Halakhah к Шаббат 18:7

As Rav Kook intimates, it is permissible to ask a non-Jew to milk a cow on Shabbat to avoid causing the cow pain and suffering (tza'ar ba'alei chaim).⁷Modern dairy farms use cows that produce large volumes of milk daily and suffer greatly unless they are milked two or three times a day. The source of this leniency is a ruling of the Maharam of Rothenburg (cited by the Rosh, Shabbat 18:3), based on a comment of the Gemara (Shabbat 128b). The Gemara permits supporting an animal with pillows and blankets if it falls into a water channel on Shabbat. Doing so entails violating a rabbinical prohibition,⁸Placing a pillow underneath an animal renders the pillow muktzah, as the pillow serves as a base for an animal, and animals are muktzah (basis ledavar ha'asur). Making a non-muktzah item muktzah (mevateil keli meiheichano) is rabbinically prohibited because it resembles soteir, destroying a utensil. In this case, the utensil is not physically destroyed, but it is rendered unusable for the remainder of Shabbat. See Rashi, Shabbat 128b s.v. Veha. yet it is permitted to alleviate an animal's suffering. The biblical imperative to alleviate an animal's pain supersedes the rabbinical prohibition. Similarly, reasons the Maharam of Rothenburg, one may set aside the rabbinical prohibition of amirah lenochri (asking a non-Jew to violate Shabbat) to alleviate the pain of a cow that needs to be milked. The Shulchan Aruch (O.C. 305:20) rules in accordance with the view of the Maharam of Rothenburg.⁹In practice, some possible restrictions are involved when employing a non-Jew to milk on Shabbat. The Korban Netaneil (Shabbat 18:70), commenting on the Maharam's leniency, lists these restrictions. First, the milk may not be used until the next day, as Chazal forbade using liquids squeezed on Shabbat until after Shabbat ends. (Chazal worried that using freshly squeezed liquids, or juice that leaked from a fruit, would cause people to violate Shabbat by squeezing more; see Beitzah 3a.) Additionally, milk squeezed on Shabbat by a non-Jew must be given to the non-Jew. If the Jewish owner would keep the milk, it would appear as if the non-Jew violated Shabbat for the Jew's personal benefit, whereas we only permit him to violate Shabbat for the animal's sake. If the Jewish owner wants the milk, he must buy it from the non-Jew (although he may pay a heavily discounted price; see Biur Halachah 305 s.v. Bedavar.) While the Korban Netaneil cites all of these restrictions, they are not all universally accepted. See Shulchan Aruch (O.C. 305:20) and the Mishnah Berurah's comments thereupon.