[Avodah] free public transport on Shabbos/Yomtov

Chana Luntz chana at kolsassoon.org.uk
Tue Jun 9 16:36:28 PDT 2020


RZS writes:.

<<This seems to address a situation in Eretz Yisrael where there are
settlements that are entirely Jewish, so that if the bus stops there it
is obviously intending to service the people of that settlement.
...
Obviously he does not mean that the Jew who wants to use it is the only
Jew living along the line, or that there is no Jewish community.
Because in that case how is there a shul for him to go to?
>>

Not necessarily.  If the bus stopped within walking distance of a shul, but
with the line being sufficiently far from the shul that no person on
weekdays would use one of its stops to access that shul, that would satisfy
both requirements, so long as the numbers going to shul were not
significant enough to cause a change in bus behaviour.
I think the analysis comes from the various discussions of using a light
lit by a non Jew.  If the light was lit for the Jew, then one is forbidden
to use it.  In this case, the driver and bus company are not running the
bus because they want to go back and forth along a particular route.  They
are doing it to service the paying customers (and get financially rewarded
as a result) or in this case for free because they are providing a service
to the citizens.   If they set up and run the line in part to service Jews
(eg they have a stop in Golders Green), the fact that they also do it for
non Jews all the rest of the way along the line may well be irrelevant.  If
an area is important enough to Jews to be surrounded by an eruv, it seems
likely that the bus company will have taken Jewish passengers into account
when determining how many buses to run and when, and where they stop.
That, it seems to me, would be enough for Rav Uzziel to prohibit (although
it is true that there may be some parts of the eruv that are only in it
because it was easier to put the various poles here rather than there, or
because there are other natural boundaries and so perhaps going to such
parts might be acceptable to Rav Uzziel).  Of course, if Jews generally do
not use transport on shabbat, and one individual does, then the bus company
will ignore his/her use.  But if a bunch of Jews flood onto the buses,
modern bus companies will put on more buses to deal with the crowds (and
especially when they are requiring people to maintain social distancing, if
there was an increase in passenger numbers, driven by Jews doing as you
suggest, that would mean running more buses on Saturdays, more like the
rest of the week).

<<Speaking of which, I think we discussed a while ago Rabbenu Yeshaya di
Trani's practice of using the gondolas in Venice on Shabbos, and the
discomfort many later rishonim felt about it, while nobody but Maharam
MeRutenberg was willing to say he was wrong.

But I've never understood how he did it without paying.  Does anyone
know?  Were the Venetian gondolas a public service, paid for by
municipal taxes?  Or was it perhaps a subscription service, and the
gondoliers recognized Rabbenu Yeshaya as a paid-up member?  I'm just
guessing here.>>

I don't know, but from what I understand, that was apparently the case of
the Rabbi in India (and/or Sweden, I have heard it told about both places)
who was supposed to use the train to get to shul on shabbas.  The Indians
being a tolerant lot, and respectful of religion, and the ticket collectors
at both ends knew him, knew who he was, and knew to let him through. I
don't know if either of these Rabbis are a form of Jewish myth though, or
really existed.

Regards

Chana
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