Separate but Equal?
Max Segall
Recently, here at Ma’ale Gilboa, we had the pleasure of being taught by Rav Dov Linzer, Rosh Yeshiva at Yeshivat Chovevei Torah, for a special shiur klali, and were privileged to gain insight into the learning process at his Yeshiva in New York. He expounded upon a particularly difficult topic found toward the end of the tractate of Bava Metzia that deals with issues of t’zar ba’alei chayim (animal cruelty).
I was told that after Mincha, he would give another shiur. However, I was not informed as to what the subject matter would be. Intrigued by his earlier shiur, I was eager to hear what he had to say about any topic. He began his second shiur by addressing the Israelis in particular. He said that he would be attempting to give a concise but accurate illustration of the current status of Modern Orthodoxy in America.
Not terribly interested in this topic, and figuring that there couldn’t possibly be anything intellectually stimulating about this shiur, especially since it was on a subject that as an American I was already quite intimately familiar, I was about to leave. But, something in the end compelled me to stay, and I am glad I did. Now I confess, at first, I felt a lot like Hermoine Granger from Harry Potter, sitting in on Muggle Studies: after all I was a complete insider, a Yankee totally familiar with the subject material, amongst outsiders for whom America remains an enigma.
Rabbi Linzer briefly touched upon the dichotomy between religious American Jewish women and religious Israeli women and, in a broader sense, women’s general respective role in Halakha. He explained that in America, the shul is the center of religious life, while the beit midrash is the center of religious life in Israel. As a result, women in America have a desire to contribute to religious services, while the women in Israel are more interested in contributing to the intellectual conversation.
The timing of this shiur couldn’t have been better, as I had recently engaged in a lengthy email exchange with my father, Mark, apropos this topic. This was prompted by an exchange my father had with Rabbi Daniel Fridman in response to a d’var Torah Rabbi Fridman gave a few weeks ago at my shul in New York, the Jewish Center.
My father relayed to Rabbi Fridman that when he was in law school, he once got into a very heated debate with a fellow law student about racism. This student, a black male, told my father that, by definition, even if my father didn’t want to be a racist, he was. He contended that this was because my father’s entire upbringing, with regard to the complete cultural framework of his life reference, made him a racist.
My father found this to be an offensive position to take. He maintained that, in his own words, “such a belief suggests a pre-determinism in human nature and a fundamental inability of any person or society to rise above his or its own point of self-reference.”
On a bit of a tangent, he continued that this was also where he thought the Exodus story affirms the Jews uniqueness in the world; after all, he wrote, “we ‘invented’ the ‘freedom narrative’ and are commanded to relive it every day. We have been persecuted more than any other culture throughout history. Therefore, coupled with our obligation to be kind to the stranger, because again, we were once slaves ourselves, how could we possibly not understand what it means to be slaves and then free?”
Concurrently, he also mentioned that he learned something from Arthur Herzberg, during his college years, relevant to the issue. Dr. Herzberg asserted that the fundamental difference between Jews in America and Jews in Europe, with regard to each respective “freedom” story, is that the Jews in Europe, France in particular, were emancipated by their “superiors”: they were recipients of emancipation, while the Jews in America were free from the outset of their time there. In America, freedom was incorporated into the very fabric of the society from its inception. In America, the Jews were born as free people, together with everyone else. In France, however, Jews had freedom bequeathed upon them, and therefore owed a debt of gratitude to their emancipators.
While these two points are seemingly disparate, they are very relevant to the topic at hand. My father explained that,
“While [he] very much enjoy[s] learning about the currents throughout Jewish history that ascribe important involvement and participation of women in Jewish life and culture, and that grant them an equal seat at the table of Jewish history and practice, the very fact that we HAVE to even have a conversation about this suggests we begin our entire perspective from one that is ‘skewed’, one that suggests there IS an argument that women are not equal to men and their role in Judaism is somehow subservient to ours. We are like the white people in [his] law school classmate’s world. Our ‘male’ cultural reference is by definition off- kilter because of the everyday context of ritual practice that ‘favors’ us, and therefore we, as men, are incapable of having a truly objective view on the role of women.”
