Is it permitted to desecrate Shabbat in order to save a non-Jew?

Hello,

In principle, one may not desecrate Shabbat to save the life of a non-Jew, since the permission to desecrate Shabbat is derived from the verse (Leviticus 18:5), "You shall keep My statutes and My ordinances, which a person shall do and live by them," and, as our Sages expounded in Tractate Yoma (85b), "and live by them" - and not die by them. See there. All of this is said specifically with regard to saving the life of a Jew, not a non-Jew.

However, in our time it is permitted for a Jewish doctor to treat non-Jewish patients even with Torah-level melachot, since the communications media are highly advanced, and there is concern that if it becomes known to non-Jewish doctors abroad that Jewish doctors do not treat their patients on Shabbat, they will take revenge against Jewish patients and will not treat them.

Even so, if he has the option to avoid it in a way that he can excuse himself by saying that he is occupied with another Jewish patient, he is obligated to do so. And how good it would be if the administrations of hospitals in the country would see to it that there be non-Jewish doctors for this purpose, as well as non-Jewish nurses, so that they can treat non-Jewish patients. Jewish doctors should then deal only with rabbinic prohibitions, issurei shevut.

And there is an expedient for religious and God-fearing Jewish doctors: when there is a need to treat non-Jewish patients on Shabbat, they should perform the Torah-level melachot through two doctors together, because when two people perform a task together, the prohibition is only rabbinic, and a rabbinic prohibition may be permitted even because of enmity alone (see at length in Yabia Omer, part 8, Orach Chaim, siman 38).

With blessings,

Hillel Meirs