The suggestion that both parents’ names should be used to identify someone for various rituals, such as being called to the Torah for an aliya, is often met with the objection that using the mother’s name in such a context would constitute a change of minhag (custom), and that customs are not to be changed. The reason that this objection is raised is because there is no actual legal, i.e., halakhic, implication in adding one’s mother’s name when being called to an aliya or in reciting the mi sheberakh after the aliya. I also assume that God knows whom we have in mind, in any event, and I don’t believe He would be so easily confused by my being called Devora bat Binyamin v’Haya rather than Devora bat Binyamin.
Therefore, it comes as no surprise that in response to a question about whether there is any halakhic reason not to use both the mother’s and father’s names for various ceremonies, the rabbis at Yeshivat Eretz Hemdah in Jerusalem after first stating the basic principle: “One doesn’t change Jewish customs, for their ‘foundation is in the holy mountains’”2 , continued as follows:
These days, when in various communities around the world there is an awakening of proper Jewish women for learning Torah and for more active participation in communal life, an awakening that in most cases is founded in praiseworthy holy sentiments, if there is a request to mention the mother’s name, it is [perhaps] appropriate to respond [positively] to such a request. However, any change from the accepted [custom] should be prevented if the desire to make [such change] derives from an inclination to imitate the gentiles and the like.3
Our rabbinic literature is replete with cases of customs that have changed over the centuries, whether new prohibitions and stringencies have been introduced—something that we are all too familiar with—or whether old customs have been abandoned or adapted to new circumstances.
The value of studying these cases lies in the lessons to be learned: Customs do, in fact, change, and frequently the claim that they must not is polemical in nature. Historical reality affects both the behavior of the Jewish people at large and the rabbinic response to that behavior, and both the behavior and response to it vary according to the time, the place, social conditions, and other factors. Space only permits us to briefly examine a few such cases of changes to custom.
The evolution of the custom of the mourner’s kaddish since its inception in the Middle Ages is one of the most fascinating examples of a custom that has changed over time. A particularly interesting case arose in 1853 when Rabbi Beer Oppenheim, the rabbi of Ivancice (Eibenschitz) in South Moravia, sent a question to the chief rabbi in Altona, Rabbi Jacob Ettlinger.4 Though Rabbi Oppenheim was a scholar in his own right, a congregational dispute prompted him to consult with Rabbi Ettlinger, a scholar of great reputation and accomplishment.
Due to the unification of two synagogues—one of which had become so dilapidated that it had to be destroyed—it was decided by the newly unified congregation that all those who needed to say the mourner’s kaddish would do so in unison, to avoid the daily disputes and fights that would otherwise break out over who had precedence to say kaddish. It must be understood that prior to this decision, the community custom had been for individual mourners to recite kaddish each time it appears in the service according to an order of precedence that was specified by Rabbi Moses Isserles (16th century)5 and in greater detail by the Magen Avraham (17th century),6 which sometimes left some mourners without the opportunity to say kaddish. The consolidation of synagogues and minyanim only exacerbated this problem.
Rabbi Oppenheim ruled that the congregation, in overriding the existing practice, had made an appropriate and correct decision, given the fact that the mourner’s kaddish is a custom that does not appear in either the Babylonian Talmud or the Jerusalem Talmud, nor in Maimonides’ code nor in the Tur (14th century), but only as a later custom. There were congregants who objected to this ruling, claiming that a custom cannot be changed, but Rabbi Oppenheim maintained that to make peace and avoid fights in a holy place, one can certainly change a custom – he had even seen someone hit another man in the face because of a dispute over who has priority to say kaddish! Rabbi Oppenheim gave detailed and citationladen arguments to explain why reciting kaddish in a group was just as effective as when said by individuals. He also pointed out that the Sephardi custom is to recite kaddish in unison and he cited other communities in which this was done and other rabbis who approved the practice. It is reasonable to think that Rabbi Oppenheim was expecting a “stamp of approval” from Rabbi Ettlinger.
But Rabbi Ettlinger was not in the least pleased with Rabbi Oppenheim’s ruling and responded:7
I was surprised at how the honorable Rabbi could call this a “worthy and correct decision”–to change the Jewish custom for mourner’s kaddish to be said individually as has been practiced in all the countries of Ashkenaz and Poland for more than three hundred years, and to follow the footsteps of the Reformers in our time who have changed matters in the prayers, and who have also practiced this custom of the mourners saying kaddish in unison.
Rabbi Ettlinger follows this opening statement with a detailed, point-bypoint argument against such a practice, concluding by stating that, for those who were prevented from saying kaddish because of the halakhot of precedence, “their silence is better than their words”.
Regardless of whose arguments are more convincing or more “halakhically sound” – Rabbi Oppenheim’s or Rabbi Ettlinger’s, – the fact is that the practice of saying kaddish in unison (and sometimes a cacophony of voices not in unison) has become the normative custom in the present day,8 with the exception of a small minority of congregations that have maintained the earlier custom. Indeed, whether kaddish is recited by individuals or in unison is only one facet of the custom of mourner’s kaddish that has changed over the centuries. The number of times kaddish is said,9 who says it and for whom,10 and other details have all changed, demonstrating clearly that custom, in fact, does change.
Let us briefly review two other cases of change in custom. Unlike kaddish, which began as a custom after the finalization of the Babylonian and Jerusalem Talmuds, our next case will demonstrate that customs regarding commandments from the Torah can also change, sometimes in spite of rabbinic objections.
