Q&A: Early Prayer
Early Prayer
Question
I pray (almost regularly) in a minyan that meets at 5:00 in the morning. The prayer is of course before sunrise (I’m not looking for halakhic justifications for that; I have more than enough), and during a significant part of the year the blessing over the tallit and tefillin is recited after the Amidah.
Since the change in the clock-change dates (instead of before Yom Kippur, at the end of October), we run into a problem during the weeks at the beginning of Tishrei.
I’m looking for a halakhic solution that will allow the prayer to be held at its proper time, while still letting people leave on time (this is a Sephardi minyan, and it usually ends at 5:45; on fast days / Chol HaMoed and such a bit later. Never after 6:00, and many people slip out much earlier). I should note that it will be hard to implement obvious and effective solutions like skipping all the Psalm of the Day and the like, because there are people there for whom Kaddish for mourners (even after a decade) is Torah-level mandatory, and part of the congregation are older people of the type that is hard to persuade. My direction is to start later than usual (at 5:05/10), reach Yotzer exactly at dawn, not say the repetition of the Amidah (we do that anyway in Musaf), and shorten as much as possible afterward.
According to what I checked, there are several definitions of dawn:
A. Astronomical — the first moment when the sun’s rays reach the horizon. At the latest, 5:30.
B. Halakhic — 72/90 fixed minutes before sunrise. (According to other opinions, when the sun is 16.1 degrees below the horizon.) According to the earliest of these opinions, at the latest 5:20.
My questions are:
A. Which parts of the prayer may not be said before dawn? Is it permitted to say Pesukei DeZimra? To take out a Torah scroll?
B. Is there any halakhic basis for relying on opinions that calculate dawn as 90 fixed minutes earlier, even though astronomically it is clear that dawn has not yet arrived at all? Is there room to say here that the halakhic definition can differ from reality?
C. It may be that they won’t listen to me about postponing the start of the prayer. If so, in that situation (where Yotzer certainly, and the Amidah very likely, will be said before dawn), is it permitted for me to complete the minyan for them for the sake of peace?
Answer
Hello,
See here:
http://halachayomit.co.il/he/default.aspx?HalachaID=1291
Discussion on Answer
See the detailed and lenient summary by Rabbi Seraya Devlitzky in a volume of Yeshurun that came out after his passing.
“As a rule, if someone is violating Jewish law, one should not assist him for the sake of peace”: does that imply that if someone asks me whether there is a lenient minority opinion on a certain issue, and I know there is one but think one should not rely on it, I am forbidden to tell him about it if I know he will act on it in practice?
Absolutely not. First, when someone asks you for information, you always can and should answer. Second, when there is a minority opinion of a halakhic decisor, you can’t dismiss it even if you disagree. Say that there is such an opinion, and add that in your opinion it is unfounded.
As a rule, if someone is violating Jewish law, one should not assist him for the sake of peace.