The International STa"M Forum

Over the past several years I keep getting added onto Sta"m and Safrus whatsapp groups, mostly Israeli in origin. I am currently part of about 25 such groups and while I hardly have time to follow them and rarely post on them, I have found them useful on occasion.  The best example of how they are useful to me would be in an emergency situation such as when I have a sofer in Israel that I usually buy from and I want his work computer checked before he sends it to me -  but the regular computer guy is not available -  I will post on the groups looking for someone else in his area who does computer checking.  Or sometimes my metayeg is busy so I will post that I am looking for a metayeg in a certain area in Israel. For such situations, the Israeli whatsapp groups are extremely helpful. Occasionally too, If I urgently need something, and I cannot get it from my regular trusted sofrim or suppliers, I may advertise that I am looking for a particular item and will usually ...

 Received the following question: Someone is giving me an old Torah that needs me to review and fix many mistakes and faded letters. How do I charge? I'm assuming by the hour. What's the going rate for this work in the USA?

 One of the WhatsApp's Safrut group I am on gave a file containing a transperency and fold tikkun for a Ktav Chabad mezuzah size 20.  The group mentioned that everyone is allowed to give the tikkun to others I had to upload it on a Google drive in order to share it. Here is a link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1LmWtIfHp2U3pbOU0FLTPmqCqsSziR5WQ/view?usp=sharing

I recently found this youtube channel that posts shiurim on STaM by Rabbi Shlomo Mulaaum.  https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5vQkMHPPMfYqcYBkujk2gw Very good videos! 

I was "surfing the web" as they say looking for anything STaM related and I found this klaf manufacturing company that sells klaf online. https://ktavsofer.co.il/ The prices look very tempting, but does anyone know or buy from them? I do not want to experience another Megillah klaf that is very hairy and not smooth to write on. (Let just say the "Too good to be true" idea came up in that purchase) (Of course, any purchases will be done after Tisha bAv) As always, thanks for the help!  Michael Arashebn 

This is a sketch of a common shailo. Please ignore the right foot, its just a bit of a rough sketch . The left foot is the one with the problem. It does not protrude properly on the left. But it does have enough that it is not a shinuy tzurah (to a ches) . It is borderline and these are common and tricky. Do you fix this or put in gniza? You can't really ask a child since the child cannot rule on a ches. It's a tough call....

IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT POST UPDATED WITH THE LETTER BELOW Any sofer using NAHARI ink purchased in the past 6 months or so should stop using it immediately. It seems that there are three problems, which I outline below: 1. The recent batches of ink are hard to write with and the ink can spread and expand after a letter is written (not sure how long after this happens) making the letter thick and ugly and sometime can loose its shape. 2. The ink bleeds to the back and is visible on the back of the parchment.This becomes is visible only after a few weeks. I have already seen it on items sent to me from sofrim in Israel (see picture). This is a problem for mechikos, because places where the ink was rubbed out, the erased ink will reappear a few weeks later under (in brown or grey) under the new writing. So if you make a mechikah, even if you erased it well, the original writing will come back lightly and it cannot be erased. 3. If parshiyos and mezuzos or written yer...

A question I received: A mezuzah has a cut in it, and I'm worried it will get bigger and tear into a letter. Am I allowed to tape it with regular tape from the back?  Or does it need a parchment patch?

I am an apart of this "Tips for Soferim" group and this notice was posted:  זוהי הודעת תפוצה "לכל" סופרי היקרים... עקב פגם בדיו נהרי בסמיכות רגילה/ בינונית. מהיצור של ה4 חודשים האחרונים שגורם שהדיו לא מתייבש מספיק ואחכ נדבק לקלף שמעליו ומשאיר סימנים של אותיות חלשות .גם בחבילות מזוזות וגם בפרשיות וסת ומגילות . אם אתה לא משתמש בדיו זה, ראה הודעה זו כמיותרת. ואם אתה משתמש בדיו הזה. אנא ממכם בדקו היטב אם נתקלתם בבעיה כזו ותזהרו מאד מנזקים שיכולים להיות גבוהים מאד....... ותחליפו במיידי הדיו.  ותבדקו היטב את מה שכבר כתבתם, אם זה מזוזות, אז שלא נדבקו מזוזות אחת לשני או שהדיו עבר למזוזות מעליהם לאחר שהנחם אותם אחת על השניה לאחר הכתיבה. ואם זה פרשיות או סת ומגילות שבגלגול הקלף לאחר הכתיבה, לא נדבקו והעבירו צבע וצורה של אותויות לקלף שמעל. מה שצריך לעשות במיידי זה לחכות הרבה הרבה שיתייבש ואחכ לא לגלגל חזק או לצופף חזק. אלא שיהיה מאוורר ולא מהודק של ידבק.... תודה שלמה

החתך בגג התי"ו נעשה אחר הכתיבה, ולכן התי"ו כשר ואין פסול של חסרון היקף גויל, כי נכתב בכשרות. טוב להדביק מטלית מאחורי הקלף לחזק את הקלף, שלא יתפתח קרע. הה"א מוקפת גויל ואין החתך מגיע אליה. אבל אם היה מגיע החתך אליה, היה צריך לגרר ביניהם. כי אע"פ שאנו מקילים בחסרון היקף גויל לאחר שעת הכתיבה, היינו רק בנוגע להיקף גויל הנוגע לאות עצמה, אבל לא לדין היקף גויל שצ"ל בין שתי אותיות. (ואמנם שאלה זו במחלוקת האחרונים, אבל יש להחמיר ולגרר ביניהם, ולא לסמוך על הקולא שאין היקף גויל לאחר שעת הכתיבה. כי דין היקף גויל שבין האותיות, חמור מדין היקף גויל לאות עצמו).

This was posted in another forum and there were various opinions. It was my opinion to be machshir as is (and to fix) while some felt a tinok should be asked. I showed this to Rav Reuvain Mendlowitz and he agreed that a tinok wasn't required.

Today many sofrim find themselves in places that lack physical access to an expert posek in Stam. Especially the last number of months with few traveling and many wary of meeting with others unless maintaining some social distancing and wearing of masks, access to poskim via phone, email, text or WhatsApp has become a greater need. If anyone would like to share the name/s, a little bit about the posek/poskim and means to access him/them please do so in the comments.

תיבה יתירה בסת"ם פוסלת. ולא מועיל כאן גרירת היתר, כי ישאר שיעור ט' אותיות [קטנות עכ"פ] והוא שיעור ריוח פרשה סתומה באמצע הפרשה. ועל כן צריכה המזוזה הזאת גניזה. דרך אגב: ככל הנראה המזוזה הזאת לא עברה הגהה כלל !!! (קשה לי להניח שמגיה לא ישים לב לדבר כזה)

Recently a person reached out to me if I can write him a Megillah Shir HaShirim.  Now I did some research on the tikkun of a Megillah Shir HaShirim and I got two layouts:  Tikkun A:   Tikkun B:   As you can see just from the first page, in Tikkun A there are many shiur parshiyahs there; however, in tikkun B there are no shiur parshiyahs. Is there any Nafkah minah from the two tikkunim?  Which tikkun is used by the Chabad community?  Thank you everyone for the help!