I love this stuff. The following is anecdotal but from a book published by a Big Writer Guy.
One of the wealthy and Orthodox families in Canada (Bronfman or Reichman, I can’t remember) had an elderly lady who was confined to a wheelchair. She liked to get out once in a while, she liked to be independant, and she lived on the second floor. She couldn’t push a button on the elevator, thus initiating an electrical circuit which might result in a spark and kindle a flame. The authorities she had consulted were pretty clear on that.
She couldn’t get downstairs or upstairs without using the elevator or having to call upon somebody to carry her.
They solved the problem by putting in an elevator and having it run on a timer. Every ten minutes it would go up or down.
She’s happy, G-D’s happy, it’s all good.
If I were to pick a religion, I’d want it to be one where the deity in charge understood these things.
I’m an atheist, but I’d like to think if there WERE a god, he would be much more of a big picture kind of a deity. More concerned with war, famine, pestilence, disease, starvation than little details like pushing buttons on an oven.
As far as I can see, the Orthodox Jews across the street (the Rabbi, et al) follow these laws VERY strictly. As do the other Jewish families in the neighborhood…not that I sit down to dinner with them on a regular basis or anything, but as I said, I AM aware that they don’t turn certain things on and off during the Sabbath. They come and get me for that.
In other words, I have seen no evidence that they are hypocritical which frankly, I respect and it makes me think kindly of them, even though I don’t have the same beliefs.
cmkeller, thank you very much for informing this ignoramous!
But it seems to me the element of certainty is still there - you know the circuit will be completed some time in the next 60 seconds. Unlike the wind, since the weather can change at any time.
Thank you, cmkeller, for the great explanation! It does come across as peculiar to me – I’m personally more drawn to mystical religious groups than to rules-oriented legal groups – but it’s very interesting to read about.
You and Isaiah, dude. (Dudette?) However, I haven’t noticed that people who don’t worry about pushing buttons spend any more time fighting war, famine, and disease.
It depends on the Jew. First of all, it’s really only the Orthodox you’re talking about in this thread…Conservative and Reform Jews don’t have a religious problem with using electricity and turning things on on the Sabbath. And even among the Orthodox, you’ll find a spectrum of “devoutness”.
I agree with Mr2001 about the random timer. The action seems pretty direct to me. In the “deer in the house” example, you don’t know for sure that the wind will blow the door shut, and you don’t know that it will do so before the deer wanders outside again. With the timer, there is no doubt that the oven will turn on, or that it will do so within the next 60 seconds.
This seems like the appropriate thread to ask about the “park bridges” in my area. If you travel along I-696, you will pass thru this one city that has a large Jewish population. Crossing over the freeway at this point are three bridges. They’re very wide (maybe a hundred yards or so each) and the top of the bridges is covered with dirt and planted with bushes and trees and stuff. I’ve been told that these structures exist because Orthodox Jews can’t cross bridges on the sabbath. I can only assume that by covering the bridges with dirt, they’re trying to turn them into tunnels. What’s the straight Dope here? Does such a “no bridge crossing” rule exist, and do the structures I’ve described circumvent this rule?
Last I checked, those two qualities are not mutually exclusive.
Mr. 2001:
True, but apparently (and I am not a Rabbi, so I am not 100% certain of the reasons and sources that support it, but this is my layman’s understanding) in order for a negative action to be considered “directly caused” and therefore forbidden, you would need to be able to know exactly when your action will bring about that occurrence, not merely a range beyond which it will have been accomplished.
If you’re interested, I could try to look it up. But the basic gist is that causing something to happen at a specific, pre-determined moment is too close to active causation, whereas merely knowing it will be accomplished by a certain time, but not controlling the exact moment of occurrence is passive.
