[Avodah] Shir HaShirim 4:5

[Jay F. Shachter]

>
> Let me give you a concrete example of a Rov who clearly raised the
> level of observance and Torah learning of his baalei batim, and how
> he did it.
>
> When he first became the rabbi of his shul, he consciously tried to
> drive away anyone who would not follow his approach to Yahadus.
> When he saw women whose necklines were too low, he publicly said in
> shul, "Ladies, cover your utters!"  He was staunchly anti-Zionistic
> and made this clear time and time again.  He made it clear that
> married women have to cover their hair.  Those who did not like his
> views and approach to Yahadus left.  From the core that remained he
> built a dynamic Torah shul.
>

It has been 25 days since the above appeared in the Avodah digest.
For 25 days, I have been waiting for someone to explain the meaning of
"cover your utters".  For 25 days, I have been hoping that someone
would ask the original poster ("OP") what that bizarre expression
means.  I have been trying for 25 days to figure it out myself.  The
only explanation I can come up with (God Almighty please tell me that
I am wrong) is that this man is saying "cover your udders", and
mispronouncing it.

"Udders" is an English word that denotes the teats of farm animals.
It is only used when speaking of farm animals, specifically cows.
Apparently (God in Heaven please tell me that I am mistaken), this
menuvval is publicly telling daughters of Israel, who have come to
worship in his synagog, to cover up their moyshele in arondlokh, and
he is publicly calling them cows.  The OP, who calls this an "approach
to Yahadus", praises this menuvval (Riboynoy shel oylam, please
tell me that I misinterpreted him) for using this tactic, as a means
to "buil[d] a dynamic Torah shul".  It is liking praising a Rabbi
whose technique for building a shul in which people are careful about
the laws of ntillath yadayyim, is to tell people publicly to "clean
your paws".

Only it is much worse.  Hands are hands, they're useful, we need them,
but we don't love them, or feel any affection for them.  Women are
fond of their breasts, or they ought to be.  I am not talking about
American women, or Jewish women who think and act like American women;
American women hate their breasts.  American women hate their whole
bodies, American women go about from morning till night believing that
they are ugly.  But Jewish women, who have not been damaged by Western
attitudes toward femininity, like their breasts, because they feed
your children, which is the most important thing in the world, and
they hold your marriage together, which is the second most important
thing in the world, because your husband likes them, and you like that
your husband likes them, so that works out well.  This combination of
the maternal and the erotic gives them an affective valence that your
hands or your elbows or your teeth do not have.  Plus you did not have
them when you were a child, and you waited so long for them, and you
were so happy when you finally got them.  And now you are in synagog,
where you don't even have to go, but you go because you love God, and
you love His Torah, and maybe your parents did not teach you how to
dress according to the standards of a society you do not live in and
have never seen, but still you have come to synagog, where some
menuvval, who somehow became the Rabbi of the synagog, is publicly
talking about your breasts, and using them to call you a farm animal
(please God tell me that I am mistaken).

I am not going to say, "Why does he even notice?", or something frum
like that.  Of course he notices.  I, too, am a man, and it is my
nature to notice women's breasts, I am as the Holy One, blessed be He,
made me.  I look away when I have to, and I don't hate myself -- or
anyone else -- for having noticed.  Maybe this menuvval hates himself
for noticing, and he projects his self-hatred onto the people whom he
notices, and he publicly blames them for sticking their tits in his
face, and he calls them cows.  This notion of projecting your
self-hatred onto others, is not Adlerian psychobabble; it is a
Talmudic insight, found in Qiddushin 70b: "kol happosel, bmumo
posel".

"Kol happposel, bmumo posel" is a description, not an explanation.
Our Sages rarely -- or never, I can think of no counterexamples --
proposed psychodynamic explanations for human conduct.  We can get
along fine without them.  Postulating the existence of a Yetzer
Hattov, and a Yetzer Hara`, was as far as they went.  But even if we
could explain this man, and understand him, it would make no
difference.  Understanding why he does what he does, does not make him
less of a menuvval.  And even if I could understand the OP (who
praises this man, and admires him, and defends him), it would not
change my moral judgement of him.

