Detailed Explanation
To Save a Synagogue invokes the following three laws:
1. May A avert a sudden significant monetary loss through temporarily using B's assets of lesser value?
If B is present, A may not do so without B's consent. If B is not available to consent or protest, Beis Din allows A to assume that B would consent to use his/her money temporarily to save a fellow Jew from suffering a clear greater financial loss so long as due compensation is guaranteed [Choshen Mishpat 308, 174].
2. One who loses an article to a lion, bear, and gales of area, rush of the river or similar circumstance of almost sure defeat despairs from ever retrieving it. Protesting the contrary is like crying over a collapsed home. While generally one should nevertheless return the article to the original owner, the finder would not be liable for damaging it [Choshen Mishpat 259:7].
3. If the "lion, bear, or gales of the sea" are encroaching towards the article but have yet to ensnare it, there is reason to argue that despair might not be a given, and the owner's protests might be legitimate. In such a situation, it is proper to treat the article as though it still belongs to the original owner [Chasam Sofer Yoreh Deah Responsum 234].
Application:
Although, as long as the widow did not protest, the townsmen were permitted to destroy her shack in order to save their "more expensive" house of worship, nonetheless they are required to immediately compensate her for the loss. We would not view the shack as though it was already lost to the "gales of the sea" and virtually ownerless; as the conflageration did not yet engulf the widow's shack. The widow's claim that her shack might not have burned down must be respected. Hence, the townsmen must rebuild her roof. [With respect to from which community fund they should draw the money, see Chasam Sofer Yoreh Deah Responsum 234].
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