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I said “equal say” is at odds with the Torah, in the context of the earlier discussion. Compromise and discussion is very much in line with the Torah. But that doesn’t mean equal say, when the Torah specifically specifies who has more say. Compromise and discussion ? equal say.
Why are you so hooked up on “force”? Technically a husband can take his wife to beis din — IF he wants to excersize that right – he doesn’t have to excersize it — to enforce his rights. Beis Din does the “enforcing”. (I think Rambam says even with a stick if necessary.) But I can’t imagine things even coming to that with people who are Torah loving. It is talking about a moredes.
GAW, he specifically wanted me to nurse for the health benefits of the baby. Formula is an adequate substitute, but not really the same thing. I’m not sure what halacha would require.
Kasha, there are plenty of issues that are not really halachic and just about every day life. And then there are halachic things – do you require your wife to wash your feet? You are allowed to technically. Would you beat her (or have beis din beat her) until she washed your feet if she didn’t want to?
I said “equal say” is at odds with the Torah, in the context of the earlier discussion. Compromise and discussion is very much in line with the Torah. But that doesn’t mean equal say, when the Torah specifically specifies who has more say. Compromise and discussion ? equal say.
OK, now you have me confused about your position.
My marriage is based on the concept of “equal say.” The mechanisms by which we achieve that are (a) discussion/compromise and (b) agreeing not to act preemptively/unilaterally.
By the use of these mechanisms, we both agree that no one will overrule the other on major decisions.
That being said, does this run counter to the way the Torah wants a marriage run or not?
The Wolf
Hereorthere,
I think you’re confusing the ideas of “feminism” with “equality in marriage.” They are not the same.
What if I don’t have a bias one way or the other? What if I don’t think the wife should have to obey* the husband or the husband obey the wife?
The Wolf
* By “obey,” I mean take and follow orders against their will.
“How do you know that washing the husbands feet is not done today?”
One poster already told us that they do exactly (like described in Halocha) that in their household. So we know in fact that it is done today.
Which poster said their wife washes their feet or they wash their husbands feet?
I’m going to do a poll on a frum women’s website and get an answer.
heretothere-
“I remember being taught in yeshivah that once something is a obligation it does not cease to be an obligation even if the original reason for it no longer exists.”
Usually you are correct. However what SJS is saying doesn’t contradict that. It could be that chazal never said that the woman must wash her husbands feet, they just said she has to do whatever is normal for a woman to do for her husband. The reason they said she has to wash his feet is simply a translation of that rule into the language of their day and age. In other words, washing the husband’s feet is the application, not the law.
I’ll give you an example. For issur v’heter, the gemara sometimes says you need 1 eid or a chazakah etc. But most poskim will tell you that a video camera or something like that is good enough, because the gemara never meant to say davka those things, they were just the application of the rule for those days, but the real rule is that you need to know, and a video camera suffices for that.
Similarly here, one can make the case that the rule was never davka to wash the feet, but rather to do what is normal in any given society. Therefore although the application might change, the rule stays the same.
Initial poll results in: 11 women said they don’t wash their husbands feet (many were grossed out at the thought) and none said they did.
Yit, you verbalized my point nicely 🙂
heretothere-
I don’t know, it’s a good question. SJS said she’s gonna ask her rabbi, sounds to me like the right way to go.
SJS-
np 🙂
yitayningwut: “It could be that chazal never said that the woman must wash her husbands feet, they just said she has to do whatever is normal for a woman to do for her husband. The reason they said she has to wash his feet is simply a translation of that rule into the language of their day and age. In other words, washing the husband’s feet is the application, not the law.”
<hereorthere asked: “So doing what is normal in society is part of the rule of obeying the husband in this case?”>
yitayningwut: “I don’t know, it’s a good question.”
First you’re trying to explain it is a general rule, then when asked if its a general rule, you answer you don’t know???
Also, no one denies that the halacha of obeying ones husband (“???”) is a general halacha, aside from specifics.
I think the whole concept of washing feet, in regards to the halachos of washing “panav, yadav, v’raglav” on Shabbos/Yom Tov are only because in those days they used to walk barefoot and there was a lot of dust on their feet. I don’t know if these halachos would be the same today. I would assume that a woman washing her husband’s feet might be the same concept.
Hereorthere wrote:
Why would they be “grossed out” at the thought of washing their husbands feet.
What about all the love and closeness a couple is supposed to have?
How about asking the husbands washing the wives feet would they too be ‘grossed out’ at the thought?
