ON WHICH ARM SHOULD WE
WEAR TEFILLIN ?

By Rabbi Steven Schonblum

 

Most men wear tefillin on their left arm, but some seem to put them on their right. Are they wrong, strange, or just trying to be different?

I happen to be one of those strange fellows who puts his tefillin on his right arm.

The reason is quite simple. I am a lefty. We are taught in the Talmud that tefillin must be placed on the weaker arm, what is known as the yad key-heh. Since most of the population is right-handed, most men wear the tefillin on the left. Us few south-paws, put them on the right.

The advantage of being a lefty is that we don't have to remove our watches before laying tefillin, since wrist watches are generally worn on the left arm, and there can be no interference between the tefillin and the flesh.

Now, that's fine for wrist watches, but what about medic alert bracelets? Most opinions hold that medic alert bracelets can and should remain on one's arm while tefillin are worn, since this is a case of pikuach nefesh, life and death, and the preservation of human life takes precedence over all other matters.

 

Copyright (c) 2001-2008 Rabbi Steven Schonblum

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