Can one use an electric incandescent light for Havdalah after Shabbat and Yom Kippur?
With the advent of electricity in the last century, halakha has faced many new questions unknown to our ancestors. Countless teshuvot and books have been written attempting to analyze the nature of electricity and how it should be conceptualized within halakhic categories. Poskim must often creatively identify Talmudic precedents that can then be used to categorize the use of electricity. Though the use of electricity on Shabbat and Yom Tov is perhaps the most famous question addressed by poskim, another set of topics has also gained significant attention. Because candles are often used in Jewish rituals, such as for Shabbat, Havdalah, and Chanukah, there has also been much discussion as to whether electric lights could be used in place of wax or oil candles.
Rabbi Eliezer Waldenberg, a noted 20th-century Israeli halakhic authority, wrote many teshuvot on the topic of electricity and its application to various areas of halakha. In one particular teshuvah (Tzitz Eliezer, 1:20:13), he explores whether or not an electric incandescent light can be used for Havdalah after Shabbat and Yom Kippur. In his analysis, he permits the use of an electric light for Havdalah after Shabbat by creatively drawing upon aggadot which explain that a candle is used to commemorate God giving fire to Adam after being exiled from the Garden of Eden.
However, he notes the flame used for Havdalah after Yom Kippur has a different requirement from the one used after Shabbat. According to the gemara (Pesachium 54a), the candle used after Yom Kippur must be a ner sh’shavat (literally, a candle that has rested) and must be a flame lit from before Yom Kippur. According to Rashi (Pesachim 54a, “or sh’shavat”), this is done in order to indicate that it is forbidden to light a flame on Yom Kippur because cooking is also forbidden, unlike on other chagim.
Rabbi Waldenberg notes that it is possible to conceive of an electric light lit after Yom Kippur as a ner sh’shavat because there was electricity in the wires to the lightbulb throughout the holiday, even if it was not on. However, he then rejects this because even if there was electricity in the wires, the light cannot be considered to have remained lit throughout the holiday and would not be a ner sh’shavat.
It should be noted that the emergence of new technology inevitably leads to halakhic debate, and it is usually the case that a consensus emerges over time. However, because technology continues to change so rapidly, halakhic questions about its use tend to remain open rather than closed. For example, today, many use LED lights rather than incandescent lights in their homes. Because they function differently through light-emitting diodes rather than a luminescent metal filament, halakhic questions about the use of electric lights in all possible applications will continue to require further analysis.
| שו”ת ציץ אליעזר חלק א סימן כ פרק יג ברכת מאורי האש על מאור החשמל. …בבבלי פסחים (ד’ נ”ד ע”א) איתא בקצרה: במוצ”ש נתן הקדוש ברוך הוא דעה באדה”ר =באדם הראשון= מעין דוגמא של מעלה והביא שני אבנים וטחנן זו בזו ויצא מהן האור. (ב) במדרש שוחר טוב על תהלים (מזמור צ”ב) מובא באופן כזה: נשתלח לו עמוד אש להאיר לו ולשמרו מכל דבר רע, ראה לעמוד האש ושמח בלבו ואמר עכשיו אני יודע שהמקום עמי ובירך בורא מאורי האש וכו’ [ואת האגדה של שתי אבנים מביא אח”כ בשם יש אומרים]. …ומדכתב בלשון נשתלח לו עמוד אש משמע בפשטות שנשתלח לו מן השמים. ועל האש הזה הוא שבירך מאורי אש, וממילא נשמע שאפשר לברך גם על אש של מעלה כברק וכדומה. ומזה היינו יכולים להשיב: אין למדין מן האגדות. אבל ראיתי בפרקי דר”א (פרק כ’) שמביא ג”כ באופן כזה של השוחר טוב, שנשתלח לו עמוד של אש להאיר לו ופשט ידו לאור האש ובירך בורא מאורי האש, ואח”כ מביא בשם ר’ מנא הלכה שאם אין לו לאדם אש פושט ידו לאור הכוכבים שהן של אש ויסתכל בצפורניו שהן לבנות מן הגוף ואומר ברוך מאורי האש. הרי בהדיא שאפשר לברך גם על אור שמיימי כאור הכוכבים… (ג) ולפי”ז אם אפשר לברך מאורי האש על אורן של כוכבים שאינם מן הארץ ואין רואין בהם שום שלהבת, ולא גוונים של אש כי אם גוון אחד למראה עין, מכ”ש שצריך להיות מותר שפיר לברך מאורי האש על מאור חשמל שהמצאתן היא בדומה להמצאת אדה”ר [אף לפי האגדה שבשני התלמודים שהקיש שני רעפים זה בזה. ואף למה שלא נזכר בשו”ע דין זה שמברכין על אורן של כוכבים] בהפגש שני מיני יסודות טבעיים זה בזה… (ד) ובדבר מה שאור החשמל אינו נראה בגלוי רק מתוך הזכוכית, הנה מלבד מה שיש לדון גם בזה כנ”ל שאור זה של החשמל שאני, מכיון שכך דרכו וזהו אופן גילויו. חוץ מזה. כבר החליטו הפוסקים שאפשר שפיר לברך על נר שבתוך הזכוכית ובלבד שיראה שלהבתו… (ה) כל זה לענין מוצאי שבת, אבל לברך על החשמל שמדליקים במוצאי יוה”כ נראה ודאי שאי אפשר, דאין זה נקרא אור