Shabbos Timers and Grama: Keeping the Status Quo vs. Causing a Melachah

Transcript

This Torah class is brought to you by TorahAnytime.com. I'd like to speak today on groma. We'll be holding in Reish Ayin Zayin, but the Mechaber speaks sholei grom kibui haner, not to be gorem kibui on Shabbos. So we'd like to discuss a little bit. We're going to — time is also, we had mentioned in the past — but just to go, what's nogea to this siman. So the Mechaber says when a person has a candle that is very close by to the door, or I'll give another case where it's close by to the window, you should be careful not to open the window or not to open the door because it's going to extinguish the candle. You should not permit it to open the door when there's a regular wind that can blow it out and it's very close to the door, to the window. You should be careful not to open it because it's going to extinguish the candle. But if the wind is about to blow out the candle, so then later on, then you're allowed to close the window, close the door, even though the candle is going to stay lit. Why is that permissible? There's a wind that's about to come and blow out the candle. You're going now, you're blocking the wind, you're closing the door, you're closing the window, so it won't extinguish the candle. Why is that permissible? By you extending the status quo, you're not making a change. So now the candle is going to burn. Is that permissible? It's already lit. Oh, very good. He's saying all you're doing is you're extending the status quo. You're leaving the matzav as it is. You're not adding anything, you're doing anything. It is as it is. You're not doing anything. It seems a very pashut svara: mutar, sheb'zeh eino osek klum, says the Mishnah Berurah. Lo mechabeh v'lo mav'ir. You're not kindling and not extinguishing, because the light is lit anyway. There was a wind that was about to come and blow it out. You're blocking the wind from coming, extinguishing. That's why it's permissible. So listen to what Reb Shlomo Zalman learns from this case of the mechabeh. He says that if you have an existing light that is on, you would be permitted to add time in a timer to keep status quo. We'll see if there's room to dispute it. But what he wants to say is, when the light is on, to add time to the timer, all you're doing is you're keeping status quo. You're not adding oil. There is a wind, so to speak, which is the time when it's about to come to an extinguish. You're blocking it from extinguishing now. You're pushing it off for another few hours. So you're keeping status quo. Keeping status quo, you're not doing any— so it's not considered a melacha. So be'etzem, on this yesod, Reb Moshe doesn't disagree. Reb Moshe says if you have the time, the time is about to go, the time to go off, and you want to keep it on all the time, you want to take off the time, it shouldn't affect the light, that is not a melacha. He says it's asur al tsmuktza, but as far as the melacha, he's maskim you're not doing any melacha. The same thing if it's off and it's supposed to go on, and you want to change it, that you keep it off, keeping status quo. So Reb Moshe also is maskim that in such a case, to keep status quo is not considered a melacha. Reb Moshe disagrees on Reb Shlomo Zalman on that nekudah, if you're allowed to adjust it or not. He says adjusting, regardless what you're doing, to keep it longer or to go off later, both he holds is issur melacha, d'oraisa. We'll see in a second, but it needs a clarification, which I want to explain in a second. Meaning— If Reb Moshe agrees that keeping status quo is not doing anything. It means if the light is on and the timer is supposed to put it off, and you are coming now and you're taking off the timer, it shouldn't affect anything on the light, and the light should stay on the whole Shabbos. That, Reb Moshe agrees, is not a melacha d'oraisa. So why adding two hours is yesh melacha d'oraisa? You're keeping status quo for another two hours. So you're pushing off what time it's going to go off. If it was supposed to go off at two o'clock, so you're, so to speak, keeping the wind for another two hours out, and you're keeping status quo. If keeping status quo for the entire Shabbos is not considered a melacha, so why if I keep status quo for another two hours, why is that considered melacha? There needs to be a... So I don't know, but I think that Reb Moshe was talking about different timers. In other words, there is a timer which is 24 hours, and every half hour has a pin, and it's push in, push out. They're all fixed in the timer itself, and you have to push in or push out. That's one type of timer. I don't think that was in existence when Reb Moshe wrote this teshuva. I think what he was talking is, you have pins, one pin to turn on and another pin to turn off.

