Was it possible to bless the queen in the name and majesty ‘who gave his honor to flesh and blood’? With the death of the Queen of England, the polemic that stirred up the community in London returns ‘in ultra-Orthodox rooms’ as recounted by the Rabbi Diner, a native of England who fondly remembers those days and the custom in his father’s synagogue to say ‘who blessed’ the Queen
Upon learning this evening (Thursday) of the death of Queen Elizabeth II of England at the age of 96, Rabbi Eliezer Halevi Diner, born in England and one of the oldest rabbis of our generation, told his students about a fascinating halachic polemic that stirred up the Jewish community in England in 2017.
In the same year, the queen was crowned after the death of her father the king, to continue the royal line that has been in succession for about 1,300 years. After her coronation, the queen went for the first time on a state tour all over England, and all the residents, including the Jews, were supposed to take to the streets of the city to honor her.
An extensive controversy arose in the community, whether they bless her with the blessing “He gave from his honor to flesh and blood”, which the Sages corrected to bless the kings of the nations of the world (see in Gm. Baruchot page 18 11 and in the Shulchan Aruch Och 3. Rakh4), For there is a debate as to whether this blessing is offered only to a king, or also to a queen.
The Gabbad said that in those days his father, the Rabbi of London, the Gaon Rabbi Yosef Zvi Halevi Diner zt’l, called all the rabbis of London to a special ‘meeting of rabbis’ to sit on the medukah, and at the end of it the Rabbi issued a decisive ruling that there is no division between a king and a queen, And also for a queen, the blessing should be given in the name of the queen.
Indeed, in early coordination between the representatives of the Jewish communities in London and the royal house, the chariot stopped its journey through the Jewish streets, and all the members of the community, women and children, greeted the rare blessing.
It should be noted that in the personal calendar of Rabbi Hagaretz Diner, it was found that he wrote to himself on that day: “To remember and teach: Malkhuta Dar’a kein Malkhuta Darki’a”!.
Rabbi Diner also said that the custom in his father’s London seminary, “Adat Yisrael”, was to bless the Queen in the well-known form of the prayer “Hanotan Tshu’a to Kings”, and the custom was that the Rabbi himself would come up every Shabbat After the reading of the Torah, Levima takes the Torah book in his hands and says the prayer with moderation and emotion. This custom, in which the rabbi himself would say the wording of the blessing, was unique only in communities of Ashkenazi origin, as it was the custom in Germany.