From the Jerusalem Post:
Regarding the ordination of female rabbis, Lamm said his opposition was "social, not religious."
"Change has to come to religion when feasible, but it should not be rushed. Women have just come into their own from an educational perspective. I would prefer not to have this innovation right now. It is simply too early. What will happen later... I am not a prophet."
This essentially corroborates my own views as referenced in a mildly controversial JTA article a couple of months ago. It is a matter of public policy and not halakha, and - as has been widely discussed in the J-Blogosphere - most Orthodox Rabbis are aware of this fact.
23 comments:
I would have said my own objections are religious but sociological, not halachic-legalistic.
Rushing change to get to a given end-state is not how mesorah works. Yes, it's a sociological issue; but one that involves the essence of Torah shebe'al peh.
-micha
Rabbi Maroof,
I haven't looked into this area at all, but I recently came across Hilchos Melachim 1:5. What is your understanding of the types of non-monarch leadership appointments for women which are prohibited by this halacha?
Matt,
The Rishonim who prohibit serara are speaking of political appointments which grant women coercive executive authority over the community, i.e., in which a woman's will is autocratically imposed upon the community.
This is to be distinguished from situations in is not the will of the individual but is his or her knowledge or instruction that serves as the basis of leadership. (Consider, for example, the controversial transition in Sefer Shmuel from a navi/education-based model of communal leadership to a monarchic authority-based model).
Serara is also to be distinguished from circumstances in which the entire community willingly accepts a given individual's leadership, since in such a case the governance cannot be regarded as coercive in nature.
Micha
Could you please clarify what you are saying. In a Mitzva system that is fully revealed, how could a sociological point involve the essence of the Torah shebaal peh?
Trying to get halakhah to fit a desired result touches on the essence of how halakhah evolves, in what directions it can't evolve, etc... Thus, the essence of TSBP. Even if the pro forma is followed, inverting means and ends is a fundamentally dangerous prospect.
R' Yisrael Salanter, when he originally recoined the idiom "daas Torah", was referring to that total immersion in Torah weltenschaung that separates someone who knows the rules of pesaq and a great poseiq.
(Nothing about career, marriage or political advice, but that basic notion of the ineffable "thinks like the Torah does" beyond what can be laid out in formal rules...)
In other words, not everything that can be done by the legalisms of halakhah ought to be done. I guess it's a product of the basic Mussar perspective that the Torah's description of right and wrong go beyond the letter of halakhah. (Even to paying the workers who broke Rabba bar bar Chana's wine barrels.)
-micha
R' Micha
One of my favorite stories about R. Yisroel Salanter was the one where he washed his hands with a minimul Shiur. When asked why, he pointed out that the water was being brought by a poor woman. R> Yisroel was not going to machmir on a shiur reviis at the expense of this woman.
Though seemingly an "ethical" issue, this is a psak. The psak is that Mitzvas Ahavta Lireyacha kamocha, takes precedence over Chumrot in Shiur Reviis.
So too in the area of Kiddush Hashem, a Chacham will do things to avoid people speaking badly of the Torah.
Even Midas Chassidus is a Halachic concept, even if it is not a chiyyuv for most of us.
Of course there are also Minhagos.
Is this what you mean by sociological factors or am I missing something?
Yes, that was the distinction I was trying to make by calling it halachic-legalistic. There are the majority of the laws which have more or less well defined limits, then there is "vehalakhta bidrakhav", "ve'asisa hayashar vehatov", "qedoshim tihyu", where mussar and halakhah meet. Halachic, but not in legalisms.
Here I mean that the problem is that accommodating feminist aspirations... -- no, let me put that more accurately -- ...accommodating the spiritual aspirations of women who are products of a feminist society could very well have no "letter of the halakhah" problem. There is no halachic definition of "rabbi" that we can say it excludes women. And somehow the sherarah issue didn't stop Shemaya veAvtalyon from serving as zugos despite being geirim -- meaning that at least one of them was av beis din, a member of Sanhedrin (I presume in finding peshat, not voting when it came to legislation). This is the whole eitzah vs sherarah distinction that led to the Yoatzot. And think how many more couples would keep taharas hamishpachah if women could make decisions on re'iyos! People can and have written guidelines for a Women's Tefillah groups that avoid halachic pitfalls (no devarim shebiqdushah, etc..) All that could be addressed, on the straight halachic-legalistic, letter of the law, level.
