[Avodah] Coat Room Mix-up

[Micha Berger]

>From today's daily blog entry of a financial halakhah from the Qitzur.
http://www.aishdas.org/asp/2010/01/qsa-182-12.shtml

182:12 (translation mine):
    Someone whose utensils were switched in the pub or the like, he
    should not use the utensils that came to his hand that weren't his.
    When the owner of the item comes, he must return it -- even if his
    own item is lost. Similarly a washer-woman who washes [clothes] for
    the community and brings him a shirt which is not his, it is
    prohibited to wear it. Rather, he must return it to its owners --
    even if his own was lost.

    However, if it rests with him many days, until it is impossible that
    the owners didn't search in the meantime for their own, then it is
    permitted for him to wear it. Because by default [you may assume
    that] the washer-woman cleared [the matter] with its owners and paid
    for this shirt.

Personal observation:

    This situation comes up in shul pretty often. There aren't that
    many different styles of men coat, and it sometimes happens that
    someone looks through the coat room and realizes that the only
    remaining coat was one similar to theirs. Someone who left already
    took with the wrong coat.

    I hadn't heard, though, of a rabbi telling the person stuck in this
    situation that he is not permitted to wear the accidentally
    exchanged coat home.

What do you think?

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             One doesn't learn mussar to be a tzaddik,
micha at aishdas.org        but to become a tzaddik.
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