Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2016 March 15

= March 15 =

Socher Reshus, Orthodox Judaic law, and the Establishment clause
Hi, this is an odd one. see this page:, our page on Eruvs, and maybe for a little more background on the relevant (religious) law underpinning this. Basically, in 2008, Sheriff Lee Baca of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department signed a 20 year rental agreement with "a representative of the Jewish Community of Los Angeles County", signing the entirety of Los Angeles County (or, more specifically, Sheriff Baca's "Jurisdiction", which I assume is the entirety of Los Angeles County) over to him/her for $1.

I realize that, in practice, any attempt to use that rental agreement to do anything more than erect and maintain an Eruv would be struck down by a court, but my question is a bit more esoteric than that. It appears that, to meet the halachic needs of the Jewish Community, there is no limitation of the rental to "public property" or accurate wording terming it a license to use utility poles to run their cable around the area. Now, it's possible that the "contract" shown in the photo is just for show and that some more formal, real contract was actually drawn up and is the legal document underpinning all this and I've just misunderstood a poorly-printed press release, but at this point I'm wondering. If that is the actual contract, isn't it a violation of the Establishment clause, along with the Fifth amendment prohibition on taking of private property for public use? Obviously, just because something is a violation of the constitution doesn't mean it can't happen; things get fixed by cases, not whining, but I figured I'd ask some other people because looking at it it's hard for me to conceive of a line of thought that leads to this being "kosher" (if you'll pardon the pun). I'm also wondering whether I could "rent" the city of Los Angeles if The Goddess Eris gave me divine inspiration that I needed to own all vendors of hot dog buns within a 100 mile radius to avoid displeasing her, though obviously that question may veer too close to a request for legal advice for the Refdesk. Riffraffselbow (talk) (contribs) 06:40, 15 March 2016 (UTC)
 * The permission of the land owner is what's required. What mickey mouse wording is used is irrelevant. And what's definitely irrelevant is whether the contract that's been drawn up would stand up to scrutiny in a civil law court. Eruv is an entirely notional concept, albeit one that needs to be grounded by the existence of some kind of physical border (existing hedges, fences, railway wires, phone wires, specially-built wires etc) but it needs the permission of the land owner in the first place, to allow the area to be considered as one massive private domain.
 * It helps to think about this on a smaller level. A block of flats contains private and public areas, all contained by the walls of the block. With the agreement of the freeholder (or other relevant owner), the entire block can be considered one "private" area (albeit that different parts are still owned by different people) and Orthodox Jews can carry items on the Sabbath in the hallways or between each other's flats.
 * Simply put, the notion of private/public is entirely different from ownership - nothing changes in terms of who owns what. --Dweller (talk) Become old fashioned! 09:12, 15 March 2016 (UTC)


 * For those who do not follow those religious rules nothing has changed. For the people who do follow those religious rules life has become a little bit easier. If you would start a religion with over half a million followers in the greater Los Angeles area, and you would ask for something that doesn't affect others but makes the lives of some of the followers of your religion a bit easier then I, as an atheist, would be totally OK with that. The Quixotic Potato (talk) 19:43, 15 March 2016 (UTC)

The Story of Philosophy
Was Will Durant's book The Story of Philosophy first published in 1924 or 1926? I have looked through the article on Durant and the article on the book, and they both contain contradictory information on this matter. FreeKnowledgeCreator (talk) 06:46, 15 March 2016 (UTC)


 * Go straight to the source and ask the horse. He'll give you the answer that you'll endorse. The Will Durant Foundation website says 1926. Clarityfiend (talk) 07:35, 15 March 2016 (UTC)


 * The book article says that it was first published as pamphlets. Maybe 1924 is referring to that? Clarityfiend (talk) 07:38, 15 March 2016 (UTC)
 * Nope. While several pamphlets titled "The story of X's Philosophy" (X being various thinkers) are dated 1924, "The Story of Francis Bacon's Philosophy" is from c. 1923 and "The Philosophy of Herbert Spencer" is from c. 1925, according to this newsletter. Clarityfiend (talk) 07:59, 15 March 2016 (UTC)