000646,
The Rambam seems to be saying that she could be lashed at the discretion of a Dayan
Not if it’s unestablished whether any violations have taken place. A kosher beis din was not lash-happy. And there are opinions that the court did not lash in this circumstance at all.
change it to something that would be considered common courtesy today and my point would still stand.
I think one reason this concept (punishment for refusal to do something) seems strange to Americanized sensibilities is that civil law rarely regulates what people do for others, whereas Torah law does. Being rude in the U.S. is not against the law, but in some cases, it could be against the law in a Torah based society.
U.S. law forbids lashing, but does imprison people, which I think can be more damaging to a person than lashes (e.g., long-term separation from family and friends, inability to develop as a person, risk of prison assaults, declines in health due to confinement, etc.). An overwhelming majority of Americans polled whether they would hypothetically prefer 10 lashes or 5 years imprisonment chose the lashes. It may very well be that in 200 years, an “enlightened” society that lashes will look back at this era in U.S. history with its 2.3 million imprisoned and say, “gosh were they immoral!” And a large number of imprisoned people are confined simply because they bought and ingested some plant that the government happens to dislike.
Torah law metes out lashes in some circumstances, we cannot get around that fact. If you think they are never right, fine, you disagree with Torah law. It seems like you are trying to limit your argument against lashes to this single case involving a wife, why? I think courts ordering lashes in any case (and especially this one) was very rare, you think they did it like candy, we’ll have to agree to disagree.
However even if he said what you say he says, throwing a woman into the street with no money, food or personal belongings is practically the same thing, especially hundreds of years ago
Conjecture. Also, any principal the wife owned before the marriage is still completely hers. And this whole argument is getting silly. Who would get themselves thrown out (or throw someone out) over washing a face?
That is a BELIEF.
NOW it is because we are in golus and don’t have a Torah society at all, but when there is a Torah society, it won’t be, since knowledge of G-d will fill the earth as waters fill the sea.