Similarly, when we advocate a more active role for women in daily ritual life, the dialogue reflects the feeling as if we are bestowing it: that is to say, we are emancipating women. As “emancipators”, we have, by definition, not created a level field of play. As men, it seems as if we are emulating the European model of emancipation. The Gemara, for example, is a dialogue of men talking about the role of women; there is never an instance where men and women discuss the issue together. We cannot escape the cultural reality of human history: men have been the “dominant” sex in most human societies for millennia. My father mentioned, for example, the Rambam: think about how this genius- the consummate “rationalist”- thought of the presence of women in daily Jewish life. He joked that the Taliban might want to quote liberally from some of his pronouncements! Finally, the question being: “how does that jibe with the universality that we ascribe to Divine law?”
A few weeks ago, I attended a shiur given by Rav Gilad, during which he spoke about the nature of women's role in Halakha. He said that if you take a look at the early chapters in the book of Genesis, you will find that there’s a seemingly paradoxical inconsistency concerning the creation of woman. Initially, the Scripture says, “And G-d created man in His image, in the image of G-d He created him; male and female He created them” (Gen. 1:27). In the subsequent chapter, however, the text reads, “And the Lord G-d fashioned the rib that He had taken from the man into a woman; and He brought her to the man” (Gen. 2:22). The former verse seems to imply that G-d created man and woman simultaneously, which would indicate that the two are equal in stature, while the latter verse could be interpreted as implicitly showing that woman is to be subservient to man.
However, as Rav Gilad demonstrated, supported by a similar drasha given to me last year by Rav Meir Soloveitchik in a high school class at Ramaz, both verses clearly maintain that men and women were created equally. Some commentators believe that the former verse implies that man was created androgynously. When G-d created woman, the female characteristics of man were used to fashion her. As a result, woman and man were one in the same. When they were separated, there is nothing to suggest that they did not remain equal in stature. So the proverbial question remains: why does it seem as if women are considered inferior in the eyes of Halakha?
The fact of the matter, at least according to Rav Gilad, is that there needs to be a distinction between the normative truth, and the actual one. Society has traditionally relegated women to an inferior status, a belief that continues to be made more and more antiquated. Rav Yoel Ben Nun, for example, says that the women that Chazal speak about are completely different from the ones that Halakha deals with today. The women of our day and age are more confident and assertive than the women of ages past. We try, as a result, to find more allowances, based on Halakha, to enable women to participate in the congregation.
Why, for example, does a minyan require ten men? A majority of the Poskim say that it’s a normative thing, as ten seems to constitute a legitimate group. Why men? Again, it’s a reflection of societal norms and precedents: men were, for many years, considered to be superior to women. Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel says that prayer was something that was initially, at least upon its institution, a spontaneous and individual act. There needed to be a separation between the sexes to ensure the possibility to optimize humility and modesty when approaching G-d. The fact of the matter is that women distract men and men distract women.
Even the prohibition against teaching girls (Torah) seems to be a normative and societal one. When the commandment to learn to Torah is given, the Scripture says “and teach them to your children” (Deut. 11:19). The male subject is used, and as a result, the Gemara infers this to mean that only men are obligated to learn and teach Torah. However, you even have opinions in the Gemara, like Ben Azai, who maintain that a father is obligated to teach his daughter Torah (Babylonian Talmud Tractate Sotah 87b-Fourth Mishna).
There are also more contemporary commentators and rabbinic authorities who maintain that girls are permitted, and perhaps even obligated, to learn Torah. The Likutei Halachot of the Chafetz Chayim says that the “prohibition” to teach girls was a societal one. When the Torah says, “ask your father and he will tell you”, this shows that it was only men who learned. Again, this was a normative issue. He asserts that if women, nowadays, are going to learn the indigenous language of the country in which they live, then of course they should be learning Torah. He does recommend, however, that they learn Tanach and the tractates that pertain to women, in particular.
The responsa of the Mikveh Hamayim also calls for women to learn Torah. He says that women in contemporary society are fully integrated and comprise a large part of the intellectual community. They need to know Torah so that they can properly uphold its stipulations and be proper adherents.
