The Iranian matriculation exams schedule lands on a Saturday this year. While I am surprised this can happen because in the Western world Saturday is not a school day, I guess in Iran it happens. Behadrei is reporting that the matriculation exams on Saturday presents a serious problem for Jewish students. There may not be that many, but they need to be able to sit their exams as well... The Tehran Jewish Committee has worked with the Iranian Ministry of Education to find a solution, and they did!. the solution is basically to use a "Shabbos Goy".

getting a shiur on hilchos shabbos on WFAN... was that on your bingo card?

I just realized.

For years, ever since the Internet bans have become a thing with conferences and rallies and asifas and whatnot, we have all been joking about using an "Internet Goy" for your Internet needs. I have personally even been the "internet goy" for the occasional neighbor or school teacher who needed some Internet usage but did not have their own access...

funny that he considers this a job to list on his resume among his jobs...

This is Robert Largan, in discussions of the CoronaVirus Bill.

Kikar is reporting about an unusual situation and an unusual psak.

A haredi couple that got married this week was meant to go to Beitar Ilit for the Shabbat Chattan (aka Shabbos sheva brachos). They slept late and woke up in their apartment in Haifa 20 minutes before Shabbos. Obviously there was no way they could get from Haifa to Beitar before Shabbos.

On the other end of this story were the families preparing for Shabbos in Beitar, wondering where the chattan and kalla were. Some thought they were resting in the rooms they were meant to be staying in, but it was soon discovered that they were not there.

When the parents finally reached the young couple by telephone, likely waking them up by the incessant ringing of the phone just 20 minutes before the onset of Shabbos, they all realized the problem.

Further complicating the matter was the poor health of one of the parents involved. If the young couple would not show up for the Shabbos, it would possibly upset the ill parent and put his life at risk.

According to the article, leading poskim were called (who all remain unnamed) and the psak was given that the young couple should call a taxi to take them to Beitar. The driver of the taxi must be a non-Jew and he must also open and close the doors of the car for them. Because of the possibility of pikuach nefesh, they should do this even though it will mean driving on Shabbos.

the chattan was, understandably, hesitant and did not want to do this, despite the psak that he was being told. They got one of the gedolei hador, also unnamed, on the phone to tell the chattan directly that this is what he must do. So they did it.

The article says the young couple arrived at the entrance to Beitar 1 hour after Shabbos began, though that sounds too quick to me, especially considering they only woke up 20 minutes before Shabbos and still had to deal with calling gedolim and getting a psak and convincing the chattan to follow it, and then to drive form Haifa to Beitar. But anyway, hey got there during Shabbos and got out of the taxi. They then walked from the entrance of Beitar to the Shabbat Chattan location in the town, taking about another hour, and went on with the celebrations.

Kikar adds that family members mentioned that they could not recall ever having a Shabbat so happy with a chattan and kalla that were do "moser nefesh" to make everyone happy..

Further, an additional note added is not to apply what was said here to other situations, as similar as they might sound. If you find yourself in such a situation, call your own [unnamed] gadol.

You've heard of the "Shabbos Goy"... now we've got the "Shaver Goy"...

A group of rabbis form a beis din in Bnei Braq, the beis din of Rav Silman, decided it was time to give kashrut certification to electric shavers.

To that end, they began looking into a variety of electric shavers to learn how they work and how close to the skin they cut.

For their testing they brought in a goy to test the shavers on his facial hair and see how they work.

According to what they say, most electric shavers are halachically problematic, as they get very close to the skin and pull the hair follicles up from beneath the surface of the skin and then cut them. The only existing certification on an electric shaver is given by the beis din of Rav Mordechai Gross, besides for several certified by the Tzomet Institute headed by National Zionist rabbis.

the rabbis testing the shavers on the shaver goy are investigating the various machines and will decide soon regarding any kosher shavers and their certification.
source: Kikar

Hey, you cannot test it on a Jew, just in case the shaver is no good! And that's how we get the "Shaver Goy"...