How can they ever get together then, for the mitzvoh of having children or are they just in marriages of convienence where they are not actually in love?
Look, some people’s feet are gross, even if they’re the feet of your spouse. It has nothing to do with being in love or the mizvah of having children. I love my wife’s neshama. I’m indifferent on her feet.
Kasha-
I don’t understand your question. I said that the general rule is to do what is normally expected in any given society. When heretothere asked for specifics I said I don’t know. I could guess, and my guess would be that washing feet is not included in our day and age, and maybe preparing a Shabbos meal is. But I don’t know, so I told him the best thing is to ask your rav. I was simply defending a very basic concept mentioned by SJS, that the application of a rule can change over time although the rule remains the same.
That which you say “no one denies”, I deny. Show me a makor that a woman is OBLIGATED to obey her husband, as a general principle.
The halacha is one is obligated to listen to the their father and mother (Kibud Av V’Eim). The halacha is also that once a women gets married she must listen to her husband ahead of her parents. (See Shulchan Aruch Yoreh Deah Siman 240:17 and commentary of the Shach. And Chayei Adam Klal 67:17 and footnote to Sefer Chareidim ibid. where he deals with this at length.) The husband must listen to his parents, even when it conflicts with his wife.
Married women are still obligated in Kibuv Av V’Aim, but they do not have to take the time to constantly do things for their parents, unless their husband allows it, since they are obligated to their husbands.
Also, a child (where the parents are not divorced) must listen to his father ahead of his mother, for the reason that his mother herself must listen to his father. If the parents are divorced, then the father loses his precedence since the mother is no longer his wife and is no longer obligated to him.
(See Shulchan Aruch Yoreh Deah Siman 240:14; Pischei Teshuva Yoreh Deah 240:12, Shu”t Rav Akiva Eiger Siman 68, Shu”t Noda B’Yehuda Mahadura Tinyana Even HaEzer Siman 45 and Chazon Ish Even HaEzer Siman 47 Dibur Hamaschil HaTel.)
I love my wife’s neshama. I’m indifferent on her feet. –
Just a guy- you couldn’t have said it better!
hereorthere- I did not try to answer your question. It doesn’t need answering either way. Why is it relevant? SJS said that in her informal “poll” some of the respondents said the thought of washing their husbands feet was “gross.” I don’t understand what you don’t understand about that and I don’t see why its worthy of any further discussion. You seem to link it with not being in love and being unable to perform the mitzvah of having children. I don’t see how they’re related.
Kasha-
There is absolutely no blanket chiyuv for a person to OBEY his parents. There is only a chiyuv to honor them. Sure, honoring them means obeying them when they ask for a cup of water, but when they expect something unreasonable one is not obligated to listen. Check the gemara in Kiddushin and the SA. If it costs money, or if it’s telling the child who to marry or where to learn, there’s no chiyuv, because the chiyuv is not to obey but rather to honor, and honoring has it’s limits.
And sure a wife is obligated to honor her husband. But a husband is obligated to honor his wife as well. The gemara (Yevamos 62b) says ?????? ???? ?????, it is proper that he honor her even more than himself.
What I assume you are referring to is the gemara in Kiddushin quoted by Rashi in the beginning of Kedoshim:
??? ??? ????? ?????: ?? ??? ??? ????? ???? ????, ??? ?????. ?????? ??? ?? ??? ???, ??? ????, ????? ???? ?????, ??? ??? ???? ?? ?? ??? ???? ???, ????? ???? ???? ?????, ??? ??? ???? ????? ????
The gemara is not referring to what you call obeying. It is saying a simple thing. A woman has obligations which revolve around her husband, so in that respect she is like a worker who can’t drop his job to honor his parents. A man has less obligations to his wife, not necessarily overall, but less that demand him to remain inside the house and not be able to honor his parents. That is how I understand it, and thus it is not a valid source that a woman has a general obligation to obey her husband.
yitayningwut: You seem to be overlooking that while a wife’s obligation to her husband take precedence over her obligations to her parents, the husband’s obligations to his parents come before his wife. I also cited many other sources.
Derech agav, to those who quoted R’ Moshe saying he was anti-feminism, the point as you are presenting it is not accurate. Sure he was opposed to the idea that women are the same as men and should be pursuing all the same career choices etc., but he also held that the world was correct for realizing that women are equal to men and neither the husband nor the wife is more ???? than the other:
In IM 5:20.33, R’ Moshe explains the halacha of an ??? ????? who does ????? in front of her husband on ???. He explains that such a woman is one who realizes her own importance. He adds parenthetically, about the few wives of gedolim over time who were noheig that way:
According to those of you who maintain that “the man is the captain”, I wonder why she would be allowed to lean. Are you insinuating that these gedolim throughout the ages weren’t ???? when their wives acted in a way contrary to the Torah hashkafa? Because that doesn’t sit well with me, especially when you cannot prove that such a concept even exists in halacha.
