The Laws of Muktzah - Rabbi Efraim Mefa'ei shlita

00:02 Speaker 1 You’re listening to “Lema’an Yishme’u,” a podcast from Machon Halacha Chabad.

00:09 Speaker 2 Good evening. We’d like to address a very important point. Our Sages say in Tractate Shabbos that if the Jewish people observe two Shabbosos, they will be redeemed immediately. So the Geulah is also connected to learning halacha—not just halacha in general, but the halachos of observing Shabbos. If we’re going to observe those two Shabbosos, we need to learn how to keep Shabbos. And our Sages say—listen, I saw this in a sefer, quoted in the name of the Arizal—that someone who doesn’t learn the halachos of Shabbos certainly doesn’t observe Shabbos fully. So it’s only right that we learn them. And to know them properly, we need to study them and break them down, as they say. There are many halachos, many details. There are 39 melachos prohibited by Torah law, but some things are prohibited by rabbinic law. One of the things prohibited by rabbinic law on Shabbos is muktzeh. The Shulchan Aruch has five sections devoted primarily to muktzeh, and other laws of muktzeh are scattered through additional sections. True, it’s rabbinic law, but the Alter Rebbe speaks twice—both in Likkutei Amarim and in Igeres Hakodesh—about how serious this is. These matters are serious: the words of the Sages are like the words of the Torah, and even more so. So we need to learn the halachos. And the halachos we’re talking about, the halachos of muktzeh, involve so many things we encounter every Shabbos without even realizing there may be a problem. We don’t know there’s a question, so we don’t ask. Someone who has learned about it knows to ask. We’ll give a few examples, but first I want to touch on the basics of

02:53 Speaker 2 the halachos of muktzeh. The Alter Rebbe gives three reasons, drawn from the Rambam and the Raavad. The first reason, which the Alter Rebbe gives right at the beginning of section 308, is “so that one may rest.” What does that mean? If we conduct ourselves on Shabbos as we do on an ordinary day, what will happen? Little by little... By Torah law, it’s permitted on Shabbos to take bricks, stones, or beams and move them from place to place. So a person might say to himself, “Why should I do that during the week? I’m not doing anything on Shabbos. I’ll start moving the blocks, the stones, the beams then.” The result is that Shabbos comes and, instead of resting, he works. That’s the first reason. The second reason the Alter Rebbe brings relates to the melacha of carrying. As the Raavad says, if a person moves things around, he may end up carrying them from a private domain into a public domain. That’s the Raavad’s second reason. And there’s another reason—the third reason, also given in the name of the Raavad. There are people who are idle, who have no work and sit around all day. They don’t work like everyone else. Shabbos arrives: what did they do all week? Nothing. And when Shabbos arrives? Nothing. For them, there’s no difference between Shabbos and a weekday. They do nothing every day, including Shabbos. So that there should be a difference between Shabbos and the weekdays, the Rambam says, there’s the law of muktzeh: on Shabbos they may not touch certain things. All week they can pick up all sorts of things that are muktzeh on Shabbos, but on Shabbos they can’t touch them. That way, they too feel the difference; they feel the holiness of Shabbos. Now that we know

05:17 Speaker 2 the reasons—whether “so that one may rest,” the concern about carrying, or the need for those particular people who are idle to experience a difference—we also need to know the different levels of muktzeh. There are different types, and each type has many practical implications. Then, when we look at our everyday conduct, we’ll know which category of muktzeh something belongs to. First, I’ll tell you something that happened to me a few years ago. I was teaching halacha, and that very week we were learning the halachos of Shabbos—specifically, muktzeh. Shabbos came, and when I got up in the morning, I went to make myself a cup of coffee. I went over to the dish rack to take a cup, and I saw the blades of a meat grinder sitting on it. Beneath the rack was a tray that caught the water. Some of the blades were in the water and some were above it. If they stayed in the water, they might gradually rust. They’re made of steel, and they could rust. Instinctively, without thinking, I reached out to lift them out of the water and leave them there to dry. But just as I reached out, I suddenly remembered: we learned this week that it’s forbidden. Wow! All of a sudden, I saw that halacha right there in my kitchen. I started laughing. My wife asked me, “What happened?” I said, “There’s a paragraph of the Shulchan Aruch right here! Do you see what it says?” She said, “I still don’t understand what you’re talking about.” I showed her the blades, and she said, “I don’t understand.” So I told her, “This week we learned that you may not move a utensil whose primary use is prohibited on Shabbos just to prevent it from being damaged.” Wow! Suddenly I began seeing the halachos of Shabbos—not just in a book. I began seeing the halachos of Shabbos, the halachos of muktzeh, on the table, in the kitchen, and everywhere else.

