Avodah Mailing List

Volume 10 : Number 072

Thursday, December 5 2002

• Women and Lighting
• RE: Re: women and chanukiyot
• RE: Kiddush
• Re: Menorah
• Re: [Avodah] women and chanukiyot
• Re: women and chanukiyot
• Rambam, Mesorah, Science, and Astrology
• Re: Re: women and neros chanukah
• Re: women and chanukiyot
• Re: women and chanukiyot (women making kidush)
• women and chanukiyot
• Re: women and chanukiyot

[R'in Katz:]
> My father was familiar with the Shulchan Aruch (it is safe to assume);
> therefore he must have read it differently than it is read by the PC
> deconstructionists, who disregard authorial intent in favor of creative
> reading of texts.

This is precisely the point. Your father was certainly familiar with the
S"A, and I am sure he knew that the Shulchan Aruch says re: women and
Menorah. But he also was aware that his family minhag was different. It's
not earth shaking news. That is precisely what minhag is.
You don't need to be a politically correct deconstructionist to reject the
minhag of your father. You just have to be someone who has a different
minhag.

Jordan Hirsch

From: Allen Baruch [mailto:Abaruch@lifebridgehealth.org]
> IIRC, a Rav here in Baltimore replied that "ishto k'gufo" has 
> real meaning and therefore he was not in favor of married 
> women lighting

Only achronim have applied "ishto k'gufo" to ner chanukah. To my
knowledge, the term does not appear in rishonim or S"A (certainly not
in the gemara!) with respect to Chanukah.

Kol tuv,
Moshe

From: Jordan Hirsch [mailto:trombaedu@earthlink.net]
> OK, I may be mixing up my Achronim, but I believe the Elyah Raba expressed
> some discomfort with the idea of a Woman making Kiddush for her husband. SO
> there is at least someone who says no.

I think you're referring to the issue of "zeilah ba milsah." That is
not an *inherent* problem (invalidating the kiddush) but merely a
statement that it's improper to do (presumably because it's demeaning
to the husband, or something like that). To my knowledge, there is no
one who says that a woman cannot be motzee a man in kiddush.

Kol tuv,
Moshe

On Fri, Nov 29, 2002 at 01:55:57PM -0500, Brown, Charles.F wrote:
: Ramban in b'ha'aloscha writes that the smichus haparshiyos of menorah
: to chanukas hamishkan by the nesi'im is because Ahron needed a nechama
: since he was not able to bring a present with the other shevatim.

I had two pence on this Ramban.

Throughout the matonos of the nesi'im, the Ramban shows how each
nasi had kavanos specific to his shevet. Since the same action
actually had different meanings, they are distinct matanos requiring
separate description in the chumash.

The role of the kohein is to give the am a common focus. To take
the different thoughts and approaches of the shevatim and aim
them at a common avodas H'.

The menorah is understood (amongst the other osos found in it) to be
the seven chochmos. Six of them point toward Torah, the neir tamid,
the neir hama'aravi, where the Shechinah "resides".

Thus, hadlakas haneiros particularly serves as a nechamah. Aharon
is told that his gift is to show others how to use theirs.

-mi

-- 
Micha Berger                     Life is complex.
micha@aishdas.org                    Decisions are complex.
http://www.aishdas.org                   The Torah is complex.
Fax: (413) 403-9905                                    - R' Binyamin Hecht

From: "Jonathan Baker" <jjbaker@panix.com>
> R'n A. Sherer wrote: 
>> Um - actually, I learned a general rule that anyone with a lesser 
>> degree of obligation can not be motzi someone who is carrying a 
>> greater level of obligation. 
>> Therefore, a woman has to either daven Friday night  or at LEAST say 
>> Good Shabbos, to be yotzei the de'oraysa chiyuv, otherwise she has a 
>> problem being yotzei with the kiddush of her husband who at that 
>> point is only under a derabbanan obligation himself. 

