I have foudn that while it is common for many to stand at a chuppa when the chosson and kalla walk tot he chuppa, some do not and prefer to sit.

I am not sure the wedding mikva thing is going to catch on and become trendy, but nowadays you can never predict these things accurately.

The Admot of Toldos Ahron is concerned over too much bittul torah. To that end he has decided to prohibit students in the Toldos Ahron yeshivas from attending the weddings of their fellow students.

TOI is reporting that the Court in Israel has decided that marriages performed online are valid and couple who try to register their marriages in Israel must be registered by the Interior Ministry as married.

Zeev Alperovitz of Merkaz Inyanim, a Haredi news media outfit not found on the Internet (that I know of), is reporting on an upcoming series of laws soon to be passed, or at least proposed. This series of laws is being seen as an anti-Haredi blitz of legislation, and MK Uri Maklev (UTJ) is supposedly working his connections to thwart them in advance from being raised and/or passed, campaigning quietly for support among religious and right wing coalition MKs.

This looks like an interesting initiative to keeps kids on the derech...

Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, along with Minister of Economics and Commerce Orna Berbibai, met today with a consortium of owners of events and wedding halls. The meeting was to hash out a plan by which the halls would be able to continue functioning hosting events and weddings while keeping people as safe as possible, even amidst the spreading of CoronaVirus with possible social limitations and restrictions coming.

People are asking me if we have no changed the guidelines and now weddings are allowed?

With Sukkos coming to an end, wedding season will once again soon be upon us. The lockdown expects to present challenges to people planning to get married. I am not sure why it is different than in the previous lockdown when people held small weddings all the time on porches and in backyards, but this lockdown will at least affect some couples for the first few days after Sukkos and possibly longer, if it will be extended.

Rav Bunim Shreiber, Rosh Yeshiva of Netiv Daas and rabbi in Ashdod, has paskened that witnesses at a wedding must remove their masks, or lower them to make the face visible, during the chuppa. They must do so even though it means breaking the Ministry of Health guidelines (for a short period of time).

Rabbi Shreiber explains that by wearing the masks, the witnesses cannot be fully identified by other people. Wearing the mask would make it difficult, if not impossible, to be "meizim" the witnesses. Viable witnesses must be potentially impeachable as "plotting witnesses", eidim zomemim. Yet with their faces covered, nobody would be able to impeach their testimony by saying they were spotted elsewhere, so the testimony shouldn't be valid to start with. Thus, the masks must be removed to make them potentially impeachable.

Rav Chaim Feinstein, the Rosh Yeshiva of Ateres Shlomo, disagrees and believes that testimony requiring theability to be impeachable is only a law found in the laws of Choshen Mishpat, financial laws, and is not found discussed as a factor in Even HaEzer - the laws of family such as marriage and divorce.
source: Hamechadesh

I would add that the Gemara talks about the rules of eidim zomemim in regards to issues of the death penalty, not just financial matters. Also with regards to transgressions that would obligate one in receiving lashes. So I am not sure this categorization is accurate, but I don't know enough about the application of eidim zomemim to argue this reasonably.

I would also note that the witnesses are supposed to be witnessing Reuven marrying Sarah, or whoever. In many weddings the bride, Sarah in our example, is covered by a very thick veil that is not see through. I have almost never seen the witnesses look under the veil, have the bride lift the veil for a moment. I do know one person, and have seen it myself, who has been witness at a number of weddings, and he is always careful to insist on having the bride lift the veil so he can confirm who the bride is, that she is the person that the groom is supposed to be marrying. But that is uncommon. I find it interesting that these rabbonim are debating the mask that partially, and only for this hopefully temporary period of time, covers the faces of the witnesses, yet make no mention of  the mask, the veil, that regularly covers the entire face of the bride.

Rav Shlomo Amar, Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem, spoke out against marriage proposals.

Yes, Rabbi Amar wants people to get married. he is not against people going on shidduchim and deciding to get married. Rav Amar is opposed to the "marriage proposal".

According to Rav Amar, this is a recent trend. It used to be the parents would speak and close the deal and all was good. But a new thing has crept in, even among the haredim and among yeshiva bochurim (though not true ones), and they get baloons and other stupidities and propose. Sometimes it might even cause a halachic problem is certain words are said and other people are present witnessing it. This is hefkerus, degrading. "woe tot hem" Rav Amar said, as he said their craziness has no limits. Religious people should do this? People who keep mitzvos?

Rav Amar wants the Roshei Yeshiva to put a stop to it and prohibit their students from doing such proposals.
source: Kikar

Far be it from me to argue with Rav Amar. I see some of these proposals and they do seem to be out of hand and silly. I am just surprised that Rav Amar is only discovering it now and thinks it is a recent trend. it has been going on for years.

