[Avodah] RYBS's Talk on Hafkaas Kiddushin, Talmud Torah and Kabalas Ol Malchus Shamayim

[Chana Luntz via Avodah]

RMB wrote:

<<R' Ari Kahn posted a transcript of that famous talk that people remember
for RYBS's statement about tav lemeisiv.
http://arikahn.blogspot.co.il/2013/03/rabbi-soloveitchik-talmud-torah-and.ht
ml

As a teaser, here is all RYBS said on tev lemeis tan du:
    Let me add something that is very important: not only the halachos
    but also the chazakos [19] which chachmei chazal have introduced
    are indestructible. We must not tamper, not only with the halachos,
    but even with the chazakos, for the chazakos of which chazal spoke
    rest not upon transient psychological behavioral patterns, but upon
    permanent ontological principles rooted in the very depth of the
    human personality, in the metaphysical human personality, which
    is as changeless as the heavens above. Let us take for example
    the chazaka that I was told about: the chazaka tav l'meisiv tan
    du mil'meisiv armalo [20] has absolutely nothing to do with the
    social and political status of women in antiquity. This chazaka is
    based not upon sociological factors, but upon a verse in breishis
    -- harba arbeh itz'voneich v'heironeich b'etzev teildi vanim v'el
    isheich t'shukaseich v'hu yimshal bach -- "I will greatly multiply
    thy pain and thy travail; in pain thou shalt bring forth children,
    and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee"
    [21]. It is a metaphysical curse rooted in the feminine personality
    -- she suffers incomparably more that the male who is in solitude.
    Solitude to the male is not as terrible an experience, as horrifying
    an experience, as is solitude to the woman. And this will never
    change, mayid shamayim vaaretz [22]. This is not a psychological
    fact; it is an existential fact, which is due not to the inferior
    status of the woman, but rather to the difference, the basic
    distinction, between the female personality and the male personality.
    Loneliness frightens the woman, and an old spinster's life is much
    more miserable and tragic than the life of an old bachelor. This was
    true in antiquity; it is still true, and it will be true a thousand
    years from now. So, to say that tan du mil'meisiv armalo was or
    is due to the inferior political or social status of the woman
    is simply misinterpreting the chazaka tan du mil'meisiv armalo.
    No legislation can alleviate the pain of the single woman, and no
    legislation can change this role. She was burdened by the Almighty,
    after she violated the first [law]. Let me ask you a question --
    ribono shel olam, G-d Almighty, if you should start modifying and
    reassessing the chazakos upon which a multitude of halachos rest,
    you will destroy yehadus. So instead of philosophizing, let us
    rather light a match and set fire to the beis yisrael, and get rid
    of our problems.

What I think is more typical of the general thesis of this portion of his
talk was the immediately prior statement:
    V'chen hakofer b'perusha v'hu torah she b'al peh v'hamach'chish
    magideha; he who denies the perfection and the truthfulness of
    chachmei chazal -- not of the Torah, but of the chachmei chazal
    as personalities, as real persona as far as their character, their
    philosophy, or their outlook on the world is concerned -- is a kofer.>>

As I have written before, what I find intensely frustrating about this is
that RYBS's invocation of tan du appears to itself involve a form of
tampering with the chazakos and by implication the denial of the perfection
and truthfulness of chachmei chazal that is then claimed to be kefira.

The gemora in discussing tan du is very clear - both in Yevamos 118b and
Kesuvos 75a: a woman in a tan du marriage commits adultery - "kulan
mezanos"! - THAT is the chazaka from Chazal regarding the nature of women.

Now this could mean:  (a) the sort of woman who is prepared to enter a tan
du marriage is prepared to and will commit adultery; or
			    (b) all women will take a tan du marriage
(RYBS), but if they find themselves in a tan du marriage - the existential
loneliness that RYBS identifies as being the particular province of women
will also, according to Chazal, inevitably drive them to adultery;

But you can't get away from the fact that Chazal set this up as a chazaka.
And if you take these chazakos in the way that RYBS says to do, then there
are inevitable conclusions: A Beis Din faced with what can now clearly be
seen as a tan du marriage HAS to assume adultery as a consequence - that
being the chazaka.  If you hold that these statements of Chazal are perhaps
limited in time and place to the times of Chazal, and the nature of women
then, then we cannot necessarily generalise to today, and despite a woman
today being demonstratably in a tan du marriage, one cannot necessarily jump
to conclusions regarding her faithfulness.  But if these chazakos are
immutable - then the only question must surely be, was there the possibility
of adultery - and given the freedom of movement of women today, I do not see
how anybody can say that opportunity was not available.  Therefore the
result, and the consequence for the marriage, was a foregone conclusion.  A
beis din, if it does not treat this marriage as a mekach taus (because the
woman is one who would not have entered a tan du marriage), has to treat it
as one in which the woman has committed adultery and is therefore forbidden
to her husband, and under which the husband is clearly under a Torah
obligation to divorce, according to all opinions ("dvar erva").

And yet note that there is none of this in RBYS's analysis.  Women's
loneliness and spiritual pain, yes - a full facing of the consequences of
what is therefore, according to Chazal, endemic in our society and in the
nature of Bnos Yisroel, no.  There is a complete glossing over of the
fundamental conclusion by Chazal regarding the consequence of a tan du
marriage.  And yet how can you write about tan du as an absolute immutable
principle and yet not mention what, according to Chazal, is the cast iron
result of that absolute immutable principl?

Note by the way that this chazaka, if indeed it is immutable in the nature
of women, has another consequence.  Given that having women commit adultery
is clearly (how shall I put this mildly) a highly destructive thing for
society - having women enter into marriages where this is the inevitable
consequence is a very bad thing.  Surely any Rabbi who is mesader kedushin
at such a wedding, any eidim at such a wedding, etc have as a matter of fact
engaged in lifnei iver lo titen michshol in the full biblical sense.  This
isn't, according to Chazal, a maybe or a possibility, this is an
inevitability.  Surely it is obligatory on any Rabbi who agrees to be
mesader kiddushin and on any shadchanim and eidim to investigate very
carefully that this marriage is not of the tan du nature?

That is if, as Rav Lichtenstein is quoted as saying "given the clear cut
evidence in the Rishonim in Yevamot and other places in Shas which clearly
indicated that this hazaka was not one that applied in all contexts and at
all times and in all situations" - then these concerns would be
significantly diminished.  After all, any marriage presented to a mesader
kedushin would then at the very least be a sfek sfeka - perhaps this isn't a
tan du marriage, and if it is, perhaps the woman might not commit adultery.
But if it is an inevitable chazaka that a woman in a tan du marriage will
commit adultery, then there is only one safek in relation to a serious issur
d'orisa - in which case must it not be the responsibility of all those who
enable such a marriage to occur to make sure that it is not a tan du
marriage and they are not enabling such adultery to take place?

To my mind, indeed, that is precisely what Chazal were really getting at.  A
genuine acknowledgement that - at least in some societies and some
environments, women are pressured into inappropriate marriages and give in
to that pressure.  And that where a woman does indeed give in to such an
inappropriate marriage, the consequences are really, really bad for the
general society and we need all to be on guard to try and prevent such
marriages occurring.  That to me demonstrates far more clearly the
"perfection and truthfulness of Chazal" than trying to squish them in to
some metaphysical understanding of womenkind that does not reverberate as
true to many.  But if one is going to apply this particular analysis to this
particular statement of Chazal, it would seem important to do it honestly
while facing the totality of what it is that Chazal actually said.

>-Micha

Regards

Chana