Activities Prohibited On Shabbat - Saving of Human Life

Saving of Human Life

For more details on this topic, see pikuach nefesh.

In the event that a human life is in danger, a Jew is not only allowed, but required, to violate any Shabbat law that stands in the way of saving that person. The concept of life being in danger is interpreted broadly: for example, it is mandated that one violate Shabbat to take a woman in active labor to a hospital.

Read more about this topic:  Activities Prohibited On Shabbat

Famous quotes containing the words human life, saving, human and/or life:

    “some little plan or chart,
    Some fragment from his dream of human life,
    Shaped by himself with newly-learned art;”
    —William Wordsworth (1770–1850)

    “Oh that my Pow’r to Saving were confin’d:
    Why am I forc’d, like Heav’n, against my mind,
    To make Examples of another Kind?
    Must I at length the Sword of Justice draw?
    Oh curst Effects of necessary Law!
    How ill my Fear they by my Mercy scan,
    Beware the Fury of a Patient Man.”
    —John Dryden (1631–1700)

    “Envy and jealousy are the private parts of the human soul. Perhaps the comparison can be extended.”
    —Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)

    “When this ring
    Parts from this finger, then parts life from hence.”
    —William Shakespeare (1564–1616)