Various Building Materials
29. Coating with plaster. In the past, they used plaster and lime to coat stone walls. Thus, the halacha is that if a wall is only finished with plaster to level and insulate it but its appearance is dull, rough, and unappealing, Chazal did not require an unfinished space to remember the Churban, as the whole house looks like a sort of ruin and does not inspire extra joy.
30. Whitewashing with lime. However, use of lime whitewash, i.e., the white, aesthetic coating they applied over plaster, is the finish for a house’s beauty and a display of wealth and comfort. Chazal decreed one must leave an unfinished space in the whitewash layer to remember the Churban.
31. Cement. In modern construction, the material used is called טיח שחור [a sort of rough base plaster], made from sand and cement. This clearly has the status of “coating with plaster” (above, 29).
32. White plaster. Today, something called טיח לבן [a skim coat or finish plaster] is used as a final layer that provides a smooth finish for the wall. This is the layer before the paint, but it is also white and smooth. Since there is sometimes nearly no visible difference between this layer and the final, white-painted wall, one should leave an unfinished space to remember the Churban in this layer too (פוסקי זמננו). However, if the wall will be painted a different color, and leaving a space without paint will be noticeable, there is no need to leave a space without white plaster; just without paint.
33. Paint. The final coat used today is the paint. Although it is not a lime whitewash, since it is the final coat in the wall’s finish in modern aesthetics, it has the status of lime whitewash, so a square amah should be left unpainted to remember the Churban. This is because the main idea is not to put the final, finishing touches on a space in the wall (שו''ת מנחת יצחק).
34. Drywall/Plaster-board. One should also leave an unfinished space to remember the Churban on drywall/plaster-board. Usually, it is coated in a joint compound layer [“שפכטל”] and then painted. If just leaving a space unpainted is noticeable, that is enough. However, if the color of the paint is similar to that of the joint compound over the drywall, one should also leave off some of the joint compound layer.
35. Wallpaper. A square amah must also be left unfinished when pasting wallpaper onto a wall, as that is the finish in that house that must have a bare space (מ''ב סק''ג, כפה''ח סק''ט, ערוה''ש ס''ה).
36. Marble, wood covering. Similarly, when a wall is covered with marble or wood panels, a square amah must also be left bare to remember the Churban, as that is the finish for that house.
Alternative Methods
37. The process mentioned in the poskim is leaving out some of the actual whitewash when applying the wall finish coat with the goal of displaying an incompletion in the beauty. A flawed wall reminds a person about the Churban. However, apparently some people preferred not having a bare, ugly wall in their houses, so they searched for alternative methods to fulfill the halacha to remember the Churban. We will now go through some of them.
38. Painting a square amah black. Some people painted a square amah black with black paint to symbolize aveilus (א''ר בשם האגודה, הובא במ''ב סק''ג), because they thought the decree was to make a reminder of the Churban in the house with an amah measurement, not necessarily in the form of something missing in the wall itself (שו''ת אג''מ או''ח ח''ג סי' פ''ו).
39. However, many poskim dismiss this minhag, as the decree was in the form of something missing in the wall itself, not just a black design or black paint as a reminder of aveilus (חיי אדם, ב''מ סק''ג). Some add onto the black background the words “זכר לחורבן”; one should not object to those who are meikel with this (שע''ת סק''צ). [I remember from my youth that in the home of the Tchabe Rov of London, there was a wall completely covered with whitewash, and there was a one square amah frame over the living room door with black paint lines inside, creating a stone pattern.]
40. Decorating the square amah. Some decorate the square amah, turning the bare space for the Churban into a decorative design element with etchings or painted images, e.g., the Beis Hamikdash, or pesukim, e.g., “אם אשכחך ירושלים”, “יבנה בית המקדש”, or the like. We must distinguish between two types.
41. If the picture is within the square amah, it destroys the reminder of the Churban, as the whole space is converted into an element of beauty—this does not fulfill Chazal’s chiyuv. [It symbolizes yearning for the Geula, but it does not remind us of the Churban; Chazal’s takana was specifically for the Churban (above, 3), or at least aveilus (38).] However, if the design is outside the area of the square amah, one should not object, as the square amah itself has the form of a flaw in the wall, only with writing around it.
42. Amah with designed bricks. Some people leave a square amah space made from designed bricks. Since this style is common for decoration and beauty today, this does not fulfill Chazal’s chiyuv to leave something bare to remember the Churban.
