Kohanim and Travel in an Airplane Carrying a Corpse

[This teshuvah concerns the halachic problem faced by kohanim when traveling in an airplane, especially to Eretz Yisroel, since there is a significant likelihood that there might be a casket on the plane bringing a Jewish deceased for burial in Israel.]

The airplane must be regarded as a "single container." Even though the plane is divided into a cargo compartment and a passenger section, the entire plane is made of metal and consequently cannot be considered to have a halachically valid separation between the cargo and passenger sections.

It is interesting to consider the possibility that the airplane is made of a metallic material that is not one of the six varieties mentioned in the Torah to which the laws of tum'ah of utensils captured from the Midianites is discussed. Only six varieties of metal are mentioned: gold, silver, copper, iron, lead, and tin. Surely, Hakadosh Baruch Hu knew that there are other metals that can be extracted from the soil, yet He saw fit to list only these six. I believe that airplanes are made of metals other than these six [e.g., aluminum, magnesium].

If my assumption that the airplane is made of materials other than the six listed metals is correct, we should certainly not add newly discovered metals to the list. The halachos of tum'ah and taharah are all strictly defined in the Torah. It is not for us to add or subtract from these laws. Glass, also extracted from the soil, is not considered to be a material that is involved in the Biblical laws of tum'ah and taharah. The Rabbis imposed the laws of tum'ah upon glassware to avoid confusion in the minds of people, since earthenware [pottery, stoneware, chinaware] is governed by the laws of tum'ah, as are metals. It would be confusing to the uneducated to differentiate glassware even though the Torah excludes glassware from the laws of tum'ah.

Nevertheless, this is a question worthy of further investigation. Is it true that airplanes do not contain any of the six metals? If they do, even if only as an alloy, then we would consider the metallic component of the airplane to be governed by the laws of tum'ah ve-taharah.

The fact that an airplane is a "movable tent" is not particularly relevant to our discussion; the kohein enters the plane when it is stationary, and in addition the concept of a movable tent should not be applied to the material within that tent. The concept of a movable tent, which is not governed by the laws of tum'at ohel according to most authorities, applies to material or people outside the tent, not to those within the confines of the movable tent.