An ethical dilemma
It was a classic case of inclusion vs. tzarchei tzibur, which I think translates roughly as "a burden on the congregation". (The sefer Torah/Torah scroll is rolled to the correct place before the service, whenever possible, to avoid tzarchei tzibur--the congregation shouldn't be burdened with having to wait for a "holy rolling." :) )
What should a congregation do when one of the people who volunteers to lein Torah/do k'riat haTorah/read from the Torah scroll during the chazzan's (cantor's) vacation is well known to have been slowed down considerably by a stroke?
To make an excruciatingly long story mercifully short, seven aliyot took over 50 minutes.
What should a congregation do when one of the people who volunteers to lein Torah/do k'riat haTorah/read from the Torah scroll during the chazzan's (cantor's) vacation is well known to have been slowed down considerably by a stroke?
To make an excruciatingly long story mercifully short, seven aliyot took over 50 minutes.
posted by Shira Salamone at 12:24 AM
4 Comments:
The answer is--not much. When I was in college, a man in his early 40's came to our minyan, the only Orthodox one in the area, to say kaddish. He would frequently volunteer to lead either Minchah or Ma'ariv. His Hebrew wasn't very good at all, so it took FOREVER to get through the repetition of the Amidah at Minchah. The gabbaim didn't know what to do, but they eventually came to the conclusion that they couldn't really do anything. They tried to steer him to leading Ma'ariv, since there's very little praying out loud for the leader or anyone else.
But this wasn't even someone we knew. For a regular congregant with a disabling illness? Well, what if it was (G-d forbid) you?
Yeah, that's pretty much why we let him lein.
Happened at our women's tefilah group.
I think shul should be a safe place for people...I know that we davka let the woman do it, because it would be even worse if these people stopped coming to shul.
We see it this way: for ages, people have been excluded (the aliya per se is not the issue at all). Now that we can include, we should do it.
"I think shul should be a safe place for people"
Agreed.
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