[Avodah] Public displays of affection, was [Areivim] mixed groups

[Yitzchak Schaffer]

On 1/19/2010 10:35, Ben Waxman wrote:
> Well that same Rema permits having a non-Jewish woman give you a bath
> (and that was the minhag in Cracow). One of the town rabbis uses this
> Rema of an example of how one can not simple quote a source and say
> muttar or assur.

Firstly, I think I botched my original message a bit; it seems like the 
issue is her looking for nits in his hair; and I'm not sure where the 
Rema ends here and the Mechaber picks back up - I had this text stored 
electronically without font differentiation, etc.

What does the bathing have to do with public displays of affection?  We 
have before us a differentiation between things done derech chibah, and 
those not.  Bathing in a bathhouse is brought in, apparently in a 
context of "not derech chibah."  We finish with "yesh omrim, one 
shouldn't even do matters of 'chibah' with one's wife."  The issue acc. 
to the Beis Shmuel quoted is, "the onlooker will come to thinking [the 
wrong things], being reminded of their closeness by this service [of the 
man by his wife]."  If picking nits is showing intimacy, then surely 
holding hands is - thus reasoned my rebbe.

I don't know the mechanics of deriving halachah from the syntax of the 
S.A., so I'm relying on him for that reading.

-- 
Yitzchak Schaffer
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