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

[Chana Luntz]

> 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.

Um, I rather suspect that the Rambam, if you asked him, would say that it
was at most an asmachta, as otherwise he would be going against the
principle that one does derive halachos from Nach.

And as I have said previously on this list (and to which RMB referred), to
the extent that one holds that a woman's place is required to be in the home
as prescriptive behaviour, you end up poselling a lot of our foremothers to
whit:

A)if Rivka had believed "kol" kavuda, then she would a) not have been at a
public well; b) not have
talked to strange men; and c) certainly not have had the familiarity to
have given Eliezer water in a public place, not to mention all that
running back and forward to the camels (hardly very tzniusdik, all that
exertion - not to mention that drawing up water generally involves
bending down and walking in front of etc etc)!  Ok, she was three!  But
a) Tznius applies from three and b) what kind of training was she being
given in how to behave!

B) Not to mention all the other women at the well, Rachel and Zipporah.

C) how about the Shunamite woman, from who we learn that
one is to go and visit one's Rebbe on shabbas and rosh chodesh.
Given that we are talking about shabbas this would seem to be a violation of
the Rambam.

D) How about Chana?  OK, Eli had a problem with her appearing to be drunk,
but what about the fact that she davka chose to daven in the mishkan,
rather than at home.  Is that not a violation of "kol kavuda"?

E) And even on the case where kol kavuda is used in Yevamos as a legitimate
justification for what the Moabite women did (or failed to do), because they
could not be faulted for not going out and providing food and drink (and
hence allowing Rut to be married into the congregation), you have, as a
counterpoint, Avigayil who did go out to David with an abundance of food and
drink.  Is this saying that what Avigail haNevia did was wrong and a
violation of kol kavuda? I have never seen such criticism. 

You see the problem with taking kol kavuda the way you are understanding the
Rambam - you end up
possulling most of our foremothers!  

Now there is another way of understanding a number of these references which
makes them more than descriptive, but less than normative for today, which
is to use the same understanding that is often applied when discussing daas
yehudis - namely, that there is a prohibition on any individual woman going
beyond what is considered appropriate for a woman in that time and place.
This is perhaps more frequently discussed with respect to dress, ie if the
custom in the particular place is to cover the ankles, then a woman is
obligated to cover her ankles, or be seen as in violation of daas yehudis.
On the other hand, despite daas yehudis being understood by the poskim to be
very much linked to time and place, it also appears important that the
fundamentals of the behaviour have some root in Nach - hence we get a whole
list of asmachtos to Shir HaShirim etc in Brochos.

It seems to me that a similar thing is going on here.  The issue for the
Rambam was that modest women of his time and place (amongst the Muslim in
Spain and Egypt) did not go out (in fact one of the striking things we saw
when we visited Malta last year was the enclosed balconies, which were built
under Muslim influence so that their women could sit outside and see but not
be seen).  But it would not have been appropriate to ban something just
because the Muslim women did it, if there was no asmachta to rely on from
our sources, but if it could be considered something with some roots in our
sources, then it is acceptable to expect Jewish women to act similarly and
not breach the boundries.

And note particularly that when The Chatam Sofer is discussing the question,
he is discussing it in the context of trying to legitimise the giving of a
get to a woman, without having recourse to the heter meah rabonim, in a
situation where there were clearly significant issues in the marriage
(inability to have relations, in any event) , but no financial resources to
go collect the meah rabonim.  And one of the bases that justify the giving
of a get is, according to the mishna, a violation of daas yehudis.  He seems
to me to be thinking along these lines in order to raise a similar kind of
concern.  And it seems clear that whatever this woman was doing, it was not
normal behaviour amongst women of that time.  Within the delicate fabric of
married life, there appears to be a halachic understanding that it is
problematic if a woman does things that might be considered to be scandalous
and shameful to the husband.  That seems to be the thrust of the Rambam and
that seems to be the thrust of the Chatam Sofer. 

An interesting question though might be asked - if today it is normative for
women not to be in the home, would a woman who insisted on staying in the
home be regarded as equally problematic?  I would have thought not, and
that, it seems to me is where kol kavuda does contain its force.  Because of
the pasuk, this is a legitimate choice for women (although one might argue
the gemora in Gitten to the contrary).

> Yitzhak

Regards

Chana