Milk & Meat - Changing Minhagim

QUESTION: I am an Ashkenazi who has the custom to wait 6 hours between meat and milk. May I be “matir neder” (undo my vow) and change my minhag to wait one hour?

ANSWER: The Rama (YD 89:1) writes that it is proper for Ashkenazim to wait six hours, but it is not an absolute obligation. However, the Pri Megadim (Sifsei Daas 89:8) writes that since the common custom is to wait six hours, one is no longer permitted to be “poretz geder” (to knock down this fence). The Aruch Hashulchan (YD 89:7) writes as well that it is absolutely forbidden to change one’s minhag to be more lenient. Furthermore, the Magen Avrohom (551:7) writes that one cannot change a stringent family minhag in a case where the minhag follows a position that some poskim say is the halacha. In our case, most Rishonim as well as the Shulchan Aruch rule that waiting six hours is obligatory. As such, according to Magen Avrohom one cannot be matir neder at all. One exception to this is a woman whose family custom is to wait six hours who gets married to a man who only waits one hour or three hours. Igros Moshe (OC 1:158) writes that when a woman gets married, she adopts all of the minhagim of her husband, both the stringencies and the leniencies, and it is also not necessary for her to be matir neder.

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