And in order to change it, you have to take out the pin. Let's say it's supposed to go off at two o'clock. You have to take out the pin and then put it back at four o'clock. What happened at the second when you took off the pin? The second you took off the pin, now the time is going to go on all the time, because you took off when it's going to go off. When you put it back on, now you're making a kibui. You're setting it to go off. It's not you're adding time. Oh, okay. So, I'm just—we'll see. Rav Moshe holds it's a de'oraisa, which we need to explain. We're going to get there, why it's de'oraisa. But you see the difference between just taking off the pin and keeping status quo, where Rav Moshe says it's nothing, it's only a problem of muktzah, whereas when you're taking it off and then you're putting it back in, which is called adjusting, there Rav Moshe held this is a de'oraisa. Okay, so let's just finish this nekudah. We'll get back to why Rav Moshe holds it's a de'oraisa. Now, this is in Hilchos Shabbos that the Rema says—the Mechaber says you should be careful not to take out the candle, not to open the window or the door when it's going to extinguish the candle. In Hilchos Yom Tov, the Rema says that if you want to extinguish a candle, what you can do is you bring it outside, not when the wind is blowing presently, but you know the wind soon is going to blow. Right now there is no breeze, but you know before there was windy, so you can take the candle outside and then it's going to get extinguished. But if the wind is already blowing now, then you can't, because then it's not a gram kibui, then it's directly extinguishing. So you see that the Rema says clearly that gram kibui, to cause indirectly for the candle to get extinguished, is permissible. That he says in Hilchos Yom Tov. On Yontif, on Yontif. So in Hilchos Yontif, the Rama says you're allowed to take the candle outside when the wind is not blowing directly right now, and you know the wind is going to come and blow it out, that is permissible. Now, by fire, in Shin Lamed Daled, the Mechaber says, what do you do when there's a fire, chas v'shalom? So you take vessels, that's the Gemara, right? You take vessels with water, you put them nearby the fire. When the fire is going to reach that vessel and it's going to burst, the water is going to extinguish the fire, and that is permissible because it's gram kibui. Indirect being mechabeh is permissible. Says the Rama, b'makom hefsed, that is only permissible if there is a financial loss. Meaning, if there's a fire, you're afraid it's going to have a big financial loss, then you're permitted to do indirect kibui. But other than that, gram kibui is not permissible for any other reason of makom tzorech. So the Magen Avraham is already asking in Hilchos Yontif, why is it that the Rama left out the makom hefsed? Here by Yontif it says you can take the candle, you want to extinguish it, go outside, you know the wind is going to come and blow it off, and he's not mechayev, he doesn't tell you it has to be b'makom hefsed. So the Magen Avraham. The Taz says that indeed, even not for hefsed, even if it's not a hefsed, you have any tzorech, you have a need, even if it's a minor need, and you want to do gram kibui, an indirect kibui, that is permissible. The Taz, Sha'ar HaTziyun there brings this Taz in Hilchos Yontif, and he says that this Rama in Hilchos Shabbos that requires that indirect kibui, gram kibui is only permissible b'makom hefsed, is the shitah of the Mordechai that brings b'shem Rabbi Yoel, which is daas yachid, only single opinion, nobody agrees with that opinion, and therefore. The Ramo here didn't bother even to bring it in Hilchos Yom Tov, and therefore he says gram kibui would be permissible, like I had mentioned in Reish Ayin Zayin. But in Arsim, in Reish Ayin Zayin, the Biur Halacha brings these opinions that hold that even without hefsed it's permissible. One thing is for sure, that Mishnah Berurah holds in Hilchos Yom Tov you don't need makom hefsed. That's how he paskens, that you can do gram kibui without hefsed. In Hilchos Shabbos, it seems that the Biur Halacha—there's no direct quote of the Mishnah Berurah what he holds—but it seems that from the Biur Halacha that he holds that even in Hilchos Shabbos you don't need mamash makom hefsed. What? For example, you want to take a little nap on Shabbos. Can you do gram kibui on Shabbos? So we get to the case of the timer. But first let's set things straight. Does the Hilchos Yom Tov, gram kibui is permissible even without a hefsed? How about Hilchos Shabbos? The Taz learns that even a small need, it doesn't have to be hefsed, it doesn't have to be necessarily for a purpose of a mitzvah, you're allowed to do indirect kibui on Shabbos as well. By the way, the Biur Halacha says clearly that this is not only b'nogea to melachas kibui. I would have thought that perhaps the halacha of gram kibui is only about kibui. So there's two—