Kasha-
Hold on, you might have a point. Let me think about it.
yitayningwut: I humbly suggest you read the aforementioned (a few comments back) S”A, poskim I cited. i.e. Shulchan Aruch Yoreh Deah Siman 240:14; Pischei Teshuva Yoreh Deah 240:12, Shu”t Rav Akiva Eiger Siman 68, Shu”t Noda B’Yehuda Mahadura Tinyana Even HaEzer Siman 45 and Chazon Ish Even HaEzer Siman 47 Dibur Hamaschil HaTel, Shulchan Aruch Yoreh Deah Siman 240:17 and commentary of the Shach. And Chayei Adam Klal 67:17 and footnote to Sefer Chareidim.
Regarding the husband being the captain of the family and the wife assistant captain see Shulchan Aruch EH 69:8.
See my edited post.
Kasha-
I looked through the SA in YD that you cited, with the Shach and Pischei T’shuvah. There is no SA EH 69:8, so you’ll have to give me that mar’eh makom again.
What I see is as follows. A woman has an obligation to honor her husband, on a level that is not an obligation for her husband. I don’t know the drasha for this, but it is clear. Therefore I retract anything I said which would imply otherwise.
However I have yet to see a makor that says a woman is obligated to OBEY her husband, beyond the scope of the normal obligations of kavod. Kavod does not require me to listen to my parents when it comes to a choice of schools for my kids, so kavod should not obligate a woman to obey her husband there either. (Agav, it could be this case is not really relevant because a father has the obligation to teach his sons and not a mother, so for that reason it might be the husband gets to decide. But not because the wife has a general obligation to obey. I just used this case for argument’s sake.)
I stand by my understanding of the Rashi in Kedoshim.
Thank you for correcting me on the first point.
Sorry about SA EH 69:8. It then must have been another part of SA EH 69, I think. I can’t look it up at the moment, but if you have time you might want to glance around that siman.
I checked and didn’t see anything contrary to what I’ve said.
To SJS: The rishonim and acharonim wrote with often very nuanced language. The S.A. in particular sometimes uses elegantly blunt terms, and in places indicates that a woman is an object. At times a cheftza shel mitzva, but an object non the less. Of course the daughters of Sara Imenu are much more than just holy objects. But yet, it is still ok to be just a holy object.
koma-
Cheftza shel mitzva and the like doesn’t mean anything. It’s a purely legalistic term and does not at all imply that a woman is an object. FYI there are places where a man is also called a ‘cheftza’ (object) such as in discussions in the meforshim regarding making a future-tense neder. If you know what I’m talking about fine, if not then learn Nedarim, my point is you can’t bring a proof from a purely legalistic term regarding the hashkafa of the matter. This has already been demonstrated above with regard to the word kinyan.
yitayningwut: How do you explain that al pi Torah a man can have more than one wife, while a woman can only have one husband?
I don’t think I need to answer that question to defend my approach, but I’ll answer it anyway. Perhaps a man is emotionally capable of loving two women, while the opposite is not true. This is pure speculation, but it’s possible, and I also heard my Rebbi Rav Tzvi Berkowitz of NIRC say a similar pshat.
And how do you explain the halacha that you save a man’s life before a woman’s life?
I recently posted my opinion about this halacha but I can’t find it to link you the whole discussion, but maybe someone else knows where it is.
Basically I do not think this has anything to do with a man being inherently better than a woman. We have no right to judge who is better or worse. But it is a halacha about survival. The halacha sees men as more capable of cultivating our social norms/culture/religion etc., and therefore it’s more important to save the man. It is like if in the middle of the war you can save either the general or the philosopher, you save the general, not because he deserves to be saved, but because he is a better protector of the society as a whole, and thus in this context he can be described as more important. But in truth that isn’t necessarily accurate.
This is the link you refer to:
What about the Mishnah in Horios (13a) that states in regard to returning lost objects one should help a man first?