However, the roles of people in society is also significant on an aggadic level. To the point that it becomes halakhah in the manner you just described.
This is a force-fitting of the halachic process to a value that needs to be assessed with da'as Torah (in the above given sense of the idiom). Are we accommodating something the Torah would prefer we reject? If men aren't supposed to want to serve as sheliach tzibbur, should we figure out a way a woman could have a similar experience? And should we encourage an attitude that tells all of society (both genders) that Yahadus is about shul, and thus this inclusion is important? Will there be secondary effects in a devaluation of Yahadus in the rest of life? And if you do tell her she has a role in shul, are you playing down the significance of chiyuv and halakhah, as her experience is the product of something halachically defined as very different than his? And if she buys into the whole project, does the fact that we just told her to find yahadus in a venue where she will always hit a glass ceiling just delay the problem which will strike back with interest? (When push came to shove, C ended up caving in on women and eidus, and the responsum doesn't even pretend to have a halachic argument. Rather, they note that they serve as rabbis and cantors, their not serving as eidim on a kesubah or the like is absurd.)
Also, such a fundamental change in roles may be break mimetic continuity to the point that the baby will be lost along with the bathwater.
-micha
R. Micha
There is a story of R Chaim Brisker
in written in the Rav's Sefer: "Halachik Man". It speaks of a Rabbinnic conference that was discussing the issue of Beris Milah.
Many of the Rabbonim wanted to use Beris Milah as a lever for other things. If a man had no Berit he would be excluded from one thing or another.
R Chaim would have none of this social policy. If the halacha allowed a person without a berit to do something, no "social policy" strings should be attached.
I don't agree with the concept of women Rabbis for Halachic reason, but if there were no such Halachaic reason- I think R Chaim's approach is the right one.
Yikov Hadin es hahar!
Rabbi Sacks,
I am curious to hear your halakhic objections, since thus far I have not seen a single Rishon or Aharon who maintains that a woman is forbidden to be a morah horaah.
Incidentally, I must say with regard to R Lamm's statement, I am absolutely baffled.
If, in fact, there were such a thing as public policy in Halacha, surely one should be silent about it. If ordination of women were halachically proper, and the only objection was that it was too volatile an issue to let the public know about, why is R. Lamm speaking publically at all about this topic?
To declare that female Rabbis are permissible, and that the only obstacle is a public that is not mature enough,in R Lamm's view, to handle the living reality of female Rabbis, is to make a bad situation worse.
R Lamm seemingly infantilizes the people, belittles Halacha and adds nothing. Can anyone explain this article?
I didn't get the impression that Rabbi Lamm imputed immaturity to the community per se.
I thought he meant that this kind of change must emerge organically and naturally rather than being artificially imposed from the outside by agenda-driven Jewish institutions or their leaders.
So he is not infantilizing people; rather, he is suggesting that radical changes not be implemented until proper conditions are in place.
"Change has to come to religion when feasible, but it should not be rushed. Women have just come into their own from an educational perspective. I would prefer not to have this innovation right now. It is simply too early. What will happen later... I am not a prophet."
By "change" and "innovation" I would think that what is meant is a development or maturation from un-development or immaturity?
I think this is what "modernity" of "modern orthodoxy" means - a change in the sense of development?
Then, clearly the community is too "undeveloped" to handle the women Rabbis?
Now what is the essence of this undevelopment in the community?
Is it a lack in accepting the phenomenon of women Rabbis only?
Or underlying the attitude toward women,is there a simplicity in the understanding of Halacha or perhaps even Chochma that would be prerequisites to accepting women rabbis?
Given the admitted fact on the part of R Lamm that the community is in fact undeveloped, surely he should beware speaking about "changes in religion" and "innovation" which are principles such a community certainly will not be able to process?
According to R Lamm's own argument, if the community were Modern or developed enough to process the ideas of "changes in religion" and "innovation"they wouldn't have a problem with women Rabbis.
So why is R Lamm talking about the issue at all if the terms needed to have discussion are unknown to the community?
Well, if I base my position on first principles, on Mussar and Telzh-esque ideas about the role of the values that underly halakhah, you shouldn't be surprised if Rav Chaim wouldn't agree.