So, because we didn't have time to go through them, one is in Bava Kama, one is in Shabbos. There's a contradiction. One Gemara, the Gemara in Shabbos says that melacha is asur, lo ta'aseh kol melacha; you're not allowed to do melacha. But grama is shari, but if you do it indirectly, that is permissible. The Gemara uses the lashon not that is patur; the Gemara says shari, it's permissible. That's the Gemara in Shabbos. The Gemara in Bava Kama says, zoreh v'ruach mesayeato. If somebody does winnowing and the wind helps him to separate the kernels from the stalk, there the Gemara says on Shabbos he's chayav; in nezikin, you're going to be patur. Shabbos is chayav, מלאכת מחשבת אסרה תורה. You see clearly that indirect, right? You're not doing it yourself; you're doing grama, using the wind to separate the kernels from the stalk, and the Gemara says that that is asur on Shabbos. So the Rosh learns that this zoreh is different than any other grama, meaning it's a specific din in hilchos zoreh. Zoreh, the entire melacha is the only way to do that melacha of winnowing is using the wind to separate the kernels from the stalk, and that is asur. But any other case, like the Gemara in Shabbos, that everything else is shari. It's a machlokes how to learn the Gemara, but it seems that the Biur Halacha applies grama not only to the melachos. Zoreh says clearly that gram kibui is not only by kibui; it's by all the melachos, grama is mutar, and that is mashma in the Gemara. More than that, there are those who want to be mechalek that grama is not mutar if your kavanah is to extinguish it. So first of all, the case the Rama brings here in Hilchos Yom Tov is you're taking out the candle for what purpose? It's not unintentionally; you don't intentionally. You want it to be mechabeh. The Mishnah Berurah by Hilchos Shin Lamed Daled, he says you're taking the barrels of water and your intention is you want to extinguish the fire; that's permissible. That means that grama is mutar on Shabbos even if you did it intentionally. That would be permissible even b'shaa melachos. So based on that, Reb Shlomo Zalman holds, essentially, that the timer, you're allowed to adjust the timer on Shabbos to add time. He says it's oisgerecht that it's permissible because he holds that you're keeping status quo if you're adding time. The light is on; you're just adding time, you're keeping status quo. You want to make it go off earlier, there it's not keeping status quo; you want to change the status quo. So he says that would only be permissible for tzorech mitzvah or tzorech gadol. That's in one place. In another place he says even a minor tzorech would be permissible. In other words, what he's struggling here is with the Rama. The Rama in Hilchos Shabbos requires only b'makom hefsed. If it's only b'makom hefsed, then you can't do gram kibui for any purpose. So you want to set the timer, you want to change the timer should go off earlier so you can go to sleep. So in one place Reb Shlomo Zalman says that even to go in to sleep, that's considered a tzorech, even though it's not a big tzorech, but it's oneg Shabbos. Just like b'hichas Yom Tov would be fine, that oneg Yom Tov is considered ochel nefesh, so too for Shabbos it's considered a mitzvah and therefore it would be permissible if you want to go to sleep earlier. That would be considered enough of a tzorech to use an indirect kibui. That's Reb Shlomo Zalman's opinion. And then he says another kneitch, that when it's on, you can set it for later on when it's going to go off, in order it should go on earlier when it's on right now. And the same thing, when it's off now, you want to change the timing for when it's going to go off later, after it gets on, that's also permissible, but you're not going to go in right now from hisraya. He brings a proof from the Chazon Shichonoch. But let's get back to the