Siman 234

Since for the Mincha prayer there is nothing before it, and it is not the way of proper conduct to come and pray immediately, as our Sages, of blessed memory, said: "A person should always arrange the praise of the Omnipresent and afterwards pray," they therefore instituted saying 'Ashrei' before the prayer. However, one who comes to the beit knesset and the congregation is standing in prayer should stand in prayer immediately, in order to pray with the congregation. And after 'Ashrei', the shaliach tzibbur says Half Kaddish; and even though there is no Kaddish without the recitation of something before it, nevertheless here there is something before it, namely the recitation of 'Ashrei'. Therefore, they should be careful to say 'Ashrei' with ten, for regarding the recitation of Kaddish, ten are required to have said something, as written in siman 55, see there. And after the prayer, they say Tachanun, Full Kaddish, Aleinu, and Mourner's Kaddish.

And some are accustomed to say the passage of the Tamid and the Ketoret before 'Ashrei', and it is a beautiful and correct custom, for they offered the afternoon Tamid and the Ketoret just as in the morning, and why should we not pay the bulls of our lips? Therefore, those who are meticulous are accustomed to say them every day before Mincha. And specifically before the prayer, but after the prayer one should not say the passage of the Tamid and the Ketoret, and also 'Ashrei' they should not say after the prayer, and they warned about this very much. And know that if a circumstance occurred where one delayed until close to sunset, he should stand in prayer immediately and say neither 'Ashrei' nor the passage of the Tamid and the Ketoret, and we do not push aside the essential because of the secondary. And one must warn simple people about this, for to them everything is equal, and see in section 7.

The Rambam wrote in chapter 3, law 3: "Many people are accustomed to praying the great and the small, and some of the Geonim ruled that it is only appropriate to pray the great as a voluntary prayer, and so the law dictates, because it corresponds to something that is not frequent every day. And if he prayed the great as an obligation—he should not pray the small except as a voluntary prayer." Thus far his words. And one should not wonder how he would prioritize the voluntary before the obligation, for even regarding the compensatory prayer which is an obligation, one may not prioritize it before the obligatory one, as is written in siman 108, certainly one should not prioritize a voluntary prayer over an obligation; for it can be said that here, since the primary obligation is at the time of mincha ketana, it is considered as if the time of the obligation has not yet arrived.

However, the Tur brought from his father, the Rosh, who responded that one should distance himself from a voluntary prayer, for we require that he recognize in himself that he is diligent and assessed to be able to intend well from its beginning until its end without a lapse of concentration. But if he is not within this category, we read regarding him: "To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices to Me, says Hashem," and our teacher, the Beit Yosef, ruled accordingly in this siman and in siman 107. And in truth, in our days we have not heard of this, and would that we could withstand the obligatory prayer. Therefore, in this time, Heaven forbid to pray a voluntary prayer, and so one should instruct.

However, the Rosh responded, and this is his wording: "But Rav Alfas ruled that a person may pray a voluntary prayer, and you who conduct yourselves according to him, it stands to reason that once six and a half hours have arrived, which is the time of mincha, the first is obligatory and the second is voluntary." Thus far his words. And this is not like the words of the Rambam, who ruled that he should pray the first as voluntary. Our teacher, the Beit Yosef, in his great book at the beginning of siman 233, inferred from this that the Rosh holds that the time of mincha ab initio is from six and a half hours, see there. In my humble opinion, there is no proof from this; rather, the Rosh holds that since in any event it is now the time of prayer, one should not precede an obligation with a voluntary act, as I wrote in section 3. And similarly, that which he inferred from the Tur, who wrote there: "And its time is from six and a half hours etc.," that he holds the primary time is mincha gedola, there is also no proof, for the Tur wrote the essence of the law. However, from the fact that the Tur did not write like the Rambam that ab initio one should pray mincha ketana, we learn from this that he holds they are equal. And we have already explained in the previous siman that there are those among the early authorities who make mincha gedola the primary time.

If one forgot to pray mincha—he prays ma'ariv twice, the first for his obligation and the second for completion, and if he reversed them—he has not fulfilled his obligation, as has been written in siman 108, and he should say 'Ashrei' before the second. The details of the laws of completion were explained in siman 108, see there.

And we have already written that one should say 'Ashrei', and one who says the passage of the Tamid and the Ketoret should say 'Ashrei' afterward. And there are those who wish to say that the passage of the Tamid is after 'Ashrei', (Taz subsection 2 and Magen Avraham) but they did not practice this way, and so it appears in my humble opinion to be the primary view. For their reason is that 'Ashrei' is like a prayer, and in the Temple they would pray at Mincha before the offering of the Tamid. But in truth 'Ashrei' is not a prayer but rather His praise, may He be blessed; however, I say that for this reason many do not say the passage of the Tamid at Mincha, because in the Temple the prayer preceded it and therefore they did not want to say it before the Shemoneh Esrei prayer. And we have already written that ten are required to say 'Ashrei' so that they may say Kaddish (Magen Avraham subsection 1, and see the Taz who wrote otherwise, but the primary view is like the Magen Avraham. And what the Magen Avraham wrote in the name of the Mahari is a puzzling matter, and the Eliyah Rabbah already challenged him and so we practice, that even if the prayer extends until night we say Kaddish).