Diceman:
Well, there’s nothing about bridges per se that wouldn’t also be true of general open spaces. What you’re describing is probably an “Eruv” of some sort. There are two types, and without knowing the exact details, what you describe could be either. To wit (with some oversimplification):
It could be an “Eruv Chatzeros.” This doesn’t address a restriction on walking, but a restriction on carrying in public spaces. Most public spaces in modern times are not public spaces as defined in the Bible for prohibition to carry on the Sabbath, but are areas which have a different status (called “Carmelis” in Hebrew), and the pronibition of carrying there is only Rabbinic. The Rabbis allowed carrying in a “Carmelis” if the area is circumscibed by walls or doorways…usually accomplished by satisfying the halachic requirements of a doorway, which is two doorposts and a lintel, by stringing a wire between two posts. This structure is called an Eruv. Possibly the stuff on top of the bridge is to allow for the placement of parts of the local eruv and allow local Orthodox Jews to carry things across the bridge.
It might be an “Eruv Techumin.” The Bible prohibits (not as “work”, but as a completely separate commandment) one from walking more than 2000 cubits (approximately a kilometer) from the edge of the city he or she is in on the Sabbath. This boundary of 2000 cubits is called the “Techum” in Hebrew, hence the name above. However, if one places a certain amount of food at the edge of the Techum, in a spot where he or she could sit down and eat it, then one can satisfy the halachic requirements of a residence. Once this spot on the edge of the Techum is established as the walker’s “home”, it allows him or her an extra 2000 cubits to walk. Perhaps the bridges in question are at such a distance that making an Eruv Techumin on the bridge (with an area in which food can be eaten) would allow Orthodox Jews to walk across them, when otherwise it wouldn’t be allowed.
There is a restriction on carrying in public spaces? Does this, in some manner, explain why I have been asked to take things from the oven and put them on the table for my Orthodox neighbors? Certainly their home doesn’t constitute a public place, but I haven’t seen anything else in your description of “what constitutes work” that would make it necessary to have someone else bring your food to the table. You’ve already said it’s okay to take things out of the oven.
These things make more sense to me now that you’ve explained the principle of not engaging in the same activities involved on the sojourn from Egypt. I guess understanding fosters respect. Go figure.
Not that I had any real disrespect for the Rabbi…it’s just that now his actions seem less like silly superstitions.
Unless, that is, I find out that he and his family are just making me bring their food to the table for fun. Maybe they all laugh at me when I leave and plan the next silly task for me? Maybe next week they’ll insist that I have to give the entire family sponge baths because of the Sabbath (wink, wink).
This may be anecdotal evidence, but I’ve spent several Shabbatot with Orthodox friends. I’m not Orthodox myself, but I have read a lot of the different rules.
There are (AFAIK) no restrictions on opening and closing the refrigerator, except for the light bulb. Since opening and closing the door has the direct effect of turning on the light, most people remove the light bulb as part of the Shabbat preparations.
I am a little curious about SexyWriter’s neighbors, though. Most of the Orthodox I know don’t ask other people (Jewish or not) to perform prohibited actions on Shabbat, such as turning on lights, which I was pretty sure was not permitted. Maybe the neighbors are just enfeebled and can’t physically lift the heavy pots out of the oven?
Fridge and freezer are fine, as long as opening and closing it doesn’t cause a light to go on and off. Many of us Orthodox Jews just take out the light bulb(s) from day 1 and don’t bother replacing it for weekday use. (How many Jewish mothers does it take to screw in a light bulb? Don’t worry about me, I’ll just sit here in the dark… :D)
SexyWriter:
No, within a single house there’s absolutely no problem with carrying. It must have something to do with their oven, but without knowing what automation features their oven has and just how much they’re asking you to do I can’t be certain exactly what restriction they’re asking you to help them circumvent. However, as a general principle, see below:
av8rmike:
An Orthodox Jew wouldn’t ask a non-Jew to do on the Sabbath something that Jews are Biblically forbidden to do. However, Rabbinical prohibitions are something that an Orthodox Jew could ask a non-Jew to do for them. So whatever SexyWriter’s neighbors are asking for probably involves something in their oven that would be Rabbinically forbidden for them to do.