Since RGS was confused by my statement, and thought I had misquoted
R' Twersky, I should rephrase:
> Yes, exactly that point was made by R' Mayer Twersky when we were
> learning Brochos at Lincoln Square, and he said that areivus allows men
> to overcome that d'oraita/d'rabbanan barrier - areivus allows party A to
> do something for the benefit of party B. A similar idea applies, it seems
> to me, by the accepting-a-gift trick on Friday afternoon, so you can
> bring the bottle of wine over to your friend's house for lunch on Saturday.

In Avodah V10 #71, JBaker wrote:
> As RMFeldman pointed out, it's a befeirush SA that a woman can motzi
> her husband on neirot Chanukah

When he's not in a position to perform the mitzva as preferably (re
pirsumai nisa) as she is, _not_ when he is but wants/decides to allow
her to take his place. Hadlokas nair shelaChannukah isn't an issue of
kovod that the ish can be mochail on.

All the best from
Michael Poppers * Elizabeth, NJ

Just when you thought we moved on, I finally get the time to catch up
on the list of emails I intended to reply to.

On Wed, Nov 27, 2002 at 03:04:00PM +0200, BACKON@vms.HUJI.AC.IL wrote:
: Curiously, the Minchat Chinuch 80 # 9 d"h "v'ra'iti" (on whether tzaar
: baalei chayim is d'oraita) writes re: the Baal haMaor: "kan katav MI'DAAT
: ATZMO d'halacha k'Rava...".

I'm missing something. Isn't Rava a ba'al mesorah?

On Mon, Nov 25, 2002 at 10:33:01AM +0200, Akiva Atwood wrote:
: > : The one with the best evidence?

: > Apples and oranges. How does one compare the means for establishing first
: > principles used in talmud Torah with that used in science?

: By putting them into two distinct and different domains of thought you make
: it impossible to have a common working ground.

To some extent this is true. Torah and science do answer different questions,
and therefore rarely have overlapping topics.

But I didn't put them into "two distinct and different domains of thought".
Rather, I noted that one's belief in the conclusions of each are different
in kind. I therefore asked how one can measure which evidence is better.

On Mon, Nov 25, 2002 at 09:07:36AM -0500, Shinnar, Meir wrote:
: The issue that was raised before is your belief that the rambam would
: always rely on mesora - and the clear statement of the section of the
: moreh is that the specifics of mesora are irrelevant to whether to accept
: Plato or not...

I took the Rambam to mean that since the mesorah stands on both sides
of the issue, one need not consider it in deciding which is true. I cited
where inthe Moreh gave me this impression.

Quoting the Me'iri, RSM posted:
:     Anything taht contradicts reason (is impossible) that is not told
:     as being a miracle must be understood allegorically... There is no
:     requirement for a mesora that it is allegorical.

This is sevara (logic, ie sevara in the sense used within shas), not
science. He's telling you that the paradox of a natural unnatural event
is to be avoided. And we know that lehalachah sevarah counts the same
as de'Oraisa.

In any case, he explicitly excludes the mabul, which is describes as
being neis.

On Mon, Nov 25, 2002 at 10:49:53AM +0000, Eli Turkel wrote:
: <The question is whether we can assume something is allegory without 
: some mesorah that it's allegory.>
: 
: It seems clear to me that many places where Maharal allegorizes a 
: Chazal it is not based on any mesorah....

Please don't take me to mean there is no concept of chiddush. Rather,
that chiddush must be consistant with mesorah. Not introducing an
idea that contradicts every extant dei'ah (assuming any dei'os exist)
because of some philosophical or scientific motive. I allowed for
switching to a da'as yachid (since there is no "azlinan basar ruba"
by aggadita) and for using other elements in mesorah to draw new
conclusions.

On Thu, Nov 21, 2002 at 06:06:25PM -0500, Shinnar, Meir wrote:
: Where do you get that? He rules out relying on a kabbala from natural
: philosophy to trump our own mesora - which is why he devotes so much
: time to proving that the Aristotelian position isn't proven. He never
: rules out using actual proofs to trump what we know - the problem is
: that people believe what they hear from philosophers, not that actual
: proof is rejected.