07:45 Speaker 2 Because we don’t understand the principles, we don’t know how to classify things or which type of muktzeh they are. We just say, “It’s muktzeh.” There’s one more point I wanted to clarify: we often use a term incorrectly. We use the word “tiltul,” moving an object, when we say, for example, “There’s an eruv here, so tiltul is permitted.” But that word refers to something else. It refers to the laws of muktzeh. What people commonly call tiltul is actually carrying from one domain to another, or carrying within a domain. Taking something from one domain to another is called hotza’ah—whether you’re taking it out or bringing it in. And moving something within a public domain, or even within a karmelis, for those who know what a karmelis is—that’s called carrying it four amos. But tiltul means moving an object. Even if it just shifts in place, without being taken from one place to another—even if I’m inside my house and I move it—I’ve moved it, and the laws of muktzeh may be an issue. You may not move muktzeh. Now that we understand a little of what tiltul means, let’s talk about what muktzeh means. Muktzeh refers to something we set aside. Some kinds of muktzeh depend on the person; others don’t. Some are muktzeh for various other reasons. Some kinds have stricter restrictions, some have more lenient ones, and some are even more lenient. But all the kinds we’ll discuss in the time we have fall into different categories. There’s a Mishnah in Tractate Shabbos that says, “All utensils may be handled on Shabbos”—you may move them, all utensils. And the Alter Rebbe begins with this: “All utensils that may be moved.” Then he lists various types of

09:59 Speaker 2 Utensils, and it doesn’t matter what size they are. When it says, “All utensils may be moved,” that includes a hoe and all the utensils you know are used for prohibited activities. You may move them on Shabbos. But it says “all utensils”: they have the status of a utensil. Whenever we look at something and it has the status of a utensil, it may be moved. We’ll talk later about utensils whose primary use is for a prohibited activity. I’ll explain what that means, though some utensils are exceptions to the rule. So first, all utensils whose primary use is prohibited, from the simple to the more substantial. In the kitchen we have pots. What do you do with a pot? You cook in it. We have a frying pan. What do you do with it? You cook in it. We also have a hammer. What do you do with it? You use it to drive nails, so its primary use is prohibited. The activity you perform with it is prohibited on Shabbos. And we can go through all these types of utensils. If we take large pots—or today, by this definition, cell phones are also considered utensils. All these electrically powered devices have a primary use that is prohibited. So any type of utensil we use for something prohibited—meaning its primary use involves one of the activities prohibited on Shabbos—is classified as a utensil whose primary use is prohibited. These utensils may be moved on Shabbos, but not—how should I put it? Hear me out: they may be moved on Shabbos. At first glance, I can pick up a hammer and move it from place to place, and there’s no problem. But every one of us knows there is a problem: it’s a hammer, it’s muktzeh. How can you touch it? True, it is one of the things called muktzeh. When, and under what circumstances, may we

12:18 Speaker 2 move them? There are two circumstances, two reasons we can move them. If I need to use the utensil for some purpose, that is called using it for its own sake—for a person’s use, not for the sake of the utensil itself. Say a person needs to crack nuts now. And here I’ll make an aside. People think there’s a problem with cracking nuts on Shabbos in order to eat them. If that were a problem, peeling an egg would also be a problem. How could you peel an egg? Just as you can’t eat the eggshell, you can’t eat the nutshell either. The Alter Rebbe gives a different reason in his rulings in the Siddur. What is the reason? Because there is another issue, an activity prohibited by Torah law. Often there are bits of shell mixed in with the nuts, and while eating I might pick up a piece of shell lying among the nuts. Or when people eat sunflower seeds, there are often bits of husk there, and you pick one up and toss it aside without thinking. That is called doing it inadvertently, and for an inadvertent violation one is liable to bring a sin offering under Torah law. So there is a Torah prohibition involved. That is why the Alter Rebbe writes that one may not crack them. But under Torah law, if I want to take... Sorry, strictly speaking, if I want to crack nuts, I can take a hammer and crack them. If I don’t have a utensil for cracking nuts, and I’m not getting into an issue of borer, separating, then again, cracking nuts would be permitted. In other words, if I want to use this object for some purpose, I may. But suppose I don’t need to crack nuts. Shabbos has arrived, and there’s a screwdriver on the table. Before Shabbos I needed to fix

14:26 Speaker 2 something, tightened something—I don’t know what—and put the screwdriver down on the table for a moment. Now I want to move the screwdriver because we’re sitting down to eat here. There’s no problem with that. I may pick up the screwdriver, and once it’s in my hand I can take it and put it away. I’m not discussing all the laws of a utensil whose primary use is prohibited right now; I just wanted to give examples of what falls into that category. And all these things—including a washing machine, an oven, and everything else—regardless of whether they’re large or small, I may move them if I need to move them for their use or because I need their place. In the case of a washing machine, I might need to move it because I need the space. Whatever the reason, I may push it, I may move it, because I need the space. That is called a utensil whose primary use is prohibited. It is muktzeh, but it is a less severe category, since I can move it either to use it or because I need its place. There is a somewhat more severe type of muktzeh, and there are many things in this category that we don’t notice. It is called muktzeh machmas gufo—muktzeh because of what it is. For example, if you have money in your pocket. Money is one of the more severe forms of muktzeh because it is not considered a utensil. The same applies to a stone, a block, a piece of wood, sticks, or all sorts of things that are not utensils. Everything that does not fall under the definition of a utensil is considered severe muktzeh, and this category really includes many things, including animals. For example, people who have a parrot, dogs, or cats. Whatever it may be, anything that isn’t a utensil falls into the category