Looking for ideas... what else can we move the kashrut certification business into? What else can we use a goy for?

The "National Shabbos Goy" trend is not just coming to the rails authority for the purpose of performing line upgrades on Shabbos. Now the Rabbanut will be jumping on that train as well and using the National Shabbos Goyim for the purpose of body removal on Shabbos.

During the week if someone dies, the Chevra Kadisha takes care of the body removal as part of the free package every citizen is entitled to upon death. If the same person dies on Shabbos, body removal is no longer free (though the same person can't die on Shabbos if he already died during the week, nyuk nyuk). Someone who dies on Sahbbos, let's say at home during Friday night dinner, will have to either stay there until after Shabbos, despite the discomfort and mental trauma and sadness it might cause the family members, or the family will have to pay a lot of money for someone to remove the body.

The Rabbanut has decided that the Chevra Kadisha will begin using non-Jews to do body removal on Shabbos, and will provide this as part of the free service it always provides. They will open a hotline, also operated by non-Jews, for this purpose.

The Chevra Kadisha says that this is a situation that repeats itself every Shabbos in places around the country. The situation until now has forced people to call private ambulances to remove the bodies, only to later find themselves strapped with bills of thousands of shekels, along with other "macherim" that got involved and took advantage of the affected families and charged a lot of money.
source: Kipa

Soon we are going to run out of shabbos goyim, between all the ones employed by private organizations and people around the country and between the ones soon to be employed by the government to run the country on Shabbos... soon we might even see the argument over public transportation on Shabbos resolved by making use of Shabbos Goyim as bus and train drivers, and then all those markets in Tel Aviv and elsewhere that want to stay open will also start doing so by hiring Shabbos Goyim to get away with it. We are on our way to having a 7-day "active" week - 6 days by Jews and 1 day by goyim.

Problem solved?

Radio Kol Hai is reporting that Minister Chaim Katz, the minister in charge of issuing the special permits needed to allow work on Shabbos, has said that work on the train tracks will continue on Shabbos.

He has said that before, but what he added now is that the work on Shabbos will be performed entirely by non-Jews.

I know the laws regarding "amira la'akum", telling a non-Jew to perform work for Jews, are relatively complicated, but they definitely turn it into a less serious issue than having Jews do the work. Though by appearances, it is still the State of Israel, the Jewish State, still performing work on Shabbos in public.

It seems he took Rav Amsalem's advice. Rav Amsalem recently suggested the work could be performed via shabbos goyim. He was obviously criticized, as he gets criticized for whatever he says, ever since he separated from Rav Ovadya Yosef and Shas, at the time. Let's see if they accept the opinion in practice or if they oppose it as they did when Rav Amsalem said it.

And where are they going to suddenly get all these non-Jewish skilled workers? Won't they need training? Can anybody just be pulled in off the street and be put to work in laying new tracks and fixing old train tracks?

We had the Shabbos Goy taking pictures and video of the White Shabbat event in Tel Aviv over the summer.

Then we had the Shabbos Goy filming a kiddush for someone in Beitar Ilit in the summer.

I said then that this could be the next big thing - having a Shabbos Goy film your Shabbos simcha/event.

And now in Vizhnitz a Shabbos Goy videoed the Friday night tish. Perhaps, supposedly, he did it on his own, without being asked - this should be mentioned.

The next big thing. Some local gentiles should start a business.

Hatzalah Bet Shemesh put out an important notice.

It reads:

IMPORTANT MESSAGE FROM HATZALA BEIT SHEMESH:
Due to the current security situation in Jerusalem, we have been advised by our Rabbonim that we will not be using our Shabbos goy this week.
Therefore, due to an issue of Techum Shabbos, should you believe that there will be a need for you to go to the hospital on Shabbos, you should prepare any items you plan on taking with you to the hospital before Shabbos, and making them hefker.

