[Avodah] Tzinius and the ILG

[Chana Luntz]

RMK writes:

> On 2/27/07, Chana Luntz <chana at kolsassoon.org.uk> wrote:
> > ....  It has been argued, on this list and elsewhere, that this
shows that the Torah is morally in 
> >favour of  slavery, and that therefore any notions that we have that 
> >slavery is  not necessarly moral are contrary to the moral compass of
the 
> > Torah....

> If I may modify that slightly: "any notions we have that 
> slavery is INHERENTLY immoral are contrary to the moral 
> compass of the Torah."  I think that the fact that the Torah 

That is why I brought the example of kiddushei biah.  Because Chazal say
that acting in this way is a form of pritzus.  It is not similar to the
case of yibbum/chalitza, where there are discussions about whether
people are capable of doing yibbum with the right motivations, so your
"perhaps it is not inherently immoral" argument works.  But regarding
kiddushin, what Chazal appear to be saying is that to have biah with
eidim in the way required to effect kiddushin al pi halacha is
intrinsically a form of pritzus, regardless of motivation.  So by saying
that it is not inherently immoral to have kiddushin in this way appears
to be contradicting Chazal on a matter of morality (and surely whatever
view you have on Chazal and science, saying that their moral
understanding was flawed must certainly be a big no no).

I think part of the difficulty you are having is, if you take away the
moral compass aspect, then you are struggling to see any rationale for
permitting kiddushei biah (ie my question - what was the Torah thinking
of?, is too strong a kasha) - so let me give you a possible
understanding.  Let us say that we need to include kiddushei biah as one
of the halachically valid means of kiddushin, not because it is ever
moral to perform kiddushin in this way, but because you need this in
order to learn out all of the halachos that the gemora learns out in the
first few blatt of kiddushin from the existence of kiddushei biah on a
d'orisa level (such as the point at which the kinyan occurs and the
nature of biah) - such halachos themselves having practical applications
in other areas of halacha that are not immediately obvious (and may not
even have been invented at the time of the gemora, eg like the correct
halachic understanding of invitro fertilisation and other aspects of
modern reproductive technology). [This BTW could be seen as a derivative
of the ben soreh u'moreh argument, at least according to the opinion
that a ben soreh u'moreh never occurred).  If you were to accept this
argument, then there is no need to deny that kiddushin by way if biah is
inherently a form of pritzus - since its halachic existence is required
for other reasons.  But it does then mean that one cannot be sure that
because something is allowed for by the Torah within its halachic
framework, it is necessarily moral to act on that which is allowed.

Regards

Chana