He rules out the possibility that such "actual proof" can exist. Not
that one trumps the other, but that any such contradiction is apparant.
And judging what he did to A, it would seem he'd avoide contradiction
by finding the flaw on the naturalphilosophy side.

On Sun, Nov 24, 2002 at 08:11:03PM +0200, Nosson Slifkin wrote:
: Isn't the acceptance of the earth as moving around the sun an example
: of how we reinterpreted Torah based on external evidence rather than any
: internal reason within Torah? After all, when Copernicus first came out
: with his heliocentric model, it was rejected as heresy by Jews too.

Actually, not all of us. Also, the chiddush was not in the pasuq. The
sun still does rise -- and therefore did stand still for Yehoshua'. We
thought this was objectively true, turns out it's only true from our
perspective. We learned how the sun stopped -- the earth stopped rotating.
We didn't deny the story as described,

(Never mind that in a relativistic sense, us spinning one way is no more
valid than saying the universe is spinning the other. Makes for more
complicated math, and a weird geometry [an odd gravitational field to
explain what would otherwise be angular momentum], but it's no less
true.)

:> See also  Moreh chelek B pereq 15. The Rambam rules out using natural
:> philosophy to trump what we know from nevu'ah and mesorah.

: He mentions nevu'ah, but I didn't see any mention of mesorah. There's
: a world of difference.

The nevu'ah in question is Moshe's, the material mesorah perpetuates.

: Why didn't chazal/rishonim know that the earth goes around the sun,
: and it is not the physical center of the universe?

Because scientific facts not necessary to learn how lehis-haleich lefanai
veleheyei samim need not be part of mesorah.

: Then, to deal with the ramifications - the results of allegorizing
: maase Bereishis and the Mabul are negligible compared with the results
: of allegorizing the Exodus and Har Sinai. Our service of Hashem and our
: fulfillment of mitzvos is fudamentally based on the latter.

So? How does "it's the basis of our lives" constitute a proof of
truth?

-mi

-- 
Micha Berger                     Life is complex.
micha@aishdas.org                    Decisions are complex.
http://www.aishdas.org                   The Torah is complex.
Fax: (413) 403-9905                                    - R' Binyamin Hecht

In Avodah V10 #70, CSherer responded to CLuntz:
> Why would that be a problem if everything beyond the first candle is
> hidur mitzva? He's making a bracha only on lighting the one candle for
> the house.

Agreed, and Robert's family custom also sounds like a wonderful way
of being m'chanaich those who higi-u l'chinuch. That said, I think
my daughter (4+ years old) really enjoys lighting _all_ the candles
on the chanukiah she helped make in her JEC class during this week of
Channukah, the first time she's been comfortable holding a candle and
lighting a nair.

[Email #2. -mi]

In Avodah V10 #71, JBaker wrote:
> As RMFeldman pointed out,
> it's a befeirush SA that a woman can motzi her husband on neirot Chanukah

When he's not in a position to perform the mitzva as preferably (re
pirsumai nisa) as she is, _not_ when he is but wants/decides to allow
her to take his place. Hadlokas nair shelaChannukah isn't an issue of
kovod that the ish can be mochail on, but it _is_ defined such that the
ish performs it in its proper time if he can do so.

All the best from
Michael Poppers * Elizabeth, NJ

On 4 Dec 2002 at 12:58, Gil Student wrote:
> In the case of a woman's name being on a lease, I don't think that
> it makes the apartment halachically hers -- mah she-kansa ishah kanah
> ba'alah. But I don't think it is relevant anyway. If the woman of the
> house makes ha-motzi for eveyone at the table, I think it is fairly clear
> that she is doing so as "the woman of the house" and has the same status
> as when "the man of the house" says ha-motzi. 

Except that the sevara behind the "ba'al ha'bayis" making motzi (and 
not one of the other mesubim) is so that he will distribute generous 
portions. One can distribute generous portions of what belongs to 
him. I don't think it's so pashut that one can distribute generous 
portions of something that does not belong to her.

This past Shabbos my son
> ate lunch at a friend's house whose father is on an extremely strict
> diet (I don't know the details) and his wife said kiddush and ha-motzi.
> Black hat, fairly good Chareidi pedigree, davens in a kollel,...