Last night the police broke up a wedding in Neve Yaakov, Jerusalem that had too many guests present, against the guidelines and allowances of the Ministry of Health. They had more than 30 guests present, at least when the police arrived. The police broke up the wedding party and fined the chosson 5000nis for the violation.

These ad hoc, on the sly weddings, and minyanim, kind of make me, and many other people, think back to the stories of the days of the Crypto Jews (aka Marranos), or the days of Soviet Russia, or other times when Jews had to sneak around and do their mitzvahs as best they could but in secret. The difference is that now the government is not hostile and the reason for the restrictions is due to a serious health crisis and danger to life, not an anti-religion edict.

Back to our joyous groom in Jerusalem...Even after paying the 5000NIS fine, he still saved a ton of money by having his wedding now, during the days of COVID-19, with these guests, and he probably thinks it was worth it even with the fine! He paid 5000nis vs ~50000nis a regular wedding would have cost...

After all this will be over and the danger to people's health and life will be nothing but a memory, I hope the one thing that remains is that we don't go back to make big weddings in halls with parties that we can barely afford, at best. These small intimate weddings taking place in homes with just family and select friends seem lovely, joyous and the simplicity is appealing...

The critical situation around the world and in Israel has generated a number of interesting piskei halacha, some of which have already been posted here. Here is another one.

Chief Rabbi Dovid Lau has paskened that anybody who has had to postpone a scheduled wedding, due to the COVID-19 crisis, will be able to have the wedding during sefiras haomer, when it is normally customary to not have weddings. Rav Lau explained that he is allowing this as a one time allowance, not for future years. Also, it will only be allowed during parts of the Omer in which some communities allow weddings (as far as I know, that would allow the entire Omer, as each part of the Omer has some people allowing weddings).

Rav Lau explains that pushing off weddings is a very difficult and damaging thing. Rav Lau says he told people not to push off the chuppa but to hold a very small event with a small number of attendees and get married, and if necessary have a party later with the friends when the crisis blows over. He is still encouraging engaged couples to get married before the holiday. However, some cannot or will not, and the crunch time because of the Omer will cause too long a delay and therefore he has paskened to allow weddings during the Omer for affected couples.
sources: Kikar, Actualic

A lot of weddings are happening "on the sly" because the wedding could not be held in a hall as planned with the invited guests, due to Corona restrictions by the Ministry of Health. Some o the weddings are keeping somewhat to the MoH guidelines, while some are not even trying.

The wedding pictured above happened today in the Ponevezshe cemetery in Bnei Braq. The chosson is an orphan, and the chuppa took place near the grave of his father.

It seems that there is a segula to have the wedding of an orphan in a cemetery during a time of plague, in order to stop the plague.

mazel tov, and I hope it helps!

I hope this story makes you smile... it is about someone who brought a llama to his sister's wedding, and dressed it in a tuxedo.

Personally I would not know where to rent a llama, nor where to get it fitted for a tuxedo, but this guy figured it all out. And they are fum Jews as well, making the story even cooler.

According to the article:

Five years, ago, Mendl Weinstock made a promise to his sister, Riva.
"My sister was talking about her wedding as if it were tomorrow when she wasn't even dating anyone at the time," he told Insider. "Just to make her mad and get a reaction, I told her if she makes me come to the wedding, I am bringing a llama with me. After a few minutes of arguing, she tried to use reverse psychology on me and said, 'OK, the llama is invited to the wedding.'"
In true little-brother fashion, Mendl made sure she never forgot about the invitation.
"He has been torturing me with this, in good fun, and has been reminding me of this probably twice a week for the last five years," Riva said. "I have tried striking so many deals, I have tried doing literally everything possible to make sure it didn't happen, and lo and behold, there was a llama at my wedding."
When Riva got engaged in October, Mendl put his plan into action.
"When he sets his mind to something, he makes it happen," she said. "Literally, I called him to tell him I was engaged, and his response was, 'Great, I'm calling the llama farm now.' Probably not even an hour later, I got a text that said his llama rental was confirmed."
Indeed, when Riva got married in Cleveland on Sunday, Shocky the llama joined the festivities. Mendl even commissioned a custom llama-sized tuxedo for the big day.Since Riva knew to expect the gag, she bargained with her brother to make it as unobtrusive as possible.
"I promised him that I would take one picture," she said. "I said, 'I will not stand next to the llama, I will not touch the llama, but I will take one picture.' My friends can attest that I went outside, I took exactly one picture, and then I went right back inside and was not having any more of it."

