[Avodah] Tzeni'us and gender roles

[Micha Berger]

On Sun, Jul 19, 2009 at 12:13:55AM +0100, Chana Luntz wrote:
: I am not quite sure what exactly you are getting at here.  The point has
: been reiterated by many posters that nowhere in common practice do we see
: any evidence of an understanding of tznius leading us to diminish the
: availability of public roles or indeed the creation of new ones - at least
: as it applies to men...

I'm curious about the second clause. What new rules created for men are
you thinking of?

...
: We do see a tendency to diminish public roles for women...

But that's not what we're talking about here. The innovator carries
the burden of proof that the change is an improvement in avodas H'.
Diminishing public role therefore has a different standard of
justification than creating new ones.

But until I get another

...
: Ah but it is highly relevant.  If you asked the halachic man on the
: equivalent of the clapham omnibus (ie the halachic everyman) what was the
: reason women could not get aliyos, chances are the explanation you would get
: back is because it is not tznius for men to see/hear a woman...

All of this is not my argument, and is part of the confusion of an
authoritative definition of tzeni'us that is accord with common practice
and your discussion of common definitions of tzeni'us.

I don't care of the man on the street thinks that kol ishah is a key
issue if it turns out that he's wrong. Or, that kol ishah and ervah is
a totally distinct issue that people conflate because they use the word
tzeni'us in two senses.

In order to say that common practice is evidence that we follow a
different shitah than the one RHS proposes, or of my understanding of
his proposal, someone has to actually show that another shitah exists.
This hasn't happened yet, which is why all this dialog (18 posts over
the weekend totalling nearly 78 K) fails to make an impression on me.

....
: You can only understand RHS like that if you think he is talking in a
: vacuum.  I find that completely impossible to believe. Rather I believe that
: your unifying definition is precisely his unifying definition...

He doesn't raise the question of tzeni'us in the anti-peritzus almost the
same thing as ervah sense of the word. He doesn't need to unify anything.

...
: A third is to explain kovod hatzibbur in some way - that it is insulting to
: the community if women do things that men could do.

It's insulting to the community if women do things men are obligated to
do and they aren't.  

: I am sure there are others.

: You may not like any of these, but these run far deeper in the sources than
: what is being proposed.  And while one might not like the consequences of
: these, they do not lead to the other negative consequences that would come
: about by applying your thesis generally.

They're vox popularis, and that's not how mesorah works.

: Yes, but that is not necessarily quiet worship (in many communities it can
: involve people chanting things together, and in others people screaming,
: what sounds at the top of their voice, their own individual prayer oblivious
: to the other).  Chana is a certain kind of an ideal, but it is not the only
: ideal...

???? This is quiet in a totally different sense. We were contrasting
life behind the mechitzah and a woman leading pesuqei dezmira. Not
talking about actual volume.

...
: Ie Moshe the flawed hero...

Asked and answered. It's not a flaw to sell one thing to buy something
greater.

On Sat, Jul 18, 2009 at 10:58:56PM -0400, Meir Shinnar wrote:
: Finally, RMB raises the issues of tzeniut as a problem - arguing for a
: model of tzeniut wherein any public role is automatically a violation
: of tzeniut - and then we judge whether there is a reason for the
: violation of tzeniut.  I, as well as others (RCL far more ably and
: more scholarly, RTK (if I and RTK agree on something.....)) view this
: model of tzeniut as being a radical innovation, without any basis (and
: RMB has still not provided any basis...

I'm saying the word means what it literally translates to. As I said
above in reply to RnCL, I do not see another definition being offered
that is relevent. Dragging in tzeni'us in terms of ervah aside, we all
agree (I beliefe) that's not the whole picture -- so what's the other
piece in yours?

: traditional Jewish values - which makes further discussion difficult,
: as RMB wishes to protect a value that is not recognized as such by the
: rest of us.  However, even with the model of tzeniut that RMB raises,
: the issue becomes one of justification - violations of RMB tzeniut may
: be acceptable if there is sufficient good that comes from that.

: He argues that the changes in the workplace - have led to changes in
: kol kvuda bat melekh pnima (and I would agree)....

I did? Could have surprised me.

I would say that entering the workplace may well have pros that outweigh
the cons, particularly in the current economy, or it allows a husband to
remain in kelei qodesh, or whatever. But not that kol kevudah or penimah
is different than it was 150 years ago.

When I asked last week for a source for this alternate definition,
RnCL answered:
> the use of tznius in tzanua laleches - which is a lot closer to anavah -
> in fact this is often translated as walking humbly with one's G-d.  The
> b'tzina, the privacy part of this, is not the public action, but the
> dedication of the heart toward G-dliness, rather than towards external
> reward.

IOW, the exact gender-neutral definition I thought was the self-evident
translation of the word. It's a value lauded in pesuqim, that of not
needing to be at the front of the room.

On Sun, Jul 19, 2009 at 11:12:17AM -0400, T613K at aol.com wrote:
: TK:  I never bought the notion that "tznius is the same for men and
: women."  I don't agree with RMB on this point and I don't think it's true.

She then goes on to discuss the ervah-type definition, and that's not
what we're talking about here. Also, I don't think tzenius even in the
sense raised here is the same for men and women. The definition may be
the same. "Hatzneiah lekhes" wasn't said only to women. But obviously
men are given more situations to seek something else. Kol kevudah bas
melekh penimah not because tzeni'us has more to do with them because
fewer mitzvos requiring that someone be the center of attention were
given to them.


Bottom line:
    Hatzneiah lekhes im E-lokekha
    Besokh ami anochi yosheves

There is a real value there, spelled out in pesuqim. Pointing to common
practice or invoking common confusion of homonymns between hatzneiah
lekhes with clothing that doesn't reveal ervah is insufficient to tell
me it isn't real.

Where do the proposed innovations (even ones permitted by not being qol
ishah, davar shebiqdushah, tefillah betzibur, or some other problem of
requiring a mechuyav lehotzi miydei chovaso) acknowledge this value?
Or are you saying there is something being bought in exchange that is of
greater value? And if so, what?

I really have little to add unless new ground is covered on this
particular question.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Spirituality is like a bird: if you tighten
micha at aishdas.org        your grip on it, it chokes; slacken your grip,
http://www.aishdas.org   and it flies away.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                            - Rav Yisrael Salanter