The International STa"M Forum

It is with great shock and sadness that I wish to share the news of the untimely passing of Harav Hagoan R' Mordechai Friedlander, one of the top Rabbonim in Sta"m and Moreh Tzedek of the Vaad Mishmeres Stam ( Yerushalayim) and Badatz Eida Hacharedis. Besides for being a giant posek and a top class Moreh Horoeh, Rav Friedlander had the ability to connect to thousands of talmidim with his approachable and warm demeanour, and his fluency in Hebrew, Yiddish and English meant that sofrim from all nationalities and backgrounds were able to have a shprach with him. He was often quoted on this forum. This is an enormous loss for us all and he will be greatly missed by the Sta"m community. We wish his family much comfort and Besuros Tovos to all.

Does anyone know a source or reason why the Aron Kodesh stays open during the entire hakafos for a Hachnasos Sefer Torah?  Is this the correct minhag? This is what I have seen by all the places that I have been to. It seems that since the Aron Kodesh is emptied out from all its Sifrei Torah there is no issue of disrespect. (That is why we do not keep the Aron Kodesh open on other occasions since there are other Sifrei Torah inside and it would be disrespectful to leave it open.) However, this still does not explain why we  דוקא leave open the Aron Kodesh.

This is just a sketch but it is not uncommon to see this type of tzurah and doesn't seem to bother too many people. Is it OK?

B"H Does anyone know where the sefer Zichron Eliyahu זכרון אליהו on Hilchos Tefillin is sold? Is the new version now in print? Freiliche Chanukah,

A frum woman who is a family friend is doing a master's degree in ritual objects, and, for a project, would like to observe and document the process of making peshutim batim.  Does anyone know of a batim macher in Brooklyn that would be open to this? Thanks, and a freilikhn Chanukah!

I am not clear if this biur halacha allows to fix only a nifsak that top is less then shiur or also a letter that was written with a yerech less than melo os.

MY THOUGHTS ON THIS REISH M''B WRITES IN SIMAN 36 REISH : ויריכה יהיה קצר ואם עשה רגל הריש קצר כמו יוד די בזה בדיעבד   WE ALL REMEMBER MB 32/44 : מלא אות קטנה היינו יוד ובקוץ התחתון שלו   (הקול סופרים  באות ד לכאורה חולק  שהרי מסביר או"ק  היינו עובי קולמס )  יד אפרים לומד שבמלא או"ק צריך תינוק והמ"ב מביאו  בדף 88 ביאור הלכה  ד"ה כשר וחולק עליו NOW THE QUESTION IS:  A REGEL  REISH SHOULDN'T BE TOO FULL KULMUSIM SIZE OF YUD IS LARGER THEN KULMUS-PROBABLY KULMUS AND HALF IS IT POSSIBLE THAT ONE AND A HALF KULMUSIM IS BDIEVED BUT ITS SUPPOSED TO BE SHORTER THAN 2 KULMUSIM. THREE EXPLANATIONS: 1)the word bdieved means should be longer but not that the os is bdieved after the fact 2)can we explain רגל הריש קצר כמו "רגל" היוד 3)can we explain יריכה יהיה קצר " מגגה" כדי  ACCORDING TO 1 KOSHER ACCORDING TO 2 LECHATCHILA ACCORDING TO 3 KOSHER BDIEVED ACCORDING TO YAD EFRAIM -SHALAS TINOK ומי שרוצה להחמיר כיד אפרים

This  24 cm sefer torah vanished while being transported by sofer to USA this past summer. Lets leave the exact investigation to the experts,however if anybody is offered this sefer or is called in to do a siyum or has any idea as to the whereabouts please contact me thesofer@yahoo.com

Full situation: in the last line, as I finished the line, I realized I had forgotten the Yud of Veyehi. I thought I had enough space to add but now I'm afraid it's too close to Mimochoras. 1) is it ok as it is? 2) if it's not, how can I fix it? If I make the Mem of mimochoras smaller is it Chok tochos ? 3) I welcome any other comments on the writing YK

This is primarily directed to Rav Moshe. I've seen a number of times that you refer to an os gedola as the shiur for kuba/zanav. I'm aware of Rav Elyashiv's opinion that the shiur is an os ketana (width of a Vav/Yud) and The Shevet Halevi (chelek 2 siman 155) writes that the shiur is a word (which word?) and then he says, "and less than a full word tzarich le'ayen ledina, nevertheless the width of a Vav or Yud certainly doesn't pasel". (Based on this, more than a Vav/Yud (which is less than an os gedola) may be the shiur.) What is the source for an os gedola?

I don't have a relationship with the sofer so I don't know if this is a fluke or if he and those who've been checking his parshios have overlooked it. He's been writing for decades. We sometimes lose sight of the bigger picture when focusing on individual letters/the smallest details so it's important we remember make sure the spacing is correct, the shiur parshios have the correct shiurim and that ends of lines don't form kuba/zanav. I've often found issues with these even by very good sofrim.

Hello, I received an order for a custom 11 line Megillah, it is for an Adom Chashuv and the person who is buying it for him wants "all" the Hiddurim. He also wants the ksav to be very large since it is for an older person so about 1.6mm or 1.8mm per line. When I called my Klaf contact to order the special sizing he mentioned that there is a new tikkun from R' Chinagel on the 11 line Megillah that is more Mehudar. Basically, the columns are much narrower and therefore they are taller than wider so it is more Mehudar. I never heard of this extra Hiddur so I called R' Chinagel and he told me that the Hiddur is basically because it is easier to Lein from a narrower column and also that the word "Amudim" means standing (taller than wider), and the regular Tikkun for 11 lines is wider than taller so it isn't really called Amudim. I got my hands on some pages of this Tikkun and I am not so crazy about it, maybe I am just used to typical 11 line Megill

היו"ד [השניה ב'עיניך'] עוקץ שמאל כמעט שוה באורך לרגל ימין הקצרה -  נראה לי שזו כשרה כי הרגל ועוקץ קצרים ביותר, ושום תינוק לא יטעה בה לקרותה חי"ת. וראוי לתקן צורתה, ע"י הוספת מעט דיו להאריך מעט את רגל ימין. [אבל  רק מעט,  לא הרבה שלא תהא בעיה של שיעור ו'].

A Gutte Voch, Despite it being  better to use sayros (hairs) from davka an egel (calf) when wrapping tefillin parshiyos, most sofrim I know use from an older cow  because the egel hairs are generally too short to wrap around properly (esp by vehoya im shamoah where the sayros must be long to extend externally). I have recently been told about a species of calf that have longer tails despite being very young and this is ideal for a sofer to use when wrapping tefillin. Can anyone provide more info on this? Does anyone know where such tails can be obtained? Thanks

Using a guest account to post this question. My email is RebYonason@gmail.com. Thank you. My new all black retzuos have lots of visible particles that come off every day (first time using all black and realizing this makes the particles much more noticeable) It's been 7 months since I bought them new but they keep shedding little pieces. I place a new piece of paper down when I take them out every day and the black dust falls off every time. I have to keep putting the paper with the tefillin dust in shaimos all the time. I've tried going over the retzuos many times with cloth to collect all the loose pieces but it doesn't seem to stop it at all, and it in fact ends up just rubbing away some of the ink on the flat shiny side. How do I stop this issue? Are there any shitas to rely on that once the particles leave the tefillin they are no longer kadosh? Right now the best I can do is to say "asey docheh lo sasei" in terms of being m'kayem the mitzvah while

(Customer is ashkenazi)