[Avodah] Tzeni'us and gender roles

[Ken Bloom]

On Mon, 2009-08-10 at 16:33 +0100, Chana Luntz wrote: 
> > You raise some very cogent points about a woman's relationship with a
> > rav, and I thank you for the insight. I'm going to suggest that the
> > third option is best (having a female role model), but 
> > discuss how this relates to Mahara"ts further down.
> 
> But if this is the best approach - how are such role models to be developed
> and made accessible, and should there be any form of more centeralised
> quality control?  If so, how do you get it - or is it just a matter of a
> particularly charismatic woman attracting a following (as, for example we
> saw recently in relation to this woman who advocated the wearing of burkas).
> In particular, how is it to be developed in the more MO setting, where girls
> are not necessarily in seminary, but in non Jewish universities and in the
> non Jewish workplace (or do we try and ensure that girls only go to
> seminaries, where the role models will be provided by those who teach
> there)?

> > Here's where I think the issue is. I think R' Weiss is being
> > disingenuous about how he presents this. He wants to create a 
> > woman who
> > can be the sole leader of a community, and he's not doing it 
> > because he
> > thinks that people can improve their halachic observance that way. 
> > AISI, R' Weiss wants to build a female pulpit rabbi so that 
> > he can show
> > the world we have gender equality. His constituency is so 
> > enamored with
> > the idea of gender equality that they're willing to pay for this.
> 
> OK, but again what you appear to be identifying is a public need, or perhaps
> we should say desire (whether R' Weiss pursuaded his constituency or his
> consituency pursuaded him) for gender equality, or showing the world we have
> gender equality.  That may be a bad desire on their part, but it is no
> longer a private one.  One might have a discussion about not pandering to
> bad public desires, but that is a totally different question - this isn't
> about individuals, it is about a community and communities and the way they
> want to present themselves.  RMB's thesis about the tznius of individuals no
> longer has any relevance.
>  
>  "In England, different members of the clergy (not all
> > of whom even have semicha) go by distinctly different titles, 
> > reflecting different roles: reverend, minister, rabbi, and dayan; maybe
> that is a
> > fine idea worth importing to America." 
> 
> But none of these are open to women, and I am not sure how any of these
> could be converted into a role that provides role modelling for women - if
> you agree this is desirable.  The only example we seem to have developed as
> a reaction to modernity, is the head of seminary/teacher in seminary role
> model, who can reasonably be compared to a Rosh yeshiva or mashgiach in a
> yeshiva.  But a) you have to be in seminary to get these (as you have to be
> in yeshiva to get the rosh yeshiva and the yeshiva maschgiach); and b) there
> is really no quality control (my son was being taught kodesh by a Beis
> Ya'akov graduate last year in first grade, and as one of his friend's mother
> put it ""X" is coming home with some really strange things" - now the fact
> that my son, male is being so taught is unusual, that being a product of
> being in a co-ed school - but it would be normal for my daughter to be so
> taught.  Truth is, my major frustration was not mostly that she was teaching
> strange things, which he can probably grow out of, but that she was teaching
> Sephardi boys in a Sephardi school Ashkenazi minhagim - I don't mind her
> doing both, the school is very mixed, so she should be doing both, but the
> fact that I had to have a fight with my son about getting his hair cut
> during the three weeks but before shavuah shechal bo is very frustrating.
> It is the usual thing about a little bit of knowledge being a dangerous
> thing).  But it seems to be what we have.  What else should we be doing?  

To clarify, there seems to be two different issues here: one is that of
having proper training and credentials for women who are going to be
role models for other women. The other is having a "female Rabbi" to
hold up and show the rest of the world how much gender equality we have.

I think that the first issue (proper training and credentials for women)
is a good thing, and it can be done without creating the title of
"Rabbi" for women. Given that we teach women torah to begin with,
teaching them the Torah necessary to advise other women on personal
halachic issues, and then giving them credentials that indicate they
have this knowledge (calling them e.g. yoatzot) is a good thing.

I think we'd be better off still if we could do the same kind of thing
with men's titles, so that it's clear what their credentials are as
well.

I think, however, that the second issue (having a "female Rabbi" to show
how much gender equality we have) is the distortion of values by
modernity that should not be accommodated (in RMB's terms).

One more thing, I notice that you haven't addressed another aspect of
the cheshbon. What happens in a society with yoatzot, when women go to
their yoatzot for things they should be going through their husbands
for? If it is possible for women go to their own halachic advisors, does
this weaken the idea that the whole family should be a single unit that
is on the same page in terms of psak?

Maybe in a community where women are married at relatively young ages,
the only kind of yoatzot we need are ones that specialize in niddah, and
deal with questions that the husband could not handle properly because
he doesn't have the appropriate understanding of the physiology (so he
either mangles the question or doesn't ask the right followups).

--Ken