A guide to books for Pesach (part one)

This Shabbat we commemorate the start of the Pesach holiday season with Parshat Hachodesh. Next Tuesday marks Rosh Chodesh Nissan.

Recently, the Orthodox Union released an interesting book on this subject, “Yerach Tov: Birkat Hachodesh in Jewish Law and Liturgy,” by Rabbi Elchanan Adler of Yeshiva University.

This rather small book of 115 pages is filled to the brim with just about all the halachic and background material that the average layman would need to help explain what constitutes the proper history and observance of the announcement and lead-up to Rosh Chodesh (the new month).

Among the topics discussed are the reasoning behind the announcing of the date, the essence of the mitzvah itself, the role of the bais din (rabbinical court), and a detailed and long overdue commentary on the text of the “Yehi Ratzon” paragraph. Most fascinating of all, it also includes the announcement of the molad (new moon): calculating it, and knowing the formal proclamation of its precise date and Jerusalem time of this ritual.

The molad is proclaimed in many shuls at a dramatic moment during the prayer, when the Torah scroll is given to the cantor to hold during the announcement that is normally made by the gabbai (sexton). What seems odd to this writer is the persistent and archaic ritual of stating the molad date in Yiddish, a habit that has long been replaced in most modern Orthodox shuls by the use of English or Hebrew. The use of Hebrew is thematically justified inasmuch as the molad reflects Jerusalem time, a venue that hardly justifies the use of Yiddish.