question you asked before. Only with the old-fashioned timers. What do you mean the old-fashioned timers? Push-in and push-out also. No, it's not with the digital. No, not digital, correct, not digital. That is correct. No, I'm not talking about digital. The Moshe holds that adjusting time to timer would be issur d'oraisa, a prohibition from the Torah, meaning in the case where the time is on now and you want to add time. Doesn't he hold that stamos, the rest is a time clock anyway? Okay, that's correct. It's another issue, which Moshe, to begin with, he doesn't hold issur d'oraisa. He says it's nichlal in amirah l'akum. Rav Moshe was not a big fan of timers to begin with, and he says in the teshuva that it's clear to him that if timers would exist in the time of Chazal, that would be included in the gezeirah of amirah l'akum. Chazal said you shouldn't tell a goy to do melacha because Chazal wanted you to rest on Shabbos, and Chazal were fully aware that you can do all the melachos that you want through minyan to a goy. That's why Chazal instituted issur amirah l'akum. So too, if timers would have existed in times of Chazal, they would prohibit it, and it's clear to him that this is nichlal, including issur of amirah l'akum. He says people can keep all the companies and the factories, everything can be running on a timer.

And therefore, he holds a timer should not be used. People use it for, like, just for the light, okay? So hanach lemisol, let them use it, okay? That's a separate discussion. But Rav Moshe doesn't hold that if you use a timer, which is set before Shabbos, it becomes issur d'oraisa, melacha, that he never had any hava amina on that. He said lights are different. He says since people use it for lights, so hanach lemisol, don't bother them. Let them keep it and stick to the lights, but nothing else. What about air conditioning? Lights are like air conditioning. If I'm not mistaken, I think I spoke to one of his grandchildren that they did have air conditioning with a timer in Rav Moshe's house. So I don't know. It has to be clarified. I'm not sure. Okay, but that was the shita. But why would it be issur melacha? So we mentioned before, libi omer li, that when Rav Moshe says that even adding time would be issur d'oraisa, he's talking in a case where you're taking out the pin and then you're putting it back for more time, and that means you're adjusting it now. It's not you're adding time; you're keeping status quo, like Rav Shlomo Zalman is talking, push-in, push-out. The push-in, push-out bottoms, you're just adding time, then you keeping status quo for another two hours. That, libi omer li, Rav Moshe would also agree that it's not issur d'oraisa. When he speaks issur d'oraisa, it means you're taking out the pin and now you're going to put in the pin for another two hours later on. Then you just adjusted and you made a gram kibui when it's going to go off, because once the pin was out, this is not set to go off. Now what you're doing is you're doing gram kibui. Rav Moshe held that this is not grama. Why is it not grama? You ask me why would it be issur d'oraisa. So Rav Moshe held it's not grama, and there are other poskim who also hold like this, that adjusting time is not grama. So I want to go into it for a second. By a mill, by grinding. So if there is a water mill that operates on its own, if you want to add now wheat and put it in the mill, are you over issur d'oraisa? Are you over on grinding? Is that considered grinding, or do you say it's grama? I'm not doing anything. I'm putting in the wheat. The wheat afterwards is going to go into the grinding machine. The machine is going to work on its own. It's going to grind it. It's grama. We said grama on Shabbos is mutar. Maybe only mokom hefsed, but at least it's no chiyuv d'oraisa. So it's a machlokes in the poskim. The Magen Avraham holds there would be no issur d'oraisa. It's only issur derabbanan. But, l'halacha nami, putting wheat in an existing water mill that is operating right now is only issur derabbanan. The Biur Halacha brings many poskim disagree, and that's the stand of the Mishnah Berurah. There would be chashash issur d'oraisa. Why? Because you're using now an existing force, and you're adding something to the existing force. That is considered that you are doing. In general, this question is a much more broad question. We're just going to keep here for Shabbos, but that