The issue of extending Daylight Savings Time (DST) has come up over the years on both the federal and state levels and Agudath Israel of America has joined other segments of society in generally opposing these efforts.
Our concerns revolved around two areas. First, as a representative of Orthodox Jewish schools, we shared the views of those in the school community who were concerned about children walking, carpooling or taking the bus to school in the pre-sunrise darkness and the increased risk of accidents and injuries that resulted. Indeed, during the Arab oil embargo in early 1970s, when a year-long DST was attempted (but was quickly ended due to public outcry), there were numerous reported incidents of children being injured and assaulted as they traveled to school in the pitch-black streets. Whatever benefit that might accrue due to extended DST pales in comparison to the cost in safety of our children.
The second concern related to an unintended consequence the change in DST would have on a fundamental aspect of Jewish religious life – morning prayers. Under Jewish law, morning prayers, and the rituals associated with them, are regulated in time-specific ways and must be performed no earlier those certain specified times. Synagogue schedules accommodate those times. With a change in DST, and the later sunrise, the times for prayers and their accompanying rituals will be disrupted –which, in turn, will put into jeopardy their proper fulfillment, discourage synagogue attendance, and result in late arrival for work.
The U.S. Senate today passed legislation that would make DST year-round and thus implicate these and other concerns. The bill will now move to the House, where the various issues on both sides will be debated. Along with others, Agudath Israel intends to continue to express its concerns to the representatives in that chamber and make clear the negative consequences the change will have on the safety of our children and on our Jewish religious practice.
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13 Responses
impressed with this worded statement thank you Reb Zwiebel.
As much as we don’t like it, I don’t think enough lawmakers are concerned with a very small group of people whose prayers will be affected. Truth be told, the impact is really just a few months a year and considering how small generally early minyanim are, I really question whether there would be measurable support for opposing this
Seems odd to me at a time when we want more independence from government, that we wouldn’t just have our schools set “winter hours” if that is deemed best locally. They have Standard Time set now for such a short bit of the year, I would rather have it be one time all year round. Nothing changes the amount of actual daylight. We live by Vasikin & shkiya no matter the number on the clock.
Not the end of the world. For frum men working outside our community, it will be a problem getting to minyan in the morning (possible solution, have more “downtown” minyanim, closer to the places of employment). But those working for Jewish organizations or businesses, or teleworking, can adjust hours. And of course, women won’t be affected.
It will give people more time to get home on Friday afternoon, and more time to finish Shabbos preparations in the winter.
I support the change.
As far as yiden going to work and davening before neitz. It is a problem and it is surmountable but i see how many people miss zman krias shma and zman tfila and even chatzois it is far better to have the zmanim later than earlier. Its true that all those people can use a better chinuch but as the fact stands of today it happens to be a lot more yiden to save from missing a mitzvah deoirayse than about davening before neitz. As of children as of chinuch whether we are chaiov in chinuch for krias shma for ktanim is a machloikes but when children daven in cheider and they say krias shma before the end of the zman it certainly protects the whole world a lot more than when they daven later!!
Please dont ruin this chance of having the time kept like in the summer!!
Akuperma, while it’s clear that women won’t be affected as much as men, I have no idea why you would assume that they won’t be affected at all.
I have a job that requires me to be at work at 8:30. Since I don’t have a car, I walk to work, which takes time. Sunrise after 8:00 would definitely be a challenge for me!
Jews are the right people to answer this question and now is the right time! We are chachamim yodea itim!
Not clear how a traditionalist organization can advocate something that is not in the gemora? Maybe we are saying that previous 3 generations accepted the gezerah and current senate is not greater than the old one?
It seems to be a disagreement about the facts: some say that changing clock leads to heart attacks and other health problems for whole population. Aguda says kids will be endangered. Need to compare the numbers.
If keeping time same is better, then the prayer argument is not valid. Before asking Hashem for health and parnosa, one should do everything possible themselves and that includes having the safer time
I mostly agree with akuperma. It would be very nice to have that extra hour before Shabbos. That would be marbeh shalom in Klal Yisrael, because it will give people more time to breathe on a busy short winter Erev Shabbos.
However, if you currently start working at 8 AM, then, depending on your location, there will be at least some days that neitz will be later than 8 AM. So, even davening in a minyan near your workplace will not resolve this, and you’d presumably have to start later on those days.
I fully support going back to the way it was in George Washington’s day:- Same time all year, but EST all year with חצות revolving around 12 Noon all year.
Everyone shall enjoy latest מוצאי-שבת in NYC being 8.23PM instead of 9.23PM come height of summer.
Latest Netz would be 8.20, latest time for putting on Tallis & Tefillin 7.20 about – in the UK that’s the case without extending DST.
eh.. I don’t really care which TZ they settle on as long as they stop the stupid practice of changing the clocks twice a year. For NY State they can either choose year-round EST or year-round AST whichever works best for them.
Eretz Yisroel should also stop the clock changes, and settle on either UTC+2:30 or UTC+3:00 (same time as Moscow, Turkey, Saudi Arabia). I personally would prefer Israel be on +3.