The "hefker" issue seems like a loophole innovation. Make your stuff hefker, privately of course so nobody else should claim your stuff, take it with you, then reclaim it when you arrive in Jerusalem?

Regarding the main point, it might perhaps be time to start training other non-Jews, besides for Arabs, to be ambulance drivers. Then they would be able to continue employing the non-Jewish driver while not compromising security.

I guess we will see how long this lasts for. Is there a purpose in getting rid of him for one week? Maybe that assumes things will calm down quickly. If not, I imagine this announcement will be extended until the situation does calm down.

There has been a funny ruckus in Beitar. Not really funny, but I find the whole story a bit humorous.

Someone threw a kiddush for a baby. He is the owner of a local Beitar paper, and he also published photographs from the kiddush in the paper. He wrote, alongside the pictures, that the pictures were photographed via a "shabbos goy". He added that the goy was not asked to do so and had photographed the event entirely on his own initiative, and therefore the pictures can be enjoyed and used, and they are being published with this disclaimer.

Highly unusual.

Is Shabbos observance only something to insist on being done properly in Tel Aviv and by secular government officials, but we, the religious, can find loopholes and ways around things? Do we now have a way to photograph our shabbos events?

With the arguing and accusations going back and forth, the goy has finally spoken up and confirmed on the radio that he did it all on his own initative. Not only that but the goy even said that he photographed the event by employing a shinui, though he did not explain how or what he changed in the process to qualify for a shinui, not that a goy needs a shinui at all...
source: Kooker

I think the funniest part of it is the goy claiming he did it with a shinui. He is a talmid chochom too! not just any old shabbos goy!

I dont know if it matters or indicates anything one way or the other, but in the pictures posted it looks like people are even posing..



I wonder if this will be the next big thing - pictures from shabbos events - kiddushes, bar mitzvahs, sheva brachos, etc...

This concept for a business is very cool, and it was not even a "yiddishe kup" that came up with it...

A company made up of, and owned by, non-Jewish IT specialists to provide IT support to hi-tech, and other, firms that do not operate on Shabbos.

Jewish-owned companies that are closed on Shabbos, especially if they are owned and managed by religious Jews, will generally not know about problems that might have cropped up in their company on Shabbos, and they definitely would not be able to fix them. They would not find out about it, or be able to fix it, until after Shabbos. Hiring a non-Jew to be on staff for Shabbos is also a problem if the owner of the company is religious.

A Druze computer guy came up with the idea after having worked at Microsoft. At the time a religious manager would sometimes ask him for help with checking for and  dealing with problems on Shabbos. After leaving Microsoft this Druze fellow decided to open his own "Shabbos Goy" company to provide Shabbos support to other companies that would not do it on their own but really need someone monitoring their systems and fixing problems on the day off.
(source: Bechadrei)

Even without being Jewish, he clearly has some sort of Yiddishe Kup. Maybe we should call it a Druish Kup

Many frum neighborhoods around Israel, and in other heimishe communities around the world, have a designated Shabbos Goy.

Legends are formed around such people, and there are always interesting stories. There are the stories of how they helped people who were desperate, there are the stories of how they dealt with appropriate payment, there are stories of how the neighborhood treated the Shabbos Goy and what working conditions they gave him, there are stories of how the non-Jew turned out actually be a Jew, and now there are stories of what else the non-Jew was doing while he was working as the Shabbos Goy.

According to a Ynet (and subsequently Kikar is also reporting it) report, a Palestinian man living in Bnei Braq employed as a Shabbos Goy was arrested for taking advantage sexually of young (in the range of 14 years old) yeshiva boys after gaining their trust and confidence by giving them money. This fellow has been living in Bnei Braq and working in this capacity for 20 years already.

The investigation has been ongoing secretly for a while, but has now been revealed upon his arrest.

Don't think the Shabbos Goy is your friend, just because he turns on your lights that went out.