Very different situation. And having some idea of the ages of your 
children, I would bet that there was no one else at the table over 
Bar Mitzva, or the husband would have asked another male over the age 
of Bar Mitzva to make the bracha (I can think of one or two occasions 
when I have asked one of my over-Bar Mitzva sons to make Kiddush or 
Havdala because I was not feeling well). 

[Email #2. -mi]

On 4 Dec 2002 at 8:15, Jonathan Baker wrote:

> The S"A only has the abbrev. BAH"B. It doesn't spell out baal or baalat.
> In which case I feel free to use either one.

Time to buy one of the new ones with fewer abbreviations. In mine 
(167:11 and 14) it says explicitly "ba'al ha'bayis." 

> And if being on the lease, and running the household, don't make her
> a baalat habayit (and the woman runs the family in pretty much every
> Jewish family I know), then I don't know what the term means unless it
> means something other than what it says.

Where is the term "ba'alat ha'bayis" ever mentioned as being a 
halachic status?

[Email #3 -mi]

On 4 Dec 2002 at 13:31, Jonathan Baker wrote:

> Remember, one of the arguments against women as shlichei tzibur, or
> women as kor'ot megillah for mixed groups, is about levels of obligation.

Another is whether they can be motzi rabim y'dei chovasam at all (see 
Tosfos and the B'Hag). But I think this list has been down that road 
before. 

> Inherent in that argument is that people of equal level of obligation
> can motzi one another in brachot/tefillah. Certainly a woman can motzi
> a man in benching.

Not in most instances. See SA OC 186:1 and MB 2 and 3 there. 

>>> I'm not saying "my way or the highway", I'm saying my way is one way,
>>> your way is another, who are you to tell me my way is bad/wrong/assur?

>> Because not every way is halachically correct (whether or not it's 
>> assur). You cannot just throw mesorah aside because you don't like it 
>> or because you like another way better. That's what lo tasur is 
>> about. 

> That which is not assur is mutar. 

No it isn't. That's the whole point of the first Ramban in Kdoshim.

One is called to account in the Next
> World for that which was mutar to one, and one did not take advantage
> of it. 

Source?????

Kadeish atzm'cha b'mutar lach is a recipe for asceticism,
> or a requirement to follow the rabbis when they forbid something, not
> a requirement for all to come up with their own personal chumras and
> impose them on others.

I didn't see anyone who is trying to impose a chumra on others. 
Aderaba, I would argue that requiring a woman to light her own 
Chanuka candles is - if anything - a chumra. 

>>> Because (as RCS mentioned) the Gemara says nasty things about a man
>>> who can't make brachot for himself, and thus has to have his wife say
>>> them for him.  In other words, the party which can't do on its own is
>>> a lesser party.  

>> No. The Gemara only says tavo me'era on a man who needs his wife to 
>> say brachos for him. Not the other way around. 

> NEEDS his wife to, not WANTS his wife to. IOW, it's a polemic against
> men who don't take the trouble to learn the most basic of mitzvot, the
> most basic of prayers - brachos on food. Doesn't sound like a ban on
> having one's wife be motzi one with a bracha. 

Read the second half of the Rashi there (Succah 38a). Rashi. Not 
(WADR) the Hillel Rabbi at a university. You're taking half a Rashi 
and putting your own gloss on it. 

As RMFeldman pointed out,
> it's a befeirush SA that a woman can motzi her husband on neirot Chanukah,
> as did R'n Katz from KSA (even if she interpreted it differently).

See the Biur Halacha 678 s"v Isha Madlekes.

>> Because according to most poskim (and keep in mind that in my house 
>> the women do light) having her husband light for her does not put a 
>> woman into a "lesser" position. The idea that it does is what 
>> Rebbetzin Katz would call the influence of "feminism." The idea that 
>> any time a woman doesn't do the exact same thing that a man does, it 
>> puts her in a lesser position. 

