[Avodah] dina demalchuta

[Micha Berger]

Discussions of Shemu'el's pesaq "dina demalkhusa dina" (DDD) appear four
times in sifrei Chazal (Bar Ilan CD says), all of them in shas (Bavli).
The other three are.

BQ 113a-b: DDD obligate one to pay tax, if the tax collector is duly
appointed and only collects what the king told him to.

BB 54b-55a: DDD can define land ownership, and one is obligated to
pay taxes

Nedarim 28a: DDD means that you can't lie to tax collectors, again the
same constraints as to who is a valid collector

In looking for Chazal, I found a rishon I hadn't known of before --
at least, not that I remember, Tosafos Yevamos 46a "ki" -- DDD and the
qinyan of an eved kenaani.

On Thu, Jul 21, 2011 at 7:04am CEST, R Arie Folger wrote:
: Rashi does not come to explain that part, but rather to explain why
: DDD would not override usual halakha for gittin, too. To that Rashi
: says that the Noa'hides are not subject to the Jewish laws of
: marriage, as BN marriage follows different rules (there are a number
: of ma'hloqot about that, too), and since for gittin there is a
: requirement of benei keritut, therefore DDD falls flat in the case of
: gittin.

: Now we may fruitfully discuss whether gittin is an exception or some
: kind of general rule, an issue on which RMB and RZS disagree. Let me
: explain.

Well, while Rashi doesn't come to dicuss the rule, I think it's clear
from his saying that get is an exception because they aren't benei
kerisus that he holds of a general rule that necessitates this exemption.
More than that, Rashi says something about that too: "aval al hadinin
nitztavu benei Noach". So, benei Noach have to have dinei mamunus, laws
against hezeq, murder, etc... So, aside from all the gemaros saying
the DDD bans cheating on taxes, Rashi here says DDD includes the vast
majority of civil law -- anything they are obligated in.

We also already discussed DDD and cooperating with law enforcement and
when it even overrides mesirah (v28n137 #12). In the Maharam Shick's case,
even when we aren't certain the accused was guilty!


On Fri, Jul 22, 2011 at 02:12pm EDT, R Eli Turkel quoted R Eli Clark:
: Thus, the Gemara establishes that evading a fixed tax collected by a
: government tax collector is prohibited by Halacha. The Rambam
: formulates this rule in his Mishneh Torah (Hilchot Gezelah ve-Avedah
: 5:11), where he explains that tax evasion constitutes stealing from
: the king. He adds (ibid. 5:18) that this rule applies only to a king
: whose currency is accepted throughout the territory, which reflects
: that the citizens have consented to his rule...
: In contemporary times, poskim (decisors) have also taken a clear
: position on the issue. For instance, R. Moshe Feinstein writes to a
: person who engaged in tax evasion that it is "vadai (certain)" that he
: must repent for his actions and never do so again.8 The context
: suggests that the individual's tax evasion occurred in the United
: States.
:          .... According to R. Herschel Schachter, R. Joseph B.
: Soloveitchik z.t.l. stated that patronizing a Jewish merchant who
: cheats on his taxes violates the Biblical prohibition of lifnei iver.

On Sun, Jul 24, 2011 at 10:50pm IDF, R Akiva Blum replied:
: I didn't see anything here suggesting that there is actually some sort of a
: mitzva to pay taxes. You owe the money, and if you don't want to make a
: chillul Hashem or get into trouble, you should take the initiative and pay,
: but nothing that has a mitzva of DDD.

But I don't understand this comment. The gemara and Rambam clearly are
phrasing DDD as a lav. RMF affirms this on a lemaaseh level in the US,
and RYBS says lifnei iveir on tax evation is assur.

So, paying taxes is not an asei, but it /is/ a mitzvas lo saasei, and thus
an issue in addition to avoiding chillul hasheim -- no?

FWIW, I think risking chillul hasheim is a worse aveirah in and of itself.
Chillul Hashem is dinei nefashos, so even just being willing to risk it
is pretty significant.



On Sat, Jul 23, 2011 at 09:21:21PM +0300, Ben Waxman wrote:
> So how does it work in a situation where there police, for all practical  
> purposes, are not enforcing the speed at all (with rare exceptions)? ...

Since the criterion for DDD is a law that is enforced, then the answer
would appear to be that if Israeli police don't enforce speed limits, DDD
wouldn't include speeding. (Of course, you still need to drive safely...)

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Live as if you were living already for the
micha at aishdas.org        second time and as if you had acted the first
http://www.aishdas.org   time as wrongly as you are about to act now!
Fax: (270) 514-1507            - Victor Frankl, Man's search for Meaning