I also believe that this bit of Brisk-ism is a basic attitude the LW-MO community picked up from R YB Soloveitchik. Despite all his post-facto taking of lessons from halakhah that RYBS did in his public talks, any student of his shiur would learn the Brisk attitude that talmud Torah means halakhah, halakhah only comes from halachic theories, and a total disattachment from what RYBS disdainfully called "ritual".
The rest of us dance on Shabbos, as long as it's not to bang out a rhythm with our feet, clap -- perhaps kele'acheir yad, and engage in other non-halachic expressions of a passionate Judaism.
Once you reduce TSBP to halakhah, then there is no "direction halakhah is heading", no conflict of values to explore to see if feminism is within the Torah gestalt, or whether people are overly identifying Yahadus with the closed spaces of shul and beis medrash... It opens the door to a Mod-O which can accept anything that you can jump through halachic hoops not to ban.
That's simply not my own derekh, that's all.
And ironically, RYBS's lament in Halakhic Man about the loss of the erev Shabbos Jew shows the disjoin between Brisker philosophy and the Brisker lifestyle. Rav Chaim, for all his ivory-tower lomdus, was a man of the people. There's just no way to get from here to there just based on the classroom.
-micha
R' Micha
I must say on second thought, I disagree with my comment about R' Chaim. The issue I brought up about Beris Milah is not relevant to the case at hand.
In that case the psak was well known, there would be no shock in the community about a revolutionary psak about the rights of an ערל. It was purely an issue of artificially adding social policy as a lever.In that case R Chaim objected.
In this case we are speaking about something totally different- a psak that is totally outside the halachic experience of the klal. This sort of shocking psak was not something R Chaim or the Rav favored. I wouldn't call this social policy, in the sense that it was not a guessing at what the Torah wants from us, but an important reason to avoid shaking up the community nonetheless.
My use of Yikov hadin es hahar then is misplaced, I apologize for any confusion I might have caused.
All of this is of course distinct from the issue of "finding what the torah wants from us" though.
What the Torah wants from us is to allow the Torah shebaal peh to serve as a perush of shebichtav.
א כל המצוות שניתנו לו למשה בסיניי--בפירושן ניתנו, שנאמר "ואתנה לך את לוחות האבן, והתורה והמצוה" (שמות כד,יב): "תורה", זו תורה שבכתב; ו"מצוה", זה פירושה. וציוונו לעשות התורה, על פי המצוה. ומצוה זו, היא הנקראת תורה שבעל פה.
This is not a derech issue, is it?
"The Rishonim who prohibit serara are speaking of political appointments which grant women coercive executive authority over the community, i.e., in which a woman's will is autocratically imposed upon the community."
So you would oppose a woman becoming President of the United States?
Kylopod,
Is our society autocratic? Last time I checked it was democratic!
I'm not sure the halachic sources make any obvious distinction between autocratic and democratic rulers.
Kylopod,
POTUS does not have the authority to order a person killed. POTUS does not have absolute unfettered power because s/he may be impeached (built into the system, as opposed to the possibility of revolt which is an abandonment of the system which made the authority figure an authority figure). In addition, the president serves a fixed term, as opposed to indefinitely.
For many of the reason that making a blessing on seeing POTUS is questionable, serara applying to that office is questionable.
I hate to do this and change the subject, But why Don't Sephardim where there Tzitzis out someone told me as to not insult there forbearers my question is why didn't the Forbearers where them out?
Wearing tzitzis out because the verse says "ur'isem oso -- and you will see them" is in the Shulchan Arukh 8:11 and the Mishnah Berurah (quoting the Magen Avaham; also at that link). And even though the Mishnah Berurah says that those who wear their tzitzis hidden would have to give an accounting for it, the author himself, the Chafetz Chaim, did not wear them exposed. No one in Litta did.
(A point in favor of the notion that the MB was written to be a theoretical work, not a practical guide.)
I don't even think pre-WWII Chassidim let the strings just hang, and they wore their tallis qatan between their shirt and their vest (to avoid questions of whether an undergarment requires tzitzis). The Ari haQadosh explicitly advises not wearing them exposed!
See photos from "the old country", eg Roman Wishniak's work.
So there really is no question why previous generations did not wear their tzitzis out. As far as I know, no one took this idea pragmatically until after WWII.
-micha
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