question could come up in regard to ksivas sefer Torah, to tefillas tzitzis, tefillin. When you need a siyua lishmah of a person, is that considered my action? If I'm using an existing force, or is that considered an action of the machine? Even though it's not directly related, we can be mechalek between mitzvas aseh, mitzvas lo sa'aseh, between different mitzvos in tefillah. Not everything is one big cholent, but the question could be applicable to many different areas as well. When I'm using an existing force of a machine, and I'm the one who's operating it, do we look at it as a grama, or do we look at it as my action? Magen Avraham holds that by tefillah, l'neged hilchos Shabbos, that is considered grama, and you're not going to be over issur d'oraisa. Mishnah Berurah holds not like that. Many poskim disagree; it would be issur d'oraisa. Rav Moshe holds that when you are adjusting a timer, you are using an existing force and you are adjusting it. In such a case, just like by tochen, you're saying that the machine was set up for such a thing. It was set up for bitochen. It was set up to do the melachah in a way of a grama. That's how it's set up. It's not an unusual way to do it. This is how the melachah is being done, and you are using that force by putting the wheat in. That is considered the melachah d'oraisa, and therefore so too by the timer, adjusting the time doesn't matter if you are setting it should go off earlier or setting it should go on earlier. In both cases, you are doing an action together with the fire that's going to put it on. Keeping status quo, libi omer li, that if that's the reasoning of Rav Moshe, it would be permissible. Meaning, in our timers, where you're not taking out the pin, you just have push-in, push-out, and you're adding two more hours that it should stay, that basically what you're doing is you're keeping status quo. Rav Moshe would also agree that it's not issur d'oraisa; rather, it would be issue of muktzah. The issue of muktzah— So when you do that, does it matter the sequence that you do it? Meaning? What do you mean, the sequence? To put those in before you take those out? Oh. So Rav Shlomo Zalman, he speaks in a different teshuvah.

About the pins, and he says the dad to take it out and move a dad you're not allowed to. So Rav Noivit came up with a eitzah, and he said, so what you're going to do is before you take out that pin, you put another pin later on, so this way it's still supposed to go off. You never took out the ma'aseh, and then you just take out that pin. Let's say it's supposed to go off at two o'clock, the pin of two o'clock. You want to extend it, it should go off at four o'clock. So you put a pin of four o'clock in, and then you take off the pin of two o'clock, and that should be fine according to everybody. Rav Moshe doesn't say why, when, what. He says, all he says in the teshuva— Yeah, l'chora that should be good according to Rav Moshe. I'll tell you what Rav Moshe's teshuva—he doesn't specify which timeer it is, but libi omer li that Rav Moshe would agree in this case. He says, Im mutar l'haziz es ha'sha'on sheyichabeh b'ichur zman, are you permitted to adjust the time it should go off later, mik'fi she'hu amad, o shelo yichabeh klal, or it shouldn't go off at all, o b'korov zman, or to make it closer, k'dei she'dolik? So he says it depends. B'chol oifen, in any case, it's asur. Aval yesh oifen shehu melacha. Some cases it's a d'oraisa, kegon she'oseh, for example, when he does shehidlak bein b'ichur, if he makes it should go off later, bein b'korov zman, or earlier, that's a melacha. U'bein sheyichabeh, and if he makes it should go off bein b'ichur zman, in a later time, bein b'kiruv, or closer time, that's also melacha. Ach kibui hu melacha she'einah tzrichah l'gufah, but extinguishing in essence is melacha she'einah tzrichah l'gufah, and melachos in the poskim, if melacha she'einah tzrichah l'gufah is issur d'oraisa. But in any case, he says it's going to be asur al tzad muktzah. But he distinguishes between a case where you're turning on the unit and you're leaving it on; it should stay on the whole Shabbos, or you're leaving it off the whole Shabbos. And that, he says, is only issur derabbanan, whereas adjusting, he holds, is going to be issur d'oraisa. And that's why we explained, in the case that he's speaking is that you're taking out the pin, and then you're making now a new ma'aseh that