16:21 Speaker 2 of muktzeh machmas gufo. That really is severe muktzeh, and it may not be moved—not to use it and not because you need its place. That is the category called severe muktzeh, muktzeh machmas gufo. There is another kind of muktzeh that we don’t even realize is muktzeh. It’s a very lenient category: any utensil whose primary use is permitted. A utensil you have no problem using—you don’t cook in it. For example, you have bowls that you don’t cook in; you only use them to serve food. You have plates, cups, forks, knives—all sorts of things you use for permitted purposes. There’s no problem with them. They’re called utensils whose primary use is permitted. So why are they called muktzeh? They’re the easiest kind to move. But even with this easiest kind, there are times when I may not move it. To understand what it means to move this lenient type of muktzeh: I can pick it up even if I see that it might be damaged where it is. If it might be damaged, I’m allowed to move it. But if I’m just playing with it—picking up the utensil and playing with it, as many people do with a spoon or fork, fiddling with it while they’re sitting there—then I may not simply move it for no reason. It is muktzeh. A plate, a cup—all these utensils whose primary use is permitted are a lenient form of muktzeh, and one may not move them for no reason. But if I need to put them away so they won’t be damaged or get dirty, or whatever the case may be, I can move them because I need to. That is, I can move them to use them as well. By contrast, with the category we mentioned earlier—a utensil whose primary use is prohibited, such as a hammer or the other utensils I mentioned—I see that the utensil

18:30 Speaker 2 is in a place where it might be stolen, broken, or otherwise damaged. That is moving it to keep it from being stolen or broken. If the reason is to keep it from being stolen, you cannot move it, because it is a utensil whose primary use is prohibited. So we’ve now seen three types of muktzeh. There are other types, but first I want to spend a little more time on these and explain what they are. Regarding the utensil whose primary use is permitted, which I mentioned earlier: many people pick up a fork and fiddle with it in their hand, moving it around. They’re used to doing that and find it hard not to. They have a bit of nervous energy, and this is how they release it. Later halachic authorities say that this isn’t considered moving it for no reason; the person is actually calming their nerves. And they write that you can indeed pick up the fork and move it if it calms you. But if it doesn’t calm you and you’re just doing it for no reason, you have no reason to move it. So those are the categories of muktzeh we have so far. There is also muktzeh machmas chisaron kis—muktzeh because of concern for financial loss. This is something valuable that you use only for very specific purposes and are particular not to use for anything else. For example, a shechitah knife. A shochet who has a knife for shechitah takes care to sharpen it so that it is as sharp and smooth as it needs to be. He would never take an apple and cut it with that knife. You’d damage the edge after he had put so much work into it. And it isn’t necessarily a shechitah knife; the same applies to a knife used for a bris, or anything else a person is very particular about. That is called muktzeh machmas

20:37 Speaker 2 Financial loss. And there are some interesting cases that really depend on the person. I’ll give you an example: merchandise, fruit, things a person sets aside. He buys merchandise to sell. If he is very particular about this merchandise he buys—he has a storeroom near his house, and nobody touches the merchandise, no matter what. He has set it aside and said, “I’m not touching it, and nobody else should touch it.” Nobody touches it. “If you want some, I’ll prepare it for you before Shabbos.” So if he is that particular about it and says, “I won’t use it before Shabbos, and I won’t use it on Shabbos,” then it, too, is muktzeh due to potential financial loss. But if he didn’t say that—he has fruit, and sometimes, when he runs short, he goes to the storeroom and takes some—then it doesn’t fall into the category of muktzeh due to potential financial loss. It won’t be muktzeh, and it can be used on Shabbos. Now, among the types of muktzeh we mentioned earlier, muktzeh due to potential financial loss is on the same level as the muktzeh we mentioned earlier: muktzeh because of the object itself. It has the same restriction: just as I may not move stones, I may not move money. Things prohibited because of the object itself are also included in the rules of muktzeh due to potential financial loss. There’s something very interesting about muktzeh due to potential financial loss. Years ago, when the new cellphone—the smartphone—came out, anyone who had one guarded it carefully and didn’t use it for just anything. No child used it; nobody touched it. What do you mean? They might damage it! So people put it aside and guarded it carefully. That’s potential financial loss. But as time went on, and

22:42 Speaker 2 everyone got a smartphone. Dad has a smartphone too, and today what do you do? The child is bothering you, pestering you, so Mom hands him the smartphone: “Here, take it, watch a video. I don’t want you bothering me.” That device has become an object whose primary use is prohibited on Shabbos. An object whose primary use is prohibited. I forgot my cellphone on the table. Today I may pick it up and put it in a cupboard. By the way, I don’t know if I said this earlier, but with an object whose primary use is prohibited, if I need the space it occupies and pick it up—or, for that matter, if I need the object itself or its space—once it’s in my hand, I may carry it to wherever I need to put it. I can put it back in a cupboard, in a suitable place. I just need to be careful that I’m allowed to open the drawer or put it in that place—a safe place, I mean. Now, among these things are items we live with at home, in the kitchen, without noticing that some of them are muktzeh, even a stringent type of muktzeh. But first I’ll mention some things that aren’t muktzeh at all. There are two things that, interestingly, we say are not muktzeh at all. First, food that a person eats: anything already fit to eat, that’s ready—not something that hasn’t been cooked yet. None of these foods are subject to the laws of muktzeh at all. I can take an ordinary apple and play with it; there’s no problem. If you want to play with it, you can do what you like and move it as much as you like. And another thing: books. The reason is, as we mentioned earlier, it was the Sages who prohibited muktzeh. The Sages prohibited those other things, but they themselves did not prohibit moving