So cool

Presumably the theme song of the wedding was Avraham Fried's Llama Llama Llama..

Kikar is reporting about an unusual situation and an unusual psak.

A haredi couple that got married this week was meant to go to Beitar Ilit for the Shabbat Chattan (aka Shabbos sheva brachos). They slept late and woke up in their apartment in Haifa 20 minutes before Shabbos. Obviously there was no way they could get from Haifa to Beitar before Shabbos.

On the other end of this story were the families preparing for Shabbos in Beitar, wondering where the chattan and kalla were. Some thought they were resting in the rooms they were meant to be staying in, but it was soon discovered that they were not there.

When the parents finally reached the young couple by telephone, likely waking them up by the incessant ringing of the phone just 20 minutes before the onset of Shabbos, they all realized the problem.

Further complicating the matter was the poor health of one of the parents involved. If the young couple would not show up for the Shabbos, it would possibly upset the ill parent and put his life at risk.

According to the article, leading poskim were called (who all remain unnamed) and the psak was given that the young couple should call a taxi to take them to Beitar. The driver of the taxi must be a non-Jew and he must also open and close the doors of the car for them. Because of the possibility of pikuach nefesh, they should do this even though it will mean driving on Shabbos.

the chattan was, understandably, hesitant and did not want to do this, despite the psak that he was being told. They got one of the gedolei hador, also unnamed, on the phone to tell the chattan directly that this is what he must do. So they did it.

The article says the young couple arrived at the entrance to Beitar 1 hour after Shabbos began, though that sounds too quick to me, especially considering they only woke up 20 minutes before Shabbos and still had to deal with calling gedolim and getting a psak and convincing the chattan to follow it, and then to drive form Haifa to Beitar. But anyway, hey got there during Shabbos and got out of the taxi. They then walked from the entrance of Beitar to the Shabbat Chattan location in the town, taking about another hour, and went on with the celebrations.

Kikar adds that family members mentioned that they could not recall ever having a Shabbat so happy with a chattan and kalla that were do "moser nefesh" to make everyone happy..

Further, an additional note added is not to apply what was said here to other situations, as similar as they might sound. If you find yourself in such a situation, call your own [unnamed] gadol.

Kipa is reporting on an interesting psak given by Rav Yuval Cherlo.

According to Rav Cherlo there are some things that women can do under the chuppa at a wedding, in an official capacity, while other things cannot be done by women. The purpose is to find a way to get women more involved, where possible, in the chuppa ceremony as many desire to.

Rav Cherlo warns that any changes must be made within the parameters of halacha, and care must be taken to ensure that any such changes will not be seen by some people as obligations or halachic necessities.

So, according to Rav Cherlo a woman, the kalla, could break the glass instead of (or even in addition to) the chosson. This is not a halachic necessity, but a minhag to break a glass, so a woman could do it as well.

Women, Rav Cherlo says, could also lead the chuppa ceremony. They can read the kesuba under the chuppa. The kalla can also make the bracha of Shehecheyanu on the ring or on her wedding dress, just as the chosson makes the bracha on his tallis.

On the other hand, pun intended, Rav Cherlo is strongly opposed to a two ring ceremony in which the chosson and kalla exchange rings. He even says he is opposed to such a ceremony being held after the chuppa's conclusion and even using a different text, though he concedes some rabbonim allow it after the chuppa and you cannot say it is prohibited..

Rav Cherlo is also opposed to women saying any of the sheva brachos under the chuppa. Sheva brachos requires a minyan so halachically a woman's bracha in this situation would be a bracha l'vatala. He does suggest that if a woman insists on saying a bracha under the chuppa they can add an 8th bracha, without using Hashem's name, using the text similar to that of the bracha made in the days of the Geonim - the bracha is found in the siddur of Rav Amram Gaon. The text of this bracha is:
כהיום הזה בירושלים –
ירבו שמחות בישראל, וינוסו אנחות מישראל,
ירבו בשורות טובות בישראל, ירבו ישועות בישראל,
ירבו נחמות בישראל.
תרבה אהבה בישראל, תרבה ברכה בישראל,
תרבה גילה בישראל, תרבה דיצה בישראל,
ירבה הוד בישראל, ירבה ועד בישראל,
ירבו זכות בישראל, ירבה חתן בישראל,
ירבו ימים טובים בישראל, תרבה כלה בישראל.
יצליחו חתן וכלה, ישמחו שניהם זה עם זה
ויעלצו שניהם זה עם זה,
ישמח חתן בכלה וכלה תשמח בחתן.
ברוך אתה משמח חתן בכלה וכלה בחתן.