Weekly Halacha Yomit: Kitzur Shulchan Aruch

This week, our learning covers many areas regarding Shabbat observance. One such law (85:5) discusses a rule regarding when a fire breaks out on Shabbat:

All sacred texts, whether written or printed, one may save them from a fire or flood or the like, even (by taking them) to a courtyard or alleyway which is (normally) forbidden to take them out to there due to the lack of an ''eruv'', this is provided they are built in such a way that an ''eruv'' could be used for the courtyard or alleyway, and by a non-Jew it is allowed to save them even via a public domain.

The Halacha presented is that a sefer, sacred text, may be saved from a fire on Shabbat to the extent that we may remove it to a courtyard or alleyway where it is otherwise forbidden to do so on Shabbat. Why are sefarim so important that their removal from a burning house can override a Shabbat prohibition?

Much of the importance of sefarim derives from the following halacha:

It is a positive commandment that everyone in Jewry should write a Torah scroll for himself for Scripture states, Now therefore write this song (Dvarim 31:19), which they [the Sages] explained to mean: write the Torah that contains this song… [The Rosh] of blessed memory wrote that all this applied in the early generations, when they would write a Torah scroll and study from it. In our days, however, when a Torah scroll is written and placed in the synagogue, to read from it in public, it is a positive commandment for everyone in Jewry who has the means, to buy chumashim, Mishnah and Talmud, and their commentaries… For the religious duty of writing a Torah scroll is in order to have it studied; and through the Talmud and its commentaries he will know the meaning of the mitzvot and the laws thoroughly.
[Positive Mitzva 15, Sefer Hamitzvot HaKatzar, Chafetz Chayim]

So we see the importance of sefarim is derived from the command to write a Sefer Torah. This is, in fact, the last (613th) mitzva in the Torah, as it appears near the end of Sefer Devarim. The Rosh's opinion cited above was not, however, universally accepted.

This opinion of the Rosh caused many raised eyebrows among other commentators. The Beit Yosef asked: how could the Rosh exempt a person from a Torah commandment -- the writing of a Torah scroll -- and replace it with an obligation to buy sefarim, the holy books of our people (Yoreh Deah #270, see also Taz)? The Beit Yosef tries to modify the words of the Rosh, suggesting that the Rosh had no intention of abolishing the requirement to write a Torah; he simply meant to add another obligation - the one to write and obtain copies of sefarim…

While there is great debate among Halakhic authorities whether or not to follow the Rosh, even the Beit Yosef agrees that today, buying Jewish books fulfills at least part of the mitzvah of writing a Sefer Torah. He says buying books is a Halakhic requirement today. Almost all rabbis in fact state that there is a mitzvah, an obligation in effect today, for each of us to buy sefarim. There are so many opportunities to begin or add to your Jewish library: besides the bookstore; there are catalogs, toll-free phone numbers to Judaic stores and, easiest of all, the Internet. The Rosh could never have imagined how easy it would be to fulfill the mitzvah of "writing a Sefer Torah."
[Divrei Moredchai - Nitzavim-Vayeilech , Rabbi Mordechai Friedfertig]

Rabbi Friedfertig makes a fantastic point about sefarim today – we have never had it so easy! Not only are sefarim so readily available in large quantities at reasonable prices and literally a few clicks away on the internet, but so much of it has been translated so the public who are not as comfortable with the original Hebrew can read it in their own language. Invest in a sefer and increase in your observance of Mitzva number 613!

If you have any comments or feedback, please email daniel@worldmizrachi.org .

• Kitzur Shulchan Aruch with English linear translation: http://www.geocities.com/yona_n.geo/index.html
• Hebrew Kitzur Shulchan Aruch with nekudot: http://www.kitzur.net
• Hebrew Kitzur Shulchan Aruch without nekudot: http://www.shofar.net/Content/Kitzur_Shulchan.htm?id=5417
• Kitzur Shulchan Aruch project, calendars and order books: http://www.kitzuryomi.org/
• Kitzur Shulchan Aruch with Misgeret HaShulchan: http://www.hebrewbooks.org/9214
• Kitzur Shulchan Aruch with She'arim Ha'Metzuyanim B'Halachah:
  • Part 1 - http://www.hebrewbooks.org/14621
  • Part 2 - http://www.hebrewbooks.org/14622
  • Part 3 - http://www.hebrewbooks.org/14619
  • Part 4 - http://www.hebrewbooks.org/14620
• Selected chapters grouped by theme: http://www.torah.org/learning/halacha/
• New Artscroll Kitzur Shulchan Aruch. Sample available at: http://www.artscroll.com/Books/ksa1.html