ששבת, אף שנמצא כל הזמן בחוטים, משום דכשנמצא הזרם בחוטים אין עוד אור במציאות כלל. והוא שם רק מין כח וחומר היולי המשמש לא רק לאור, והאור מתהוה בהגיע הזרם לתוך חוטי הזכוכית. … וא”כ לא נקרא זה אור ששבת כלל. | Responsa, Tzitz Eliezer, 1:20:13 The blessing of “the one who creates illuminations of fire” on an electric light: …In Bavli Pesachim (54a) it says: At the end of Shabbat, the holy One blessed be He, provided a heavenly example to Adam of a flame, and he then went and ground two stones together and produced a flame from them. (2) In the midrash Sochar Tov on Psalms (Psalm 92), it is brought in this way: A flame was sent to him [Adam] to provide light for him and to protect him from harm. He saw a pillar of flame and rejoiced in his heart and said, “Now, I know that God is with me, and he blessed “the one who creates illuminations of fire.” The aggadah about the two stones is brought afterward as an additional opinion. Since it was written in the way God sent him a pillar of flame, this simply means that it was sent to him from heaven. It was on this kind of flame that he made the blessing, and therefore it appears that it is possible to make the blessing also on a heavenly flame such as lightning and things like it. One could respond to this: One doesn’t learn [halakha] from aggadot. But I have seen in Pirkei d’Rebbe Eliezer (Chapter 20) where it also brings a similar story to the Sochar Tov, that it [the flame] was sent to him [Adam] to provide light for him, and he opened his hand to the light and made the blessing “the one who creates illuminations of fire.” And after this, it brings in the name of Rabbi Mana the ruling that if one doesn’t have a flame, they can open their hands to the light of the stars that are also flames and look at one’s fingernails… and say “the one who creates illuminations of fire”…Therefore it is obviously possible to make the blessing on heavenly lights like the light of the stars… (3) According to this, if it is possible to make the blessing of “illuminations of fire” on the light of the stars that are not of this world and one doesn’t see them as a large flame and not as various flames [coming together] but rather as just one before one’s eyes, all the more so it must be permitted to make the blessing of “illuminations of fire” on an electric light whose appearance is similar to Adam’s discovery of it… by bringing together two natural elements [the electricity and the metal filament]… (4) Regarding an electric light that is only visible through glass, there is what to say that it is different because it is made manifest only in this way [in a glass bulb]. Besides this, the poskim have already decided that it is possible to make the blessing on a candle in a glass case as long as one can see the flame… (5) All this is only after Shabbat, but to bless on an electric light that one lights after Yom Kippur is certainly not possible because this is not considered a light that has rested. Even if it [the electricity] remained in the wires the entire time [during the holiday] there was no light in the world [because of them]. It only places the potential and the hylic substance [in the wires] that can be used but not only for light. The light only exists when the electric current arrives at the metal filament in the glass bulb. And if so, this cannot be called a flame that has rested at all.
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Rabbi Zachary Truboff ('10) is the coordinator of the International Beit Din Institute, which seeks to educate rabbis about halakhic solutions to the agunah problem. His writings on contemporary Jewish thought and Zionism have appeared in the Lehrhaus, Arutz Sheva, Akdamot, and Zerufim. His first book, Torah Goes Forth From Zion: Essays on the Thought of Rav Kook and Rav Shagar, will appear in the coming year. Before making aliyah, he served for nearly a decade as the rabbi of Cedar Sinai Synagogue in Cleveland. Under his leadership the synagogue grew substantially and became known for its inclusive community and innovative programing. In 2015, he was chosen by the Cleveland Jewish News as one of the 18 Difference Makers, a select group honored for their contributions to Jewish communal life in Northeast Ohio. He has taught in a variety of adult education settings such as the Wexner Heritage Program, the Torat Tzion Kollel, and the Hartman Institute. . He received semikha from Rav Zalman Nechemia Goldberg and Yeshivat Chovevei Torah. He and wife, Jen, live in Jerusalem with the four children Nahum, Elihai, Shaiya, and Orya.
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