[Avodah] Counting a Wife Beater Toward a Minyan

[Zev Sero]

Micha Berger wrote:

> At 9:06am EST this morning, R Dmitry Kreslavskiy (CC-ed; a friend of mine from
> around the neighborhood) commented:
>     So how does this work? If a person is a home abuser, G-d forbid, and
>     hits his wife, that means he cannot be counted towards a minyan? So
>     what happens if he davens with another group of 9 unsuspecting
>     people? Is such davening not considered davening with a minyan?
> 
> To which I replied:
>     I think you're right. I think the people would be beshogegim not
>     davening with a minyan. (Unless a rasha, like a qatan, could be
>     counted in extremis at the 10th toward a minyan with sefarim present.)
> 
>     It's certainly worth bouncing of the chevrah on Avodah.
> 
> So, I'm asking.... What do you think?

I don't think it works like that.  I haven't seen anywhere that a rasha
doesn't count toward a minyan; all I've seen is that one may not count
him.  The most straighforward reading is that he *does* count, but one
must pretend otherwise.  If we know that we have nine plus a rasha we
must not say a davar shebikdusha, even though there really is a minyan
present.  It's a knas, not a change in metzius.  We punish him by
treating him as if he weren't there.  But in fact he is there, and
therefore there is a minyan.  After all, the ten meraglim were an eidah;
just not an eidah we would care to be associated with.  So if the other
nine don't know about the rasha then there's no problem.

-- 
Zev Sero                      The trouble with socialism is that you
zev at sero.name                 eventually run out of other people’s money
                                                     - Margaret Thatcher