DEUT705 There are many things which may not be condemned by the law, yet are culpable in the eyes of ethical teaching. These are actions which violate the moral standard, though not actually infringing upon the civil law (B. Metz. 108b). As an example, we may quote the law of the Shemitah, the seventh year of Release [this verse and 1-6]. Though the debt is automatically released with the advent of the seventh year, no debtor may take undue advantage of this law. Whenever possible, he should pay his debt before the arrival of the Shemitah year (Shebiit x.9) When the Rabbis suspected prevarication, they organized the device of the Prozbul, a declaration made in court before the execution of a loan to the effect that the law of limitation, by the entrance of the Sabbatical year, shall not apply to the loan to be transacted (Gittin 36a). This was no subterfuge but an honest attempt to make a law of the Torah conform to the spirit which first created it. It was also taught that since the Shemitah was contingent on the Jubilee year, the first was not applicable when the latter was no longer in force. Similarly, the various laws concerning the Erubin were so many honest attempts at keeping in the minds of the people the purpose of the Law. The permission to cook a little extra on the festival-day if it be a week-day in order to have food left over for the morrow, which is a Sabbath, when no cooking was allowed, is called Erev Tavshillin (Bezah 15b). The provision to unite families living in one court into one household by placing a meal in a common-room accessible to all was known as Eruv Hatzerot. These were devices true to the principle of "that he may live by them" (Leviticus xviii. 5). Without these modified interpretations of the Biblical laws, a conscientious fulfillment would be well-nigh impossible in the changing conditions of life on account of the hardships they entailed. (Continued at [[LEV224]] Leviticus 18:5 live LEHRMAN 81-2).