[Avodah] Kol kevudah: a woman's place is in the home

[Yitzhak Grossman]

On Mon, 31 Aug 2009 17:42:58 +0300
"Shoshana L. Boublil" <toramada at bezeqint.net> wrote:

...

> >From the reading of the context and the content it appears that if there was 
> an issue of staying home - it was in a historical context - that is, women 
> at the Historical Time and Place behaved in one way, and the men acted in 
> another way. Chzal are NOT trying to imply that women SHOULD stay home, they 
> are saying there that it was customary at the time.

At least we've gotten past the idea of "kol kevudah" referring
exclusively to the internal beauty of the soul as opposed to the outer
layer of riches.  Incidentally, another Gemara which uses kol kevudah
to suggest that a woman's place is in the home is Shevuos 30a (and see
Tosfos there).

I do concede the plausibility of your suggestion that the Gemara in
Yevamos can be understood as descriptive rather than normative.
Nevertheless, the Aharonim that I've seen, perhaps in light of all the
Gemaros together, perhaps from some other basis, do understand kol
kevudah to be normative (although it obviously remains to be determined
exactly what conduct is being praised here).  In addition to the Hasam
Sofer (Resp. EH II:99) mentioned in my previous mail, see R. Leiter's
fascinating and erudite collection of sources in his MiTorasan Shel
Rishonim to Gittin 12a.

Moreover, I remind you once again that you have yet to respond to the
Rambam who explicitly derives from the verse that a woman's place is in
the home.

Yitzhak
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