[Avodah] Yichud and fostering

[Micha Berger]

On Tue, Nov 28, 2006 at 11:00:02AM +0000, Dov Kay wrote:
: My wife and I know a young unmarried lady in town who fosters children.
:                                ....  She eventually contacted a dayan in 
: London who permitted the boy to live with our friend for a month until a 
: permanent foster family could be found.

R' Dovid Cohen (Flatbush) who is Ohel's poseiq, is quite meiqil, since
foster care is inherently a she'as hadechaq. In this he follows Rav
Moshe -- the basic din holds, minus every possible qulah.

To possibly tie this into another thread: He holds that child who enters
the home before puberty (regardless of current age) may be kissed and
hugged as one would ones own children.

Given the shortage of frum foster homes, there is strong resemblence to
the gemara's "al tehi tzadiq harbei". The kids aren't  drowning, but
there are souls at stake.

This wasn't lema'aseh for nidon didan, but a number of poseqim (I recall
the Tzitz Eliezer VI, but not whom else) permit treating a child who
entered your home in infancy as one's own child for all of these dinim.
There is a story/legend of RYBS laughing at someone for asking this
she'eilah before adopting a newborn. As his talmidim tell it, RYBS
did so so that the person would have no doubts about the certainty and
lechat-chilah nature of his pesaq.

OTOH, I know from L adoptive parents that the LR pasqened lechumrah
regardless of when the child enters the home.

Tir'u baTov!
-mi

-- 
Micha Berger             Like a bird, man can reach undreamed-of
micha at aishdas.org        heights as long as he works his wings.
http://www.aishdas.org   But if he relaxes them for but one minute,
Fax: (270) 514-1507      he plummets downward.   - Rav Yisrael Salanter