QUESTION

A student borrowed linens from her grandparents in Jerusalem to use at her midrasha over the summer. She is flying back to the US and wants to wash the linens before she leaves. This would be before Shabbat of the week in which Tisha B’Av falls.

Her grandparents are currently in the US and would not use the sheets until well after Tisha B’Av. If the granddaughter does not wash the linens now, however, her elderly grandmother will have to wash them when she returns to Israel, during shavua shechal bo (the week in which Tisha B’Av falls).

The granddaughter’s Israeli rabbi ruled that washing them is forbidden, but he was not aware of the grandmother’s situation. Given these circumstances, is it permitted to launder the linens today?

ANSWER

It is permitted under these circumstances.

There are three reasons why this is not prohibited me’ikar ha-din:

1. It is still before Shabbat and therefore not yet shavua shechal bo. At this point, the prohibition is based on minhag (custom), rather than me’ikar ha-din (Ta’anit 26b; Rema, Shulchan Arukh, Orach Chayyim 551:3).
2. It is bed linen, and it is questionable whether bed linen falls within the core category of the prohibition. Although Shulchan Arukh (Orach Chayyim 551:3) rules that the issur kibbus (prohibition of laundering) applies to hand towels and similar items, the Taz (551:4), citing the Maharshal, raises questions about this. The language is somewhat unclear—see Pri Megadim, Mishbetzot Zahav, ad loc.—but he appears more inclined to permit other non-clothing items, while being less inclined to permit bed linen.
3. The broader issue of kibbus shelanu (modern machine laundering) makes the application of the prohibition me’ikar ha-din questionable.

Of course, in practice, we do not launder bed linen during the Nine Days. It is important, however, to understand that this represents a double or even triple extension beyond the ikkar ha-din.

The reason to permit the laundering in this case is the grandmother’s situation. We permit activities that are normally forbidden during the Nine Days in cases of mitzvah or davar ha-avad (a case of potential loss), certainly when the activity takes place before shavua shechal bo (Rema 551:3; Mishnah Berurah 551:11).

Here, sparing an elderly grandmother from having to do the work, and showing her proper respect, would count as a davar mitzvah (a mitzvah-related matter), especially when considered together with the three points above.

In addition, if the granddaughter does not wash the linens, her grandmother will likely wash them during shavua shechal bo. That would be worse, since the grandmother would be laundering them during the more stringent period and would not have the same heter (permission) of davar mitzvah.

One might still object based on the principle of ein omrim le-adam chatei kedei she-yizkeh chaverkha (we do not tell a person to sin so that another person may benefit—Shabbat 4a). But that is not really what is happening here. The granddaughter is not being asked to do something forbidden in order to prevent her grandmother from doing so. She is relying on a legitimate heter, based on the davar mitzvah involved and the three mitigating factors discussed above.

It also matters that, if she does not wash the linens now, her grandmother will likely wash them later, during the stricter period of shavua shechal bo. Washing them now both spares her elderly grandmother the work and prevents the laundering from taking place at a more problematic time. It also prevents the granddaughter from placing her grandmother in a situation in which she may be machshil (cause her to stumble). That adds further weight to the davar mitzvah consideration.