Askmoses-A Jews Resource
What is the minimum amount one must give to charity?
Browse our archives

The Scholar is ready to answer your question. Click the button below to chat now.

Scholar Online:

Type in your question here:

Do you have to be a Rabbi to read the Megillah?

by Rabbi Moshe Miller

  

Library » Holidays » Purim » The Laws | Subscribe | What is RSS?

PRINT EMAIL COMMENT

One does not have to be a rabbi to read the Megillah. However, the person who is reading for the community – so that they can fulfill the obligation to hear the Megillah reading – must know the text and the cantillation (trope) so that he can read it clearly and in the proper tune.

Bear in mind that the megillah scroll contains no vowelization or punctuation, and is practically unreadable for anyone who has not practiced extensively.

A man who has his faculty of hearing and is over the age of bar Mitzvah should read the Megillah for the community. A woman can read the megillah for herself and for other women.1

Footnotes

  • 1. Shulchan Aruch Orach Chaim 689:2.

ADD A COMMENT

Please email me when new comments are posted (you must be  logged in).
Mitzvah
(pl. Mitzvot). A commandment from G-d. Mitzvah also means a connection, for a Jew connects with G–d through fulfilling His commandments.
Megillah
A scroll. Usually a reference to the Book of Esther, one of the books of the "Written Torah", which is read--from a scroll--on the holiday of Purim.