Water Wars: Comfort for Me, Danger for Thee?

Adapted from the writings of Dayan Yitzhak Grossman

February 6, 2025

AP News reports:

Social media users have claimed that Stewart and Lynda Resnick, co-owners of a massive agriculture company that has a majority stake in California’s Kern Water Bank, control California’s water and have refused to lend enough to firefighting efforts.

The water bank stores up to 1.5 million acre-feet of water underground for agricultural, municipal, and industrial use during dry years. The water gets used by the Resnicks’ company, The Wonderful Company, known for such brands as Fiji Water and Wonderful Pistachios. It also serves Bakersfield and other farmers in Kern County.

But the water bank is more than 100 miles north of Los Angeles and plays no part in its water supply. The Wonderful Company said there was “zero truth” that it controls California water or has anything to do with water going to Los Angeles. Kern Water Bank didn’t respond to a request for comment.

The Wonderful Company has faced criticism over its extensive water use, especially in times of drought, and its control of what many consider a public resource. But Peter Gleick said neither the Resnicks nor their company have anything to do with water supply issues around the wildfires.

“There are many problems with how California allocates water among users and especially the control of water by large agribusinesses, exemplified by the Resnicks, but those problems are completely unrelated to the LA fires and efforts to control them,” he said.[1]

In this article, we explore the propriety of reserving a supply of water for one’s own lower-priority use when others face a shortage of water for their higher-priority needs.

The Gemara cites a breisa:

A spring that originates within a city (and thus belongs to the residents of the city) and flows through another city, if there is not enough water for both cities (so the residents of the first city must choose between their own lives and the lives of others), their own lives take precedence over the lives of others. If they must choose between their own animals (drinking) and the animals of others, their own animals take precedence over the animals of others. If they must choose between their own laundering and the laundering of others, their own laundering takes precedence over the laundering of others. If, however, they must choose between the lives of others and their own laundering, the lives of others take precedence over their own laundering. R’ Yosi says: Their own laundering takes precedence over the lives of others.[2]

The Gemara explains R’ Yosi’s position by way of a statement of Shmuel that “uncleanliness of clothing leads to dementia.” In a version of this breisa found in the Tosefta, however, R’ Yosi additionally maintains that even the needs of the city’s animals take precedence over the lives of others,[3] which requires explanation.[4]

In any event, the She’iltos DeRav Achai Gaon rules in accordance with R’ Yosi (as per the Gemara’s citation of his position); the Rambam, Tur, and Shulchan Aruch do not codify this dispute.[5] We shall see further discussion of the halacha below.

The Bais Shmuel (R’ Shmuel of Fiurda) invokes the water debate in explanation of a difficult ruling of the Rambam:

During the time a woman nurses her child, her tasks are reduced, and wine and things that are good for her milk are added to her sustenance.

If she was allotted the foods appropriate for her, but she desires to eat more or desires to eat other foods because of the illness of the desire in her belly, she may eat, from her own funds, everything she desires. The husband may not stop her by saying that if she will eat too much or eat bad foods the child will die, because the pain of her body comes first.[6]

The Chelkas Mechokeik (R’ Moshe Lima) is very puzzled by this ruling: Assuming that not indulging her craving will cause the woman distress but not endanger her life, and that indulging it will endanger the life of her child, how may she indulge it?[7] The Bais Shmuel answers that R’ Yosi’s position that one’s own city’s laundry takes precedence over another city’s lives indeed implies that preventing one’s own suffering takes precedence over others’ lives. (But he does not know why the Rambam rules like R’ Yosi).[8]

The Hafla’ah (R’ Pinchas Horowitz) rejects the Bais Shmuel’s analogy between the cases, arguing that R’ Yosi’s ruling is limited to a case where the second city’s residents can obtain water from another source or are able to relocate; R’ Yosi does not mean to assert a right to prevent one’s own suffering at the expense of exposing others even to the mere possibility of mortal danger. (He supports this position with a variety of arguments).[9] The Bais Shlomo (R’ Shlomo Drimer), too, argues that R’ Yosi’s ruling must be limited to where the second city has access to another water source, because his ruling is inconceivable otherwise.[10] Similarly, the Tiferes Yisrael (R’ Yisrael Lifschitz) explains that when R’ Yosi rules that “their own laundering takes precedence over the lives of others,” he does not mean that if the others don’t drink they will die, only that they will suffer greatly from thirst.”[11]

