[wyldfire]

Gentile here -- what's not available on the sabbath is probably easier to define. IIRC it mostly consists of things considered to be 'work', but depending on your orthodoxy it is usually the most "active" things that are barred. e.g. cooking w/oven barred, but preparing something to eat is not necessarily barred. Activating a light switch barred, but passively enjoying the light emitted (if it were already on) is not.

> Are there gray areas, where it is open to interpretation whether or not an activity constitutes work?

Yes, but humorously (IMO) there are those who go to great lengths to create devices or methods that dodge the rules.

[lozaning]

I was tasked at one point with certifying some aspects of a line of samsung ovens. One of the features that took the longest to validate was the sabbath mode. Normally the oven would turn off if left untouched for 12 hours. With Sabbath mode activated the oven just stay on in perpetuity until turned off. Had to try it once with it off to make sure it turned off, and once with it one, to ensure it didn't.

This way you could set the oven friday morning, and then use it all day long on the Sabbath, without having done anything that fits their definition of work. Then just turn it off once the Sabbath is over.

[dragonsky]

Always struck me as strange that cooking is not work, but turning on a oven is. Would starting a fire to cook over be considered work?

[thaumasiotes]

As far as I'm aware, starting a fire is what is actually prohibited, and certain modern Jews refuse to activate electric devices on the theory that electricity is a form of fire.

[Symbiote]

That "feature" should be illegal.

How do Jews justify wasting so much energy to get around a daft religious rule? If they don't want to observe it, don't observe it, don't just pretend.

[danieka]

One example of “cheating” is the sabbath elevator. As you said activating switches is barred, and that goes for the floor buttons in an elevator as well. So on the sabbath there are elevators that will visit every floor and thus has its buttons disabled.

I find it a fascinating view of ethics. Christians usual try to reason about why a law was made, and see their thoughts and intents as the primary means of wrongdoing, but while Jews appear to be much more beholden to the letter of the law. Basically Christians believe that sin comes from within and Jews believe sin comes from the outside world through their actions. As I understand it.

[MrMorden]

Or, in the case of Mr. Levenson from the article's first paragraph, break the rules entirely.

https://www.sefaria.org/Shabbat.122a.4?ven=William_Davidson_...