Hi friends and welcome back to Talmud Daily, our 40-week tour throughout the entire Talmud. And today, we are starting a new tractate. I’m so excited about this one. We did our introduction. We did tractate Brachos. We did an overview of tractate Shabbos, and right after Shabbos comes the tractate known as Eruvin. And this is very exciting because this is a continuation, almost a relative, a first cousin if you will, to tractate Shabbos.
Now, what is Eruvin about? The word eruv literally means like a mixture—to take two different qualities and to mix them together. There’s a word irbuvya, which means total chaos, mixtures all over together, that derives from the word eruv, which means to mix.
Now, we are not talking about mixing like in cooking ingredients. The eruvin that we are talking about is mixing different domains, whether it is the private domain or a public domain. That is what this tractate is going to be talking about.
Something that is essential to understand about Shabbos, and a theme that we’ve touched on before, is really two things to really understand. Number one, in the 35th chapter of Exodus, in the beginning of the weekly parsha known as Vayakhel, the concept and commandment of Shabbos is introduced with a very clear verb. It’s the only time that a commandment is introduced with this verb, and that is the verb of vayakhel. Vayakhel means to gather, or you may even hear in the very word, kehilla. Kehilla means community. It means a congregation.
Shabbos literally creates the boundaries of community. Why is that? Because, as we also mentioned, the word Shabbos, if you’d hear it in the word, has the word shav, which means to return, like teshuva that we have in the High Holidays. To shav means to return. And in fact, we have an explicit verse in the 16th chapter—this is earlier, Shabbos is mentioned a bunch of times in the Torah—but in the 16th chapter of Exodus, when they are getting the heavenly manna. The Jewish people are wandering through the desert, they are told, don’t go and collect the manna on Shabbos. On Shabbos, the language of the Torah is, lo yeitzei ish mimkomo, “a person should not go out from their place.” Shabbos is about returning, about having that fixed place—a home, a neighborhood, a community that you go back to.
In many ways, it reminds me, when I was in yeshiva. I studied in a yeshiva called Ner Yisroel in Baltimore. And they had actually a very beautiful custom related to Shabbos that I want to share with you that really highlights this theme. You know, every single day at lunchtime. So you would go and find a lunch table, and you know, different people, you could pick any table in the lunchroom. Different people would gravitate, the lunchroom, on the left side, on the right side, in the front, in the back, in the middle—different people, different days.
Only on Shabbos, one day a week, you would be assigned a table. And I always found it was very profound on how on Shabbos, you’re approaching the table that belongs to you. Shabbos is about returning back to that home, to that fixed point. And one of the ways that we do that is clarifying the boundaries of where does our home end, where does our community end.
Now, there are different types of eruv, and the word that we use to describe is a colloquialism. There are really two different types of eruv. There is one type of eruv that is known as an eruvei chatzeiros. A chatzer is a courtyard. So you could imagine if there are multiple apartments or homes, and they all feed into one kind of collected space. To make sure that is all considered one space, they have one piece of food that they share collectively, and it transforms what the definition of that space is. That is the first kind of eruv.
There is a second kind of eruv known as an eruvei techumin. Techumin means boundaries, and that is how far out can you walk, can you travel on Shabbos. And all of this kind of derives from the Jewish people’s wandering in the desert. That is the typology of how all of the halacha, all of the laws regarding Shabbos, really emerge from them. And that second type of eruv governs how far out you can walk, and there is a way that you could extend that boundary by placing like a meal and almost establishing the boundaries of your home already as Shabbos begins 2,000 cubits, which is the measuring system—we don’t use feet or inches or the metric system in the Talmud—2,000 cubits outward. Those are the two types of eruv.
Now, there are really two prohibitions that are being juggled in this tractate. One is how far out you can travel, and one is carrying from one type of domain to another type of domain. When they were in the desert, that was considered the public domain. This was a vast area, and you had to be careful. When they were building the Mishkan, that place of dwelling of God in the desert, they had to be very careful when they take things from their tent into the desert, from the desert back into the enclosed structure of the Mishkan. All of these were different forms of carrying from one domain to another, and we do not carry from a public domain into a private domain.
How do we define what’s public and what’s private? Is it by how many people use it? Is it by access? Can you, I don’t know, transform, can you buy a public domain? I own it personally, does that make it into a private domain? These are all questions that are going to be resolved throughout the tractate and discussed throughout the tractate.
But classically, we use these words improperly. We really have two major types of domains in the Talmud. One is called, and I’m going to use the Talmudic terminology, one is called a reshus hayachid, which we’re going to clumsily define, yachid means individual, reshus means a domain. So let’s call it an individual domain. And the other is called a reshus harabbim, which is a public domain.
