Dear Rabbi ..
Last year my mother cleaned house and gave me my late Grandfather’s tallit and tefilin. These may date from around 1913. The tallit has frayed away to nothing in spots; I can’t even unfold it completely.
Early this year, my wife’s uncle died, and we’ve just inherited two more sets of tefillin and four talitot. One of the talitot, which we think belonged to my wife’s late grandfather, might be suitable for our 10-year-old on his Bar Mitzvah, if it can be cleaned. Two others are quite ordinary and are suitable for donation to Adat Shalom if cleaned. The third is also damaged, and my mother-in-law wants to use part of it in a collage she is making.
So, the question: How do I dispose of talitot that can’t be repaired? Can I take the others to a dry cleaner? Can fragments of a tallit be used in an art project? And what on earth do I do with three inherited antique tefilin? I have my own set, which I hardly ever put on.
Tangled up in blue (& white)
Dear Tangled:
How lucky to be awash in Judaica! May we all be thus blessed, so those who come before us may enjoy these objects for a length of days, then pass them along to us to love, cherish, donate, and make collages out of. Yes, collages: that’s Reconstructing! We encourage writing in prayer books, creative adaptation of law & liturgy, and avoiding brisket & corned beef; why not a loving art project, itself a keepsake for future generations, out of inherited Judaica?
One important distinction here: tallis, shmallis, it can also be a scarf for all the tradition cares. ‘Tallit’ simply means cloth or garment. What makes it a ritual object are the tzitzit, the four specially-knotted string fringes from each corner. Save those; they should be reused, or buried (one place where reuse & recycle don’t apply). But the "tzitzit holder"--what we usually call the tallis--can be used for anything.
Tefillin are another story. The parchment ("claf") should be checked periodically to see that it’s still legible; assuming it is, that’s one holy piece paper. The leather box and bindings are pretty special too, if only because a cow died for your grandparents’ ritual. Keep them, if you think you or those after you might ever use them. Or donate them--there’s always a need for tefillin, and (for instance) there might be some liberal synagogues that would like to be able to do education about tefillin, but don’t have any.
May your children delight in these ritual objects, whether over their shoulders or between their eyes or framed on a wall--it’s all Jewish, and it’s all family. May those ritual objects be loved and well-used, whether in your possession or donated, rather than getting dusty. And when your tallitot need to be cleaned, remember the one about the new dry cleaner who charged more than Goldberg did...
--De Rebbe