Blowing Shofar

Many synagogues hold additional shofar blowings after services or at other points during the day for those who cannot make it to services, and even arrange for shofar blowers to come to the homes of those who are ill or otherwise housebound.

When these blowings include men who have not yet discharged their obligation, or boys of a certain age to whom the rabbinic mitzva of chinuch le-mitzvot (mitzva education) applies, they are clearly permissible. However, when the attendees are all women, a few halachic issues arise:

I. Uvdin De-chol  Blowing a shofar is considered an uvdin de-chol, a weekday activity that should not be freely performed on Shabbat or Yom Tov outside of the mitzva context.

Adults may blow shofar on Rosh Ha-shana only when necessary. Is it necessary to blow shofar for women, who are not obligated in the mitzva?

II. Areivut  When a person has already discharged a halachic obligation, he or she may perform it again to discharge another’s obligation. This is because of the principle of areivut, guarantorship.

Can areivut work when the person for whom a mitzva-facilitating act is being repeated is not directly obligated from the Torah?

III. Hotza’a On Yom Tov We are not supposed to carry items in the public domain without an eiruv unless they are carried le-tzorech Yom Tov, for the purpose of Yom Tov.

Can bringing the shofar to a woman so that she can hear it be considered tzorech Yom Tov?

Solutions

How are these difficulties addressed in practice? Early halachic authorities take different approaches.

Ra’avan expresses concern about the permissibility of men blowing for women, and about the fact that common practice is to override such concerns.¹

Ra’avan minimizes the issue of uvdin de-chol in order to justify prevalent practice in his day, but suggests that the best way to address it and concerns about areivut is for the blower not to fulfill his mitzva of shofar prior to blowing for women.² For example, the blower might blow at the same time as the synagogue’s blowing, or might even deliberately intend during services not to discharge his own obligation with the synagogue blasts!³

Ra’avyah, however, disagrees. He maintains that all three concerns may be overridden to allow for special shofar blowing for women:

According to Ra’avyah, women’s mitzva fulfillment is of sufficient halachic value to override the concern of uvdin de-chol, to have the law of areivut apply, and even to consider the blowing tzorech yom tov. This ruling is a halachic expression of recognition of the value of women’s shofar observance, and is widely followed.⁴

Beracha

Two blessings precede shofar blowing, and it is customary for the blower to recite both for the congregation.

Rema explains that even if a man has already fulfilled his obligation, he still recites the blessings if he blows shofar to discharge others’ obligations. Is this also the case if he is blowing only for women, who are exempt from the Torah-level obligation? Or would a beracha recited by a man over women’s voluntary performance be considered a beracha le-vatala, in vain?

Rashi’s teacher Rabbi Yitzchak ben Yehuda does permit men to recite the beracha in this case:

His view is not widely accepted. Shulchan Aruch rules in general that a woman should not recite a beracha over a mitzva from which she is exempt, like shofar. It follows from that position that a man does not recite one for her.

Rema rules that a woman does recite a beracha over her voluntary mitzva performance, of which hearing shofar is a prime example. He adds, though, that she should recite the beracha over shofar herself. Areivut can extend to having a man facilitate voluntary mitzva performance, but not to reciting a beracha on her behalf.

Common practice is to follow Rema’s ruling.

A Group of Women

If a group of women gathers to hear shofar, there is disagreement whether one woman may recite the beracha for all the women present, since they all have the same level of binding custom, or each should recite a beracha on her own. In general, Rav Shlomo Zalman Auerbach reportedly permitted one woman to recite berachot for a group of women:

May a woman blow shofar for herself?

When a woman misses shofar blowing in synagogue, a man typically blows for her. Is this a matter of convenience or halacha?

