[Avodah] New Brachos

[Chana]

RAF writes

> You are quoting the paramount Sefardi qanai, while I was explaining a
> possible understanding of the Ashkenazi position. Apples and pears.

I agree.  The point I was trying to make to RAM was, that the Ashkenazi position makes a lot of sense.  If anything it seems to be the Sephardi position that I find hard to understand (which is the opposite of where he was coming from, as he said that he understood the Sephardi position, as it gelled with everything he had been taught, but could not understand the Ashkenzai position).

> The logic goes the opposite way. Quite obviously, most people don't
> have such gripes. Yes, we are exceedingly careful about not
> pronouncing G"d's Name unnecessarily, but we do generally pronounce it
> when praising Him in religious song and poetry, as well as in
> voluntary prayers (zemirot, te'hinot). Almost no one has a problem
> with this. So, merely pronouncing G"d's Name outside of the framework
> of Talmudically prescribed prayers isn't yet levatalah. Hence, the
> reason why it may be considered levatalah has to do with the formula
> of blessings.

I agree, and as you elaborate (and which I have snipped), this fits very nicely into the whole Ashkenazi framework

> However, that doesn't mean we can't innovate blessings at all, just
> that it is so dear and risky that only very seldom may a post Talmudic
> blessing appear.

I think it probably needs to be a bit stronger than that, given the way the rule is cited.  Whether the rule not to make post Talmudic brochos is indeed linked to the rule not to make post Talmudic gezeros (which is where we started) is interesting to consider (note they both source in the Rosh).  And you do need two caveats:

a) fiddling around with portions of the wording of a brocha does not constitute a new brocha; and
b) minhag may allow for violations of the no post Shas brochos rule.

But other than that, I think what you say makes perfect sense within the Ashkenazi context.

I do want however to spend some more time on the Sephardi position,  because, as I have tried to articulate, that one seems to be the more difficult to understand.  And I don't know how to reconcile RAF's research with the Sephardi position.  But even more basic than that, I don't understand what is underlying the Sephardi position. This is probably of far less interest to RAF than it is to me, because he lives fully within an Ashkenazi context, and hence the Sephardi limud is only really about a road not taken, although for learning's sake it no doubt has value.  But of course for me, who lives somewhere between the two worlds - as I have articulated before, it is of far greater relevance [For those who do not know my background, I am Ashkenazi who married a Sephardi man, and, because one of the big issues that worried me about the shiddush before I married was the vast differences in minhagim, we agreed before we married that while in terms of food related matters in the house we would keep the Sephardi minhagim, I would otherwise retain my own minhagim. That means that I say sheasani kerotzono with shem and malchus, bench lulav with a brocha (using the Ashkenazi method of shaking the lulav, not the Sephardi one) etc etc].

That is not to say I cannot quote the Sephardi position. The ROY teshuva in which he says that shasani k'rotzono must be said without Shem and malchus and if said with Shem and Malchus it is a brocha l'vatala is to be found in Yechave Da'at chelek 4 siman 4.  And indeed he holds that the Rosh's prohibition on new brochos post Shas is due to bracha l'vatala issues.  And I can indeed understand the chain of tradition that leads ROY to say this, a chain of tradition which fundamentally stems back to the Rambam who holds (as per the Magen Avraham siman 215) that the issur bracha l'vatala hu issur min haTorah shenemar lo tisa et hashem Hashem Elokecha l'shav (see fuller details as to where the Rambam states this in ROY's teshuva).

But what that ultimately seems to mean is that I do not understand the Rambam.

Or rather, if I was just looking at the pasuk of lo tisa, without any background, I might well understand it to mean when it says that one shall not take the name of Hashem in vain, that that meant that one was in violation of the lav if one mentioned Hashem's name at any time when it was not absolutely necessary.  And in fact it seems to me that we do take this approach with regard to the shem hameforash.  Even somebody who knows how to pronounce it (like the Kohen Gadol) cannot just go around pronouncing it, he only says it on Yom Kippur in the correct place etc.

But, it seems to me, to say what the Rambam seems to say (or at least the way that it is understood by the various commentators down the line to ROY) means that we have to say the same thing regarding the word(s) we use in our brochos.  We only know that a brocha is absolutely necessary if formulated by Chazal, and anything else is potentially not necessary.

Now it seems to me that the alternative way of reading the pasuk (the Ashkenazi way) is that lo tisa prohibits using Hashem's name in any context that is false (not just unnecessary).  That comfortably picks up the various shavuah issues, as they are only discussing giving malkos when somebody uses Hashem's name to say something that is false, like I ate when I didn't, or something that is known to everybody to be untrue.  And I can see how one can get to making brocha on something and then not eating it as being within the same category.

But logically the Ashkenazi way does not lead one to object on lo tisa grounds to sheasani kerotzono, as this statement is one of shevach which is undoubtedly true.

So how do we explain the Sephardi approach?  I don't think we can say according to the Sephardi approach (as RAF has logically said according to the Ashkenazi approach) that "Hence, the reason why it may be considered levatalah has to do with the formula of blessings." - because the formula of blessing appears unquestionably to be a d'rabbanan formulation, and yet according to the Sephardi approach deviating from it makes for a d'orisa violation.  Ie according to the Sephardi approach, there must be something in the use of Shem and Malchus that triggers off a d'orisa (that it would seem gets waived if the brocha is one instituted by Chazal, presumably because if Chazal say it is necessary then it is necessary, ie they define what is not in vain, but anything they don't specifically say is not in vain is in violation).  But that would seem logically to lead to saying Hashem's name in zmiros etc as being equally problematic, but the Sephardi tradition is not so.  Oh, and just to throw into the mix, ROY holds that despite the Mechaber not wanting the saying of hanoten l'ayef koach, that this is to be said with Shem and Malchus (although I confess the ultimate basis seems to be that while we can't find any evidence of it being in Shas, it is such an old brocha, known by the geonim, that it must really have been in Shas and gotten lost).  This is despite hanotel l'ayef koach really being a new brocha, whereas one could argue that sheasani krotzono is really a refiddling of the form of shelo asani isha so as to make it true in context.

So all this is really saying - how does one explain the Rambam, and I don't at this stage have any real answers to this.

> Arie Folger

Regards

Chana