<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">
<HTML><HEAD>
<META http-equiv=Content-Type content="text/html; charset=US-ASCII">
<META content="MSHTML 6.00.6000.16825" name=GENERATOR></HEAD>
<BODY id=role_body style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; COLOR: #000000; FONT-FAMILY: Arial"
bottomMargin=7 leftMargin=7 topMargin=7 rightMargin=7><FONT id=role_document
face=Arial color=#000000 size=2>
<DIV><FONT lang=0 face=Arial color=#000000 size=2 FAMILY="SANSSERIF"
PTSIZE="10"> </DIV>
<DIV>
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" face=Arial color=#000000
size=2><BR>>> I think this topic is a great example of "lo ra'inu aino
raaya" (absence of evidence is not evidence of absence). If we can't find any
siddurim which include "modah", one could easily argue that this says nothing
about how the women davened, but that it shows *who* used the siddurim. In other
words, one could argue that women have been saying "modah" for ages, but that it
was passed on orally; if women were less literate than men, why bother printing
it in the siddur? <<<BR><BR>Akiva Miller</FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>>>>>>></DIV>
<DIV>
<DIV>You think women in general knew Hebrew grammar? Doubtful.
</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>I was taught to say "Modeh ani" long before I could read or learn from a
siddur what to say, and the thought of saying "modah" never entered my mind
until the subject showed up here on Avodah in its first incarnation a few years
ago. My mother said "modeh," her mother said "modeh" and who knows how far
back it went? </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>If there was a time in the past when women said "Modah" why would that ever
have changed? Mothers are the ones who get their little ones up in the
morning. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>(If BTW it's true that the Gra thought "modah" was right, that is
absolutely zero proof that women ever did what the Gra thought they should do --
he might well have been innovating something new, something that made sense
logically but was not up until then the common practice.) (And the Gra
was big but we are not big, so if we can rely on him, good -- we'll see if RMB
can come up with that citation -- but if not, we should not be getting uppity
ideas about changing things ourselves on the basis of our own logic.)</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT lang=0 face=Arial color=#0000ff size=2 FAMILY="SANSSERIF"
PTSIZE="10"><BR><B>--Toby Katz<BR>==========<BR><BR></FONT><FONT lang=0
face=Arial color=#000000 size=2 FAMILY="SANSSERIF"
PTSIZE="10"></B>--------------------</FONT></DIV></DIV>
<BLOCKQUOTE
style="PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: blue 2px solid"><FONT
lang=0 face=Arial color=#000000 size=2 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" PTSIZE="10"><FONT
style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" face=Arial color=#000000
size=2><BR></FONT> </BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></DIV></FONT></BODY></HTML>