The mitzvah of tzitzit is explicitly stated in the Torah. Based on his understanding of Menahot 41b, Maimonides ruled regarding the color of the tzitzit that should be tied to a tallit that is all red or all green.11 Red and green presumably are examples of all colors other than tekhelet – or white, i.e., not dyed at all – as a tallit that is the color of tekhelet has its own specific rules regarding the tzitzit. The ruling itself is not of interest to us here; rather, what is of interest is the fact that Maimonides expressed no concern or judgment about the color that might be used for a tallit. What is of importance to him is the color of the tzitzit that one is required to affix to the tallit. The commentators on Maimonides’ ruling, and later codifiers such as the Tur and the Beit Yosef, 12 present differing opinions about Maimonides’ ruling – may the tzitzit on a red or green garment be white, or must they match the color of the garment, but, again, we do not see any reservation regarding wearing any variety of colored tallitot.
However, about 150 years following the time of the Tur, we find the following in a responsum by Rabbi Israel ben Hayyim Bruna, a leading halakhic authority in 15th century Ashkenaz:13
I was asked if a wealthy person from the land of Russia is permitted to make a silk tallit in red or green for the Sabbath and Festivals. I responded that he should not do so, but rather [should do] as our ancestors in all of Israel [i.e., all Jewish communities] have practiced, that the tallit should be white, and I have not seen and not heard of the custom being changed.
Rabbi Israel ben Hayyim Bruna presented evidence for his opinion from some of the same sources that were used to define the ruling for colored tallitot, and he also used aggadic sources to buttress his ruling, and continued:
One should not change the custom even though Maimonides wrote at the end of the laws of tzitzit that all the colors are proper for a tallit, whether red or green.
Since Maimonides made no statement about the permissibility of a red or green tallit, Rabbi Israel ben Hayyim Bruna inferred from Maimonides’ ruling about the colors of the tzitzit that colored tallitot are permissible. It is curious, then, for Rabbi Bruna to claim that our ancestors used white and to forbid changing that custom. If our ancestors always wore white, it seems doubtful that Maimonides, the Tur, and all the commentators would have bothered discussing and debating the requirements of the tzitzit on a colored tallit to the extent that they did, or at least one of them would have commented that the custom was to wear white. Thus, what Rabbi Israel ben Hayyim Bruna perceived as the prevalent custom probably developed over time. It is also interesting that Rabbi Bruna made no mention of stripes or colors of stripes, though in our time, traditionalists either wear white stripes on white (a Sephardi custom) or black stripes on white (the custom of most other communities today). We also find that in many communities today stripes of all colors and colored tallitot have become quite acceptable, demonstrating the evolution of custom and perhaps the revival of an old custom.
The last example of changing customs that we will briefly look at will bring us back to our original motivation for this article: the names that are used when calling someone for an aliya to the Torah. The rabbis from Yeshivat Eretz Hemdah, who were quoted above, based their response on the assumption that the widespread custom is to call someone to the Torah using the father’s name. However, a question posed in 1985 to Rabbi Eliezer Waldenberg, as well as his answer,14 suggest that there is another custom as well. In a particular synagogue, the gabbai gave out cards to those who would be called to the Torah and then they were not called by their name, but rather they were called up as “the Kohen”, “the Levi”, “the third”, “the fourth”, etc. Rabbi Waldenberg was asked if it is proper to do this or not. He responded:
The essence of the law is that there is no obligation to call the oleh by his explicit name, as the Darkhei Moshe [Rabbi Moses Isserles, 16th century]15 wrote in the name of the Mordekhai [13th century], that “there is no obligation to mention the name of the oleh; rather he can be signaled to come up.”
However, the Darkhei Moshe16 already added to this by stating that “one is not required to call the oleh by his name and that to signal to him is quite sufficient; however the widespread custom is to call ‘so-andso son of so-and-so to stand’.” If so, one should not change the custom…
In spite of his instruction not to change the custom, Rabbi Waldenberg called attention to earlier rabbinic literature from the 19th century 17 that provided evidence that not using names to call people to the Torah is not a new phenomenon. He also stated that “our brethren the Sepharadim” practice this custom as their norm, and they do not call people to the Torah according to “so-and-so son of so-andso”, but they signal to the oleh to come up to the Torah.
In light of these variations to the custom of how someone is called for an aliya and the fact that there is no actual obligation to use any names, using both the father’s and the mother’s names is not so radical an innovation – the custom has not been fixed in stone from time immemorial. Considering that our prevalent custom today is to use names in calling someone up to the Torah, it is fitting to use both the father’s and mother’s names as identification. In a responsum attributed to Hai Ga’on,18 Rav Hai writes that Yo’av ben Tzruya 19 is named according to his mother, as are the Sages Simon ben Pazi, Rabbah bar Hanna, and Rabbi Isaac bar Samuel bar Marta. Rav Hai explains the important family connections of these women, which is why it is an honor to name those individuals according to their mothers. These days, we follow the principle that “all of our women are important”, as the Mordekhai wrote20 in the name of the Tosafot, when he obligated all women as well as men to recline at the Passover seder (also a change in custom). In contemporary society, we consider our mothers as important “in the public sphere” as our fathers and so it makes sense to extend the reasoning of Hai Ga’on and call up an individual using the names of both parents.
Studying rabbinic literature enables us to appreciate that Jewish practice has never been stagnant, but changes for a variety of reasons, sometimes in spite of the reservations of some rabbinic authorities, sometimes with the support of some rabbinic authorities. Limitations of space have permitted me to touch on just a few aspects of this process, but sufficient, it is hoped, to convince the reader that evolving custom is in fact our custom.