[Avodah] The Molad of Tamuz

[Micha Berger]

On Tue, Jul 03, 2018 at 02:06:47AM -0400, Zev Sero via Avodah wrote:
:              The purpose of the announcement seems obvious: as he
: himself notes there are multiple sources saying that it's proper to
: know when the molad is, and the most efficient way to let people
: know is for it to be announced just before they need the
: information....

I do not believe this is true. If it were, the most efficient way would
be to announce the time in local standard time. (And then I wouldn't
have room to speculate whether the clock being used is really J-m Mean
Time rather than mean time for some meridian further east.) Aside from
a tiny minority of us pendants, who bothers subtracting out the time to
know what the announcement means to them?

When I asked an LOR this question I was given a prettier explanation
for the minhag. ("Prettiness" being subjective, of course.)

The Shaar Hakollel (26:7) writes that Birkhas haChodesh is a
reenactment of the idea that the Sanhedrin would recite a tefillah
when they were meqadshim hachodesh. (Sofrim 19:9) We therefore
announce the time as they did, using the clock they would have.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Weeds are flowers too
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