Shulchan Arukh Orach Chayim · Siman 392

Shulchan Arukh Orach Chayim 392 — English translation

Translation: Sefaria Community Translation. Section numbers match the Hebrew text above.

1. 1Laws of City Eruvin. Containing 8 paragraphs: A city that has been the property of an individual, even if it became public- everyone can join in one partnership, and carry throughout the whole estate. Similarly, if it is publicly owned and it has one entrance- everyone can join in one partnership. But if it is publicly owned and and has two entrances, where the populace goes in one and out the other, even if the area came under private ownership, we may not make the whole thing into an Eruv. Rather, we must exclude a place, even as small as one courtyard and the house within it, from the city, and join the rest of the city together. Then all the participants in the partnership will be permitted in the whole city, except that one place that they excluded, and those residents remaining will be permitted in their own location, through a partnership they make for themselves. But if there are many residents remaining, it is forbidden to carry in the entire city. This is a provision instituted for the purpose of recognition, so that the residents will be aware that the Eruv has permitted them to carry in this place. The public becomes become expert on it, observing that we do not carry in the place that was excluded and not joined with them, but rather these carry in their own space and those carry in their own space. If residents wanted to institute an Eruv for each alley on its own, that would certainly be effective, for there is no greater exclusion than this.
2. 2A city of many people that has a first entrance and a ladder in another place, they are all mixed up and it is not necessary to remember that the ladder in the wall is not considered as a door, and even if many ladders are placed side by side up to a width of ten, it is not considered as a door. And if it has two doors and there is a garbage pile in front of one of them, it is as if there is only a first door there:
3. 3The houses that are placed separately, even though they are not open to the city, but have their backs to the city and their faces are outside, and even if it is (just one house, even) a cattle house or a hay house that does not need to be fenced, they are considered separate, and the rest of the houses are fenced:
4. 4A city in which all its inhabitants participated except one alleyway, then carrying is forbidden to all of them. And if they built a monument at the entrance of the alleyway then carrying is not forbidden to them. Therefore, a city that was the property of a single person, even if it became the property of many, is not divided into halves, but either the whole or both entrances and exits. And each entrance and exit builds a monument at its entrance if he wants to share his permission with them so that he does not prohibit the rest of his entrances.
5. 5What is the meaning of the words, "It is not to be built for the half of a city"? That is it is surrounded by a high wall, and it has a gate. But if the whole city were not prepared on the outside, and they came to prepare the half and to build the half, they allowed it in their hands:
6. 6The one who qualifies all the inhabitants of the city for participation, if they all participated he does not need to inform them that the right is theirs. And the law for anyone who forgot and did not participate with the inhabitants of the city, or for anyone who went to exile in another city, or for a foreigner who was with them in the city, is the same as the law for the courtyard and in the alleyway:

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