Skip to main content

Thought for the Day: Check Your Mezuzos Twice in Seven Years (A PSA)

My father, עליו השלום, once let me change the spark plugs on our car.  He warned me, "Be sure to take off only one at a time!"  I was a bit confused, as I had no thought to take them off (all eight... this was the 70s) by the handful.  As I started to remove the first one, though, I realized what he meant.  For those of you who are still mystified: Before electronic ignition, power was sent to the spark plugs via a distributor cap/rotor system.  The rotor, of course, delivers the power to the attached wires sequentially.  However, the cylinders of the car do not fire sequentially.  That means that the order of the spark plugs connected to the distributor cap is crucial to the running of the car.  In fact, the results of mixing up the order is at best a poorly running engine and at worst real damage to the engine.  So of course I replaced them one at a time, being careful with the order.  Also of course, though, I told my father, "Don't worry Dad.  I took them all off one at a time; now I am going to start connecting them one at a time."  I was a rewarded with a brief look of panic until he realized I was kidding.

Mezuzos need to be checked twice in seven years.  That's the halacha.  Some people like to have them checked every year right before Rosh HaShanah; extra credit... but it is the days of awe, after all.  Some check them every Adar II.  Since there are seven Adar II's every 19 years; that works out to just under three times in seven years.  That's comfortably safe.  Others have them checked when they think about it.  That's a very, very bad plan.  It is also the schedule I have been using till yesterday...

You are allowed to leave your house without mezuzos for a day while you have them checked.  Some sofrim will make house calls; but it's really not a big deal to handle it yourself.  First rule: mezuzos have to be returned to the same doorpost from which they were removed.  There are two basic reasons for that.  First, you are not allowed to downgrade a doorway with a less expensive/less beautiful mezuzah.  Since not all mezuzos are created equal, you are safest to keep them where they are; otherwise you will almost certainly be downgrading some doorways (albeit upgrading others, but errors don't cancel in halacha; they add).  Secondly, not all doorways are created equal.  Doorways with arches, partial doorposts on one or both sides, sans doors, inside doors are all obligated at different levels and all potentially obligated less than a regular outside door.  Therefore, play it safe and put them back from whence they came.

The easiest way to ensure the correct placement is to simply put one piece of masking tape on the doorpost and one the mezuzah case (or ziplock bag, if you are taking them out of the case); then write the same number on both.  Assuming all are kosher and you get them replaced on the same day, you just put them up without a bracha.  Of course... life is never quite that simple.

One of ours was פסול/invalid.  When I say פסול, that is an understatement.  The only visible evidence left of the mezuzah was the smear of ink on the inside of the cellophane in which it had been wrapped.  How did that happen, you may be asking yourself.  It was the mezuzah from the deck, that had -- despite a waterproof holder -- been bested by several (I am embarrassed to tell you how many) Chicago winters.  No problem; we'll just get a new one -- extra beautiful, of course.  One serious issue, though.

What's the issue?  The mezuzos were going back up on the day they were removed, so no bracha should be required.  That one doorway (on the deck), though, hadn't had a mezuzah for Lord Knows how long.  That one, therefore, might require a bracha when affixing the mezuzah.  Why only "might"?  First, the deck doorway only has half height doors (double, like many decks).  The Rambam holds that a doorway without a door does not require a mezuzah.  We put one up because of the other authorities that argue, but without a bracha; it's the Rambam, after all.  Secondly, if the mezuzah cannot be placed in such a way that it can survive the elements, then the Chazon Ish holds that it does not require a mezuzah.  Moreover, the Chazon Ish would not allow you to put up a mezuzah in that case because it will come to be invalidated and is therefore a disgrace to the mitzvah.

So I measured the doors; they are 39" tall and therefore meet the minimum 10 טפחים/handbreadth measure needed to be considered a full qualified door to require a mezuzah.  (In fact, 35" would have been good enough; 37" just to be safe.)  We got a better waterproof case to satisfy the opinion of the Chazon Ish.  We also moved one of the less beautiful mezuzos (from an inside doorway) to the deck and replaced it with a more beautiful mezuzah.  (Note well: upgrading the mezuzah would not be sufficient change to warrant a new bracha.)

There you have it.  One parting word.  The difference between a beautiful mezuzah and an extra beautiful mezuzah was $10.00.  I find it hard to justify being cheap for $10.00 per doorway on a house that retails for 100s of thousands of dollars.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Thought for the Day: Love in the Time of Corona Virus/Anxiously Awaiting the Mashiach

Two scenarios: Scenario I: A young boy awakened in the middle of the night, placed in the back of vehicle, told not to make any noise, and the vehicle speeds off down the highway. Scenario II: Young boy playing in park goes to see firetruck, turns around to see scary man in angry pursuit, poised to attack. I experienced and lived through both of those scenarios. Terrifying, no? Actually, no; and my picture was never on a milk carton. Here's the context: Scenario I: We addressed both set of our grandparents as "grandma" and "grandpa". How did we distinguish? One set lived less than a half hour's drive; those were there "close grandma and grandpa". The other set lived five hour drive away; they were the "way far away grandma and grandpa". To make the trip the most pleasant for all of us, Dad would wake up my brother and I at 4:00AM, we'd groggily -- but with excitement! -- wander out and down to the garage where we'd crawl

Thought for the Day: David HaMelech's Five Stages of Finding HaShem In the World

Many of us "sing" (once you have heard what I call carrying a tune, you'll question how I can, in good conscience, use that verb, even with the quotation marks) Eishes Chayil before the Friday night Shabbos meal.  We feel like we are singing the praises of our wives.  In fact, I have also been to chasunas where the chasson proudly (sometimes even tearfully) sings Eishes Chayil to his new eishes chayil.  Beautiful.  Also wrong.  (The sentiments, of course, are not wrong; just a misunderstanding of the intent of the author of these exalted words.) Chazal (TB Brachos, 10a) tell us that when Sholmo HaMelech wrote the words "She opens her mouth Mwith wisdom; the torah of kindness is on her tongue", that he was referring to his father, Dovid HaMelech, who (I am continuing to quote Chazal here) lived in five worlds and sang a song of praise [to each].  It seems to me that "world" here means a perception of reality.  Four times Dovid had to readjust his perc

Thought for the Day: אוושא מילתא Debases Yours Shabbos

My granddaughter came home with a list the girls and phone numbers in her first grade class.  It was cute because they had made it an arts and crafts project by pasting the list to piece of construction paper cut out to look like an old desk phone and a receiver attached by a pipe cleaner.  I realized, though, that the cuteness was entirely lost on her.  She, of course, has never seen a desk phone with a receiver.  When they pretend to talk on the phone, it is on any relatively flat, rectangular object they find.  (In fact, her 18 month old brother turns every  relatively flat, rectangular object into a phone and walks around babbling into it.  Not much different than the rest of us, except his train of thought is not interrupted by someone else babbling into his ear.) I was reminded of that when my chavrusa (who has children my grandchildrens age) and I were learning about אוושא מילתא.  It came up because of a quote from the Shulchan Aruch HaRav that referred to the noise of תקתוק