[Avodah] Kashrus and Shabbas

[Chana Luntz]

> I asked:
> 
> > > Err, where do you get that from?
> 
> And RIB wrote:
> 
> > http://www.halachayomit.co.il/Default.asp?PageIndex=2&HalachaID=614
> 

I then wrote, inter alia:

> It seems really very odd to me that Rav Ovadiah would come out with a
> major heter like this without one of his fully sourced and thoroughly
> argued teshuvot.  There are no sources in this at all.

OK, so I have found the source for the on line teshuva.  It turns out that
there is a volume of Yabiat Omer than I don't have, volume 10 (I am not sure
when it was published, but obviously more recently than my set, and I would
guess more recently than the Yalkut Yosef - or at least my edition of the
Yalkut Yosef, I don't know if he has updated it.  Note it also seems to be
more recent than Bar Ilan is aware of either).  And the relevant teshuva is
Orech Chaim siman 26.

On at least one point I was right, however, you wouldn't get a psak like
this without a learned discourse and many sources.  It is in true Rav
Ovadiah style.

I further wrote:

> And note that even this teshuva writer acknowledges that the din is
> that yesh bishul achar bishul for a dvar lach, that is why he has to
> suggest this "eitza" regarding the shabbas clock, to enable warm soup.
> If there was no bishul achar bishul, like with yavesh, none of this
> would be necessary.  So really this teshuva is about what may be
> permitted by way of a shabbas platter and a time clock.

On this last point I was right also - the vast majority of the teshuva is
about grama.  Basically ROY bases his psak on the fact that the gemora in
Shabba 120b says "lo ta'ase kol melacha asiya hu d'asur ha grama shari" and
his basic position is v'zeh nikra grama, afilu issur d'rabbanan leka.

This is coupled with the fact that he holds (and has held previously, this I
was aware of) that because a shabbas platter is meyuchad l'shabbas, and
there in no option of adjusting the controls, there are no issues of mechzei
k'mevashel or shema yechate gchalim, so all of the concerns based on that
can be dismissed.

Now of course he has to deal with the Rema saying that grama is only
permitted in cases of hefsed meruba.  It is interesting to note though that
he does not do this by saying - Oh well this is a Rema, and we are
Sephardim, but by (at least initially) arguing that the Rema is relying on a
daas yachid amongst the rishonim.  He then does go on to provide some
further support for the Rema, but even so, I get the feeling that he is
really trying to say that even if you were Ashkenazi he would have thought
that this was a place that he would have expected Askenazi psak to go
against the Rema (which is why I think he is spending so much time with the
Taz).  {He also does not, as I guess I would have expected him to, dwell on
the contradiction between what the Rema says in Shabbas and what he says in
Yom Tov vis a vis grama).  He does note that various modern poskim (Tzitz
Eliezer, Rav Moshe) disagree with him regarding cooking on a shabbas
platter, but he feels they are creating new gezeras, and that we cannot do
this.

Now at one point (in the middle of paragraph gimel) he does add in that to
warm up an item that is mostly gravy or is lach "yesh lanu tzaddaim lhakel
yoter" and this is because of the fact that there is a machlokus rishonim as
to whether or not there is bishul achar bishul on a dvar lach with the
opinion of the Rambam and the Rashba and the Ritva and the Ran to be makil
because they hold ain bishul achar bishul on a dvar lach.  On the other hand
there is Rashi and the Rosh and the Rabbanu Yona who hold yesh bishul achar
bishul on a dvar lach, and he then explains that the Shulchan Aruch poskens
"l'chachmir k'kol sfeka d'orita" - ie holds that the Shulchan Aruch didn't
hold this way because that is necessarily what he held, but mishum safek,
and since a safek d'orisa is a d'rabbanan, bishul achar bishul on a d'var
lach is d'rabbanan.  And since rov poskim hold that grama is mutar even
shelo bemakom hefsed there is a sfek sfeka l'kula and you are clearly in the
clear, as it were.

But this is really only a small part of it, and the majority of the teshuva
is dealing not with bishul achar bishul for a dvar lach, but with bishul
mamash by way of placing the food on a shabbas platter which is off but then
subsequently comes on by way of a time clock.  And while he doesn't have one
of his formal conclusion paragraphs, the last part of his final sentence
says that there is no issur because of the issur of sheheya, or of chazara
lest one stir the coals because these gezerot ainum shachayot lgabei platter
chashmalit and therefore we see l'maskana d'dina that there is to permit
because there is not here a chashash lo mishum magis [this was the Tzitz
Eliezer] vlo mishum zilta d'shabbat [this is Rav Moshe]. Vchen ikar
l'halacha u'lma'ase. 

I [this is Chana commenting] am not totally convinced that all Sephardim
would necessarily agree that the Shulchan Aruch poskening that yesh bishul
achar bishul on a dvar lach is in fact done meshum safek and that his psak
is therefore to be treated as a d'rabbanan.  That in some ways seems more
radical to me than his stance on grama [although again instead of arguing
against the Rema, I have heard this as a Sephardi/Ashkenazi difference
especially as it is also the Rema and the Trumat HaDeshen who prohibit
putting a pot on a heater that a person knows a non Jew is going to then
light (permissibly because of the cold) based on Beitza 34a - which is also
one of the topics ROY discusses at length].  Of course the whole issue of
grama is very fraught because with the aid of modern technology it would
seem to allow us to circumvent a whole host of the shabbas restrictions.
ROY does have an earlier teshuva where he forbids putting television or
radio on a shabbas clock so one can then watch or listen, but I don't
remember the details, and after this one I should probably go back and
revisit that and see what he says (and try and understand why this is
different).

Regards

Chana