[Avodah] Kashrus and Shabbas

[Chana Luntz]

RIB writes:

> Thanks for your comments about Davar Lach and Sfardishe Hanhogos as
> well as the comments about R' Ovadya's method of psak.
> On the matter of Davar Lach, I recall R' Ovadya paskening that you
> could have cold soup on a plata and use a shabbos clock
> to warm it up if you put the soup on it while the plata was not
> working.

Err, where do you get that from?

I will quote you relevant bits of the Yalkut Yosef (which of course always
reflect his father's psak when appropriate).

This is from volume 4, Shabbat 3 Siman 318 "din bishul achar bishul"
paragraph 54:

"There is no bishul for a thing which is already nitvashel kol tzorcho.
With regard to what are we speaking, btavshil yaveish.  Aval tavish lach you
cannot return it or heat it on Shabbat unless you fulfil the conditions of
chazara that have  been explained above in siman 253, because for a tavshil
lach yesh bishul achar bishul.  [section about the permissibility of putting
dry foods from the refrigerator onto the platter sniped].  And it is
permitted to command an akum to put a tavshil lach mevashel kol tzorko on
the platter chashmalit Shabbat, since there are those who say that there is
no bishul achar bishul also for a dvar lach, so in relation to amira l'akum
we can rely on the lenient opinion in this.

Paragraph 56:

A Sephardi Yeshiva bocher who learns in a yeshiva of Ashkenazim who go after
the piskei Rema, and he sees that they return on Shabbat a tavshil lach onto
the platter hashmalit after the tavshil is no longer heated to the
temperature of yad soledet bo but it is still not nitztanen l'gamrei [and
they have fulfilled the other conditions of chazara] and even if they do
this for the needs of the Sephardi bochrim who learn in the yeshiva one does
not need to protest., because even though the opinion of Maran Hashulchan
Aruch if a tavshil is not warmed to yad soledet bo, it is forbidden to
return it onto the platter, in any event, after the opinion of the Rema that
all tashvshil that was not cooled completely it is permitted to return it
[when they fulfil the other conditions of chazara] you do not need to
protest that the Ashkenazi do this.  But a Sephardi cannot command an
Ashkenazi to return on Shabbat a tavshil where the majority is lach onto the
platter chashmalit after the heat of the tavshil has gone below yad soledet
bo/  Because one who is Sephardi needs to go according to the opinion of
Maran Hashulchan Aruch, and one may not be lenient and command another to do
for him a thing that for him is forbidden completely.  But rather if the
Ashkenazi does it by himself, even if he does it for the needs of a Sephardi
baal habayit it is not necessary to protest.

On the other hand in paragraph 16 he discusses whether it is permitted to
place milk or cold water which has been cooked from before Shabbat on the
platter in order to take the cold off (ie make it luke warm) so long as he
makes sure that he takes it off once it has become lukewarm and before it
gets to a temperature of yad soledet bo.  And while he comments that "that
if it gets to the temperature of yad soledet bo behold he is over on the
issur of bishul on Shabbat also with milk or cooked water because there is
bishul achar bishul b'dvar lach.  But meikar hadin there is place to be
lenient in this for any person [on a platter chashmalit] if one is is doing
this for the needs of a baby or elderly or similar [and there is not in this
a chashash of nirei kmevashel since behold it is not the derech of bishul on
platter].  But anyway if one is machmir in all this it seems to me in order
to be choshesh for the opinion of the machmirim, a blessing is upon him.

In the footnote there, footnote sixteen he gives a very clear picture of the
kind of way his father works on these things:

" I have already explained in paragraph 14 that the opinion of Maran is to
hold like Tosphot and the Rosh, and with water that has not cooked at all,
it is forbidden to place them on a heat source, lest he forget and it comes
to bishul.  But all this is with regard to a thing that was not cooked, but
for a thing that was cooked and it is a dvar lach, behold there is in this a
safek sfeka, perhaps the halacha is like the Rambam and the Rashba and the
Ran that ain bishul achar bishul l'dvar lach and even if it does come to
cook there is nothing in it.  And if you want to say that the halacha is
like Rashi and Rabbanu Yona and the Rosh that yesh bishul achar bishul
b'dvar lach, and like poskens Maran Hashulchan Aruch, perhaps the halacha is
like the one who holds that we are not concerned lest one forget it and it
comes to the temperature of yad soledet bo, and according to this therefore
there is to be lenient in this for anyone who stands there to guard that
immediately it is luke warm he will take it from there .. etc

With regard to a platter that is put on via a time clock, he says in siman
253 paragraph 11:

"There are those who say that it is permitted to put from erev Shabbat a
tavshil tzonen sheyesh bo marak on a platter chashmalit that is not working,
and that during Shabbat the platter will ignite by way of a shabbat clock
and the tavshil will be heated on Shabbat.  And there are those who disagree
and forbid even when he puts the tavshil on erev Shabbat, and the ikar hadin
is to be makil like the first opinion, and in any event one who is machmir
tavo alav bracha."

And the footnote discusses the question as to whether one considers putting
the food on erev Shabbat on the platter that will later come on is analogous
to the situation discussed in the Rema of placing a pot where one knows a
goy will later come and light a fire, or the case in the gemora which
discusses the one who brings the sticks to enable cooking, which is deemed
patur avul assur.

Ie the essential discussion is not about whether or not there is bishul
achar bishul for a d'var lach, but whether it can be considered an act of
bishul on shabbas if everything is set up from before shabbas.  I certainly
don't get the impression from this paragraph and the footnotes that ROY
would be in favour of placing a dvar lach onto a platter mamash on Shabbat,
even if it was not working at the time.  Do you have a sources for your
recollection?
 
> > To say that something that is a safek d'rabbanan is
> > metame es halev (as has been suggested here) I suspect would be
> considered
> > as of necessity undermining the whole principle of safek d'rabbanan
> l'kula
> > (given that safek d'rabbanan l'kula is also a rabbinic principle) and
> hence
> > I don't imagine he would have much truck with it.
> 
> A nice summary of the issue of Timtum Halev is here
> 
> http://www.badatz.biz/ShowArticle.aspx?ArticleId=176=

But although Sephardi, and deferential to Rav Ovadiah, he doesn't operate or
think like him (note his comments regarding things that are assur to
Sephardim and mutar to Ashkenazim).  After all, even in the discussion you
can see above from the Yalkut Yosef, you can see that ROY allows a Sephardi
Yeshiva bocher (somebody one would expect to be a baal nefesh and the sort
of person to be particularly concerned about being metame et halev) eating
soup which according the psak he follows was mevashel on shabbas, and
possibly even done for him.  Given that we hold that an issur d'rabbanan
makes machalot assurot also metame et halev, you can even see from this, and
it can been seen even more clearly from some of his other psakim concerning
kashrus (shabbas I agree you can drey as slightly different), that once
there is a safek as to how to pasken, then there appears to be no issue of
metame et halev.

Shabbat Shalom

Chana