You cannot transform and make a public domain, you know, with whatever, wires, which we’re going to get to in a second, or whatever you do. A public domain is a public domain. The question is, there are areas which are kind of in between, they’re in the middle, and maybe over there, there are different fixtures that we can make in such types of places. Maybe think of a courtyard. You know, your front yard. Think of the, you know, the little environs of your community. Is that really considered a public thoroughfare, or is there a way that we can consider it a private thoroughfare, but it would still need kind of some fixing to ensure that it is halachically considered a private domain?
This enters the modern controversies surrounding the real colloquial question of eruv. The issue is a lot of people get introduced to this specifically through debate, through communal—not just debate—fighting, really. Debate sounds very Talmudic. I wish this stayed Talmudic. Communities can get torn apart by this, which we’ll come back to. I don’t think that’s a coincidence, either, that the mechanism that forms the boundaries of community is, in fact, what very often has this volcanic, explosive reaction for how communities feel about those boundaries.
But to introduce this, I want to give a snippet from a video. We’re not going to do this every week, I promise, but this did air on The Daily Show, and this was a debate within a Jewish community over the construction of an eruv.
[Video Clip Begins Playing]
Jon Stewart:
Welcome back. You know, with all the strife and fighting overseas, it’s easy to lose sight of the turmoil at home. There are hot spots here that are disintegrating into chaos as the world sits idly by. Wyatt Cenac traveled to Long Island and filed this report.
Wyatt Cenac:
We’ve all heard about the religious structure that’s been enraging Manhattanites. Now a similar controversy is engulfing Long Island.
Unnamed TV News Anchor
Call it a holy war in the Hamptons. Residents of the village of Westhampton Beach say a proposal of an eruv is an outrage.
Wyatt Cenac:
That’s right, a Jewish Orthodox group has been given permission to erect a religious boundary called an eruv around Westhampton Beach, a structure supporters claim will be harmless.
Jeff Weisenfeld:
It’s just a religious freedom issue, and if your religion requires an eruv, you should be able to do it.
Wyatt Cenac:
But for others, it’s an aesthetic issue.
Charles Gottesman:
It would totally transform the look of this town, which I enjoy.
Wyatt Cenac:
What does an eruv look like, Charles?
Charles Gottesman:
Basically, you wouldn’t even see the thing. It’s a matter…
Wyatt Cenac:
You wouldn’t see it?
Charles Gottesman:
No, because it’s a line. It could be a thin line running through the poles in the street around a whole area. It really is almost invisible.
Wyatt Cenac:
Yes, these beautiful seaside power lines will be ruined by this. [Zooms in.] Wait, this. [Zooms in again.] Over here. [Zooms in again.] See?
What is the problem with letting them have a string around the town?
Charles Gottesman:
It will attract many, many Orthodox Jews who want to break the rules of their religion.
Wyatt Cenac:
Oh, so maybe the view he’s talking about is less this and more this.
The Orthodox want an eruv because Jewish law prohibits performing daily tasks on the Sabbath, everything from pushing a stroller to even carrying keys.
If I were in an eruv, can I kill a man?
Jeff Weisenfeld:
No.
Wyatt Cenac:
Oh, okay. If the string is virtually invisible, why not just pretend it’s there?
Jeff Weisenfeld:
You can’t say it’s there and it’s not there. If you’re not involved, it’s imaginary to you.
Wyatt Cenac:
But it’s imaginary.
Jeff Weisenfeld:
It’s real, but it’s imaginary in a metaphorical sense.
Wyatt Cenac:
So it’s really imaginary.
Jeff Weisenfeld:
It’s not quite like Alice in Wonderland.
Wyatt Cenac:
It’s more like Mr. Snuffleupagus?
I went to Westhampton Beach to save the town before it became a lawless wild West Bank.
Unnamed Interviewee #1:
You know, it allows them to push the carriages and it’s okay.
Wyatt Cenac:
But first they start pushing their kids, next they start pushing their Orthodox agenda.
Unnamed Interviewee #1:
I think that people just need to be more open-minded, and I think it’ll all work itself out.
Unnamed Interviewee #2:
I’m not worried about the eruv, really.
Wyatt Cenac:
Restaurants like this bakery are going to have to become kosher.
Unnamed Interviewee #2:
This bakery is already kosher.
Wyatt Cenac:
Wow, it’s already begun.
And what’s most shocking are the hardball tactics the Orthodox are using against the established Jews.
Charles Gottesman:
One of them tried to explain to me very loudly that she could not shop on the Sabbath, and then I said to her, take your groise tuchus, which means very large behind, outside of my store.
Wyatt Cenac:
That just seems rude on their part.
