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From: sb@linus.UUCP (Shimshon Berkovits)
Newsgroups: net.religion.jewish
Subject: Re: Speaking of fences ... the "EIRUV" and my religious views
Message-ID: <807@linus.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 2-Mar-84 09:39:25 EST
Article-I.D.: linus.807
Posted: Fri Mar  2 09:39:25 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 3-Mar-84 04:00:21 EST
References: <932@ihuxr.UUCP> <1011@pegasus.UUCP>
Organization: MITRE Corp., Bedford MA
Lines: 17

Avi's description of the laws and rational of an EIRUV are as I remember them
- except in one detail. The original prohibition against carrying on Shabbat
refers to a place called "R'shus HaRabbim - the place open to the multitude."
This the Talmud defines as an open common in which 100,000 people can pass.
Any area smaller than this which is not private property is called a
"Karmelis (I don't know the litteral translation)." One of the fences
constructed arround the Torah is the forbidding of carrying in a Karmelis.
However, that fence is dismantelled if another fence (the EIRUV) is constructed
around the Karmelis to make it private property. It should be noted that some
sort of agreement has to be made with the governing body of the town(s)
inside the EIRUV esentially to rent the space and to give everyone the
right of access to the area concerned. This whole process is a business deal
executed for the converience of certain of the town's inhabitants. It is
hardly the secular government becoming involved in religious matters.

				Shim