[Avodah] SoVar VeKibbel

[Zev Sero]

Meir Rabi wrote:

> I believe Rabbenu Tam suggests that those chaps who engage in jousting 
> matches as a form of entertaining the groom and bride, are not able to 
> claim financial compensation for damages suffered in those duels, since 
> they have understood the dangers and agreed to them. SoVar VeKibbel.
> 
> Is this not an argument that should equally apply to the game of 
> throwing a stone against a wall where the players try to catch and throw 
> the stone back or something like that? See Rashi Sanhedrin 77b. However 
> in this case, if someone gets killed, there may be a Golus sentence 
> imposed or possibly it may be more than a Shogeg in which case Golus 
> will not grant immunity and he must employ his own protection.

Savar vekibbel is a legitimate consideration in dinei mamonot, where
the plaintiff is seeking financial compensation for his injury; if he
willingly accepted the risk, then he consented to the injury and is
not entitled to be paid for it.  The same would presumably apply if
he was killed and his estate sued for financial compensation for his
death.  But in the second case we are not dealing with dinei mamonot;
nobody is asking for financial compensation.  Instead we're dealing
with the crime of manslaughter, and for that purpose the victim's
assumption of risk is irrelevant: even if a person explicitly consents
to be killed, that does not excuse the killer from criminal culpability.

-- 
Zev Sero               Something has gone seriously awry with this Court's
zev at sero.name          interpretation of the Constitution.
                       	                          - Clarence Thomas