24:41 Speaker 2 fruit, food, or books. So from the outset, the laws of muktzeh don’t apply to them. Sometimes we’ll actually use that to—how do you say it?—permit various things that we may discuss later. In the kitchen, as we’ve mentioned many times, we have things that haven’t been cooked yet and aren’t fit to eat. We have rice, flour, all sorts of foods like that which aren’t fit to eat as they are. Uncooked potatoes. So anything that isn’t fit to eat is called stringent muktzeh—muktzeh because of the object itself—and may not be moved at all. Even if I want to do some… I want to move something, so I’ll push it like this, indirectly. There is the matter of moving something in an unusual way, which I haven’t gotten into yet, but you need to be aware of that with these things too. Don’t try to get around it. We don’t move these things. Moving them is prohibited. There are things that are edible as they are, but have another problem: terumos and maasros haven’t been separated from them. Since terumos and maasros haven’t been separated, they may not be eaten; they’re called tevel. Tevel may not be eaten, so it is stringent muktzeh. Again, we’ve arrived at muktzeh because of the object itself. There are other things we don’t notice, though we use them. And another thing—again, we’re defining categories of muktzeh. For example, uncooked meat or uncooked fish. Later on, in the text of the Shulchan Aruch, further along in the section, the Alter Rebbe says that uncooked meat may be moved. But uncooked fish may not be moved. Why? Because meat is fit to eat, while fish isn’t. I recently saw

26:57 Speaker 2 that today, I don’t know who eats meat like that, uncooked. But with cooked meat, it says that people would give meat to a dog. So it’s fit for a dog to eat, and food for your animals may be moved if you have animals. Consequently, meat is something you can give a dog, but fish isn’t given to a dog, so moving it is indeed prohibited. Today, if we don’t have a dog and don’t have that option, then seemingly it would be prohibited to move it. Now, animal food—where does that fit in? If you have animals, you may pick up orange peels or other peels that animals can eat. If you have fish, you may pick up food for your fish. It’s food, and there’s no problem with it, but the animals have to be yours. We don’t have the allowances people had in the past. People used to use wood for cooking, so wood and anything else designated for burning were muktzeh. There’s little point in discussing that, since today we don’t have those types of muktzeh in our kitchens. But even with these things, you need to know that there are various categories of muktzeh, and you have to determine whether something is animal food. For those who have pets, if it’s food for one of their pets, it may be moved; if it isn’t food, it may not be moved. There are exceptions among foods—things that are muktzeh, stringent muktzeh. In the past, people would take grapes or figs, put them on the roof, and dry them in the sun. Between their initial state, when they are edible, and their final state, when they are also edible—as raisins or dried figs—there is an interval

29:13 Speaker 2 when they spoil, as the moisture inside them gradually rises and comes out, and for a while they aren’t edible at all. While they aren’t edible, they are stringent muktzeh, because they aren’t fit to eat. They have ceased to be considered food. And once they have ceased to be considered food, they are stringent muktzeh. But what if, on Shabbos, you suddenly see that although they weren’t fit to eat before Shabbos, once Shabbos arrived they dried out completely? Now they are fit to eat. Since they weren’t fit to eat at twilight, they remain prohibited throughout Shabbos. There are other types of muktzeh we have at home without noticing them. There’s muktzeh involving laundry. I hung up wet laundry that can’t be used. The laundry can’t be worn; it’s muktzeh, because you can’t wear it. Now, I take clothespins and hang up the laundry so it won’t fall in the wind. Those clothespins are like a base for a prohibited item, as we mentioned earlier, and they take on the prohibition of the wet laundry. The laundry will dry during Shabbos, but since it was wet at twilight, the laundry can’t be used, and consequently those clothespins can’t be used either. In other words, this is another example of all these things we look at and suddenly realize, “Oh, that’s prohibited.” There’s also dirty laundry. You take clothes you’ve worn all week and throw them into the laundry basket. Those clothes you threw in are muktzeh. You may not use them unless you would use them at least in a pressing situation. You might use them to wipe something—I don’t know—to wipe the floor, dust something off, wipe something. If

31:50 Speaker 2 If you use it to wipe something, then you can handle the laundry. But usually, when we take laundry and throw it in the laundry, we don’t use it again, so there’s a muktzeh problem with that too. You’re not allowed to move it. There are other kinds of muktzeh—for example, muktzeh because it was set aside for a mitzvah. This comes up in the laws of sukkah. If I have a sukkah, its schach and walls are meant for the sukkah, and there are also things people use to decorate it—fruit or whatever else. Since they were set aside for the mitzvah, you’re not allowed to use them; they’re entirely muktzeh. So even if a bit of schach falls down on Shabbos and I want to use it as a toothpick, it’s muktzeh. That’s muktzeh because it was set aside for a mitzvah. There’s something very interesting about muktzeh. We have a shofar—the shofar we blow on Rosh Hashanah. Similarly, we put on tefillin, but you’re not allowed to put on tefillin on Shabbos. You’re not allowed to put on tefillin on Shabbos. What about a mezuzah, if I have a loose mezuzah? May I move it? Or a Megillah? And there’s something very interesting about genizah, where we have all sorts of things. Those items may be moved only if you need to use them or need the space they occupy. If you need the space where your tefillin are—say you forgot your tefillin on the table on Shabbos, as I mentioned earlier, or even put them there deliberately, but then guests suddenly came and you need that space—you may pick up the tefillin and put them somewhere else. But you may not move them for no reason. You can’t just move the tefillin from their place. A mezuzah, too, and a shofar, as we said, is for a mitzvah,

