[Avodah] electricity on shabbat

[Rich, Joel]

6- Last, to me what is more interesting is what it says about halachic process that there was such broad concensus le'esor and so little consensus over why.

RRW suggested that this showed that electricity was a matter of societal taqanah.

I would instead suggest that it illustrates the role of "daas Torah", thinking from the gestalt, using "gefeel" or however it should be labeled -- in producing pesaq. There was an instinctive "this couldn't fit Shabbos" which those who have a more reliable insinct about such things all felt in common. What they couldn't converge on is the formal justification.

:-)BBii!
-Micha

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R' Asher Weiss says explicitly that what you describe is IIRC makeh bpatish-anything chazal "felt" was "not shabbatdik" falls into a single category.  The challenge is imho that we present, at least to the masses (yes we've discussed this before), halacha as an algorithmic, objective process  . I wonder if that is the reason why there is such an effort to fit electricity (and others) into a neat micro-halachic category?

KT
Joel Rich

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