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know to which blessing one is responding. See the Mishnah Berurah
(31). The opinion of the Bach, the Taz and the Magen Giborim is that
a person is allowed to respond with amein to blessings in which he
doesn’t intend to be included, as is explained in the Biur Halachah
(ibid. s.v. v’yesh). These opinions may be relied upon in this extreme
situation, in order to minimize friction among Jews and particularly
in regard to parent.s2



ɳ Response to Question One

We shall now return to the questions posed by Doctor Eliyahu
Schussheim regarding the mother’s threat to commit suicide if her
daughter does not abort her fetus. With Hashem’s help, the idea of
convincing the parents that their daughter would commit suicide if
she was forced to abort succeeded, and the mother ‘granted’ her per-
mission for the pregnancy to continue. I was asked: 1. Is the mother’s
suicide threat sufficient justification for the daughter to have an abor-
tion? 2. Was it permitted to induce false panic in order to prevent an
abortion?

The answers to these questions seem to be as follows:
1. One should not cave in to the mother’s suicide threat, particular-
ly in view of her demand that the fetus be killed.
Consider the severity of aborting a single fetus, which is viewed as
the abortion of many, as the Torah says, “And if men quarrel togeth-
er and they strike a pregnant woman and she loses her babes… he
shall surely be penalized…” (Shemos 21:22). We need to understand
why the Torah writes that she loses her “babes,” in the plural. Is the
halachah any different if only a single child is lost? The author of Ha-
flaah answers that if the assailant caused the loss of only one child, he

2. See earlier, siman 110, Note 4, regarding how to go about making the blessings
when lighting Chanukah lights in a public venue [where there is no obligation
to light] and our comments in the Note regarding conducting a staged wedding;
a distinction can be drawn between the two cases.

346 1 Medical-Halachic Responsa of Rav Zilberstein