Q. Is it permitted for women to also cut a bit of the hair of a boy when he becomes three years old?
Is it correct, what many do after the chalaka, that they take the child to a non-Jewish barber and he finishes professionally the hair cut?
Does one have to wash hands three times, after cutting some of the hair?
A. Shaarei Yerushalaim, Nitei Gavriel (7: 3) and others write that the minhag is to invite Rabbonim, elders and grandparents to take part in the hair cutting and in giving their blessings to the child.
The mother and other women traditionally also take part in the hair cutting ceremony. However, Horav Shlomo Miller Shlit’a recommends that it should be done with modesty, as a separate group.
Although, one is normally permitted to use the services of a Gentile barber (Shulchan Aruch Y.D. 156:1), however, Kaf Hachaim (260: 13), Nitei Gavriel (ibid. 7) and others assert that in this special first hair cutting a Jewish Shomer Torah barber should be engaged.
In regard if one has to wash hands three times, after cutting some of the hair, see question 460.
Rabbi A. Bartfeld as revised by Horav Shlomo Miller Shlit’a.