[Avodah] wife lighting menora

[Micha Berger]

On Thu, Dec 02, 2010 at 03:36:04PM +0200, Goldmeier wrote:
> The Ram"a says the Yesh Omrim that is the basic minhag ashkenaz (I  
> think) based on the RAMBAM that everyone in the house should light their  
> own set of candles.

I understand the machloqes is that Sepharadim hold that if one is lighting
the mehadrin min hamehadrin of mosif veholeikh, then one isn't lighting
neir lekhol echad (the mehadrin version). However, Ashkenazim assume that
MMhM must include mehadrin, that one is lighting a set of mosif veholeikh
for each person.

See R' David Brofsky's piece in this year's Chanukah Package from Gush
<http://vbm-torah.org/archive/chag71/chan71.htm>.

...
> Where else do we find a wife being excluded from a mitzva because of the  
> exception of eeshto k'gufo? ...

Excluded from hiddur mitzvah as defined by one side of a machloqes. The
chiyuv mitzvah is neir ish ubeiso, one per family. That's tenuous enough
to perhaps explain why ner Chanukah is unique.

But I would like to suggest something else. The basic chiyuv is neir
ish ubeiso... for a husband and wife to light separately therefore might
ch"v imply pirud and a lack of shalom bayis. (Just thinking out loud.)

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

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Micha Berger             What we do for ourselves dies with us.
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