> And a Maimonidean would say that anyplace where Tosfos interjects Minhag
> Ashkenaz, it's a western influence from Xianity and Xian lands, and thus
> forbidden. But we don't hold that way. The whole mode of argument in
> the Gemara is Socratic method - in other words, our whole Torah is based
> on Hellenistic methodology.

Mah inyan shmitta eitzel Har Sinai?

-- Carl

Please daven and learn for a Refuah Shleima for our son,
Baruch Yosef ben Adina Batya among the sick of Israel.  
Thank you very much.

From: "Jonathan Baker" <jjbaker@panix.com>
>> Well, what if your wife started making kiddush on her own at her
>> parent's house; now that she is married, should you be making kiddush
>> for her or should she continue making it for herself at the table in
>> front of you? There are a number of things that a married woman is
>> privileged to have her husband do for her that she did for herself when
>> she was single. This is not a bad thing at all....

> Sometimes we switch around and she says kiddush.  So?

There is a Mogen Avrohom in Hilchas Birchas Hamozoun that says that if a
woman or, for that matter, anybody that is 'yoitze' with someone elses
kidush and he misses even ONE word, he/she is NOT yoitze. The mogen
Avrohom goes on to give an 'eitzeh', that the person that is yoitzeh
from someone else should say along kidush word for word with the one
who is actualy making the kidush on the cup of wine.

I know of some families that are of Galitcian descent(since the Mogen
Avrohom came from Galicia) that have this minhug that all the household,
INCLUDING THE WOMEN, say along kidush with the head of the household.
This should solve the problem.

Sent to Areivim by mistake:
RCS: 
> On 4 Dec 2002 at 13:31, Jonathan Baker wrote: 

>> Remember, one of the arguments against women as shlichei tzibur, or 
>> women as kor'ot megillah for mixed groups, is about levels of obligation. 
>> Inherent in that argument is that people of equal level of obligation 
>> can motzi one another in brachot/tefillah. Certainly a woman can motzi 
>> a man in benching. 

> Not in most instances. See SA OC 186:1 and MB 2 and 3 there. 

Fine. But as long as their chiuv is the same, she can. 

And the Tosfos on Sukkah 38a seems to imply that it works, even over 
the d'oraita/d'rabbanan chiyuv barrier, but that it's not a good thing 
to do. 

>>>> I'm not saying "my way or the highway", I'm saying my way is one way, 
>>>> your way is another, who are you to tell me my way is bad/wrong/assur? 

>>> Because not every way is halachically correct (whether or not it's 
>>> assur). You cannot just throw mesorah aside because you don't like it 
>>> or because you like another way better. That's what lo tasur is 
>>> about. 

>> That which is not assur is mutar. 

> No it isn't. That's the whole point of the first Ramban in Kdoshim. 

> One is called to account in the Next 
>> World for that which was mutar to one, and one did not take advantage 
>> of it. 

> Source????? 

Lots of people have said this. Looking on the web, it's always 
attributed to "the talmud", but nobody specifies a page number. 
Maybe it's one of the phantom maamorei chazal? Suffice it to say, 
I've heard it in lots of places, modern, Chabad, etc. 

> Kadeish atzm'cha b'mutar lach is a recipe for asceticism, 
>> or a requirement to follow the rabbis when they forbid something, not 
>> a requirement for all to come up with their own personal chumras and 
>> impose them on others. 

> I didn't see anyone who is trying to impose a chumra on others. 
> Aderaba, I would argue that requiring a woman to light her own 
> Chanuka candles is - if anything - a chumra. 

Or, telling her she's incapable of lighting is a chumra. Certainly 
looking at the list, it's the "frummies" who are more likely to have 
the woman not light, and the "frummies" are generally considered more 
concerned with "chumrot" than the just plain folks. 

>>>> Because (as RCS mentioned) the Gemara says nasty things about a man 
>>>> who can't make brachot for himself, and thus has to have his wife say 
>>>> them for him. In other words, the party which can't do on its own is 
>>>> a lesser party. 

>>> No. The Gemara only says tavo me'era on a man who needs his wife to 
>>> say brachos for him. Not the other way around. 

