[Avodah] Halachic Discussion of Tow Truck Baby

[Prof. Levine]

At http://tinyurl.com/6tawbv7 R. Gil Student concludes

I suggest, albeit tentatively, that the husband 
who flagged down someone to help was doing the 
right thing in trying to secure either a woman or 
gentile to assist. He must even hire someone to 
help if necessary; certainly he must try to ask 
someone to help. If no help was forthcoming, then 
he should delivery the baby himself.

An additional consideration is that almost anyone 
is more qualified to deliver a baby than the 
father, who is usually so nervous that he cannot 
properly function. Add in the unusual roadside 
circumstances and you have a very jittery man. A 
stranger is probably better for the wife. Of 
course, the wife is probably uncomfortable with a 
strange man delivering her baby. The exact 
calculus of which is greater–the physical benefit 
of a clear-thinking man or the psychological 
detriment of a strange man–seems impossible to 
resolve on any general basis. Every case is different.

Of course, this all assumes that he had 
sufficient time to find someone. If not, he would 
be endangering his wife’s and his baby’s lives. 
 From the fact that he was successful, we can 
deduce that either he had enough time to ask for 
help or he was lucky. My two youngest children 
were extremely quick deliveries but I seem to 
recall time for brief discussion (by the doctor, 
not me) during the final moments.

In the end, I can’t condemn the man. He may have 
done the halakhically proper thing. It all 
depends on so many factors that we cannot 
evaluate from a brief news report. Most important 
to note is that he did not abandon his wife; he 
sought help. If no one was available to assist, 
he would certainly have delivered the baby 
himself rather than abandon his wife and newborn to child to an uncertain fate.

See the above URL for the entire article.  YL

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