A Third U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel last Thursday pressed lawyers on whether a symbolic religious enclosure strung to a New Jersey town’s utility poles is an unconstitutional mixing of church and state.

The Tenafly Eruv Association has appealed a federal district judge’s order upholding Tenafly’s refusal to allow the hanging of an “eruv.” Within an eruv’s ambit, Orthodox Jews may push strollers or carry items on the Sabbath, activities otherwise forbidden by Talmudic law.