Broken nail
6 January, 2011
Question:Thank you for your wonderful website.
I immersed and made sure to check my body before I was tovel. In addition, the mikvah lady examined my hands and stated that I was ready to dip.
Shortly after I arrived home, I realized that one of my nails was broken; when I checked the nail, I saw that there was a split in the nail.
If I had noticed this before the mikvah, of course I would have filed down the nail. However, considering that the mikvah lady checked my hands before I was tovel, and although I checked my hands before I dipped (although I can't 100% say that the split was not there when I checked––I might have missed it), is it safe to assume that my tevilah was valid? Or would this warrant me having to be tovel again?
Thank you so much.
Answer:As long as the preparations were done shortly before immersing (and not hours before), and you inspected your body immediately prior to immersion, you may assume that the nail cracked after you had already immersed. Your tevilah remains valid.
Please feel free to get back to us with any further questions.
This internet service does not preclude, override or replace the psak of any rabbinical authority. It is the responsibility of the questioner to inform us of any previous consultation or ruling. As even slight variation in circumstances may have Halachic consequences, views expressed concerning one case may not be applied to other, seemingly similar cases. All health and health-related information contained within Nishmat's Women's Health & Halacha Web site is intended to be general in nature and should not be used as a substitute for consulting with your health care professional. The advice is intended to offer a basis for individuals to discuss their medical condition with their health care provider but not individual advice. Although every effort is made to ensure that the material within Nishmat's Women's Health & Halacha Web site is accurate and timely, it is provided for the convenience of the Web site user but should not be considered official. Advice for actual medical practice should be obtained from a licensed health care professional.
For further questions or comments:
The Nishmat Women's Health and Halacha Site is a public service of Nishmat, The Jeanie Schottenstein Center for Advanced Torah Study for Women. This project and others like it are made possible by contributions from people like you. If you have benefited from the service, and wish to enable us to help others, click here to donate.
Users of Internet filtering services: This site discusses sensitive subjects that some services filter without visual indication. A page that appears 100% complete might actually be missing critical Jewish-law or medical information. To ensure that you view the pages accurately, ask the filtering service to whitelist all pages under yoatzot.org.