Davening Parts of Shabbat Mincha Before Mincha Gedola to Ensure A Minyan

QUESTION

St. Louis Park, Minnesota

In our shul, we currently have Mincha on Shabbat right after Kiddush. I’m trying to keep it going as long as possible because our minyanim are slim, especially if it involves coming back out in the cold to a shul that currently does not offer seudah shelishit.

Due to the time of Mincha Gedola, we have a sizable time gap between Kiddush and Mincha. We have already moved Shacharit as late as possible and I give a small shiur to fill part of the gap, but some congregants are unhappy. We currently begin Ashrei in time to reach Mincha Gedola by the Amidah.

Is there any room for greater leniency to start earlier? Could we time it such that we reach Mincha Gedola by hazarat hashatz or perhaps even start Mincha after chatzot? Also, is it permissible lekhatchilah to calculate the 30 minutes after Chatzot according to sha’ot zemaniyot rather than as a fixed 30 minutes (which seems to be Hebcal’s inclination)?

ANSWER

First, it would help to weigh out the importance of having Mincha in the shul compared to the potential drawbacks that come with it.

While you are ensuring attendance for Mincha, you expressed that some members are unhappy and feeling burdened by it. This may possibly reduce attendance at Shacharit/Musaf as a result.

As well, to accommodate Mincha, you are moving Shacharit later, which likely will mean missing sof zman keriat Shema (the latest time for saying Shema). On the other hand, many congregants might not say Shema at home at all, and even if they do, they may not say it with the berakhot at the proper time.

Given all this, which option is best?

From a purely halakhic perspective, it would be equally (if not more) valid to have an earlier Shacharit with keriat shema at its proper time if that would get the same or more people coming to shul, and less tircha (bother or difficulty) and grumbling.

However, I do realize that:

Even an earlier Shacharit might mean that a lot of people are not coming on time and are not saying Shema at its proper time. However, still, more people will recite shema in its right time than if the shacharit service doesn’t allow any of its attendees to say it in the correct time.
There are other factors than just narrowly defined halakhic ones, such as what it means in terms of the sense of a shul that is still surviving and operating in these times ¹.

Therefore, if you feel that given all the above, the tradeoffs are worth doing Mincha if it can be done at the halakhically proper time, then I would say the following:

You can definitely use a half-hour sha’ah zmanit (proportional hour) (Rema OH 233:1, Sha’ar HaTziyun OH 233:8).
B’dieved, poskim rule that you fulfill your obligation if you did keriat HaTorah on Shabbat Mincha after chatzot but before 12:30 (proportional hours). For a discussion of this, see Tzitz Eliezer 10:20, Siddur Ya’avetz 125b:10-11, and Rivevot Efraim 7:268. The situation you describe is certainly sha’at hedechak, and if doing it this way will allow you to not only do keriat HaTorah with a minyan, but also have a minyan for Mincha Amidah, then I would definitely say sha’at hedechak k’b’dieved dami, and that’s what you should do. Of course, if you can do it later, albeit with some grumbling from congregants, then it’s less clear that you can rely on this leniency. ’ll leave it to you to figure out that calculus.
As to the davening the Amidah between 12:00 and 12:30 (proportional hours), the Mishnah Berurah 233:2 cites Achronim that say that you might be yotzei during this time. It seems here, too, if this is necessary for tefilah betzibur and otherwise many will not daven Mincha at all, then I think you can rely on those poskim. However, this is a bigger stretch, so I would only do this if you feel that if there were no minyan, people probably wouldn’t daven Mincha, and if it were later, they wouldn’t stay.

1 This question was posed during Covid-19, during which many shuls were either fully or partially closed, or had many restrictions on attendance.