Respect for the Torah and for Torah Books IV

  1. It is forbidden to sit on a chair or a bench on which seforim
    have been placed unless something, no matter how thin, was placed beneath
    them.

  2. It is forbidden to place seforim on the floor
    (upright or lying down) unless they are raised above the ground a tefach,
    though where there is no choice, even the slightest elevation is adequate.

  3. Seforim in a plastic bag should not be placed on the
    ground, but they may be placed on the ground if they are in a hard
    container.

  4. According to the Kehilos Yaakov, when a bench is
    divided, a person may sit on one section of the bench even though seforim
    lie on another section. He also writes that if a person is sitting on a
    bench and someone else places seforim on it, he is not required to
    get up from the bench because the person who placed the seforim down
    violated his space.

  5. A sefer has kedushah even before anyone learns
    from it. Once someone learns from it, it acquires a very high level of
    kedushah.

  6. Can a person go into a rest room with a sefer in
    his pocket? On this matter there is disagreement. Some hold that it is
    sufficient to enclose the sefer in a single pocket (covering). Others
    hold that it has to have a double pocket, of which one may be transparent.

  7. A sefer should not be used as a pillow. Seforim
    should not be used for personal benefit, and, besides, the sefer may
    be soiled.

  8. If a person uses part of a sheet of paper to write divrei
    Torah, he should not use the remaining space to write something that is
    secular. But it seems that if he wrote on it on the condition that he could
    use the remaining part of the page to write something secular, it is
    allowed.

  9. When an inheritance is being divided up, seforim
    should not be exchanged for something of little worth.

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