34:08 Speaker 2 so you’re not allowed to move it. You’re not allowed to handle the shofar either. But there’s something interesting when you look at a Megillah. What’s the problem with a Megillah? You’re not allowed to read the Megillah on Shabbos. But if I open a Tanach, I can read the Megillah there. So why shouldn’t I open the Megillah scroll and study from it? Usually we set it aside; we put it away, and it isn’t meant for ordinary reading. The same applies to genizah. A Chumash that we used and then put aside—we no longer use it. So what I’m saying is that if it’s just been put aside, and the genizah is kept somewhere in a corner of the shul, there’s a problem with taking something from it. If you don’t need the space and you simply come and pick up the Chumash, there’s a problem: it’s treated like a utensil whose primary use is prohibited, which may be moved only if you need to use it or need its place. But perhaps you’re the kind of person who looks through the genizah regularly, because people throw out all sorts of things. Or perhaps there’s a volume of Likkutei Sichos there, or something else that people take out and read. If those things are used, you too may move them. In other words, if you look for something there and use it, that counts as moving it in order to use it, and that is permitted. The truth is that nowadays we don’t use a—just as an example—we don’t ordinarily use a shofar, a mezuzah, or a Megillah. What do I mean? We don’t use them casually. If someone has a mezuzah, he’ll say, “Don’t touch it; it could get damaged.” What does “it could get damaged” mean? That makes it muktzeh due to concern for monetary loss. That is a stricter prohibition, and in fact you may not move it. Recent halachic authorities rule that you don’t open a Megillah scroll casually; you open it only for the Megillah reading. For the

35:57 Speaker 2 Megillah reading, you open it. Otherwise, you don’t touch it. Just like something that is muktzeh due to concern for monetary loss, you don’t move these things even if you need to use them or need the space they occupy. But suppose it might get damaged, right? You can see for yourself: if you leave the Megillah there, people may come and play with it, and it could get damaged. That would be a substantial loss. To prevent a substantial loss, I may pick it up and move it somewhere safe. In other words, the Sages who prohibited moving this muktzeh also allowed an exception here. They permitted us to move this item that is muktzeh due to concern for monetary loss. Now, what about clearing the table on Shabbos? Today we’re used to putting a regular tablecloth on the table and then a disposable covering over it. People who still eat with regular dishes generally don’t need that, but many people do it and put everything on the table. At the end, there’s waste on the table, and I come along, gather everything up, take the plastic covering and throw it away. For those who eat with disposable dishes, there’s a bit of a problem. What’s the problem? We put those disposable dishes on the table, and afterward we want to clear the whole table. I pick up the dirty dishes and throw them away. I take the trash can, pick up the dishes and throw them in. Often, besides muktzeh, there’s another prohibition involved: borer, sorting. A lot of the time, I pick up the cups and there’s a peel there, so I take it out. But sometimes the peel is mixed in with food, and then you’re sorting. People don’t notice these

38:18 Speaker 2 things. Several times in my own home I’ve said, “Be careful—you’re doing the melachah of borer right now.” So we have to be careful about how we clear the table. Let’s pay attention to this: if disposable dishes are still fit for some use—even if I’ve finished drinking from a cup or eating from a plate—the dish may still be usable. It hasn’t become forbidden to move; it can still be used. But if I’ve taken the plate, cup, fork, or whatever it is and thrown it into the trash, it’s certainly muktzeh by then. I’m not going to take it back out of the trash and use it, so it becomes muktzeh in the stricter sense. Now, when I want to clean the table, I pick up the plates. For example, at farbrengens, people sit down to eat on Shabbos. First they eat fish, and then they want to clear the plates. But when you pick up the plates, you may be picking up plates you no longer need. You have to be careful: pick up clean dishes along with them, or, best of all, leave a little food on the plates. As an aside, let me go back to utensils whose primary use is prohibited. I mentioned pots, and there’s a problem here too. We often make a mistake. Once we’ve finished using a pot—we’ve served the soup and the pot is empty—we pick it up and put it to the side. Why put it to the side? Just to keep things tidy. When you move it, do you need to use the pot or the space it occupies? Do you need the pot for anything else right now? No. Do you need that space right now? No. And there’s more; this happens in many homes:

40:22 Speaker 2 People take pots after using them and rinse them. Some even do more than rinse them—they wash them thoroughly. Why? Because the pot is dirty, and while it’s still wet, it’s easier to wash. So I wash it. But why are you washing it? So you won’t have work to do after Shabbos. If you don’t wash it right away, you’ll have a lot of work after Shabbos because everything will have dried on. So first of all, there’s a problem because you’re preparing on Shabbos for after Shabbos. Second, there’s something we simply don’t realize, because we aren’t familiar with it. Someone who hasn’t studied the laws doesn’t know that you may not just move that pot. To tidy up, I take one pot and put it inside another, or whatever I do. But I’m moving muktzeh for no permitted purpose—not because I need to use it or need the space it occupies. If I want to move it aside just to tidy up, the only way I can move it is if a little food is left inside. Since there’s still some food there, I can move the pot with the food in it. The same applies to disposable plates: if there’s a little food on them, you may move them. Sometimes those plates break, or a cup breaks. Then it’s muktzeh even while it’s still on the table, because it can’t be used. Halachah discusses broken utensils. In the past, people used large earthenware vessels, for example. If one fell and broke—or a glass vessel broke, or any other vessel—people might take a shard and use it to cover the mouth of a jug. But who uses it for that today? Who needs to use it? So something has broken.

