[Avodah] dina demalchuta

[Micha Berger]

On Wed, Jul 20, 2011 at 09:55:48AM -0500, Lisa Liel wrote:
>> However, saying that a shetar is valid is identical to saying I have a
>> chiyuv to abide by that shetar and identical to saying I have an issur
>> against violating that shetar.
>
> Not really.  Those stem from it, and a shtar is only one case...

I agree, and as RnCL noted, that's the general trend of halachic
discussion on DDD as well. But Zev doesn't and it's his position I'm
trying to understand.

>              Those stem from it, and a shtar is only one case.  You  
> might as well say that every lav is an asei, because you have an  
> obligation to keep the lav.

I thought the difference between a lav and an asei is textual.

To take an from Friday's Y-mi daf yomi (BH I'm ahead of schedule)...
Pesachim 1:4 (vilna 4a) finds two mitzvos asei and two lavin in not
eating chameitz, according to R' Yehudah.

Not eating:
    "Shiv'as yamim tokhal alav matzos" -- velo chameitz
    "Lo sokhal alav chameitz"

Burning:
    "tashbisu se'or"
    "shiv'as yamim se'or lo yimatzei bevateikhem"

(Side-note: I think it's interesting that 7 days is invoked for the asei
of eating and the lav associated with bi'ur. Not sure what to make of it.)

Not eating would appear to be a lav, but it's both; bi'ur would appear
to be an asei, but it's both. It's all about whether the words "lo",
"al", "bal", the shoresh /sh-m-r/ appear in the mitzvah or don't.

But in terms of semantics, yes they can be identical -- and in the case
in Y-mi Pesachim (among numerous others), they explicitly are.

Here we have the concept of the validity of civil contracts. We only have
two buckets: asei vs lav. I would think this is a din in "lo signov",
for most contracts, and thus Shemu'el's DDD here is "it is a lav to
violate a civil contract". But I'm not married to that assumption.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             "The worst thing that can happen to a
micha at aishdas.org        person is to remain asleep and untamed."
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