However, even these purportedly more liberal Poskim all seem to suggest that the only reason that women are to be given equal status as men is because of the change as to what’s accepted in contemporaneous society. Rabbi Eliezer and the Rambam both believe that there is no reason to teach Torah to women, as they will be incapable of comprehending the material. The Rambam goes as far to suggest that women should remain at home and tend to their husband’s domain constantly. So, how do we reconcile this issue?
In response to my father’s inquiry, Rabbi Fridman replied that he was very taken with the distinction that my father raised in the name of Arthur Herzberg regarding American Jewry and French Jewry, and the relationships, which they had, even subconsciously, with the majority populations in their respective countries. He believes that it is very important that no Halakhist operate with even the subtlest sense of 'liberator/emancipator.'
Finding himself in complete agreement with my father, with regard to his law school dispute, apropos the capacity of the individual to transcend any cultural forces, Rabbi Fridman said that he would simply add that this kind of determinism, which was being advocated by my father’s fellow student, is irreconcilable with our cherished notion of free will and would apply the very same concept of expansive free will to the question of one's Halakhic analysis of women.
“When we, meaning you and I, and hopefully many others, learn sugyot, which deal with the Halakhic status of women, hopefully we do so without a trace, conscious or subconscious, of any form of superiority. As I mentioned on Shabbat, that sense of superiority is entirely at odds with the Torah's insistence on the axiological equality between men and women. Just as I agree with you that one can relate to black people without any subconscious racism, despite the fact that there may happen to be many white racists, at least in certain contexts, I would insist that the same is entirely possible in terms of one's perspective on women in halacha; it is true that there are many sexists, I am sorry to say, in the world, and also in the Jewish world, but I would like to think that we are not trapped by their prejudice any more than you were trapped in law school by the biases of white racists.”
He believes that it is important for our community to articulate a vigorous position regarding the contribution of women to Jewish life through the ages, going all the way back to the era of the Matriarchs, and in his opinion, Jewish women certainly do not need anyone's approval or validation. Pointing out that women have played, and must play, a huge role in the transmission of mesora (tradition) does run the risk of implicitly giving credence to a position, which would deny that. At the end of the day, however, when all is weighed on the ledger, it is imperative that men still, “speak forcefully regarding the axiological equality of men and women, etc., while still managing to convey the message that women to do not need men to make them equal, as the Almighty has already done so.”
I find the ideas that Rabbi Fridman espouses to be most compelling. However, the opinions he presents represent the ideal, and the sad truth is that the ideal is often optimistic in nature, in that it's virtually unobtainable.
While Rav Gilad maintains that men and women are of equal stature socially, culturally, and biologically, I believe, and bear in mind these are extrapolations I've made from inferences of his, that he asserts that, despite the need to be progressive and more accommodating, within reason, Halakhically, women will not be completely equal to men within the foreseeable future. Halakha is determined by tradition and precedent, which was established by the very same men who dealt with these "issues" in the Gemara. These men were almost incontrovertibly "sexist" in some form or another, no doubt. As a result, women will sadly, I believe, continue to be relegated to the roles that Judaism has established for them.
While it's true, and again this is something that Rav Gilad produces consistently when the topic arises, that you can find a plethora of contemporary Poskim, commentators, and biblically verses that assert that women are equal to men when it comes to other important aspects, they aren't equal in the eyes of Halakha. Even the Matriarchs and other important biblical female figures, whom I'm sure even the most radical Charedi would contend were holy, were still confined to the predetermined roles that their religion and gender, in earlier epochs, set for them.
Even if by some miracle that today's radical Poskim or even the Charedim of Beit Shemesh for that matter, unanimously and emphatically agreed that women are equal to men in all facets of life, Halakha isn't the most malleable code of law. Even with the great strides made to "modernize" Halakha and make it applicable to contemporaneous issues, it's still relatively intractable and requires nuance (chidushim) to alter it. These come from serious deliberation based on the opinions of erstwhile Poskim. Even then, you'll have those who maintain that there was neither a need nor was it the intention of G-d/the Torah to make women obligated in Halakha like men. As a result it does indeed become an issue of "emancipation" when anyone makes allowances for women to have a greater role in Halakha and the Jewish community.
