THE SERVICE IN VIDEO

QUESTION:

Would it be in accord with the spirit of halakhic tradition to put the religious service into video (and, of course, audio) so that it can be followed at home? (Question asked by Rabbi Earl Kaplan, Pomona, California.)

ANSWER:

In the present development of electronic devices, it is now a current practice to record television programs on electronic tape. This type of tape is now widely purchased and television programs thus recorded are played and replayed at home at any convenient time. The question asked here is whether it would be proper in the spirit of the traditional halakhah so to record the service that it may be seen and heard at home.

As may well be imagined, the question of these new forms of the reproduction of the sights and sounds of the religious service has received much discussion in modern Orthodox responsa literature. At least the audio has been discussed. But as far as I know, there has been, as yet, no discussion of the video.

The discussion as to reproduced sound may be said to have begun with Benzion Uziel (the Chief Sephardic Rabbi in Israel in the first quarter of this century) in his responsa Mishpatei Uziel, Vol. I, 5. He discusses the pre-electronic situation, namely the hearing of blessings or the shofar over the gramophone. May one say amen after such a blessing? Or if one had heard the shofar over the gramophone, has he fulfilled the duty of hearing the shofar on the New Year? The answers given by Benzion Uziel were then applied by later scholars to religious services over the radio or through a loud speaker in the synagogue. The objection to the validity of this type of indirect worship is based upon the Mishnah (Rosh Hashanah 3:7) which states that if one passes outside a synagogue and hears the sound of the shofar being blown, has he done his duty of hearing the shofar on the New Year? The Mishnah answers that if what he hears is the sound of the shofar itself, he has done his duty, but if what he hears is the mere echo or reverberation of the sound, he has not done his duty. So as to the gramophone, Uziel says that the man who had sounded the shofar has long since gone away, and the listener now hears only a mechanical reverberation.

This answer was taken up by later respondents such as Eliezer Waldenberg in Israel (Tzitz Eliezer, Vol. VIII, 11; Moses Feinstein (in Igrot Mosheh, Vol. IM Orah Hayyim 8) and many others. They go beyond the fact that the listener does not hear the voice itself. They say that very often over the radio, you do not know who the man is who is reciting the blessing or sounding the shofar or reading the Megillah. He may be a person who is not authorized to perform these actions, and the rule of the law is that a person who is not authorized to perform a certain mitzvah cannot be an agent (as a cantor, for example) to perform the mitzvah for others.

Furthermore, there is the question of the use of electricity on the Sabbath and holidays. Also, some scholars mention the fact that the sound heard over the television and radio comes over a long distance and undoubtedly traverses many unclean places. Also, some of the scholars warn that if one does listen, he should be careful to be in a clean place when he listens.

Eliezer Waldenberg, who answered the question from Jerusalem to a former pupil of his who is a rabbi in Brooklyn, was not too definite in prohibiting the reading of the Megillah over the loudspeaker. He concedes that it might be permissible to use it in the case of unavoidable necessity. He himself is, in a sense, the Resident Rabbi of the Shaare Zedek Hospital in Jerusalem, and he states that in a hospital (let us say with fifty Jewish patients in fifty separate rooms) it would be permissible to read the Megillah or sound the shofar for them over an electronic device.

On the basis of the above and similar discussions, we can come to a fairly definite conclusion. As for whatever little electrical impulses are activated when the video is listened to at home, this is not of great concern to a Reform Jewish household, although of course, the Orthodox rabbinate would object to the electricity used on Saturday and holidays. Furthermore, if it is a video reproduction of the services conducted by the rabbi and cantor of the congregation, then the members know exactly who it is and in fact see who it is who is making the recording. So this objection is no longer material. Yet in the light of Waldenberg’s reluctance in conceding the use of recordings in the hospitals, the following caution must be exercised. If the video is for the benefit of shut-ins who cannot come to the service, it is justified. But if it will tend to keep people away from the synagogue, it should be avoided. Also those who receive it should be cautioned to be in the same proper mood as they would be in the synagogue. With these cautions and in the light of the previous discussions in the recent halakhic literature, the video of the service might be (with some reservations) permitted.