[Avodah] t a fyneral

[kennethgmiller at juno.com]

R' Joseph Kaplan asked:
> does the fact that we're talking about minhagim affecting
> mourners, who are in a difficult emotional state, affect
> the answer to these questions?  That is, should the
> standards governing demanding that a mourner follow a minhag
> of mourning that he/she finds emotionally problematic be the
> same as, for example, a rabbi deciding whether to insist
> that a male not put on tefillin in the rabbi's shul on chol
> HaMoed?

I suspect your point is that when someone is "in a difficult emotional state", he should be granted more leeway, and should be allowed to do that which he feels appropriate even if contrary to local minhag, as opposed to a purely ritual minhag like tefilin on Chol Hamoed.

On the one hand, my heart wants to agree. It certainly seems like such a situation counts as a "shaas hadchak", with all the leniencies that go with it. I even recall a principle that "we go l'kula in aveilus". (It's probably a too-frequently misused principle, but I'm pretty sure that it does exist.)

But on the other hand, I think that it is also fair to say that when someone is "in a difficult emotional state", that which *feels* the best may not actually *be* what's best. Indeed, aninus is a strong example of this: Haven't there been many people who have suddenly lost the person closest to them, and then were denied the comfort of familiar rituals, be they tefillin, shul, or whatever?

My heart goes out to those who were genuinely hurt by how the rules of the Chevra Kadisha impacted them. But I'd like to think that these minhagim did not develop in an arbitrary manner, and that they tend to be beneficial.

Akiva Miller

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