[Avodah] inconceivable-- Ben Sorer uMoreh

[Michael Makovi]

>> Which chachamim?  Bear in mind that the halacha accepted by everybody
>> until about 1800 was that one may *not* do so, and *not* to worry about
>> eivah.
>>
>> R' Zev Sero

Let's change that 8 in 1800 to a 9. Mishnah Berurah 330:8, as
translated in a source sheet at
http://www.lookstein.org/resources/hatzoloh.pdf

"The doctors in our own days even amongst the most observant, are not
wary of this at all. Every Shabbat they travel some distances to treat
non-Jews, writing prescriptions and grinding medicines themselves.
They have no [authority] to rely upon because even if it were
permissible to commit a Rabbinical infraction of Shabbat on account of
animosity—which is, itself, not clear—it is unanimously accepted that
it is prohibited to commit a Biblical infraction. They are deliberate
Shabbat violators, God forbid."

Further there, we see the Mishnah that a Jew may not be a midwife for
a gentile, but Rav Yosef in the Gemara permits if the mother is
customarily charged a fee, for in that case, to refuse service would
invoke eiva. But Abbaye notes that on Shabbat, a Jew should refuse,
and the gentiles will accept the excuse offered (that Shabbat
violation is permitted only for those who keep Shabbat); thus, on
Shabbat, eiva is not sufficent.

Later, Hatam Sofer notes that whereas in Abbaye's time, the gentiles
would accept the excuse, this is not so today, and so eiva *does* now
permit Shabbat violation. Rabbi Moshe Feinstein cites the Mishnah
Berurah and says that whereas the Hafetz Haim's gentiles (like
Abbaye's) did not have enough eiva to permit Shabbat violation, our
gentiles (like the Hatam Sofer's) do have enough eiva, and so the
Mishnah Berurah's stricture does not apply.

In short, it seems (quite logically) that eiva permits violation only
when the eiva is sufficient to be pikuah nefesh. For Abbaye and the
Mishnah Berurah, the gentiles' eiva was not sufficent to permit
violation, but for the Hatam Sofer and Rabbi Feinstein, it was.

Michael Makovi