[Avodah] Geirus

[Micha Berger]

Qabbalas ol mitzvos is required of the geir qatan. "Ve'im higdilu
yekholim limchos" (Kesuvos 11a).

There is a logistic problem making it impossible to time this, since
geirus would require the deOraisa standard of 2 sa'aros. And once chal,
it's binding forever so the window of opportunity is all of tokh kedei
dibur from growing that second sa'ar. The gemara says "sha'ah achas",
which here means "one point in time" not an hour, but there is no
pragmatic difference in terms of the impossibility of determination.

This is why lemaaseh we assume that a child in that situation who acted
as a member of the shomer Torah umitzvos community from before that time
until after is a valid geir.

But in terms of our discussion, KOM (or QOM, as I would transliterate it)
is required as part of geirus; the question with qetanim is only in how
one does that.

As for the Rambam, I reposted the following summary of a talk by RYBS
(May '68, Nordlicht #5286) by R' Rivlin and R' Josh Rapps at
<http://www.aishdas.org/avodah/vol05/v05n069.shtml#05>.

We also argued this topic at length in vol4, around 254 (when I drag
in the Rambam at <http://www.aishdas.org/avodah/vol04/v04n254.shtml#09>
to 270 or so (which also forked into the thread titled "Geirus for
Marriage").

Here's how I read the Rambam (from v4n256), some noted rav objected off
list (I don't recall who, this was 8-1/2 years ago), but my error was
never explained. 

> However, in [Issurei Bi'ah] 13:12 the Rambam states that in the days
> of David and Shelomo, when we had reason to supspect someone's motives,
> we tried not to make geirim. And, when hedyotos did, so now we're talking
> bedi'eved, "Vihayu Beis Din haGadol chosheshin lahen. Lo dochin osan,
> achar shetivlu bichol makom. Bilo mekarvin osan ad shetiya'eh acharison.

> When we get to 13:14, where they did geirus and omitted to check his
> motives before hand, if they know that he had an ulterior motive,
> "yatza miklal hagoyim, vechosheshin lo ad sheyisba'eir tzidkaso". In
> a case of ignorance, he's not bechezkas goy, but again we see the word
> "chosheshin" -- we can't say he is a Jew either.

> If a safeik of whether he holds a secondary proper motive in addition to
> the improper one produces a cheshash in the geirus, I can't see how one
> can argue that the Rambam holds that with a chazakah that the 2nd motive
> doesn't exist (e.g. an engaged person who converts under the auspices
> of three men who don't believe halachah is binding) can produce a geir.

> So then what about 13:13 itself -- the geirus of Shimshon and Shelomo's
> wives? It very explicitely says "vichashvun hakasuv ki'ilu hein goyos,
> ubi'isuran omdin". The biblical examples of people who went through the
> forms, married Jews, but were not mekabeil ol mitzvos, are all non-Jews!

My naive reading of the Rambam makes a chiluq between the criterion for
geirus and the criterion for having to assume geirus. RYBS resolves the
same difficulty by making a tzvei dinim between ceasing to be a non-Jew
and becoming a geir tzedeq. One is not permitted lechat-khilah to marry
someone who wasn't meqabeil ol mitzvos. However, the marriage would
be binding bedi'eved, and all the other chiyuvim bein adam lachaveiro
(eg hashavas aveidah) would apply.

I do not see how R' Uzziel's shitah, that KOM isn't required as long
as the person accepts peoplehood, is supportable by the Rambam. The
Rambam clearly states that at some level "be'issuran omedin" and the
Mishpetei Uzziel is allowing a BD to choose this course lechat-khilah
(admittedly in suboptimal circumstances).

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             A person lives with himself for seventy years,
micha at aishdas.org        and after it is all over, he still does not
http://www.aishdas.org   know himself.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                            - Rav Yisrael Salanter