Why don we take down the eruv once a year, so that people don forget about the laws of carrying on Shabbat?
Some communities have a practice of declaring the eruv to be down for one Shabbat a year, to help educate people about the laws of carrying, or to avoid people taking the eruv for granted. We are not inclined to follow this practice for the following reasons: 1) The eruv has been up every week only through great effort on the part of the committee; at some point, it will likely be down for a week anyway. 2) The eruv greatly enhances people’s Shabbat; detracting from people’s comfort and oneg Shabbat even for one week seems wrong. We would not suggest removing any other conveniences of Jewish life, such as the mikvah or kosher butcher, for even a day to remind people of what it’s like to be without those. 3) If you want to teach your children (or yourselves) about the laws of carrying on Shabbat, you can take them to Fort Tryon Park.
