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bad news are grounds for permitting Shabbos desecration, not only
of rabbinically forbidden travel with a non-Jewish driver but even of
melachos forbidden by Torah law?

Rabbi Eyal Krim, Military Rabbinate

ɳ Response

The great majority of people who faint upon hearing bad news wake
up and do not die [exceptions include heart patients who are liable to
become endangered and die, Heaven forbid]. Therefore, when we are
unsure whether parents who hear bad news suddenly might faint and
not wake up, there are multiple factors posing only a distant risk, for
which Shabbos is not desecrated. To explain:

1. Hashem yisbarach created his world and has decreed that
man should return to the earth. When Hakadosh baruch
Hu sends misfortune, He also bestows the resources to
withstand it. Therefore, although fainting from illness or
mania poses danger to life, this type of fainting is different,
[see further, for an account of Rav Shlomo Zalman Auer-
bach’s conduct in such a situation and the proofs he cited,]
in that a vast majority of people wake up after fainting
from shock.

2. In Hilchos Milah (Yoreh De’ah 325), the Avnei Nezer writes
that a baby boy whose two older brothers were endangered
by circumcision but recovered, should also be circumcised,
for in Chazal it is only written that if two older brothers
“died” from circumcision a third one should not be cir-
cumcised but not if they were merely “endangered.” Thus,
just as there is a presumption that they will be endangered
there is a presumption that they will recover.

3. The Aruch Hashulchan (316:22) writes,“It is unclear when
it is uncertain whether or not a dog is rabid, whether this is
considered possible piku’ach nefesh which sets aside Shab-
bos, or whether it is not comparable [to piku’ach nefesh],

438 1 Medical-Halachic Responsa of Rav Zilberstein