Same. It’s all about preserving quality of life either for this person or for that. This one will have a bigger chain reaction when his life is made better, while this one will have a lesser one. Therefore it’s better for society as a whole to return the man’s aveidah.
yitayningwut: I am alarmed that you regard halachic terminology meaningless. Heftza shel mitzva is my take on the opening statements of hilchos ishus. When I do my homework, I regard the specific terminology of Hazal very meaningful.
thanx mod.
koma-
I do not mean to say that halachic terminology is meaningless. Heaven forbid. What I do mean is that in the context of this discussion, the terminology used in a purely legal sense is not at all relevant. Allow me to explain.
When talking about a mitzva, there is the one performing the mitzva and the object through which it is performed. This idea of ‘cheftza shel mitzva’ is a legal terminology which specifies that object that the mitzva is done through. When analyzing the man’s mitzva to marry and procreate, the woman is legally classified the ‘object’. In the same sense, when analyzing one’s obligation to save a life, the one being saved is the ‘object’. This legal terminology is simply a way of examining the details of the mitzva being performed, but in no way does it reflect Chazal’s values regarding whether a certain person or kind of person is truly regarded as an object.
I’m sorry if I wasn’t clear before.
yitay, regarding your speculative answer on multiple wives, a non-speculative approach to the question is that someone can acquire things in multiples, but something can be acquired only by one person. (Hopefully I’m being clear about what I’m trying to say.)
Another question would be why a woman can’t be an eid (witness).
Kasha,
I did not use the word “embrace” in my post. The mods edited my post and, as such, completely undermined my entire point.
The Wolf
EDITED
Kasha,
A woman can be a eid for some things, but not others. For example, her testimony for kashrut is as good as that of a man.
I am referring to court testimony.
kasha-
That is just as speculative an approach as mine. It only isn’t speculative if the actual source of the halacha specifies that reason, which it does not. Therefore aside from the fact that it’s a gezeiras hakasuv, all we have is speculation.
About a woman not being an eid, I can speculate more. But I’m not sure I see the point. All I was trying to say is that you have no proof that a woman has a general obligation to obey her husband, and that I think in general they have an equal say. I never said anything about men and women having the same dinim in kol hatorah kulah, and I don’t think I ever implied that. It seems like your using my opinion here to pin the entire feminist agenda on me and then debate me on points I never made, which is just not fair.
On the other hand, if you’re stam interested in my opinion on other matters, I’ll gladly share it. Let’s just first be clear where we stand.
(Agav, I’m not even so sure your speculation is plausible, because who said the chicken came before the egg? That is, perhaps the kinyan was set up in a way that the man acquires and not the woman specifically because of the reason I gave!)
I disagree with you, but would like to hear the speculative opinion you offered to share regarding eidus nevertheless.
P.S. I don’t hold you responsible for the entire feminist agenda. 🙂
kasha-
Thanx for the clarification 😉
This might draw me some hate from the more extreme feminists among us, but I think it is possible that halacha sees women in general as not being good critical judges of a situation. Consider for example, the ratio of women to men in chess and poker tournaments. You’ll see that even in a world which promotes egalitarianism the women still are a very small minority in those games for which the main requirement is critical thinking. Perhaps they have other strong points which men don’t have nearly as much as they do, but their general weakness in the area of critical analysis might be the halacha’s reason for disqualifying them as witnesses, which demands the eid to be a good judge of the situation he is witnessing.
I haven’t read the entire thread but here are my thoughts.
I really don’t know what this whole Feminism thing comes about. Men and women are Biologically different, how can we fulfill the same roles in life? A Mans role is to learn and support his family , a women’s is to take care of her husband and family. We just have different roles, and yes because of that we are made up differently to be able to fulfill those roles. This whole American feminism thing is ridiculous. what are they trying to prove/deny? We are biologically, physically, mentally, and emotionally DIFFERENT, A painter can’t use a stone cutter’s tools! I really don’t understand all this fuss of whose greater etc. we are equal in stature but DIFFERENT in our tafkidim.
Now i didn’t read the whole thread but for all those that were saying they are a lot more than a mother/wife or husband/father – no one’s saying that your not. It’s just what’s your PRIORITY what’s my main goal. Yes you can be a machaneches, head of some chessed organization, amazing and dedicated daughter,sister,friend home decorator, etc or avreich, tutor, rebby, doctor, father, brother, son…but whats the main goal? what’s the main priority? (which should be in any case the HOME.)
heretothere-
These are curses, not laws. It is saying that unfortunately the world will run its course that way, not that anyone is obligated to act that way. Would you suggest that the halacha says a woman must have pain in childbirth and may not take a painkiller? Because it says that there too.
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