>> NEEDS his wife to, not WANTS his wife to. IOW, it's a polemic against 
>> men who don't take the trouble to learn the most basic of mitzvot, the 
>> most basic of prayers - brachos on food. Doesn't sound like a ban on 
>> having one's wife be motzi one with a bracha. 

> Read the second half of the Rashi there (Succah 38a). Rashi. Not 
> (WADR) the Hillel Rabbi at a university. You're taking half a Rashi 
> and putting your own gloss on it. 

I was reading YOU and being medakdek in how YOU put it. Also, I 
found it in Brachot, without any Rashi. 

Also, I did not see this sentiment brought down in the MB you mentioned. 
So I question how normative it is. Yes, I saw Rashi on "b'emet" there, 
so why isn't it brought down in SA? 

And I looked at that Rashi, and there is no second half of it. 
All it says is "d'vadai machmat shelo lamad hu" - because it 
means he hasn't bothered learning at all - so it's a shame to 
him. Nothing at all about asking his wife to do it. 

Oh, I see what you're talking about. Tosfos there seems to have 
an extended version of that Rashi. But by the same token, Tosfos 
counters Rashi's argument by talking about levels of obligation: 
that it's bad for a woman who has a derabanan level to motzi a man 
who has a d'oraita level. Which does not apply by either birchot 
hanehenin or by neirot Chanukah (see MB 675 s"k 10). 

> As RMFeldman pointed out, 
>> it's a befeirush SA that a woman can motzi her husband on neirot Chanukah, 
>> as did R'n Katz from KSA (even if she interpreted it differently). 

> See the Biur Halacha 678 s"v Isha Madlekes. 

YM 675. By the same token, though, see MB s"k 9-10 there. He may bring 
down that gemara in the BH, but in the MB, he gives complete parity. 

>>> Because according to most poskim (and keep in mind that in my house 
>>> the women do light) having her husband light for her does not put a 
>>> woman into a "lesser" position. The idea that it does is what 
>>> Rebbetzin Katz would call the influence of "feminism." The idea that 
>>> any time a woman doesn't do the exact same thing that a man does, it 
>>> puts her in a lesser position. 

>> And a Maimonidean would say that anyplace where Tosfos interjects Minhag 
>> Ashkenaz, it's a western influence from Xianity and Xian lands, and thus 
>> forbidden. But we don't hold that way. The whole mode of argument in 
>> the Gemara is Socratic method - in other words, our whole Torah is based 
>> on Hellenistic methodology. 

> Mah inyan shmitta eitzel Har Sinai? 

That's what I would ask you. If you're going to interpret Rashi on Sukkah 
38a as a Westernized gloss and thus impermissible, remember that others 
regard much of what we do as impermissible Westernized glosses. Where do 
you draw the line? 

- jon baker jjbaker@panix.com <http://www.panix.com/~jjbaker> - 

RCS: 
> On 4 Dec 2002 at 13:31, Jonathan Baker wrote:
>> Remember, one of the arguments against women as shlichei tzibur, or
>> women as kor'ot megillah for mixed groups, is about levels of obligation.
>> Inherent in that argument is that people of equal level of obligation
>> can motzi one another in brachot/tefillah. Certainly a woman can motzi
>> a man in benching.

> Not in most instances. See SA OC 186:1 and MB 2 and 3 there. 

Fine.  But as long as their chiuv is the same, she can.

And the Tosfos on Sukkah 38a seems to imply that it works, even over
the d'oraita/d'rabbanan chiyuv barrier, but that it's not a good thing
to do.

>>>> I'm not saying "my way or the highway", I'm saying my way is one way,
>>>> your way is another, who are you to tell me my way is bad/wrong/assur?

>>> Because not every way is halachically correct (whether or not it's 
>>> assur). You cannot just throw mesorah aside because you don't like it 
>>> or because you like another way better. That's what lo tasur is 
>>> about. 

>> That which is not assur is mutar. 

> No it isn't. That's the whole point of the first Ramban in Kdoshim.

> One is called to account in the Next
>> World for that which was mutar to one, and one did not take advantage
>> of it. 