Now, you could assume that since men have a more “overt” ritual and legal role in daily religion, than women, and considering that they cannot participate “equally”, that means that they are “less” equal. As my father put it, “we see that through the crucible of ‘modernity’ that insists equality has to mean equal roles and responsibilities.”
However, perhaps our point of reference is wrong? Is it unreasonable to presume that just like men and women inexorably differ on a physical level, there are inescapable societal differences that we have to respect? Just because a woman can’t be counted toward a minyan or be an ayd (witness) doesn’t mean that she is considered to be, in the eyes of G-d or society, inferior, just like a man is not considered to be inferior due to his inability to conceive and bear children.
The issue is, however, once you start expounding upon and designating what constitutes those differences, you create a barrier between the sexes, which in turn engenders a sense of disaffiliation and disunion. People will, in my opinion, always argue that parity is about equal roles and responsibilities. Is separate but equal truly equal?
If you are to accept that human history is a broad arching experience, then seeing it only from the perspective of 21st Century American secular humanist culture is not necessarily the “universal truth”. However, wouldn't it be within reason to say that the notion of complete religious parity is a by-product of 21st Century American secular humanist culture, specifically the feminist movement? As a result, there is always going to be a faction of people who maintain that notion of equality mandates that there be no distinguishable differences between the sexes.
This issue goes back to the rather incontrovertible nature of Halakha. When asked if women were permitted to wear talit and teffilin, Rav Moshe Feinstein responded that it was not permissible because their desire to be included in the mitzvah stemmed from a feminist desire to be equal to men. If you look at the issue in that regard, then one could make the argument that any recent provision to allow women to have a greater Halakhic role in Judaism is erroneous and inappropriate.
As my father put it so eloquently,
“The conclusions we reach through this analysis are critical: as society evolves and the role of women overall becomes ever more “equal”, how do we function halachically in a way that recognizes the crucial role of women, while also accepting that our law still demands important distinctions and separations, many of which we cannot help but feel as never quite making women truly equal. Whatever conclusions we reach, we cannot be left with the feeling that, as George Orwell would say, ‘All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others…’”
The Akeidat Yitzhak, I believe, has a wonderful response to this very notion. He says that women have a dual role/personality as is reflected by the fact that they have “two” names, as demonstrated by Chavah (Eve). Her name, as we all know, was Chava, but he was also called an isha (woman). The etymology of isha implies that she was a “by-product” of man. As a result, she has the ability to comprehend anything a man can, as demonstrated by the Matriarchs and all the other female leaders heretofore (eishet chayil demonstrates thusly). On the other hand, Chava denotes fertility and implies that she is the mother of all living things. It’s the woman’s job to rear and raise the children because she is the one that brings them into the world. However, as I said earlier, that is not her only purpose, which is why Jacob got so angry at Rachel when she said she’d die if he didn’t give her sons: that is not a woman’s only function in life.
My hope is that, as Rabbi Fridman said, "a male can still speak forcefully regarding the axiological equality of men and women...while still managing to convey the message that women do not need men to make them equal, as the Almighty has already done so." One day, ideally, women will be attain greater Halakhic status and be allowed to have more consequential and profound roles in the Jewish community. What I believe to be somewhat of a consolation is that women have indeed come a long way from where they used to be. While it would be nice to allow women to have a greater role in leading the congregation in tefillah, for example, it is still amazing and important to acknowledge that women do have a profound impact and influence on their community and religion.
However, as many Rabbeim will assert, the issue, from a Halakhic perspective, remains: Halakha constantly grapples with issues of nuance, advancement, innovation, and tradition. If any major changes are to be enacted, I believe that it is crucial that they be incremental and glacial in speed. We need time to absorb each change. Our religion has survived for so long precisely because we are so careful about preserving the core of our faith. In order not to allow a single generational preference to determine Halakha, it makes sense that you would need the perspective of a number of generations to be able to distinguish between a cultural fad and a fundamental change in human nature. That is why we do not just change Halakha as soon as the “need” arises, and it is also why Minhag (custom) is so important. While certain Poskim like Rav Feinstein may seem insensitive or impassive about such issues, it is within reason for them to be dubious and ambivalent about the nature of and the desire for change. We need to be careful to balance a 3,500-year-old mesora with the inexorable progress of human society.
