berachot Archives | Rosh Yeshiva Responds

7 05, 2021

Tefilah and Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

May 7th, 2021|Berakhot, Disabilities, Orach Chayim, Shema and Shemoneh Esrei|

QUESTION

Washington, D.C.

The following is a personal and complicated question, and I totally understand if you don’t have time to answer it, but I thought I’d give it a shot:

I have been diagnosed with OCD for a few years, and one of the ways that manifests itself for me is that, on a daily basis, I doubt whether I have said parts of davening correctly (especially Shema where wrong pronunciation prevents fulfilment of the mitzvah, as far as I know), and repeat myself several times, or at least have a really strong urge to repeat myself.

I’m wondering if you think that

27 02, 2021

Berakhot for Latecomers to Megillah

February 27th, 2021|Berakhot, Orach Chayim, Purim|

QUESTION

New York, NY

I said berakhot and started leining megillah, for a small group of people, when one minute in, a few people show up. are any of the following workable solutions, for how they can be yotzei?

Restart from the beginning of the Megillah. If so, the new arrivals would say the berakhot, before we restart?
Pause, and have them read to themselves the first minute of the megillah, from their chumash, until they catch up. Here too, would they make sure to say the berakhot before doing that?

ANSWER

Either of those would work. Given that whichever solution you adopt, the rest of the people

26 02, 2021

Repeating Berakhot for Megillah if Interrupted for a Medical Call

February 26th, 2021|Berakhot, Orach Chayim, Purim|

QUESTION

Canada

If a ba’al korei gets an important call mid-megillah that they can’t ignore, can they continue the megillah from when the call came in or do they need to repeat the megillah? Should they repeat the berakhot?

ANSWER

The general halakha is that even a large interruption – כדי לגמור את כולה – is bedieved okay in the case of megillah (and pretty much everything else) – see Shulchan Arukh OC 690:5 and Rema. However, as Mishnah Berurah 690:18 points out, we find in Hilkhot Keriat Shema (Shulchan Arukh OC 65:1) that if the interruption was מחמת אונס, due to something out of your control, you do have to go

15 11, 2020

Hefseik in Sheva Berakhot

November 15th, 2020|Berakhot, Even HaEzer, Kiddushin and Ketubah|

QUESTION

Brooklyn, NY

Should I be concerned for hefseik when doing Sheva Berakhot at a chuppah?

If so, is asking someone to offer a personal (not liturgical) blessing to the couple, between Sheva Berakhot, constitute a hefseik?

(I want to have seven women each speak personally, after each of seven men recite a berakhah.)

(I assume having seven women offer translation wouldn’t be a hefseik, but this is different/personal.)

ANSWER

I have done something like this before. We rule

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