>>Could you explain this term for us please Les? “shabbes goy”

>>

>Yes, easily.

>

>A Shabbos goy is a gentile who does work for the Jew prohibited because of

>the Sabbath. The gentile can do the work because;

>(a) The laws of Sabbath observance apply only to the Jew, not to the

>gentile.

>(b) The gentile is not employed only to work on the sabbath.

>(c) The gentile works on the Sabbath because they want to. They must not be

>required to.

>(d) The gentile is never paid for work done on the Sabbath. They are paid

>for work done at other times plus a penalty in the expectation that they

>will want to work on the Sabbath.

>

>I personally have trouble with the idea of a “Shabbos goy”, not because it

>wrong if done correctly, but because it may appear to other gentiles, who

>don’t know better, they they are working for the Jew only on the Sabbath

and >being paid for that work. Heaven forbid, that a gentile should believe that

>we Jews are not observing the laws of the Sabbath as explained by Moses,

our >Teacher.

>

>We used to have a good gentile couple who came around to our place on

Friday >nights for a game of cards (21, actually). They would boil the kettle to

>make a cup of tea for us all, turn on/off lights. If we wanted them to do

>something, we would say, for example, “Isn’t it cold?” and they would turn

>up the heating. We never asked them, and we never even hinted that they

>should do something from which they should not also benefit. We blessed

them >for their kindness and consideration which was amazing.

Thank you Les for that explanation. >

>The couple has since become devout Christians with the husband studying for

>the ministry. I feel that their time with us on Friday nights had

>contributed to their religious awakening.

Les Brown