I suspect that any prohibition against fingerprinting would be rabbinical, since even if it’s writing, it’s not “two or more letters”. As such, it can be set aside if it conflicts with a rule from the Torah itself. The Noahide commandment (the seven commandments considered binding on all humans, not just Jews) to form a civilized society would seem to apply, here.
Actually, that’s how fingerprints are taken. If you let the person just do it themselves, the prints are invariably smeared.
There might be some problems with signing various forms, such as acknowledgment of rights, booking documents, etc…
In 21 years as a cop, I’ve never run into this (of course, there are very few Jews in this area).
The Staff Report that cmkeller wrote should be found here: Using the toilet on Shabbat - Factual Questions - Straight Dope Message Board
It apparently fell through the cracks in the conversion to the $#*@ing new system. I’ve asked that it be found and restated, so this link should work in a day or so. Sorry.
On top of what Chronos wrote, here’s some more info:
You’re right about Confession first taking place at a fairly young age (at least by age 8 or so). So going to Confession is meant to be a regular thing for children of Confirmation age (12-14 or so). So … what you’re supposed to do is go to Confession sometime before your Confirmation, clear your slate with God (thus getting off the “ultimate hook” of damnation), and then proceed with Confirmation.
This conversation is extremely refreshing. It is obvious that there are many cultures, ethnic groups - whatever - in this world that are viewed only through the lens of stereotype or naivite. Despite all the blather about the melting pot and assimilation, we continue to be a country of enclaves, probably more so today than ever before. And our national obsession with “being offended” has more and more limited our opportunities to truly know more about one another. Our ignorance is one of our biggest obstacles to growth and real understanding, but there are few places where people feel safe enough to converse. Fortunately, the SDMB is one of them, and this particular thread is a good example of that. Notice how many people apologize for asking questions. They are mannerly and deferential, which is nice, but that’s how sensitive we have become, and it’s not good. THIS is good. “Hey, what are you like? Why do you do those things? What’s the point?” Except for one notably unenlightened poster, this has been a wonderful and open learning experience. Would that it could occur elsewhere, about all sorts of people, in other forums, in public, in conversation, in the media. Love it.
From a position of ignorance, that seems like a particularly hairy one becausing “carrying” is a broad, broad concept. Might a rabbi ever conceivably tell his congregates that they should not be “carrying” their clothing during the Sabbath, for instance?
Or upthread, when Keeve (I think) mentioned that making a PB&J sandwich during the Sabbath was OK: is picking up the sandwich to take a bite, which requires momentary carrying, expressly forbidden? I am assuming not, but I do not know how “carrying of type A” is reckoned against “carrying of type B”. Is it something along the lines of “toting loads” versus “picking up a magazine”?
Or the mention upthread of the Orthodox Jewish man who was arranging folding chairs during the Sabbath, but doing so with in the bounds of an eruv. Would a pick-up football game be OK if the field were someone’s backyard that was wholly enclosed within an eruv?
I have some cousins who are Orthodox Jews, and when I was a kid and played catch with them in their back yards on Shabbos, the rule we had was this: It was OK as long as we were inside the enclosed back yard. But if someone opened one of the gates, breaking the enclosure, we had to drop the ball. I don’t know if the rabbi would have approved, but we were only eleven years old so it worked for us then.
Ed
Picking up a sandwich in the house is not a problem, because you are not moving it from one type or domain to another type. (The house is a private domain. You can carry within the house.) However, without an eruv, you could not carry the sandwich from the house (a private domain) outside to the street, because you are now taking it from a private domain to a public one.
And yes, Bordelond, reading books on Shabbat is fine. My wife returned a few days ago from a visit to the States, and she brought me fine, Shabbat reading material - the newest Garrison Keillor book. I curled up with it for most of the afternoon.
If it’s wholly contained within someone’s backyard (or house, in the sandwich example), no eruv is needed. The carrying prohibition isn’t against all carrying, but only carrying within a public space. Carrying in a private domain is not a problem. One’s own backyard is probably automatically a private domain, but a neighborhood of houses owned by many different people is not automatically private. The symbolic boundary of an eruv and certain associated actions (I believe sharing food is part of it) transform the public space in question into a private space, so carrying within that space is permitted, just as if it were your own backyard.
Good answers about the carrying, everyone. For more info, I had posted a link to the Wikipedia article on “Eruv”.
Re fingerprinting: Yes, perfect logic why it is only a rabbinic prohibition, but I’m not sure whether the situation is enough of a reason to make it actually permitted. But as someone pointed out, the police actually do it, so I guess there’s not much of a question.
On a related note, My wife went into labor with our first child late Friday night, well after Shabbat had begun. This is enough of a medical issue to justify driving myself. But for various reasons I planned in advance and made arrangements with a taxi company just in case. Two of the reasons are: (1) Driving to the hospital is justified as being a medical emergency; parking and turning the car off after she’s out of the car, not so much. (2) I wasn’t really sure how safely I’d drive under such conditions.
Anyway, once we arrived, I cooperated fully with the (presumably non-Jewish) staff at the admissions department, answering all their questions while they typed it into the computers. When we were all done it was time for me to sign, I explained about the Sabbath and asked if I could just give my verbal consent, and then sign the forms on Saturday night. She had to get an okay from the supervisor, who okayed it, and signed as a witness to my consent. All worked out okay, and my son was born that Saturday afternoon.