Given the constraints on blowing shofar on Yom Tov beyond the obligatory and customary blasts, we could construct an argument, as Sha’agat Aryeh does, that a woman should not blow shofar for herself:

Sha’agat Aryeh contends that the constraint on blowing does not apply to men on Rosh Hashana. Since (ho’il) the prohibition is suspended for men so that they may fulfill their own obligation, they are generally allowed to blow shofar. As women are not commanded to hear the shofar, the argument of “ho’il” does not apply to them and the prohibition stands.

However, Sha’agat Aryeh’s opinion on this matter is an outlier. The Talmud already tells us that women should not be prevented from blowing:

It would seem to follow that a woman who is not able to hear the shofar blasts with the congregation is permitted to blow shofar for herself. Indeed, Ha-ittur suggest that a woman blowing for herself “makes sense.”

Similar permissive rulings can be found in a number of Rishonim, and is the simple reading of Shulchan Aruch.⁵

When a woman blows for herself, she should ideally do so prior to reciting mussaf, and timed close to the congregation’s timing.⁶ If this is not possible she may blow or hear shofar at any point during the day – as the commandment to blow shofar is not relegated to specific hours of the day. One praying alone should not blow shofar during the silent recitation of mussaf.⁷

The question of whether a woman may blow shofar for others depends on how we define the mitzva of shofar. Is the mitzva just to hear the shofar, or also to blow it? There are two main approaches to defining the mitzva:

I. Hearing and Blowing   We can try to understand the nature of the mitzva by examining the beracha recited over its performance. Some early authorities, including Rabbeinu Tam, reportedly maintained that the beracha over shofar refers to blowing:

Given that the Talmud repeatedly discusses what one must hear to discharge the obligation, Rabbeinu Tam presumably maintains that the mitzva is a combination of blowing and hearing shofar, though the beracha relates to the more physical act of blowing. Rav Moshe ibn Chabib (18th century Yerushalayim) formulates this position clearly, with an emphasis on hearing:

II. Hearing  In practice, we do not recite the beracha over shofar as formulated by Rabbeinu Tam. Instead, the blower recites “… Who commanded us to hear the sound of the shofar.” Rambam explains accordingly that the commandment is to hear the shofar, not to blow it.⁸

The Blower

How do these perspectives on the mitzva relate to questions about who may blow the shofar? In the context of discussing shofar, the mishna teaches us that one must have the same or greater level of obligation as another person in order to discharge their obligation in a mitzva.⁹

According to the first view, that the mitzva is both hearing and blowing, it makes sense that who blows the shofar is a significant matter. For this reason, a woman, who is not obligated in the mitzva on a Torah level, may not blow for a man, though she should be able to blow for another woman, whose binding custom is just like hers.

If, however, we maintain that the mitzva is exclusively to hear the shofar, then it is unclear why who is blowing the shofar should matter. If a woman were to blow for a man, would he not still hear what he needs to hear and fulfill his obligation?

We can answer that a stipulation for fulfilling the mitzva of hearing is that the blower be one who is obligated in the mitzva. Levush writes this:

Rav Tzvi Pesach Frank elaborates on this idea, explaining that the halachic definition of “kol shofar,” a sound of a shofar, goes beyond the need for the blast to emanate from a physical shofar:

For a blast to be defined as a shofar blast according to halacha, it must be blwon by a person who is fully obligated. Therefore, a woman may not blow shofar for a man, as she does not have the same level of obligation. This view also helps us understand why the blower’s intention is considered a critical part of the mitzva

Based on the above logic, we could also argue that a woman should not blow shofar for another woman, since a woman fulfilling the obligation voluntarily would naturally want to hear a shofar sound that meets all criteria for fulfilling the mitzva.¹⁰

However, we have already seen that a woman is permitted to blow shofar for herself. That must mean that a woman may fulfill the mitzva of shofar by hearing a shofar sound blown by someone else with at least her level of obligation, not necessarily by someone obligated on a Torah level. Though naturally, those, like Sha’agat Aryeh, who prefer that a woman not blow for herself would also prefer that she not blow for others.

Concluding Note