Other Acharonim raise a different objection to the Bais Shmuel’s analogy: Since the Gemara explains R’ Yosi to be concerned for dementia—which constitutes danger rather than mere discomfort—if the nursing woman would experience not danger but discomfort, the child’s life would take precedence.[12] The Netziv (R’ Naftali Tzvi Yehudah Berlin) adds that R’ Yosi’s position in the Tosefta that the city’s animals’ water needs take precedence over those of the other city’s people is also based on the assumption that the animals are essential for the people’s survival.[13] But the Divrei Yatziv (R’ Yekusiel Yehudah Halberstam, the Sanz-Klausenberger Rebbe) notes that this assumption seems rather dubious.[14]

On the other hand, the Bais Shlomo and the Netziv understand that the Rambam, too, is referring to a situation where abstaining will endanger the woman’s life.[15] R’ Dovid Oppenheim apparently goes even further and asserts that in general, any failure to satisfy a person’s food craving may endanger his life![16]

In any event, the Ra’avad argues on the Rambam and maintains that she may not indulge herself at the expense of the child’s safety,[17] and this is also the view of the Tur.[18] The Maharsham (R’ Shalom Mordechai Schwadron of Brezhan) assumes, like the Bais Shmuel, that the Rambam is ruling like R’ Yosi, and he implies that the Ra’avad is ruling like the breisa’s first view.[19]

Another context in which R’ Yosi is invoked is that of the issur deRabanan against marrying a nursing woman (if the prospective husband is not the father of the child), due to the concern that the woman may become pregnant by the new husband, which will cause her milk to dry up and might cause her first child to starve. But according to R’ Yosi, who seems to maintain that one’s own comfort takes precedence over the vital needs of others, why is the potential danger to the woman’s child grounds to bar her from marrying? We find two opposite resolutions to this in the Acharonim:

The Divrei Chaim (R’ Chaim Halberstam of Sanz), following the Bais Shmuel, apparently takes the positions of R’ Yosi and the Rambam at face value, that it is indeed permitted for someone to prevent his own substantial discomfort even at the cost of endangering lives. He accordingly concludes that refraining from marriage and marital relations for a limited duration is a minor matter and not grounds to endanger a child’s life.[20]
The Bais Shlomo, on the other hand, maintains that refraining from marriage and marital relations constitutes substantial distress—refraining from marital relations is one of the five inuyim (afflictions) of Yom Kippur, and the Gemara derives that this is considered an inuy from a [21] Accordingly, he considers the prohibition against marrying a nursing woman to constitute an irrefutable—”except by way of pilpul (casuistry)”—proof of his previously cited contention that it is certainly prohibited to indulge one’s own desires at the expense of others’ safety.[22] This argument was previously advanced by the Hafla’ah.

[1]Melissa Goldin and Brittany Peterson. For LA water issues, misinformation spreads nearly as fast as the wildfires. AP News. https://apnews.com/article/california-los-angeles-wildfires-water-misinformation-27b0059719e8b475d452030c221fe544.

[2]Nedarim 80b.

[3]Tosefta Bava Metzia, end of perek 11.

[4]See Ha’ameik She’eilah she’ilta 147 os 4; Shu”t Divrei Yatziv C.M. siman 79 os 26.

[5]See Ha’ameik She’eilah ibid. at the end of his discussion for a suggestion of why the poskim do not codify this breisa, and see Shai Lamora (Natanson) E.H. 80:12.

[6]Hilchos Ishus 21:11

[7]Chelkas Mechokeik ibid. s.k. 22.

[8]Bais Shmuel ibid. s.k. 15.

[9]Hafla’ah, Kuntres Acharon ibid.

[10]Shu”t Bais Shlomo Y.D. cheilek 2 siman 99. Shu”t Yabia Omer cheilek 10 C.M. siman 6 os 10 notes that this interpretation of R’ Yosi’s position is already found in R’ Yehudah ben Kalonimus of Speyer’s Yichusei Tana’im Va’amora’im.

[11]Tiferes Yisrael Peiah 1:1 Bo’az end of os 1, and cf. Divrei Yatziv ibid. os 28 s.v. Vetzarich lomar.

[12]Bais Meir ibid.; Ba’er Heiteiv ibid. s.k. 14.

[13]Ha’ameik She’eilah ibid.

[14]Divrei Yatziv ibid. os 28.

[15]Bais Shlomo and Ha’ameik She’eilah ibid.

[16]Shu”t Nishal Dovid E.H. siman 6 s.v. Uma shekasav od sham bateshuvah.

[17]Ra’avad ibid.