42:18 Speaker 2 Nowadays we don’t use broken pieces of utensils, so a utensil that breaks is muktzeh, and muktzeh may not be moved. How, then, can you move glass that has broken? It’s muktzeh because we don’t use broken pieces of utensils, and they aren’t fit for use—even large pieces. The permission to move broken glass is so that people won’t get hurt. If the glass could cause injury, you may move it. But it says that if an earthenware utensil broke and there are pieces on the floor, and they won’t cause injury, you may not move them. [unclear] If no one will get hurt, [unclear]. You may not move it. Now, what about the pot we discussed—whether or not it may be moved—and its lid? What is the status of the lid? Since it is part of the pot, intended to cover it, it has the same muktzeh status as the pot. It, too, follows the status of a utensil whose primary use is prohibited on Shabbos. In other words, the lid has become part of the pot, a utensil whose primary use is prohibited. So how do I clear the table? Let me say it again: Do I have to leave everything on the table? I don’t just pick out the food; I take everything that’s there. In the past, there was a tablecloth. You would take the tablecloth, shake it out, and have somewhere to put it. There have to be things on it that may be moved, so that you can move the tablecloth with everything on it. There’s another type of muktzeh called muktzeh because it is repulsive. In halachah, this comes up with the lamps people once used. First, let me explain what a lamp means here, because what we call a lamp today isn’t really the same thing. What is it? A lamp is the vessel that holds the oil and the wick that is lit. Together, that is a lamp. But the lamp

44:29 Speaker 2 the Sages are talking about is the vessel into which the oil is placed. People used to have earthenware lamps, because earthenware was cheap and very common. An earthenware lamp is a utensil whose primary use is prohibited on Shabbos, but it can have another problem. If it was lit that Shabbos, it served as a base for the wick. We’ve just had Chanukah, and some people have a tray on which they place their Shabbos candles. So there’s a tray with candles on it. I may not move the tray because it served as a base for the flame. Even after the candles go out, I may not move it. We learned about this recently. Anyone who learned it knows that something had to be done with the tray so that I could move it. That’s called muktzeh because it served as a base. I’ll come back to that lamp in a moment. First, let’s return to the lamp itself. People used to use earthenware lamps. Take an old earthenware lamp that was not lit this Shabbos. What is its status? It is a utensil whose primary use is prohibited, because you use it to light the Shabbos lamp. But besides that, it has another problem: when you light an earthenware lamp, it absorbs the oil and the vessel becomes repulsive. Something like that is called muktzeh because it is repulsive. Anything repulsive is muktzeh and may not be moved. This gives us another interesting point. When we throw things into the garbage, they are considered repulsive. I don’t want to use them; they’re repulsive, so they

46:46 Speaker 2 become muktzeh because they are repulsive, which is also a strict form of muktzeh. That raises a question: how do we move a garbage bin? How do you take the garbage and move it somewhere else? Sometimes the bin fills up and I want to move it. What do I do? How do I move the bin from there? Suppose we have a garbage bin inside—inside the building. I take the bag and put it there. That’s not a problem, right, because it’s inside the building. But if the bin is in an out-of-the-way place where it bothers no one, it may not be moved. Why? Because it is muktzeh due to being repulsive, a strict form of muktzeh. There is a leniency that allows you to move it if it bothers you. The Sages call this a graf shel re’i—waste that is bothersome. If it is in the middle of the house, it bothers you, and you may clean it up. Similarly, if the bin is somewhere it bothers you, you may take it, empty it, and put it away. Since it is in a place where people move about, that is permitted. We encounter graf shel re’i, this kind of waste, in many places. If it is somewhere bothersome, this is a leniency even with a strict form of muktzeh. But you may not create a graf shel re’i deliberately. I may not put garbage somewhere bothersome just so that I’ll be allowed to move it. If its usual place is out of the way and it won’t be a problem until after Shabbos, we don’t move it. So now, when I want to clear all the things off the table and take

48:54 Speaker 2 the plastic bag, since it also contains things that may be moved, I take it to its place and put it there. And know this: once I’ve put it in the bin, that’s it. Before I throw the bag with the plates or cups into the bin—even cups I could still use for mayim acharonim—they are still called cups. Once I throw them into the bin, they become repulsive, a strict form of muktzeh. We may not use muktzeh because it is repulsive. So any base, any tray on which there was something muktzeh, takes on the status of the item that was on it. If that item was a utensil whose primary use is prohibited on Shabbos—a hammer or any such utensil—then I may not move the tray for its own sake. If I simply want to move it and don’t need the space it occupies, I may not. But if I need the space, I can move the tray together with the utensil whose primary use is prohibited. I cannot, however, take the tray, tip the hammer or other muktzeh item off it, and then use the tray. Since it was in that state at bein hashmashos, at the onset of Shabbos, it became muktzeh then. The Sages say: since it was set aside at bein hashmashos, it remains set aside for the whole of Shabbos. This applies to all types of muktzeh. Accordingly, if I had a candle tray with candlesticks on it, I cannot tip the candlesticks off—even if they are not made of earthenware or glass, and I could roll them off without breaking or damaging them. That is forbidden, because the tray served as a base for something prohibited, or for muktzeh because it is repulsive, and so on. Now,