> Source?????

Lots of people have said this.  Looking on the web, it's always 
attributed to "the talmud", but nobody specifies a page number.
Maybe it's one of the phantom maamorei chazal?  Suffice it to say,
I've heard it in lots of places, modern, Chabad, etc.

> Kadeish atzm'cha b'mutar lach is a recipe for asceticism,
>> or a requirement to follow the rabbis when they forbid something, not
>> a requirement for all to come up with their own personal chumras and
>> impose them on others.

> I didn't see anyone who is trying to impose a chumra on others. 
> Aderaba, I would argue that requiring a woman to light her own 
> Chanuka candles is - if anything - a chumra. 

Or, telling her she's incapable of lighting is a chumra.  Certainly
looking at the list, it's the "frummies" who are more likely to have
the woman not light, and the "frummies" are generally considered more
concerned with "chumrot" than the just plain folks.

>>>> Because (as RCS mentioned) the Gemara says nasty things about a man
>>>> who can't make brachot for himself, and thus has to have his wife say
>>>> them for him.  In other words, the party which can't do on its own is
>>>> a lesser party.  

>>> No. The Gemara only says tavo me'era on a man who needs his wife to 
>>> say brachos for him. Not the other way around. 

>> NEEDS his wife to, not WANTS his wife to. IOW, it's a polemic against
>> men who don't take the trouble to learn the most basic of mitzvot, the
>> most basic of prayers - brachos on food. Doesn't sound like a ban on
>> having one's wife be motzi one with a bracha. 

> Read the second half of the Rashi there (Succah 38a). Rashi. Not 
> (WADR) the Hillel Rabbi at a university. You're taking half a Rashi 
> and putting your own gloss on it. 

I was reading YOU and being medakdek in how YOU put it.  Also, I 
found it in Brachot, without any Rashi.

Also, I did not see this sentiment brought down in the MB you mentioned.
So I question how normative it is.  Yes, I saw Rashi on "b'emet" there,
so why isn't it brought down in SA?

And I looked at that Rashi, and there is no second half of it.
All it says is "d'vadai machmat shelo lamad hu" - because it 
means he hasn't bothered learning at all - so it's a shame to
him.  Nothing at all about asking his wife to do it.

Oh, I see what you're talking about.  Tosfos there seems to have
an extended version of that Rashi.  But by the same token, Tosfos
counters Rashi's argument by talking about levels of obligation:
that it's bad for a woman who has a derabanan level to motzi a man
who has a d'oraita level.  Which does not apply by either birchot
hanehenin or by neirot Chanukah (see MB 675 s"k 10).

> As RMFeldman pointed out,
>> it's a befeirush SA that a woman can motzi her husband on neirot Chanukah,
>> as did R'n Katz from KSA (even if she interpreted it differently).

> See the Biur Halacha 678 s"v Isha Madlekes.

YM 675.  By the same token, though, see MB s"k 9-10 there.  He may bring
down that gemara in the BH, but in the MB, he gives complete parity.

>>> Because according to most poskim (and keep in mind that in my house 
>>> the women do light) having her husband light for her does not put a 
>>> woman into a "lesser" position. The idea that it does is what 
>>> Rebbetzin Katz would call the influence of "feminism." The idea that 
>>> any time a woman doesn't do the exact same thing that a man does, it 
>>> puts her in a lesser position. 

>> And a Maimonidean would say that anyplace where Tosfos interjects Minhag
>> Ashkenaz, it's a western influence from Xianity and Xian lands, and thus
>> forbidden. But we don't hold that way. The whole mode of argument in
>> the Gemara is Socratic method - in other words, our whole Torah is based
>> on Hellenistic methodology.

> Mah inyan shmitta eitzel Har Sinai?

That's what I would ask you. If you're going to interpret Rashi on
Sukkah 38a as a Westernized gloss and thus impermissible, remember that
others regard much of what we do as impermissible Westernized glosses.
Where do you draw the line?

   - jon baker    jjbaker@panix.com     <http://www.panix.com/~jjbaker> -

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