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Learned something new last night: The prohibition against kindling fire on Shabbat is not only from Oral Law, it is also written in the Torah (Parsha Vayakhel) that Hashem told Moses it was a commandment. Makes it tougher to dodge this one now... I guess I have some things to reconsider concerning how I observe Shabbat.
Learned something new last night: The prohibition against kindling fire on Shabbat is not only from Oral Law, it is also written in the Torah (Parsha Vayakhel) that Hashem told Moses it was a commandment.
We once bought an old farm house in the country because we wanted to grow our own food...it had a handful of acres in pasture. The house was built in 1921 and had no insulation. We had a central heating system, but quickly realized that using it cost almost as much as our monthly mortgage payment, so we installed a wood stove. The kindling of fire on Shabbat also became a question for us at that time. Dh would get up in the middle of the night to check to fire and make sure it didn't burn out so we wouldn't have to rekindle it. Personally, I can now understand that commandment...it's definitely a lot of work and headache to get a fire going. I never did get to be very good at it. :-)
We once bought an old farm house in the country because we wanted to grow our own food...it had a handful of acres in pasture. The house was built in 1921 and had no insulation. We had a central heating system, but quickly realized that using it cost almost as much as our monthly mortgage payment, so we installed a wood stove. The kindling of fire on Shabbat also became a question for us at that time. Dh would get up in the middle of the night to check to fire and make sure it didn't burn out so we wouldn't have to rekindle it. Personally, I can now understand that commandment...it's definitely a lot of work and headache to get a fire going. I never did get to be very good at it. :-)
So your DB's action were likely an isser d'raisa (broke a Torah commandment), but if you we're not attempting to observe all the mitzvahs, those actions may have been no worse than eating trief or violating the laws of family purity. This is why we have LORD's (local orthodox rabbi dudes) for. You two could have asked a qualified Posek a shaila (halachic ruling) and found the best way to stay warm without violating the Torah.
FYI, stoking a fire may have only been an issur d'Rabbonim, but it's an issur d'raisa to transgress an issur d'Rabbonim. Hence why we Jews ask a shaila.
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