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Below are Rabbi Ribiat’s four orders of melachot:

1) The Order of Bread: choresh (plowing), zore’a (sowing), kotzer (reaping), me’ammer (gathering), dash (threshing), zoreh (winnowing), borer (sorting), tochen (grinding), meraked (sifting), lash (kneading), and ofeh/bishul (baking/cooking).

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2) The Order of Garments: gozez (shearing), melabben (scouring), menappetz (combing), tzove’a (dyeing), toveh (spinning), mesech (warping), oseh shtei batei nirin (constructing two heddles), oreg (weaving), potze’a (removing), ko’sher (tying), mattir (untying), tofer (sewing), and kore’a (tearing).

3) The Order of Hides: tzad (trapping), shochet (slaughtering), mafshit (skinning), me’abbed (tanning), memmachek (smoothing), mesartet (scoring), and mechatech (measured cutting).

4) The Order of Construction: kotev (writing), mochek (erasing), boneh (building), so’ter (demolishing), makkeh bepatish (final hammer blow), mechabbeh (extinguishing a flame), mav’ir (kindling), and hotza’a (transferring).

In four volumes, Rabbi Ribiat presents the forbidden labors in an easy-to-understand yet comprehensive manner with modern-day, up-to-date applications.

An additional excellent resource for the study of the 39 forbidden melachot, based on the Shulchan Aruch and Talmud, is the classic Chayyei Adam by Rabbi Avraham Danzig of Vilna (Hilchot Shabbat, topics 9-47). I believe this is available in an English translation.

Studying these laws and committing to their observance is not only a sign of one’s Sabbath observance, but serves as a key identifier of one’s entire Torah observance.

(To be continued)


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Rabbi Yaakov Klass is Rav of K’hal Bnei Matisyahu in Flatbush; Torah Editor of The Jewish Press; and Presidium Chairman, Rabbinical Alliance of America/Igud HaRabbonim.