Today is the 2nd day of Shebat , 5771
There are 39 categories of Melakha (creative tasks) that are forbidden of Shabbat. One of them is Kotser: reaping fruits, flowers, plants, leaves, etc. from the ground or from a tree or cutting branches for a fireplace, or mowing a lawn.
In other words, cutting or plucking any ‘growing’ thing.
This is one of the few melakhot explicitly mentioned in the Torah (Ex. 34:21), “Six days shall you work, but you shall pause on the seventh; in plowing and in harvesting, you shall stop.”
Examples: During Shabbat you cannot reap a fruit from its tree, even though you intend to eat it right away. Similarly, during Shabbat you cannot cut a mint -branch while is attached to the ground. Not even to use it for smelling it and say a berakha (when using mint branches for Habdala, we should be careful to pick those mint branches, only once Shabbat is over!).
From the other side, once the fruit is already detached from the tree or a plant is detached from the ground, you may cut it or break it in smaller pieces.
For example: if you have a mint branch already detached from the ground, you may cut it ‘with your hands’ in smaller branches or leaves, in the same way you are allowed to cut an apple, once is not in the tree anymore.
A a fruit which falls naturally from a tree on Sabbath, may not be used on the same day (Mukse).
Shabbat Shalom!
Candle Lighting in NY: 4:26 PM
Shabbat Ends in NY: 5:35 PM
Children Singing Moroccan Habdalah http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xigNLJkD5RQ
Rabbi Yosef Bitton. YMJC | 130 Steamboat Rd. | Great Neck | NY | 11024
