My wife made a hefsek bedikah 10-11 minutes after shkiyah (Queens, NY). Is that too late?
Answer:
If you follow the rulings of Rabbeinu Tam for the time of nightfall, even as a leniency, you can be lenient.
However, if you don’t follow the rulings of Rabbeinu Tam even as a leniency, some are stringent and will require you to begin from tomorrow.
Please see here for details.
Best wishes.
Sources:
For those who follow the times of Rabbeinu Tam as a “certainty” it follows that even after shkiya it remains day. However, if one follows Rabbeinu Tam as a stringency alone, then the time is a safek, and there will be a safek sefeika involved.
Some write that one can rely on the safek safeka, whereas other authorities are stringent on this matter.
See Iggros Moshe, Orach Chaim 4:62; Be’er Moshe 2:61; Beis Avi 3:117:3; Olas Yitzchak 117:3; see also Taz 110:15 and Shach 110:29-30.
Some authorities are stringent on this issue; see Kol Eliyahu, Yoreh De’ah 17.
It is permitted to follow the leniency opinions, and this is the more true for somebody who is careful to observe Rabbeinu Tam.