51:03 Speaker 2 according to this, all those trays we put underneath the candles—can you move them? You cannot. This includes the table as well. If I placed those things on the table and it was intended to hold them, it would become muktzeh because it served as a base for the candles. All this applies if it truly served as a base for the candles or another prohibited item. But if it did not serve as a base for them—because, for example, we also eat at the table, or because we put food and a book, something important, on the tray—then afterward I can move the muktzeh item, use the tray, and move it. The same applies to the table: since I use it for eating, it does not become muktzeh. I can lift and move the table while the muktzeh item is on it. Now, again, we said that whatever was muktzeh at bein hashmashos remains muktzeh. With all these cases of a base that I mentioned, if a muktzeh item was resting on something at bein hashmashos, the base may not be moved either, just like the item on it. All this is when I placed it there intending it to remain there on Shabbos. But what if I forgot? I put my cellphone on the table after finishing a call and forgot it there. Now I want to move it. It isn’t bothering me—it’s on a side table where no one goes. I don’t have small children, but I don’t want it on the table. Why not? It doesn’t look right. What do you mean, it doesn’t look right? I want to put it in a cupboard. You may not move it. But how did it get there? I put the phone down when I finished the call and forgot it. I want to take the cupboard, the table, or the tray

53:01 Speaker 2 The object it was resting on does not become muktzeh. So if I want to turn over the table, or take the tray and turn it over to spill the muktzeh off it, there’s no problem. Since I didn’t designate it to hold the muktzeh, it didn’t become a base for it. So, first of all, what emerges from all this is that, broadly speaking, the Alter Rebbe lists five categories of muktzeh: muktzeh because of potential financial loss; we mentioned muktzeh because of the object itself; and muktzeh because it is forbidden to derive benefit from it or eat it. As an example of the last category, we mentioned food from which tithes have not been separated. You can’t eat it—it’s forbidden to eat—so it is muktzeh. But if, for example, I have an animal, I may feed it to the animal. There are also things from which it is forbidden to derive benefit. One example given is stam yeinam. I don’t know how many listeners understand what stam yeinam means, so they should know: it means wine whose status is uncertain, wine produced somewhere without Jewish supervision or kosher oversight. There may have been a non-Jew involved there, for all I know. That is called stam yeinam. There is a concern that it might be wine used for idolatrous purposes; it is not definitely such wine, so the prohibition is only rabbinic. Stam yeinam is forbidden to derive benefit from—yes, forbidden to derive benefit from. So that is a problem, and it is muktzeh too. If you have a bottle of wine at home without kosher supervision, and you have no idea whether it is permissible to drink—you bought it, or someone bought it, I don’t know where—and there is a problem with it, then don’t move that bottle. In other words, this category of muktzeh consists of things from which benefit is forbidden. The same applies to chametz on Pesach. Chametz that remained over Pesach, and you didn’t know it was lying there and thought everything was fine. If it is chametz belonging to a Jew that remained over

55:00 Speaker 2 Pesach, then it is serious muktzeh and may not be used. That is why, when someone finds chametz on Pesach—on Yom Tov, or on Shabbos during Chol Hamoed—he leaves it where he found it. The halachah says to place a vessel over it, because it is muktzeh and you may not move it. Cover it; the covering is not considered a base for the chametz, because it only covers it. Some want to say that it does become a base, but in fact, as I said, most halachic authorities say there is no problem of a base here: you simply place a vessel over it. These matters we’ve begun to touch on, which are permitted because—sorry, forbidden because of a rabbinic prohibition. As I said earlier, the Alter Rebbe says this is very, very serious. I saw in one of the books an account of Tur Shimon—that’s the name of a town—and why it was destroyed. Two reasons are given. One reason is that they were not careful about playing ball: they played ball on Shabbos, and according to certain opinions a ball is considered muktzeh. According to one opinion, that entire place was destroyed because of the prohibition of muktzeh. And imagine: the people there were truly very charitable. It says they would distribute a very large amount of food to the poor every Friday, every Erev Shabbos. But none of that helped, and all of Tur Shimon was destroyed over this matter. In other words, it is something very, very serious. But since we’ve only learned a little so far, and we’ve seen that there are all kinds of things we haven’t really touched on that are forbidden as muktzeh, how will we know the rest? How will we know all the details? We really need to study the books. I’m not saying that, to really begin knowing them, you must start studying Shulchan Aruch, the Alter Rebbe’s Shulchan Aruch, and all those works. But what I would really suggest—and the Rebbe speaks about this; there are letters and also sichos—

56:59 Speaker 2 I’ve seen it, and I’ve even heard it in a video of one of the sichos where the Rebbe speaks about it: study the halachos in Kitzur Shulchan Aruch or Derech Chaim. The Rebbe writes in letters that people should study the halachos there. I once wrote to the Rebbe about one of the—about something I had written regarding study schedules, and the Rebbe wrote there to study at least Kitzur Shulchan Aruch or... That was it. So I thought about it: I study Shulchan Aruch; why is the Rebbe telling me to study Kitzur Shulchan Aruch? I took it to heart. I didn’t know what the Rebbe wanted from this. The next day I was somewhere, and at the time a new edition of Ganzfried’s Kitzur Shulchan Aruch had come out. Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu, a”h, had divided it into a schedule for studying all the halachos over the course of a year. He arranged it so that you wouldn’t study the halachos of Purim, Chanukah, Pesach, or, I don’t know, Tisha B’Av at some unrelated time. He arranged it so that for each holiday, you study its halachos. The salesman came over to me—he knew I liked buying books—and said, “A new Kitzur Shulchan Aruch just came out.” I said, “No, I have several editions of the Kitzur at home, at least fifteen. What do I need another one for?” He said, “You don’t have a Kitzur like this one.” Then he showed me the schedule. I liked the idea, and suddenly I remembered: the previous night I had been teaching and had told people that—I don’t know—the Rebbe had written about Kitzur Shulchan Aruch. I remembered, and immediately took copies. I bought thirty copies from him and put them in my car. I thought to myself: This is an instruction. The Rebbe wants people to study the Kitzur. So wherever I could, I brought a copy. I saw people who were busy—one worked in a store, another somewhere else—and I would say, “Do you study? When do you study? Where do you study?” They didn’t know the halachos at all. I said, “You could study the halachos in the Kitzur.” “I don’t have time.” I said, “Do you have ten or twelve minutes? That’s about how long the daily lesson takes. So I’ll give you a Kitzur at my expense. Study it.” And that’s how I gave away all the copies. That was it. I did my—I did my part, as they say.

