Fifty years after a rabbinical ruling made it sacrilegious for orthodox Jews to use mains power on the Sabbath, Israel's national grid has come up with a bright idea for the observant: kosher electricity.
The £6 million scheme, announced last week, will light up lives in highly religious neighbourhoods across Israel, where families have traditionally relied on meagre generator power or even spirit lamps on the holiest day of the week.
 | |
The religious ban on using the national grid on the Jewish Sabbath, which runs for a day from sundown on Friday, was imposed because Jewish technicians at Israel's national electricity company work on the holy day, contrary to Torah law.
"It's written in the Torah that Jews are not allowed to work on the Sabbath," said Arieh Moshkovitz, from the ultra-orthodox neighbourhood of Mea Shearim, in Jerusalem. "Jews at the electric company work on the Sabbath to make the power, so we don't use it."
To overcome the problem, the 50-year-old father of 16 children, Mr Moshkovitz, has been one of an unlikely troop of ultra-orthodox electricians who have for years maintained generators to power religious districts on the Jewish day of rest.
Under a small stone bridge, in a narrow street peopled exclusively by residents dressed - like him - in traditional black hats and coats, Mr Moshkovitz fiddled with a large collection of keys before finding the one that fitted a small metal door.
Inside, an eight-cylinder British-built diesel generator distributes enough electricity, once a week, to power a hotplate and a light bulb or two in 500 nearby orthodox households.
"The exhaust goes 10 yards higher than the tallest local building," said Mr Moshkovitz. "That's the synagogue, of course." Next to the generator lies a greasy mattress and a box of tools for emergency repairs. But they do not belong to Mr Moshkovitz, who, as an orthodox Jew, is unable to work and fix anything on the Sabbath. Instead, the tools belong to a Palestinian.
"We have a goy Arab who sleeps here every Sabbath," said Mr Moshkovitz, using the Jewish term for non-Jews.
Now the electricity company will also start producing "kosher electricity", using so-called "Sabbath-goys" to do the work. "We will automate some processes but we will also employ 150 non-Jews to work on the Sabbath," said Elad Sasi, from the Israeli infrastructure ministry.
Mr Sasi said that the official production of kosher electricity would save lives, as the alternative homespun generators cause accidents.
"We have wanted to close these generators for years, because the orthodox don't have a licence to run them and they are dangerous," he said. "Instead of doing it by force, we have come up with a peaceful solution instead." But the £6 million price tag has led to complaints that Israel's orthodox Jews, who are spared otherwise obligatory military service, are being pandered to by the government. In recent weeks the religious community, which makes up almost 10 per cent of Israel's seven million population, has forced a string of leading companies to adopt religious business practices.
Egged, the national bus company, has recently begun to segregate buses by gender on certain routes so as not to offend the strict sensibilities of the religious community.
"My fear is that segregated bus routes are just the beginning, and a slippery slope toward widespread segregation awaits Israeli society," said Orly Erez-Likhovski, a lawyer from the Religious Action Centre, founded in America by "reform" Jews, who live their religion less hidebound by tradition.
In Mea Shearim, however, there is little sign of any change to the strict tradition and rabbinical law that have governed everyday life for decades.
"I'm partially happy about this 'kosher' electricity," said Mr Moshkovitz, as he checked over the generator. "But I'm sure Jews will still be supervising the Arabs at the electricity company on Sabbath." Asked whether that would mean he would have to keep running the generator, he replied: "I don't know. I'll do whatever the rabbis decree."
No comments:
Post a Comment