Hi Rav Kornfeld and the Kollel,
In the gemara menachos we learn of the famous letters that have 3 tagin..."Shatnez Gat". However the rambam in hilchos tefillin, torah and mezuzot 2:9 states that in tefillin a number of letters not in this list have 3 tagin (mem soffit, peh etc). This is how tefillin are in fact written today. Are the rules for tefillin different than for the torah? Or is the shatnez gat not all inclusive?
Thank you and gmar chatima tova!
Dear Joshua,
The Tagim that the Rambam mentions here are special Tagim for Tefilin (see Mishnah Berurah OC 36:14) and they are in addition to the standard Tagim of "Sha'atnez Getz." Apparently, Yemenite Jews follow the Rambam's Shitah and write their Tefilin with these extra Tagim. To the best of my knowledge, the Ashkenazi and Sephardi Soferim today do not include them in their writing. The Rambam himself writes in a Teshuvah (#154) that if one leaves out these Tagim, indeed if one leaves out Tagim altogether, the Tefilin are still Kasher (most Poskim, including the Shulchan Aruch (OC 36:3) concur with this Psak; see Mishnah Berurah OC 36:15 for a discussion of this point).
Kol Tuv,
Yonasan Sigler
This is not a Psak Halachah