[Avodah] Violate Shabbat to Save a Jentile

[Michael Makovi]

In [Avodah] Violate Shabbat to Save a Jentile,
http://www.aishdas.org/avodah/vol25/v25n147.shtml#07, the following
exchange occurred:

(spelled with a J to avoid antisemitic Googles)

**Henceforth: All individuals who are not Jewish, will be called ixlplatyls.**

This post is answering a previously unanswered question from that old thread.

> > > Personally, it seems to me that if we can say that Shabbat was given
> > > to us and not us to Shabbat, kal vachomer ixlplatyls were not given to
> > > Shabbat (to lose their lives on its account).
> > > Mikha'el Makovi

[I.e., if we can justify a Jew-A violating Shabbat to save Jew-B
because Jew-B was not given over to Shabbat, then surely the same
logic would allow Jew-A to violate Shabbat for Mr. Ixlplatyl, who also
wasn't given over to Shabbat.]

> > Without reference to the, AFAIK, settled halacha that one does save the
> > life of an ixlplatyl on Shabbos, the above kv"ch doesn't work.  IIUC, this
> > limud says a Jew doesn't give up his life for Shabbos, so the kol
> > v'chomer is that an ixlplatyl doesn't have to die to avoid violating
> > Shabbos.  Which is clearly true: in fact an ixlplatyl is chayiv misah
> > (bidei shamayim, I assume) for keeping Shabbos.  Nothing can be implied
> > about whether a Jew should violate Shabbos to save him.
> > R' Daniel M. Israel

[I.e., it's great that my kal vahomer establishes an ixlplatyl victim
doesn't have to give his life up. But how does this help the Jewish
rescuer? We're trying to justify the Jewish rescuer being m'halel
Shabbat, and so excusing the ixlplatyl victim doesn't help!]

> B'vadai an ixlplatyl doesn't have to die to avoid Shabbat. But the
> Gemara, AFAIK, uses this limud to prove that Jew A doesn't have to die
> because of Jew B keeping Shabbat. Jew B can break Shabbat to save Jew
> A, and Jew A doesn't have to die, because Jew A wasn't given to
> Shabbat, but rather Shabbat was given to Jew A, and therefore, Jew B
> can violate Shabbat.
>
> It seems to me that if so, then all the more so, Ixlplatyl A doesn't
> have to die by Jew B's shomer Shabbat-ness.
>
> Yes, my logic is very quirky and my kol vachomer is suspect, I'll
> admit. But is the Gemara's limud any less quirky? Because Jew A was
> not given to Shabbat, this gives permission for Jew B to violate it? I
> would think that it would give only permission to Jew A himself.
>
> Mikha'el Makovi

[My answer is that true, it isn't logical, but what can I do, for
Chazal rule like this? If Chazal decided that releasing a Jewish
victim from Shabbat releases the Jewish rescuer too, then why
shouldn't releasing an ixlplatyl victim from Shabbat also release the
Jewish rescuer? I don't know why releasing the victim releases the
rescuer too, but so Chazal decided. I would have thought that
releasing the victim from Shabbat would only permit himself to
violate Shabbat to save himself, but somehow Chazal extended this to
the rescuer too; how, I don't know.]

I am now delighted, because I just found a solution for my dilemma: "A
Halakhic View of the Non-Jew" by Rabbi Nachum L. Rabinovitch,
Tradition 8:3 1966 & Le'ela 1:5 (18-23) 1979, http://tiny.cc/Wlpvw

There, in footnote 26 on page 38 (according to the page numbering of
the publication itself, i.e. in the lower-corner of the pages), the
footnote says:
"In a recent work, Rabbi Abraham A. Price disagrees with this
interpretation. [R' Rabinovitch has just argued that in "which if a
man do, shall live [and not die]", "man" refers to Jew and ixlplatyl
alike, for R' Meir drashed this to mean that an ixlplatyl who occupies in
Torah is like a kohen gadol. Therefore, he says, the authorization to
violate Shabbat (or any mitzvah besides murder, idolatry, sexuality)
to save a life, applies to saving Jew and ixlplatyl alike.] He [Rabbi
Price] argues that the verse "by doing which a man shall live"
releases only the victim who is in danger from the duty to keep the
Sabbath. In the case of an ixlplatyl, of course, no such permission is
required. In order to establish that another may another may break the
Sabbath on behalf of the victim, he argues, we must refer to "he shall
live with you" [Lev. 25:35-36; this is the famous two men in the
desert, one flask pasuk - Sifra says it includes both Jew and ger
toshav in the mitzvah to save a life - see Ramban thereon] which makes
it obligatory for me to do everything to save someone else that I
would do for myself. Since if my own life is endangered I may
transgress the Sabbath law [thanks to "which if a man do, shall
live"], the same may be done on behalf of anybody
else. In any case, the conclusion is identical that for a Ger Toshav
just as for a full Jew [because "shall live with you" includes the ger
tzedek and the ger toshav - see Ramban], the duty to save a life is
paramount. See
Mishnat Avraham, Toronto 5710 [?? text illegible], p. 3."

Evidently, Rabbi Price's logic is the same as mine - we are arguing
whether the *victim*'s life is to be given over to Shabbat or not.
Obviously, we cannot be arguing whether the rescuer's life is to be
given over, because his life isn't in danger in the first place! So we
are obviously arguing whether the victim is to be given to Shabbat,
and we conclude no. If this is for the Jew, certainly for the ixlplatyl.

Now, I had a difficulty, as shown by R' Israel: how does releasing the
victim help the rescuer? How does releasing the ixlplatyl (or Jewish,
for that matter) victim from Shabbat help the Jewish rescuer violate
Shabbat? My best answer was that Chazal's logic was what it was, and
what could I do?

But Rabbi Price answers beautifully: now that the victim may violate
Shabbat to save himself (based on "which if a man do, shall live"),
the rescuer may do whatever he'd do for himself were he himself a
victim (based on "he shall live with you"), and this applies
to both Jewish and ixlplatyl victims, as we've established.

Actually, it turns out then, that excusing the ixl platylvictim is
unnecessary. Since he's permitted (obligated) to violate Shabbat
anyway, we don't have to excuse him from Shabbat to save himself. We
need excuse only the Jewish victim. And once we excuse the Jewish
victim, he (the Jewish victim turned rescuer) can save another in
whatever way he'd save himself. And since "shall live with you"
includes the ixlplatyl (see Ramban), that's our justification to save
the ixlplatyl, right there. We don't need "which if a man do, shall
live" to refer to the ixlplatyl; even if it referred to the Jew only,
we'd still be able to violate Shabbat for an ixlplatyl because of
"shall live with you".

(But "shall live with you" includes only the ger toshav, not ben Noach
- Rabbi Rabinovitch then brings Rabbi Yosef Eliyahu Henkin that a ben
Noach is a ger toshav in all respects except domicile and livelihood
in Israel, so we can violate Shabbat for any ben Noach. Moreover, we
can violate Shabbat even for a rasha-non-ben-Noach, he says, for
darkhei shalom, i.e. we want to make a kiddush hashem and bring the
rasha to teshuva. He brings Bet Yosef Yoreh Deah 154, which brings
that Ramban himself would treat blatant antisemitic ixlplatyls on
Shabbat, saying that perhaps they'd do teshuva thanks to Ramban's love
and kindness. So it's not a fear of reprisal (mishum eiva), but rather
a positive and true desire for them to see our love and G-dliness. Of
course, Rabbi Rabinovitch also brings Meiri.)

I'm personally elated - now I know that I wasn't being an idiot!!

Mikha'el Makovi