[Avodah] New Brachos

[Arie Folger]

RAM pontificated on post-Talmudic berakhot, and how those who say them
understand the concept of berakhah levatalah.

While I cannot answer the above conundrum, he also wrote:

> The second exception was mentioned in the thread about the Bracha
> Acharona on granola bars. Namely, the possibility that we might have
> to say an unheard-of bracha. Now, this is not a new halacha; I learned
> it -- and the Tosfos it is based on -- decades ago in regard to Puffed
> Wheat cereal. But I never understood it. What is the havamina to say
> such a bracha?

Based on my recent investigation into these matters, I believe that we
do not generally hold that Chazal legislated the exact wording of
blessings. Rather, they decreed particular forms we must observe.

Thus, there is a discussion in the gemara about whether one says motzi
le'hem min ha-aretz or *ha*motzi...

Likewise Magen Avraham and others suggest that since a convert cannot
say shelo 'assani goy, since he wasn't made Jewish; he made himself,
therefore he should say she'assani ger or shehikhnissani ta'hat kanfei
hashekhinah. They do not have any source for this, and it seems that
they understand there to be an obligation to recite three shelo
'assani blessings (women 2, and indeed, they seem to be completing the
triad by adding she'assani kirtzono). Since the standard blessing
cannot be recited, a variant will do just fine. (To be fair, Mishnah
Verurah, which quotes the two views, also suggest not saying anything,
so this is no slam dunk reasoning.)

That also seems to be the reasoning behinds those who accept Vaye'etar
Yits'haq's correction of shelo 'assani goy to shelo 'assani nokhri,
based on the reasoning that lashon miqra 'adif. Why would that matter,
how can they correct blessings, when the Talmud and Tosefta and all
ancient sources have shelo 'assani goy? Probably for the same reason.

This same reasoning may be what prompts the 'al neqiyut yadayim and
'al peirot haadamah. Well founded hypercorrections, which ought to be
permissible, as they are in the spirit of the original rabbinic
enactment.

Kol tuv,
-- 
Arie Folger,
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