Badekin

Source: Halachipedia: Badekin

Link: https://halachipedia.com/index.php?title=Badekin

Categories: Interactions between Men and Women, Lifecycles

Exported: 2025-12-30

1. The Ashkenazic custom is to have a bedekin before the chupah because according to some it is considered the marriage.¹ Sephardim don’t have this minhag.²
2. When the Chatan does the bedekin the rabbi and parents bless the kallah "אחותנו את היי לאלפי רבבה."³ Some say:אֲחֹתֵנוּ אַתְּ הֲיִי לְאַלְפֵי רְבָבָה ישמך אלקים כשרה רבקה רחל ולאה יְבָרֶכְךָ ה' וְיִשְׁמְרֶךָ. יָאֵר ה' פָּנָיו אֵלֶיךָ וִיחֻנֶּךָּ. יִשָּׂא ה' פָּנָיו אֵלֶיךָ וְיָשֵׂם לְךָ שָׁלוֹם.⁴
3. At a second marriage the bedekin is not done by the chatan but by someone else.⁵

References

¹: The Darkei Moshe 66:1 quotes Tosfot Yoma 13b s.v. lechada as holding that a betulah is married when she goes out with her hair covered. Similarly, the Rama 55:1 writes that some say that when the chatan covers his and his kallah’s head during the sheva brachot it is considered the chupah. Nitai Gavriel (Nesiun 13:3) writes that the Ashkenazic minhag nowadays is to do the bedekin before the chupa. see The Veiling Ceremony: Bedeken on Chabad.org for more

²: Yalkut Yosef (Sovah Semachot 6:2)

³: Shevach Hanesuin p. 37

⁴: RCA Madrich p. 86

⁵: Seder Kiddushin Vnesuin p. 48