The OP is also factually incorrect, when he describes the tactic of
publicly insulting, and dehumanizing, and humiliating, women in his
synagog, by calling public attention to their incompletely covered
breasts, and calling them "udders", and driving away from his synagog,
not only the women whom he insulted, but also, anyone of sensitivity
who witnessed him insulting them, and then focusing his efforts only
on the people who did not leave, as an effective tactic for building
"a dynamic Torah shul".  A more effective tactic for building a
dynamic Torah shul would have been to bring his congregants to the
Torah without driving them away.  He could then build his dynamic
Torah shul, starting with a much larger group.

But even if it is an effective tactic -- even if it is the most
effective tactic -- it is wrong to employ it.  It violates the
halakhoth of tokhaxa.  Hilkhoth De`oth 6:7 recites in pertinent part:
"hammokhiax eth xavero -- beyn bidvarim shebeyno lveyno, beyn bidvarim
shebeyno lveyn hammaqom -- tzarikh lhokhixo beyno lveyn `atzmo,
viydabber lo bnaxath, uvilshon rakkah".  To build up a dynamic Torah
shul thru the violation of this halakha, is a mitzva habba'ah
b`averah.  C'est pire qu'une faute, c'est un crime.

Moreover, the OP, and the menuvval whom he publicly praises, and
admires, and defends, have also lost sight of the reason for building
a "dynamic Torah shul".  Let us continue the passage quoted from the
original posting, that was begun earlier:

>
> ... From the core that remained he built a dynamic Torah shul.
>
> He began learning with a group of men who had very limited Torah
> backgrounds.  One of them told me that at the very start he would
> have them write the nekudos in the text so that they would pronounce
> the words properly.  The fellow who told me this eventually learned
> through Shas many times.
> 
> His congregation truly had positive improvement in Torah observance
> and learning.
>
> How many rabbis will have the courage to strongly speak out publicly
> against practices of their congregant that are not appropriate.? Not
> many
>

The reason for building a dynamic Torah shul is not so that people
(specifically, men) will increase their Torah knowledge, and learn
thru Shas many times.  That is not the goal.  True, we do have that
passage in Shabbath 127a -- men say it every day -- "vthalmud Torah
kneged kulam".  But that passage must be understood in the light of
the passages in Qiddushin 40b. "talmud gadol, shehatalmud meviy liydey
ma`aseh" and Avoth 4:17, "... vkhether shem tov `oleh `al gabbeyhen".

The United States of America has two founding documents: the
Declaration of Independence, and the Constitution.  Of the two, only
the Constitution is a legal document, from which laws can be derived.
The Declaration of Independence is purely hortatory, you cannot derive
laws from it.  There are Jews who think that passages of the sort
quoted in Qiddushin -- and all of Massekheth Avoth -- are purely
hortatory, they think that, e.g., you don't really have to say hello
to every stranger who passes you in the street.  But we Jews do not
have purely hortatory tractates in the Talmud, halakha can be derived
from everything in it, and those halakhoth tell us what is the purpose
of a dynamic Torah shul, and what is not, and producing men who can
learn thru Shas many times, is not.  Nowadays, when there is a whole
class of Jews, and whole communities of Jews, who live off of
violating Hilkhoth Talmud Torah 1:7, those halakhoth are ignored, and
downplayed, and obscured; but they are halakhoth nonetheless, and they
are binding.

Folks, I am not a tzaddiq, as far as I know.  I mean, I could be a
tzaddiq, and not know it, but I think that if I was a tzaddiq, then
people would be coming up to me, and saying, "Yaakov, you are totally
a tzaddik", and people don't do that.  Nevertheless, even I, who am
not a tzaddiq, know what the OP clearly does not know, and what the
menuvval whom he loves so much certainly did not know, which is that
you do not tell a tzelem Elohim, in public, that she is a cow.


                        Jay F. ("Yaakov") Shachter
                        6424 North Whipple Street
                        Chicago IL  60645-4111
                                (1-773)7613784   landline
                                (1-410)9964737   GoogleVoice
                                jay at m5.chicago.il.us
                                http://m5.chicago.il.us

                        "Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur"