Shabbos 43
“The status of every vessel, i.e., whether or not it may be used on Shabbat, is determined at twilight.”
Wading through today’s text felt like a visit to a museum of curiosities. Today’s reading contains an odd mixture of public safety announcements, warnings of poor construction in new homes, broken vessels, bees, dead bodies, loaves of bread, babies, eggs, chickens and unsteady beams. Hidden deep within this meandering text and collection of true oddities are two important themes: self-preservation and preserving benefit for the living.
We are provided with a series of examples of when one is allowed to move a vessel of one sort or another on the Sabbath. Self-preservation is the general principle and it is permissible to avoid fire, falling beams and inconvenient leaks, all of which are common dangers in newly constructed homes of the time. It is allowable to move an oil lamp if it poses a danger to a nearby beam, because it is common for low-ceilinged houses of the day to catch fire. If a roof beam breaks, it is acceptable to move a bench under it as a support. We are told that there are myriad dangers in a new house, which may require moving objects on the Sabbath.
It is admissible to move a basket on the Sabbath that once held baby chicks if they have climbed out, but not while they are nesting within it. However, if one is disposed, he can overturn the basket so that the chicks crawl out in order to carry it away. If the chicks are resting on top of the basket on Shabbat Eve, the basket can be set aside during the Shabbat period. We are offered this explanation: “The status of every vessel, i.e., whether or not it may be used on Shabbat, is determined at twilight.”
The discussion of what is allowable to be moved on Shabbat includes this peculiarity: if an egg is laid on the Shabbat or on a Festival, “one may neither move it to cover a vessel with it, nor to support the legs of a bed with it.” The extension of the discussion in this direction is very odd, because it is presumed that an egg would never be able to support the weight of a bed, unless we are discussing a bed that is the size of one that would be placed in a miniature dollhouse.
Bees enter the picture and we are told that a mat can be placed over a beehive on the Sabbath in order to offer protection from the harsh rays of the sun or from a driving rain. As long as one does not intend to trap the bees on the Sabbath it is permitted to cover the hive.
From bees we turn to the dead. Two people can sit beside a corpse that is laid out in the sun and when they need to rest, they can both place a bed on either side of the dead body. When the sun’s rays beating down on them becomes too much to bear, they can go inside after constructing a canopy above the corpse. This involves positioning the beds horizontally and placing a mat between the two. This is permissible on the Sabbath as long as it is “for the benefit of the living” rather than “for the sake of the corpse.”
The scenario of allowing a dead body to be moved if a loaf of bread or baby is placed upon it appeared in an earlier reading. We are told that the “corpse becomes a base for an object that one is permitted to move on Shabbat and, consequently, one may move the corpse due to the permitted object.”
What resonates the most for me in today’s text is that there are certain activities allowed on the Sabbath if they are for the sake of the living rather than the dead. I am obsessed with the numbers related to COVID19 cases. Today’s New York City statistics are terrifying, with over 1,508 COVID-19 cases per 100,000 people and 102 deaths among the same population. COVID-19 was the second most prevalent cause of death last week after heart disease. As we stay locked up inside, which for me is becoming ever more excruciating, we are upholding two principles from today’s rambling reading of oddities: self-preservation and deriving benefit for the living. I am terrified of ending up with my predisposition to asthma and respiratory illness in a tent in Central Park on a ventilator. So, I stay home. And I want to do my part to preserve life and not be a carrier to others of a virus that might be lurking within me. So, I stay home.
For a diversion from all this sickness and death and curious Talmud text, here is a link to the Coney Island Museum. May Summer come!