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monetary obligation and to pay double or 4 or 5 times the amount if tents of Reuven’s letter. However, since doing so would benefit many
he slaughtered or sold a stolen ox or sheep. people and may involve pikuach nefesh, it might be permitted.
In light of this, it is up to the beis din to decide. If he paid and In Responsa Beis David (Saloniki, Yoreh Deah #158), there is a more
returned that which he stole, then there is no permission to hand him stringent ruling on this issue. There it says that even if one saw a letter
over. He has repented. If this is the case, then the physician has no by accident, he needs atonement. In our case, Shimon probably does
right to report that the criminal is healthy, since he will cause him to not require atonement since it was not an unintentional act but an
be handed over contrary to Jewish law. oness.
It seems that it would be permissible for Shimon to destroy the
This is a very severe thing to do! We learned in Shulchan Aruch
(Yoreh Deah #281:3 and Orach Chayim #39:1): If someone who handed letter before it reaches Reuven. We learn this from Halachos Ketanos
over a Jew to gentiles or the government writes a Sefer Torah or tefillin, (Part 1 #173), who writes as follows:
these are invalid (pasul); Responsa Ketav Sofer (Yoreh Deah #137) dis- If a man sent a letter with his fellowman sealed with the
cusses whether they are Rabbinically or Biblically invalid. We would acrostic “pagin dragma,” and the messenger suspects that
need to look into the halachah regarding someone who reports on a the letter contains information that could be harmful to
sinner that he is healthy, thus causing his extradition. Is he considered him, what is he to do? If he opens the letter he will be
a mosser (one who hands over Jews to gentiles or to the government)? excommunicated. If he delivers it, perhaps he will be hurt.
Perhaps in halachah he is not a mosser since we learned in the Rama If he returns it to the sender, the man will send it with
(Choshen Mishpat #388:15) that if someone speaks of a Jew’s crimes another messenger. He has no choice but to shred it and
before the entire community, causing some enforcer of the law to hear throw the pieces to the wind or into the ocean.
and to punish him, then although he is not halachically considered a
mosser, nevertheless, he is punished according to the discretion of the 1 SuMMaRy and Conclusions
three judges of the beis din.
Shimon is permitted to tell the hospital administration that Reuven
has received an offer to leave the hospital in Israel. Although one is
Case 4:
prohibited to tell others what one has seen, since it would benefit the
A Jew intentionally killed a gentile and fled to the land of Israel. people of our land and there is a chance that it involves pikuach nefesh,
Now the country where the murder took place is demanding his ex- Shimon is permitted to reveal it.
tradition. One can assume that if he is not extradited, Jews will be
killed. In this case, it is permissible to extradite him because halachi-
cally he is a pursuer (rodef). He is no better than a coin forger, whom
one is permitted to hand over according to the laws of rodef. Even if
the court will sentence him to death according to the laws of the land, Revealing a secret
one should extradite him in order to save other Jews, as explained in 1
Shulchan Aruch (Choshen Mishpat #388:12). Question
The Chazon Ish wrote something similar (Yoreh Deah #69) about Does the prohibition of revealing a secret apply specifically when
what it says in the Yerushalmi (Terumos 8:4): someone reveals something that was explicitly told as a secret, and
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