[Avodah] women learning Torah

[T613K at aol.com]

R' Binyomin Hirsch writes:



"If girls don't learn Torah before they're  born, why do they have  a pinch 
under their noses?" 
>>By extension the same question can be  asked ad to why all humans have that 
pinch mark under their noses, everyone from  the Chinese to the lost tribes 
in Africa. Did they all learn Torah, and if they  did is that more problematic 
than a woman learning  Torah?<<




and R' Menachem Posner writes:
 
>>The source of this is Niddah 30b. Interestingly, the Talmud  mentions the 
angel tapping the baby on the mouth but nothing about the dent  (philtrum) left 
behind. If this is the sole source, it would render your   question and that 
of why non-Jews have dents immaterial; unless there is another  source which 
does mention it.<<

>>>>>
In reality my question about the dent under the nose was meant half in  jest. 
 I don't /really/ believe it's there because the malach tapped you  under the 
nose.  (I know someone who does not have that dent under her  nose and she 
does NOT remember learning the whole Torah from an angel before she  was born :- 
) )
 
But my question about girls learning Torah in utero was meant  seriously.  
And RBH's question -- which I didn't think of, though I should  have -- is also 
a logical question.  Do goyim learn Torah in utero?
 
I can think of a number of possibilies:
 
1.  Females and goyim learn what they will some day need to know, and  no 
more than that.
 
2.  Females and goyim do indeed learn the whole Torah.
 
3.  Females do but goyim don't (because their neshamos are different  from 
Jewish neshamos?  speculative).
 
4.  Goyim do but females don't (because goyim can become geirim some  day and 
so at least the possibility exists that some day they will learn Torah  and 
will need to know it, but females will never become males and will never  have 
a mitzva of limud Torah).
 
5.  Other?


--Toby  Katz
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