58:57 Speaker 2 Years passed. One day I came to a store—to the store where I had given a man a Kitzur. At the time he had said he could study, even though he didn’t have time. I gave him the Kitzur, and he studied it. When I came in, I remembered the Kitzur and asked him about it. He said, “I’m still studying it to this day.” He said, “I used to have no time to study.” He showed me several books he kept in the back, and now he studies. Boruch Hashem, he covers a good deal of material. But he told me that a few weeks earlier he had gone to his mother-in-law’s house. Why? It was his father-in-law’s yahrzeit. His wife had said, “Let’s go spend Shabbos with my mother,” so they went there for Shabbos. On Shabbos afternoon he had nothing to do, so he went to the shul to study. He heard a rabbi there, someone giving a shiur. They studied some subject, and at the end of the shiur they studied halachos. The rabbi was going over the halachos, and suddenly he heard him state a particular halachah. He told me, “I’m listening to this rabbi state the halachah with such confidence, and I’m a simple person—who am I? He gives shiurim, and yet I hear him rule incorrectly, because I know the halachah from Kitzur Shulchan Aruch.” He said, “I’ve been studying Kitzur Shulchan Aruch for about fifteen years now, so I know the halachah.” So

1:00:51 Speaker 2 I immediately looked for a Kitzur Shulchan Aruch in the shul, and, baruch Hashem, I found one. I came back and opened it. He knows the Kitzur the way we know where to open a siddur for Ashrei. So he immediately opened to the halacha, looked at what it said, went over to the rabbi and showed him. At first, the rabbi barely looked. He saw a simple man who didn’t look like a Torah scholar and said, “No, nonsense. What are you talking about?” He said, “Excuse me, look at what it says,” and read it aloud to him. The rabbi read it and said, “I’m sorry, you’re right. I apologize to you.” Then he told the whole congregation, “Gentlemen, I want to tell you that this dear Jew corrected me. I was mistaken. The halacha is not as I said; we need to act as it says here in the Kitzur.” Just that story he told me shows what knowing halachos did for him, from learning the Kitzur for ten or twelve minutes every day. You finish the whole Kitzur, and all the halachos are in it—including the laws of funerals and burial, and the laws of vidui that we aren’t familiar with. When someone, G-d forbid, is nearing death, people don’t know that vidui needs to be said or what to say. He knows that too. So, to gain at least a basic knowledge of the laws of Shabbos—Shabbos comes around again every week, and we need to know these halachos—we should at least learn the Kitzur and get somewhat familiar with them. Someone once told me, “That isn’t the Chabad custom.” First of all, in Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu’s Kitzur, he notes below what the Alter Rebbe rules, as well as what the Ben Ish Chai rules, or the Mishnah Berurah, for that matter. But by all means, if you want to learn, we have our own Kitzur by Rabbi Bistritzky, with the Alter Rebbe’s rulings. Learn it, but make sure you go through all the halachos, so we don’t end up in a situation where we don’t

1:02:47 Speaker 2 know such simple things. And as I said, Shabbos comes around all the time. So the halachos we’re going through now are only meant to prompt us, not to issue halachic rulings—to prompt each and every one of us to open a sefer and learn. There are concise books on muktzeh that list all the utensils and other items: which kind of muktzeh each is, what is permitted and what is forbidden. That way, you know these things. And as we said at the beginning, if the Jewish people keep two Shabboses, it says they will be redeemed immediately. There is a difference of opinion between the Bavli and the Yerushalmi—one Shabbos or two Shabboses—but either way, the main thing is to keep Shabbos. That’s what we’re working on: bringing the days of Moshiach. So, “all the days of your life”—to bring the days of Moshiach. It could be that I spend the whole week learning the laws of Shabbos in order to bring the days of Moshiach, so that we can keep those two Shabboses and Moshiach will come. May it be Hashem’s will that, as we are now in this time of galus, in a truly difficult situation, hearing and seeing horrifying things every day—the whole world is already crying out, “When is Moshiach coming?”—Hashem will help us, and through learning the halachos, with Hashem’s help, we will merit the true and complete Geulah. We will see the revelation of Melech HaMoshiach; with Hashem’s help, he will come and redeem us. And, how do you say it, we are living in physical bodies. We won’t have to go through... how do you say it, that brief passage through the... “For you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” With Hashem’s help, there will be such a passage, and we will merit the true and complete Geulah, with Hashem’s help.