Sunday, March 11, 2007

Daf Yomi - Megillah 32 - VOWELS IN THE MEGILLAH

The Gemora provides the reason for Rabbi Meir: One recites the blessing when the Torah is closed in order that people will not think that the blessings are written in the Torah.

Shulchan Aruch (691:9) rules that a Megillah which has been vowelized (the nekudos have been written in) or the blessings have been written on the front page, is not disqualified and it may be used.

The Mishna Berura writes that one should not initially write the blessings in the Megillah. It can be inferred that one may be permitted to insert the vowels and punctuation into the Megillah if he doesn’t know how to read the Megillah otherwise.

The Gr”A rules however, that it is forbidden to place the vowels into the Megillah.

The Maharsham rules that one should not draw pictures on the margins of a Megillah.

Reb Yitzchak Zilberstein comments that if a person cannot read the Megillah without punctuation and vowels written in, one may insert them in the verses and words that if they are read incorrectly would invalidate the reading.

The Aruch Hashulchan (691:14) rules that it is preferential to read the Megillah without the trop than to write the trop inside the Megillah.

Perhaps one can write the vowels and the trop on a piece of paper and tape it to the Megillah.

2 comments:

Lion of Zion said...

i've always been tempted to write the vowels/trop into megillah used by the shul where lein.

"The Maharsham rules that one should not draw pictures on the margins of a Megillah."

well we now that this was pretty much disregarded in many jewish communities. manuscript collections are full of illustrated megilot.

Anonymous said...

I was wondering if you can put a dot or a line on the side of the words to indicate that there is a fancy trop here "vayishlach seforim." Mutar?