God came to you and said that you either had to tape ST or sacrafice your first born.
Besides, what’s so wrong about taping stuff on Yom Kippur? It’s not like you’re gonna eat the film. Unless you get hungry enough, I guess, which sometimes happens to me around 4 o’clock.
There’s gotta be a loophole. There’s always a loophole.
It is customary on the day before the Sabbath to prepare for the holiday. This includes preparing meals which can be left to warm on the stove, provided that the fire on the stove is neither lowered nor raised and that the meal is not stirred while on the stove.
I think the analogy of preparing a meal the day before to setting the VCR to tape a show is sound. The purpose of the Sabbath is not to deprive oneself – the point is that it’s supposed to be devoted to celebrating spiritual matters, concentrating on learning and avoiding worldly concerns. So yes, you’re supposed to unplug the phone and hide the toys so you won’t accidentally use them, but this in no way prevents you from dragging them out of hiding the following day and enjoying them.
Now Yom Kippur is another story, because it is a day of atonement. In addition to keeping the rest of the Shabbos proscriptions, you also fast to show contrition for your sins against God. I would think in this case, if you were particularly guilt-ridden, you could also consider the not-taping of a favored television show to be an act of penance. But in this case, watching the show if it came on on Sunday would seem to negate this particular sacrifice.
So I’m at a bit of a loss as to how you would explain this, unless you were to view the rerunning of the show by UPN’s executives as a sign of God’s beneficence to man. And that’s a judgement I’m going to have to leave until I actually see the pilot.
So my thoughts are this:
a. Setting the VCR on Friday afternoon to tape shows on Shabbos. Okey-dokey.
b. Setting the VCR to tape shows on Yom Kippur. Morally dubious.
Zev, since traditionally the Orthodox have hired Gentiles to light fires and so forth to avoid breaking the Law, couldn’t you get a Shabbos goy to tape the show for you?
Nah. Usually that was done only where there was a legitimate need to do so. Despite my overacting in the OP, the world won’t come to an end if I miss the premiere. In any event, they’ll probably re-run again in a few months.
It’s not a matter that my missing Enterprise is a sacrifice for Yom Kippur. It’s a matter of a principle that if something is on the air on Shabbos (or a holiday) then I shouldn’t circumvent the rules (even if the circumvention is legal) in order just to see it. If, however, it’s repeated on Sunday night, then there’s no problem.
I would also have to disagree with your analogy between eating and watching Star Trek. Eating is a legitmate Shabbos activity, watching Star Trek is not. While you are correct in stating that Shabbos is not about depriving oneself of life’s pleasures, it is, as you mentioned, a day for spiritual fulfillment, and not one for sitting and wondering “Did the VCR go on last night? Did the reception come in OK on the tape?”
Well, but Scylla was planning to tape it, and he is going to tape it regardless of whether you end up watching the tape or not. If he were to give or loan you the tape afterwards, there wouldn’t be any violation. That would be like if you rented a tape from Blockbuster. You have no way of knowing if the tape you rent was produced on the Sabbath or some other holiday, but it doesn’t matter, because the tape wasn’t made for your particular benefit. Alternatively, of course, you could always catch it on repeats.
Okay, I admit I’m still having trouble with this. If a gentile friend buys a book on Yom Kippur, and gives it to you, you shouldn’t read it? Or, if “creation” is the key, if a gentile friend writes a poem on Yom Kippur, should you then never read it?
Take a case of donuts for example. A Jew is not allowed to eat (even after Shabbos) food that was cooked by a Jew on Shabbos. So, how can you know, when you go buy a box of Entemenn’s donughts, that it wasn’t cooked by a Jew on Shabbos? You don’t. However, you rely upon the principle of rov (majority). Since the majority of Entemann’s donughts are not cooked by Jews on Shabbos, you can reasonably assume that the doughnuts you are buying were not cooked by a Jew on Shabbos.
That does not, however, apply to a tape where I know it was taped on Yom Kippur.
In any event, as I mentioned earlier, there really is no issue according to Jewish Law. One may use (after Shabbos, of course) a tape that a non-Jew taped on Shabbos. It is a matter of a personal stringency that I took upon myself (as to what I (IMHO) feel is the spirit of the law).
[/quote]
**
Alternatively, of course, you could always catch it on repeats. **
[/QUOTE]
That’s my ultimate fallback position. Although I’d like to see the first episode before the second…
I guess I don’t understand UPN. Are they planning on only putting the premier on Saturdays or is that to be the regular showing of the show? If the latter, we’ll need to find some compromise for poor zev since I, for one refuse to think of him trek-less throughout the year.
It’s not a matter that my missing Enterprise is a sacrifice for Yom Kippur. It’s a matter of a principle that if something is on the air on Shabbos (or a holiday) then I shouldn’t circumvent the rules (even if the circumvention is legal) in order just to see it. If, however, it’s repeated on Sunday night, then there’s no problem.
I would also have to disagree with your analogy between eating and watching Star Trek. Eating is a legitmate Shabbos activity, watching Star Trek is not. While you are correct in stating that Shabbos is not about depriving oneself of life’s pleasures, it is, as you mentioned, a day for spiritual fulfillment, and not one for sitting and wondering “Did the VCR go on last night? Did the reception come in OK on the tape?”
Zev Steinhardt
**
[/QUOTE]
I think my contention was that seeing that the purpose of Shabbos is not to deprive you of your normal pleasures but merely to set aside worldly cares for the day, that there is no reason to think that you are circumventing the rules by generating a tape. As long as you’re in Shul, reciting the bruchas, and studying the Torah, that’s all that’s required. The rules, as far as I can tell, are not to prevent you from seeing Star Trek; they are simply to make sure that on the day of the Sabbath no one is tempted to start down the slippery slope of departing from the purely spiritual by, for example, lighting a fire or turning on a stove, which could in turn lead to, say, cooking.
So I guess I disagree with your interpretation of the spirit of the Sabbath. It is a day of rest and spiritual reflection, but not one of penance. And which would more distract you from your prayers, the thought “Did I set the VCR” or “Darn it, I’m missing Star Trek while I’m here in Shul!” The Sabbath is supposed to be a joyous day, so why mar it with resentment?
