Spending Shabbos in the Psychiatric Ward Part 2

Question

Last week, I asked about how to deal with the electric doors here in the hospital on Shabbos. Rav Zafrani explained to me that the best course of action is just to stand by the doors until someone realizes that you need to get through. Most of the time, Jewish nurses were buzzing the door open for me. This got me worried: Am I not causing another Jew to sin?

Thank you.

Rav Auerbach 

While obviously the best option would be for a non-Jew to open the door, I concur with the analysis of Rav Zafrani that you are permitted to stand by the door until a nurse opens it for you.

However, you are raising a very valid and intelligent question. Seemingly, there is a problem with what Rav Zafrani said. Since the Jewish nurse is employed to open the door for anyone who needs to enter, why don’t we consider standing by the door to be causing the Jewish nurse to do meleches Shabbos, which would seem to be a problem of lifnei iver, causing a Jew to transgress, a Torah prohibition, or at least mesayei’a ovrei aveirah, helping a Jew to transgress, which is a rabbinic prohibition?

The answer is that even if one of the Jewish nurses opens the door, since you did not tell them to do anything and you did not even hint to them to transgress—rather, you are simply standing there—this action does not constitute either of these two prohibitions. Since it is neither of them, there is no issur to stand there by the door.

Even if it is permitted for you to stand there, we still do not want a Jew to transgress, and in general, I would not recommend such a course of action. In your situation, however, in addition to what we have already explained, there are a number of other factors that allow one to act leniently.

Even though the accepted practice follows the Chazon Ish that the use of electricity on Shabbos is considered a Torah prohibition, there are lenient opinions. For the sake of such a pressing question as yours, there would be reason to rely on these opinions and consider this a rabbinic prohibition.

Once we are considering this a rabbinic prohibition, we must determine whether it can be violated for a choleh kol haguf. There are four opinions cited in the Shulchan Aruch (328:17) regarding when it is permitted to violate an issur derabbonon for the sake of a sick person. One of these opinions rules that in the case of a choleh kol haguf, one may perform an issur derabbonon even without a shinui. Even though we do not rule like this opinion, the fact that it is cited in the Shulchan Aruch is significant. Therefore, in this case, you need not be concerned that you are doing anything wrong.

So far, we have dealt with the issue of causing another Jew to transgress. There is one more issue that must be clarified. According to the accepted halacha that one is only permitted to perform an issur derabbonon if it is done with a shinui, is there a problem of ma’aseh Shabbos, benefiting from meleches Shabbos?

There are two reasons why you do not need to worry about ma’aseh Shabbos. If we consider opening the electric doors to be a rabbinic prohibition, we can rely on the opinions that an issur derabbonon that is not done intentionally—e.g., the nurse is not religious or her rabbi permitted her to do it—does not create an issue of ma’aseh Shabbos (Biur Halacha 318:1). Another reason to be lenient is that my father-in-law, Rav Yosef Shalom Elyashiv, ruled that there is no direct benefit from walking through a door that has been opened b’issur (as cited in Orchos Shabbos 25:29:61).

May your daughter have a refuah sheleimah and be released from the hospital soon.