We're going to continue with the halachah (Jewish law) of Amirah le'akum (telling a non-Jew). One of the most challenging situations we need to clarify a little bit is having a maid in the house on Shabbat: what this person is allowed to do and what she is not allowed to do. Let's start with the following. There is a big machloket (dispute) between the Rambam and the Ra'avad on one point in the Lashon (wording) of the Shulchan Aruch.
First of all, we have studied enough to know that there's a problem: there's a difference between a Sachir (wage worker) for a Zman (time) and Kablanut. If you pay for work that is done whenever they want, that's fine, even if they do it on Shabbat, because they decide; they control the time. Therefore, that would be okay. We said that's the example of a cleaner or a tailor or whatever. Unless you taught them to do it on Shabbat, it would be okay.
But the problem with the maid is that you pay the person, and you need certain tasks to be done on Shabbat. If you pay for tasks to be done on Shabbat, we don't have any heter (permission) to have this person do any melachah (prohibited labor) for you. That's indeed the halachah. Somebody hires a person for a year or two—that means a very long-term Sachir Zman. It's not a Sachir Yom (daily worker); it's for a very long time, a Shana (year) or Shnatayim (two years), to write a book; you hire an editor, or someone to sew clothes, and he could do it. I don't know if you remember Shabbat, because what he meant to say is, “Do it whenever you want. You're not bound by time,” on condition that you don't make a Sachir Zman every day.
That's not the case in our life, because you need them to be there on Shabbat; they need to be there on Shabbat. It's not like somebody who is doing it off-site, which we're going to see is very important. Off-site, then it's different: I don't care if you do it on Shabbat, Sunday, or Monday; it makes no difference to me. But with the tasks of the house, especially for us, on Shabbat you have more guests than on Monday or Tuesday, so you need more help. You can't say, “Oh, it's hired per month or per year, whatever.” No, no, no, no; it doesn't work.
The Shulchan Aruch adds another condition: you cannot do the work in the house—the house of the Jew; it has to be done off-site. So it's very clear in the Shulchan Aruch that if it's not Kablanut, there's something similar to Kablanut, which is that you hire for a long time. But the only way to do that is that you're not makpid (particular) about every day, and also that they do it outside the house of the Jew. If it's done inside the house of the Jew, it doesn't work; you're not allowed to. So for us, it's a problem. Therefore, it's Assur (not allowed), chazak u'baruch (be strong and blessed). It's Assur.
So, you have a problem. Any melachah that you ask the Goyah (non-Jewish woman) to do for you is Assur. Even if you don't ask, it's Assur, because if she does it for you, it's Assur. So, now you're stuck, right? She could put the plates. She could take them out. She could clean them. She could do all the melachah that is mutar (allowed). The law is like this: if there's a way to do it for you, then there's a way she could do it. If there's no way for you to do it, then she's not allowed to do it. Of course, what we're going to have to discover is how to deal with the situation. Sometimes there's some loophole, etc. Be'ezrat Hashem (with God's help), in the coming days, we will continue.