it should go off, that would be issur d'oraisa because he held it's like toichen, like using a mill that is operating, and that is considered work together and would be issur d'oraisa. Reb Shlomo Zalman is mechalek between techinah and here. Another case that is similar is by tzeidah also. If you go hunting and you're using your dog to catch the animal, and you're standing from one side and the dog goes and the animal is scared to come your direction, and it goes the other way and the dog catches the animal, that is issur d'oraisa of tzeidah. What did you do? You only did a grama. You were gorem the animal to get scared and run the other direction, and then it got caught by the dog. That's not called tzeidah. Why is that tzeidah? It should be grama. Grama holds you chayav, and Reb Shlomo explains because you are helping here with the dog, and since that melachah is usually done together, that's how you go hunting. You go on your horse, so you're standing there and you're closing up the animal from one side, and the dog comes from the other side. That's how tzeidah is done. So then it's not considered just grama because you're helping in the action of tzeidah, and in such a case would be issur d'oraisa. So the question was, the time is, do we view it as my action helping to initiate the light, or is it just like a barrel of water that I'm putting it next to the fire and the fire is going to come there and get extinguished? That was the shaylah, how to look at it. So the case we brought from the mechaber, that you have a wind and the wind is about to extinguish the candle, and you're permitted to close the door because you're not doing anything; the candle stays on. There's a reverse case also in סעיף ב'. In סעיף ב' he's talking that there's a fire that's about to get extinguished, and the wind keeps blowing and keeps it on. That wind that keeps blowing and keeps it on, you want to come now and close that door or close that window so that the wind should stop keeping the fire on. So the Mechaber says that's permissible and it's not considered that you're extinguishing the fire. I know very well that the fire is almost dead, and the only thing that keeps it alive is the fact that the wind keeps blowing in. You're going to close now the wind; within 30 seconds or within a minute, the fire is going to go off. Says the Mechaber, you're not doing anything. That's not considered extinguishing. You're not doing anything. It's going to extinguish, it's going to extinguish. You didn't do an action in the pu'ulah of kibui. So too, keeping status quo. If it's off, that it shouldn't go on, that would also be, says Reb Shlomo Zalman, would be the same idea. If it's off now and it shouldn't go on, and you want to push off it should stay off more hours, it shouldn't go on so early, that is keeping status quo. You're preventing the wind from coming.

Coming in and keeping the fire on, and that would be permissible. So that's where Reb Shlomo Zalman is coming from. So just to summarize, Reb Shlomo Zalman is of the opinion that adjusting the timers is permissible in some cases. Pashut would be even according to Rav Moshe as far as issur d'oraisa, meaning when you want to add time and it should stay on longer. If you want to make it go off earlier or go on earlier, that's when you come to machlokes, a much wider machlokes. Reb Shlomo Zalman holds it would be permissible if it's l'tzorech mitzvah, even maybe tzorech kol shehu. Rav Moshe holds it would be issur d'oraisa. But one thing there could be is that I think they both would be maskim that b'nogea to amira l'akum, if you want to tell a goy to turn on a timer, to adjust a timer for a different time, I think Rav Moshe would also be maskim that there is room to say that it would be permissible, because we find even by techinah that is a machlokes between the Magen Avraham and the other poskim if you're allowed to add reeds to an existing mill. So perhaps, and we know a general klal, b'nogea to amira l'akum, to tell a goy, whenever there's a machlokes, you can be meikel on amira l'akum, that it's considered melacha d'rabbanan. So since the Magen Avraham holds that even tochen by a mill is considered melacha d'rabbanan, to tell a goy to adjust a timer would be pashut permissible according to everybody, even according to Rav Moshe. We'll stop here. You've just experienced another Torah class, brought to you by TorahAnytime.com.