Re: Kol Isha - Just the Facts, please!

[Jordan Hirsch <trombaedu...>]

Alana,
The content of your Email is certainly interesting and undoubtedly
accurate. However, in terms of the approach to Kabbalistic texts of the
chasidim, there is a much greater fear (for want of a better word) of
gender mixing in the Chasidic world. Maybe it did not play out in the
early years of Chasidus, but as a "chasidic approach" evolved, the gender
walls became ever more rigid, especially in the sects like Satmar that
came from the Hungarian part of the Hapsburg empire. Groups lke Belz and
Lubavitch were always more worldly.

Jordan





y"Ms. Cat" wrote:

> --- Jordan Hirsch <trombaedu (at) earthlink(dot)net> wrote:
> > It is my opinion that as Chasidim have started
> > learning in more Lithuanian style Yeshivos in the
> > last twenty years, their customs have also
> > infiltrated the thinking in those "litvishe"
> > Yeshivos.
> > Chasidic thinking was always based on a mystical
> > approach to Gender relations, which mandated many
> > more distinctions in behavior and mixing.
> > ... But what is important is the way in which
> > those ideas have become more mainstream than they
> > ever were.
>
> Actually, historically speaking, this is almost
> exactly backwards (perhaps historically is different
> than practically though), in that it's actually the
> case that when Chasidism began, one of the reasons
> that the mitnagdim hated them so much was because they
> thought that their (in mitnagdish eyes. I am not here
> expressing an opinion) utter disregard of halacha was
> apikorsis - especially in their notions of
> transmigration of souls -- and in the fact that women
> in chasidism often had a much wider variety of
> opportunities for public leadership, beginning with
> the daughter of the Baal Shem Tov, Edel, who
> accompanied him everywhere, and whom he claimed had "a
> man's soul."
> Other chasidic women were heads of "courts" sometimes
> jointly with their husbands, sometimes *on their own.*
> Some became ascetic and hermit "holy women," to whom
> people went for blessings and prayers on their behalf,
> just as they would to a man. Many women wrote
> manuscripts of various sorts, some gave piskei
> halachah (halachic legal decisions), taught (often
> from behind a screen or some such thing), gave divrei
> torah publicly, wore tzitzit and tefilin, received
> petitions from their chasidim, or had mystical
> experiences that they spoke about publically, and so
> on. We know for certain of a few dozen - there were
> almost certainly hundreds more whom we don't know
> about by name or title, because as chasidism became
> more mainstream, it has attempted to bury its rather
> more radical past.
> A short and reasonably coherent account of some of the
> women whom we know of for certain can be found in a
> book called _Written Out of History_ by Henry and
> Taitz, although with some little research, one can
> find writings on some of these women on one's own.
>
> OTOH, Judith writes:
> "At one synagogue where the rabbi cancelled a concert
> of mine which the sisterhood had already set up and
> advertised on "kol isha " grounds, he then said it
> would be ok if even one other woman sang with me . I
> said the only other woman I knew at the time (my
> daughter was small and not singing much yet) who
> really knew the style well (a former member of
> Gerineldo) was much more gorgeous and sexy and
> potentially lust-inspiring than I, and I couldn't see
> why that would be a mitigating factor. He said, that
> was ok.
>
> This exchange did nothing to convince me of the
> "right" of rabbis to make these decisions."
>
> Whether one agrees with the decision or not (I've made
> what I think is the correct halachah on KI clear), it
> is certainly the case that rabbi have the "right" as
> well as the obligation to make such decisions. That
> is, simply as a matter of fact, what rabbis do. They
> study and learn the sources -Torah (including talmud)
> and other commentators, and make legal decisions.
> Indeed, it is precisely what a rabbi is.
> Anyone can become a rav if you're willing to give up a
> number of years of your life, study Jewish law
> intensively, understand that you're obligated to obey
> the law (as any Jew is, of course), learn the
> hermaneutics of interpretation, and study how others
> have applied them. That's what gives rabbis the
> "right," together with the Torah, which tells us that
> one must obey the decisions of the judges of our day -
> which is what rabbis are.
> As for the case given, if, in fact, one does hold by
> KI that it isn't just about someone trying to recite
> the shma, the rabbi is correct in that it isn't the
> woman's physical appearance which causes KI (otherwise
> it wouldn't be *kol*), it's the voice.
> There are, of course, other problems with physical
> appearance and dress, but they aren't kol isha, and
> one doesn't (necessarily) need to deal with them
> simultaneously.
>
> Alana Suskin
>
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