I wrote this several years ago and have held off posting until this year.
It's not about any current young member of the Synagogue I serve
On the Shabbat before
Purim, the Mesorah states we should read the regular Torah reading (almost always
Parshat Tetzaveh) then the special Maftir Zachor “Remember what Amalek did to
you,” (Deut 25:17) from a second scroll. The obligation to remember Amalek is
significant – Rambam considering it one of the 613 literally specified Torah
mandates (Taaseh 189). And then one should continue with the Haftarah connected
to this special Shabbat, ‘Pekaditi Et Asher Asah Amalek’ (I Sam 15).
The former is attested
in the Mishnah (Megillah 3:4) and the latter is already attested in the Tosefta
(3:1), cited in the Bavli 30a. Interestingly, there is a dispute about whether
these readings are to be pushed off until the Shabbat AFTER Purim when Purim
falls on a Friday. But the Halachah is entirely clear;
Mishneh Torah Hil Tefillah 13:20, SA OH 685:2.
The question is – what
to do when a BM has prepared the weekly portion Maftir and the weekly portion
connected Haftarah and there isn’t time for them to prepare the (34 verse)
Haftarah in the time between this being realised and the BM.
One piece is clear. We
should, as a community, read Maftir Zachor, from a scroll. And we will. That
can be done after the BM has read the last verses of Tetzaveh which can be done
as an Acharon Aliyah. It needn’t be read by the BM.
Various options as to
what to do at that point include, cancelling the learning the BM has done and
have someone else read the Haftarah or have the BM read the Haftarah they have
prepared.
It’s not really
something discussed in classical sources, not merely because the practice of a
BM reading Maftir and Haftarah as their BM is far more recent, but because the
entire way in which Torah was read has gone through a complete inversion since
the classical period. In the time of the Mishnah there was no ‘vicarious’ Torah
reading for anyone at all. Everyone was expected to read their own Aliyah
(Tosefta Megillah 3:12) and even Joseph Caro (d. 1575) protests against
‘vicarious’ Torah reading, “One who doesn’t know how to
read, one needs to protest against them so they do not go up to read from
the sefer torah.” (OH 139:2) That said there is clear shift in
Jewish practice already evident from the time of one of Caro’s great guiding
inspirations – R. Asher Ben Yehiel, the Rosh, who says, “The thing we do now,
where the shaliach tzibbur reads, that is so as not to
embarrass people who can’t read.” (on Megillah 21a 3:2).
There is a clear introduction, into
traditional Jewish practice, even in ultra-orthodoxy – of a desire not to
embarrass a person who is not capable of producing perfect leyning, “at the
drop of a hat.” The key word is “Cavod” – honour or more literally “appropriate
weight.” That word “Cavod” makes numerous appearances in Halahic discourse
around Torah reading; around the issue of calling a Cohen, or a second Cohen if
there is no Levi, or calling minors and, in orthodox environments, women. This
is behind my sense that an appropriate response to this challenge would need to
recognize of ‘Cavod HaOleh’ or ‘Cavod HaBar Mitzvah.’ It’s worth noting, in
this case, that BM has worked hard and well on material they have already
prepared and is not at fault.
More generally, the decent treatment of
humans is an absolutely central part of Jewish practice. Onaat Devarim –
mistreating people with words, is considered equivalent to Shifchut Damim,
drawing blood (Baba Metzia 58b). I think this is especially applicable to a
young person, on the edge of adulthood where there is a possibility, both, of
drawing a person into a welcoming adult engagement with Judaism, or presenting
Judaism as a Tirchah – un-necessary burden.
I’m grateful to my colleague, Rabbi Anthony
Lazarus Margill who shared this story about one of the great Poskim of 20th
world-Jewry, Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach. In that situation, the BM prepared
the Haftarah connected to the weekly Parasha instead of the Machar Chodesh
Haftarah which should have been prepared. This was in Israel where one could
assume an increased fluency in Hebrew, but there is a similarity to this case
in that, for this particular BM learning difficulties meant they could not
prepare the correct Haftarah afresh in the time available between spotting the
problem and the BM. Rav Auerbach permitted the wrong Haftarah and movingly
ensured there would be no issue during the service. The popular Orthodox
magazine, Mishpacha, reported;
“The [father]
escorted a proud and nervous [son] to shul. He prayed and hoped that the other
[congregants] would have compassion for his son, and not jump on him angrily
when he began reading a haftarah that was not Machar Chodesh.
As he entered,
he stopped in shock. There, in his Givat Shaul shul, sat Rav Shlomo Zalman
Auerbach. The venerated sage had braved the summer heat and trekked from his
Shaarei Chesed home all the way to Givat Shaul — to serve as a bulwark of
security and support for a little boy who’d poured his last grain of effort
into the wrong haftarah.” https://mishpacha.com/finding-a-finale/
The sefer Divrei Mordechai p.262 deals with
the situation where a BM had prepared the regular-week Haftarah for what should
have been Shabbat Shekalim. He suggests that the, “In order not to cause the
child soul-pain – Agmat Nefesh – the boy could read the blessing before the
haftarah, an adult could read the Haftarah for Shekalim, then the boy could
read the material ‘which he had prepared’, then the boy could read the
blessings after the Haftarah. The Rabbi wisely adds, “there is from this case a
warning to Gabbais to inform BMs ahead of time, which parasha and haftarah is
upon them to prepare.” Amen to that.[1]
I’m also grateful to another colleague who
suggested that, in this circumstance, a BM could read the first and last verse
from the correct Haftarah and read the material prepared in the middle. I’m
minded to suggest something a little different. The first verse of the correct
Haftarah is cited in all the major sources – but the last verse isn’t. I think
it would be appropriate for the BM to read the blessings before the Haftarah,
the first verse of the correct Haftarah, then switch to Haftarah Tetzaveh, read
that to its conclusion and then share the blessings after the Haftarah.
[1] I’m grateful to David
Chaim Wallach for this source, and also a source from Harerei Moshe about a
situation where someone starts the wrong Haftarah and only realises their error
mid-Haftarah (or perhaps more likely was made aware of the error!)
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