The “Jewish” hospital where my wife gave birth had arrangements for taking care of the car for observant people arriving on Shabbat. My wife went into labor late one Shabbat afternoon, and I drove her to the hospital. The hospital has the guard on door duty park the car, and then give the keys back later. It’s a good thing I drove, because if we had waited for a taxi, my wife would have given birth in the back seat! :eek:
A) This is following a line of reasoning that began with a rather simplistic view of the “will of God”. The Talmud is loaded with statements about “70 facets of the Torah” and “These (opinions) and these (opposing ones) are the words of the Living God” (or perhaps, living words of God? Probably deliberately ambiguous phrasing). You assume that the arguments of the rabbis are simply to deduce the “will of God”. Sometimes this may be the case-- simply defining a biblical prohibition, as well as placing rabbinical safeguard around it, more and more definitively, until “thou shalt not light a fire” becomes a point of contention regarding incandescent lightbulbs millenia later. Other times, though, the Bible has nothing much to say about a matter. The corpus of Halakha (Jewish law) has had a couple thousand years to evolve, always a more or less living tradition, adapting to circumstances while conforming to established norms. I suppose we all view this as the “will of God”, but certainly we all readily acknowledge that it is a less directly manifest will than “thou shall not steal”. A Jew is part of a system, a tradition, a civilization, whatever, and a halakhically observant one will bind himself or herself to the rules. I do not know how often I think directly about the “will of God” when I act. More often, I think about what it says in the second section of Shulhan Arukh, a codified book of Jewish law. The fact that this ruling goes against the contrary opinions, eventually rejected after consideration of the author, does not bother me, any more than it bothers me to go to an integrated school in spite of Supreme Court rulings about Separate but Equal. The difference, though, is that I could sometimes conceive of following the rejected opinion, and that is because a halakhic picture of truth is somewhat more pluralistic than any answer to “well, is segregation unequal or not?”
B) As Gila pointed out, this is a very backwards way of having this discussion. It should begin with first principles, IE the 39 basic prohibitions of Shabbat, and proceed to early rabbinic interpretation (Tannaitic, in the Mishna), later rabbinic interpretation (amoraitic, in the Gemara, which interprets and explains the Mishna), later rabbinic rulings throughout the first and second millenium CE, and contemporary “p’sak halakha” (Jewish legal rulings).
There is a simply staggering amount of literature on each and every sabbath prohibition. The issur (prohibition) of k’ri’ah al m’nat litpor (constructive tearing), to use the example we are dealing with, is considered biblical, but parameters for what fits into this biblical category are given by the Mishna, interpreted in the Gemara, commented upon and argued about by early and late rabbis, all to be studied by current Rabbis. Toilet paper wasn’t an issue for anyone discussing it in the Talmud two thousand years ago. It is a recent innovation, but rulings regarding it are to be based upon the paradigms established far earlier. The reason why a layman would keep a box of tissues in his bathroom is not necessarily because of his extensive knowledge of this matter. It is, more likely, because his rabbi, who has far more expertise, has instructed him to do so, either directly or indirectly. Or because his father did so, and thus an ancient mimetic tradition continues.
What about downloading and other lengthy computer intensive stuff (i.e. huge calculations and rendering)?
I’ll separate the two.
Downloading would involve data to be transferred from private domains, to several public (various routers), back to private (your house). It also involves constantly flipping switches in your computer (making and breaking tons of circuits, violating the igniting/extinguishing a fire, and/or the building prohibition, depending on what you go by). If you start the download beforehand is it still considered a violation. I understand setting a timer beforehand for something isn’t prohibited, but it doesn’t make/break connections all the time, nor does it “create” (meaning create a file on your hard drive).
Rendering and calculations can take weeks, and if you turn it off you can very well lose what you got and have to start over (meaning it’ll never get done). However, rendering is all of downloading, except the transfer. It also is very much creative (it’s essentially putting the finishing touches on your work, changing it from an unusable format into a stable, complete one). Is this a grey area, outright allowed? Prohibited? Again, assume you start beforehand.
I’ve asked about that before. The Sabbath applies to humans, not to machines, so your computer is free to continue carrying, making fires, finishing things, and all the rest.
Golems, however, if one believes the stories, generally take the Sabbath off, like humans.
Apparently some believe differently. B & H Photo Video, a large Internet site, completely shuts down their WWW order taking from Friday night until Saturday night, even though it is entirely computer-automated. I’ve been told they are Jewish and it is for religious reasons, but I have not confirmed this.
Sorry to continue the hijack, but your original statement
isn’t supported by what you quoted. There’s nothing there that says children are not fully responsible for their actions. A Catholic of any age can avail himself of Confession, “clearing their slate with God”, which presumes they were fully responsible.
Correct – I was wrong about that.
Make up your mind!
(The only way I can solve a Rubik’s cube is by taking it apart and putting it back together.)
RR
As a side note, I will point out that there is a huge amount of anti-semitism in the New York City area. (A lot of the time it’s Jew on Jew antisemitism.)
For example, Jews who wear yarmulkes and who have Yiddish accents often have a hard time getting professional jobs and it’s not uncommon for Orthodox Jews to leave the yarmulke at home when Job hunting.
As another example, there was a huge court battle in Bergen County, New Jersey over whether orthodox Jews could install an eruv. Basically the reform and conservative Jews did not want the orthodox Jews to move in.
Oh boy… let’s try to break this down.
The first issue you brought up (carrying) doesn’t apply here. The prohibition does not include electronic data as they are not physical objects.
The other prohibitions that you mention do not apply either. As someone pointed out later, the prohibitions do not include one’s machines. My refrigerator, my air conditioner, my heater and my lights all continue to work on Shabbos, even sometimes turning on or off by themselves.
Zev Steinhardt