Charles Gottesman:
Exactly. They are a very close-minded little group.
Wyatt Cenac:
That’s why Charles and the other open-minded Jews created an organization to keep Orthodox Jews out of their town.
Whatever you all are doing, it has to be horrible. You made a 73-year-old Jewish man complain.
Jeff Weisenfeld:
I envy him, because that’s the only thing he’s got to complain about is that fishing line up there? Boy.
Wyatt Cenac:
There had to be a way to bring peace to this troubled land. Perhaps a compromise.
Jeff Weisenfeld:
An eruv hat?
Wyatt Cenac:
Yeah. Look, got myself a nice little bacon sandwich and a glass of milk. Check me out. [Eats the bacon.] Watch this. [Dips the bacon in the milk and eats it.] Look at me. Boy, that’s delicious.
Jeff Weisenfeld:
Even if you had an eruv from here to California, you can’t eat that.
Wyatt Cenac:
It’s ironic that both groups, with 4,000 years of shared history, were choosing to ignore tradition.
Charles, we should keep the Hamptons the way they’re supposed to be: Christian.
Charles Gottesman:
Well, I totally disagree with that, because the Hamptons are for everyone.
Wyatt Cenac:
Except, apparently, these folks.
Charles Gottesman:
Yes. We are against a little group taking over our way of life.
Wyatt Cenac:
And the best way to protect your way of life: make sure Orthodox Jews can’t practice theirs.
Jon Stewart:
Wyatt Cenac. We’ll be right back.
[Video Clips Ends]
Now, when you watch this video, this repeats a very classic trope, a misunderstanding that people have about eruvin. They think that eruvin is the ultimate legal loophole. It’s like pretend. It’s all make-believe. It is absolutely not. That misunderstanding comes from a very shallow understanding of the Talmudic basis of eruvin.
Essentially, it is prohibited to carry in a public domain. Now, the boundaries of what is considered public and private are a little bit ambiguous. In places which are not classically defined as a public domain. It needs a certain size, which would be 16 cubits by 16 cubits. That’s also derived from Shabbos. It’s going to need make sure that it’s not enclosed by walls. What is considered a wall? That is all the details of this tractate.
But what we need to understand is that the wire that goes around and encloses, let’s say, a city, and there are many Jewish communities that are enclosed by this kind of wire, is actually something very different. We are transforming an ambiguous private domain into a classically defined private domain.
So we’re actually avoiding major, major thoroughfares. These don’t go over, let’s say, a major highway. We’re not going to put the wires over there. Now, we’re not going to get into all of the details of this, but to really understand why this is not a classical legal loophole, you really just have to open up the first Rashi in tractate Eruvin, which we of course will link to. And the first Rashi over there says something extraordinarily profound, and this is something that is voiced in the opening words of my friend, who we will absolutely have on Talmud Daily later, Rabbi Daniel Feldman, who wrote a book called Letter and Spirit, which is all about legal loopholes in halacha, in Jewish law.
And he actually says, this does not count as a legal loophole. Do you want to know why it doesn’t count? He quotes the first Rashi in Eruvin. Rashi is saying, the reason why we do this is actually, these would be places where we would be allowed to carry. The problem is, is we’re concerned that if people carry in these places, which are only rabbinically prohibited, they’re going to end up carrying even in a properly defined public domain, a reshus harabbim. So what did they do? They said, “Look, we will lower our prohibition. These places—the ambiguous private domains—we will allow you to carry in them since we were the ones rabbinically…” They were the reason why they were prohibited in the first place. “So we will relax that prohibition, but only if you make a very clear distinction so you don’t forget and wind up carrying in actual public domains.”
So this was a part of the legal reasoning from the very beginning. From the very beginning: public domains prohibited, private domains permitted. There is an ambiguous [space]. Where exactly? How do we define a private domain? So rabbis said, “You can’t carry in an ambiguous private domain, but we will allow you to continue to carry if you set up this structure.” What is this structure? This is the structure of the modern-day eruv, which is essentially known as a tzuras hapesach. Tzura means the look, the facade of; pesach is a doorway.
The way that we build community, and this is something very beautiful. In the Jewish world, halachically, the way that we build community is not by erecting walls, it’s actually by creating doorways.
We’re a community completely of doorways. That is how the modern-day eruv transforms the ambiguous private space into a classically defined private space that allows people to then carry. But what it really does is it creates kahal, it creates community. Everyone knows there is something different about Shabbos-observant communities, and the way that we create that community, the way that we create that home, is through the vehicle of eruvs, something that we will explore through the duration of this week.
I am so excited for our tour of Tractate Eruvin. Stay tuned and let’s keep making Torah sweet.