Is the Khaf sofit in 'vaderekh' fixable?
Rabbi Reuvain Mendlowitz clarifies his position on Ksav Chabad (and my final thoughts)
Last week I posted some thoughts in response to a public lecture given by Rabbi Reuvain Mendlowitz regarding Ksav Chabad (the Alter Rebbe's ksav). I felt he did not represent the issue fairly, and since I had received questions about it from a number of people I felt it made sense to write a general response. After I posted my response on this forum, Rabbi Mendlowitz reached out to me by email and we ended up having a respectful and productive email exchange regarding the relevant issues surrounding Ksav Chabad. His position is a lot clearer to me now, and I think he also took certain things on board that I clarified with him. The purpose of the Stam Forum (at least back in it's heyday before all the whats app groups took over) was to connect sofrim from around the world, to promote achdus and build bridges, as well as to offer support and advice. In that spirit, I felt I should write a follow up post, to clarify some of the issues and misconception...
Yikes. The gug is longer than the regel. No way to fix. The most lenient opinions who are macshir (with shailos tinok) are when they are even or regel slightly longer (provided of course the regel goes down lower like a chof pshutah)
ReplyDeletepasul gamur! I also seriously question if this sofer can be relied upon as it's a blatant and obvious psul
ReplyDeleteWe have examples of STaM from the times of the Rishonim where the Sofer stretched a final kaf. Apparently they considered it kosher as long as the regel went obviously below the line. In any case nowadays we would definitely not accept this.
ReplyDeleteThe bigger question I always have when I see things like this is that it shows clearly that the sofer is an am haaretz, so how can we trust that he wrote anything k'halacha.
ReplyDeleteThe bigger question I always have when I see things like this is that it shows clearly that the sofer is an am haaretz, so how can we trust that he wrote anything k'halacha.
ReplyDeleteThe bigger question I always have when I see things like this is that it shows clearly that the sofer is an am haaretz, so how can we trust that he wrote anything k'halacha.
ReplyDeleteNo idea, why my things keep posting in duplicate or triplicate. But I apologize.
ReplyDelete