At risk of hijacking this thread…wait a minute here…
I wonder this every Friday evening…
If the Rabbi believes that it’s against G_d’s law to perform these actions (do Jews call them sins?) then does he believe I’m going to hell (or the Jewish equivalent) for performing the simple tasks he asks me to do?
Ordinarily the things they request of me or my boyfriend involve turning things OFF such as lights, the gas on the stove or the gas to the entire household, etc. I have also adjusted a timer in their basement which appears to control when their lights shut down at night…I did so right after the recent daylight savings time change. Though I believe I did flip a switch that turned ON some household electrical function on at least one occasion.
As for being allowed to perform tasks that fall under “Rabbinical Prohibition” status, does it make any difference (or isn’t it interesting, anyway) that the person who generally comes to get me to perform these tasks IS the RABBI.
I also haven’t mentioned to the Rabbi…my mother found out a couple of years ago that her biological mother was Jewish. She was adopted by a Catholic family at 6 months old. When he asked if I was Jewish (before having me help him out) I told him “no” since I don’t adhere to any Jewish religious practices, nor do I have any idea what a Matzah ball is. I was raised in a protestant farm family.
Maybe I should tell him…he might feel bad if he knew I was “technically” Jewish…like he was breaking his own laws or something.
Well, Jews don’t believe that non-Jews need to follow the same set of rules as Jews do. So it’s fine to ask a non-Jew to do something that violates a Rabbinic prohibition, since the prohibition doesn’t pertain to them. (These Rabbinic prohibitions were set up by the rabbis of a couple of millenia ago, and the fact that this person is a rabbi now doesn’t have anything to do with it.) However, Orthodox Jews don’t treat one’s Jewishness as a cultural thing - either you are or you’re not, and the only criterion is whether your (biological) mom was Jewish. You should definitely tell the rabbi across the street that you’re Jewish, as there is no way that they’d ask you to do these things if they knew.
IANAJ, and most of the information herein is gleaned from previous posts by our Jewish dopers (were those posts I gleaned already harvested?). Any errors in the following should be assumed to be errors in my understanding of what others have said, not errors in what they said themselves.
But the Jewish law applies only to Jews. There is a set of laws (called the Noahide laws, since they were given to Noah, ancestor of all modern humans, not to Moses) which all humans are expected to follow, but it’s a very short list (seven laws? Am I remembering correctly?). You probaby do follow all of those laws; they’re fairly universal things like no killing, no incest, being generally “civilized”, etc. Jews, as part of their covenant, agree to follow a good deal more laws. There is no belief that following those extra Mosaic (given to Moses) laws makes one a “better person”, or more qualified for Heaven, or anything of the sort. This is why Judaism actively discourages converts: A convert is voluntarily putting a bunch of restrictions on himself, to no personal advantage, and the Jewish authorities want to make absolutely certain that a convert knows what he’s getting into.
But as to your other point, if your mother’s mother was Jewish, then you are Jewish. In the eyes of a law-abiding Jew, the Mosaic law in its entirety is binding on you. Most Jews probably wouldn’t make too big a deal about violations of the Law in your own life, but it really isn’t proper for you to be doing such things for your Jewish neighbor.
Just popping in to say I’m really enjoying folks’ stories and explanations in this thread; they’re very interesting to me.
This despite the fact that the thread title is a lie: while the oven’s manual mentions a Sabbath feature, my specific model apparently lacks it (or else the Time Cook button, integral to using the Sabbath Feature, is remarkably well hidden).
You might be overdoing it a bit here. You don’t need to know the exact second. (I am not familiar with the shabbos ovens - I believe they were designed by R’ Heineman from Baltimore - Star-K).
This is a controversial subject - there are different rulings.
This is generally not correct. However, a shvus d’shvus b’makom mitzva is permitted, and many cases fall under this category. But not everything.
SexyWriter,
I think you should tell the guy that you are Jewish according to religious law. I also wonder why the guy needs you to turn things on and off every week. Generally people have figured out how to run their own set-up, and only need a Gentile if something goes wrong.