Mara d'asra and member of the Crown Heights Beis Din
Rabbi Yosef Yeshaya Braun's Rulings on Carrying in Crown Heights
Rabbi Yosef Yeshaya Braun is a signatory of the 2 Iyar ruling and the later Crown Heights notices concerning the advertised eruv.
The practical Beis Din guidance
Even before the public controversy of 5776, the official Tishrei guides based on Rabbi Braun's shiurim stated the practice plainly: “Here in the neighborhood there is no eruv.” They therefore prohibit carrying on both Shabbos and Yom Kippur.
The guidance places the issue in ordinary halacha, including the things people are tempted to hand to a child or non-Jew. The absence of an eruv remains the starting point; any genuine medical or life-saving need follows its own halachos.
The ruling with Rabbi Schwei
Rabbi Braun and Rabbi Schwei wrote that carrying in the neighborhood streets was absolutely forbidden and that the proposed eruv was treated as nonexistent.
The later rulings with Rabbi Osdoba
Rabbi Braun and Rabbi Osdoba repeated the prohibition when the eruv was advertised again. Their 5782 notice describes the rejection of the eruv as the unanimous position of the Crown Heights Rabbonim. The following year they answered the argument that exterior walls could validate the route and ruled that it changed nothing.
The most recent notice in the present collection again bears Rabbi Braun's printed name and states that carrying in Crown Heights is prohibited (4 Tishrei 5786). The visible handwritten autograph on that scan is Rabbi Osdoba's.