Hi,
I know this isn't a recent topic... but when making eruv chatzeiros for a building with many residents... one of the residents (frum person) says that he doesn't want to accept the matzos and doesn't want to be part of the eruv. Since he is actively rejecting the gift, the eruv can't work for anyone?
Does it make sense to do a zechiya of the matzos to his property instead of to him directly?
Thanks
I cannot see what sense it would make to do the zechiya to his property because the eruv unites the people in the chatzer, not just the properties, but there is another possibility; namely according to the Gemara Eruvin end 80a, where Shmuel said that if one of the residents in the Movuy was accustomed to take part in the Shituf, but now does not want to (see Chazon Ish 99:5 that this applies even if the resident protests), the members of the movuy enter his house and take the Shituf against his will.
KOL TUV
Dovid Bloom
NB The above are just my initial thoughts, but it does deserve further study.
Follow-up reply:
1) When I first saw this question, I fairly soon thought to myself; what sense can there be in making a zechiya to an inanimate object?! This thought was strengthened when I remembered that Tosfos Kidushin 19a DH Omer writes that a minor does not possess zechiya mideoraisa. We learn that for somebody to be zocheh they must be an adult; so certainly an inanimate object, like a property, does not possess zechiya. [Tosfos there continues and writes that if somebody else is Makneh to the minor he/she does possess zechiya mideoraisa. However this would only seem to be apply to a minor; who will later grow up to become a fully-fledged person; but it would not seem to apply to an inanimate object]
2) But then I started thinking that possibly there may be a concept of zechiya to an inanimate object. The source for this may start in Bava Metzia 10b, where there is an opinion that "Chatzer Mishum Yad Itrabai"; the reason that the Torah says that a person's back yard acquires anything placed inside it, is because the Chatzer is considered as the hand of its owner. Then we go to Kidushin top 44b where the Gemara asks what is the status of a Na'arah? Is she like the hand of her father or is she like the Chatzer of her father? Tosfos Rosh Kidushin 5b DH Ma Lehatzad cites the Gemara Kidushin top 44b and writes that according to the possibility that she is like the Chatzer of her father, this means that if a Get is placed in the father's Chatzer she is thereby divorced even if the father does not want this. It appears that we may have found a source that if one puts an item inside somebody's Chatzer he acquires it even against his will. According to this it may be that if one puts the matzo of the Eruv into the property of the resident who says he does not want to accept the matzos, he still is automatically included in the Eruv.
3) However there is still a lot more thinking still needed on this question.
Shabbat Shalom
Dovid Bloom
Another try:
1) I told a Talmid Chacham about the above answer and he was not happy with it, because he said that the sources that I cited; that a Chatzer can acquire an item against the wishes of the owner; only apply to a Get, which can be given Mideoraisa against the will of the wife, but for anything else the Chatzer will not acquire Ba'al Korcho.
2) However, I am going to make a different suggestion, based on Rashi Bava Metzia end 11b DH Ella Amar, who writes that the Chatzer acquires a present for the owner; even if he is not standing next to the Chatzer at the time; because "Anan Sahadi"; we are witnesses; that the owner wishes his Chatzer to acquire the present for him. Everyone knows that he wants that present.
Now the Mishneh Berurah 367:1 writes that the reason a wife can join in the Eruv, even without the knowledge of her husband; even if the husband protests; is because Chazal gave a leniency since a householder may try and annoy his neighbors and prevent them carrying on Shabbos.
3) The Rambam writes, in a very different context, in Hilchot Gerushin 2:20 that in a case where the husband is obliged by the Torah to give his wife a Get, but does not want to, we force him to give the Get. This is because every Jew wants to carry out all the Mitzvot of the Torah, but sometimes the Yetzer Hara gets the better of him. If we make him do the Mitzvah, he is deep down really happy about this.
So, in our scenario, an otherwise good Jew developed a Yetzer Hara to quarrel with his neighbors. But we say that "Anan Sahadi" that he really wants to be on good terms with his fellow residents, if not for that Yetzer Hara confusing him. So we can put the matzos of the Eruv inside his property and deep down this is a zechiya for him, since it is making life easier on Shabbos both for the other residents and also for himself.
Yasher Koach
Dovid Bloom