[Avodah] Kriah on seeing the makom hamikdash nowadays

Marty Bluke marty.bluke at gmail.com
Sun Jul 29 00:05:40 PDT 2007


After Tisha B'Av I looked at the halachos of zecher l'mikdash and was
bothered by the following question. There is a chiyuv to rip kriah
when you see the place where the Beis Hamikdash once stood. If you
return within 30 days there is no chiyuv again.

What is the din if you see the makom hamikdash live on a video camera,
for example Aish Hatorah's Kotel Cam. You are seeing the makom
hamikdash just as if you were there. Is there a chiyuv kriah? Would it
exempt you from tearing kriah if you saw it and then visited less then
30 days later?

I specifically picked a live camera because I think that a picture or
even a video doesn't bring out the same emotions. It is a picture of
the past, it isn;t now. However, the web cam is live, it is as if you
are there.

It is clear from the halacha that it is a din in seeing no matter
where you are, you don't need to be at the makom hamikdash and
therefore why should a vide feed be different?

This is clearly a question that has only come up in the past few
years, does anyone know of any contemporary poskim who have dealt with
the question?



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