Thursday, February 24, 2011

Women’s Sense, Study and Status in Torah

This is not an exploration of the truth about women’s intelligence. As one Chasidic woman stated “I was born into a Chabad-Lubavitch family that never questioned the intellect or ability of a woman[1]”. This is about grappling with traditions that challenge me and my quest to live by the highest standards of modern morality and remain true to the Torah. My other interest in this is that the treatment of women in life and text is often used to put down the other[2].
Exhibit A. “A wise woman asked R. Eliezer. Since, the acts of sinning with the golden calf were equally forbidden, why were the death penalties different? (Some being slaughtered with the sword, some dying by water, or by a plague?[3] He answered) There is no wisdom to the woman but the spindle, as it is written "All the wise women spun with their hands"[4] [5].
Taken at face value he refused to answer her question because she is a woman and his belief that women are meant to restrict their wisdom to domestic responsibilities. An alternative explanation is that he was simply being evasive because he had no tradition about this issue from his teachers [6]. The context seems to support this interpretation because it follows a series of other questions that R. Eliezer deflected [7], eg. He is asked, “What about plastering one’s home?”  he replies, “What about plastering a grave?”  His response is explained in the Talmud as being “only because he would not say anything that he never heard from his teacher”.
In the Jerusalem Talmud, we have the same story but with the following addition; Hurkanus, his son said to him (R. Eliezer), “so as not to tell her one matter from the Torah you have caused me to lose 300 Kor of tithes every year!” (R. Eliezer) said to him, “let the words of the Torah be burned and let it not be given over to women[8]”.   This supports a more problematic explanation.
A third  interpretation is that Rabbi Eliezer was saying “why is she bothering us with these questions, she should just occupy herself with her spindle and dough and that she will be enough for her[9]. It is not proper for the wisdom of a woman to be directed to anything but spinning, the needs of her house and the honor of her husband and therefore our sages forbade the teaching of Torah to daughters[10]. This is consistent with R. Eliezer’s view that is opposed to teaching Torah to daughters. Ben Azai, holds the opposing view, that it is an obligation to teach Torah to one’s daughters[11].  
Exhibit B. “Women’s minds are light[12]”. This phrase appears in the thinking of a fugitive Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai who had dared speak out against the Roman occupation.
“Rabbis, Judah, Josi and Shimon were sitting, Judah son of converts was sitting by them. R. Judah opened with “how pleasant are the actions of this nation (Rome), they established marketplaces, bridges and bathhouses”. R. Josi was silent. R. Shimon Bar Yochai answered, “all that they established  they did for their own needs. The markets for Harlots to sit in, bathhouses for their own pleasure and bridges for tolls”. Judah son of converts [13]  went and told their words and they were heard by the government. They said, “Judah who talked us up, will be elevated, Josi who was silent should be exiled to Zipori and Shimon who denigrated should be killed”. He and his son hid in the house of study and their wives brought them bread...When the decree intensified, Shimon said to his  son, “Women their mind is light on them, perhaps she will be tortured and they will reveal our hiding place”. So they hid in a cave.”
Shoshana Pantel Zolty, notes that one might object to R. Shimon's assumption[14], about how women respond to intense pressure. However, the phrase “Women's minds are light”was never used in the Talmud in reference either to intellectual abilities of moral character[15].
Zolty draws attention to statements that speak in glowing terms of women's intellectual capacities, citing the statement “Additional understanding was given to women more than to the man[16]”. This is based on a play on words in the verse “and God built the woman[17]”, the word for built is Vayeeven, which is related to the word for understanding “Bina”. To be consistent  this must also be considered in its original narrower context, which relates to the laws of Vows and that females are considered mature a year earlier than males. Commentaries are clear that this is about timing, that a girl is earlier with acquiring understanding[18]. Still, I think the original context has lost significance in more recent thinking among scholars and in recent times this phrase is understood more generally to be referring to women’s superior insight.
It has been said in relation to Islam, 'Islam is as Islam does'. I think this is a useful formula for grappling with clashes between ancient sacred texts and modern sensibilities. The current status of women is key in this discussion. The question of teaching Torah to daughters has taken on additional urgency and gained wide acceptance in the last century. Problems began to arise with the classic formula of teaching daughters “the laws, in order to do and be careful with Mitzvot (to know) what to do and what not to do, but not the depth of the Talmud or the reasons of Mitzvot and secrets of Torah[19]”. Pioneer of girls education, Sarah Schnirer, became concerned in the early 1900's when she saw her father and brother in religious rapture after returning from the court of their Rebbe, her mother reading the pretty basic “Tzena Ure-enah” Yiddish version of bible stories and her sister tuned out with a Polish Novel. This prompted the ruling by the Chafetz Chaim  that women should learn Scripture and ethics[20].
The trend toward increased Torah study for women, while far from parity with the study undertaken by men, is strong and broadly seen in various streams of Orthodox Judaism[21]. The Lubavitcher Rebbe “exhorts women to increase their study and teaching, and asks for the community at large to support this endeavor. He asks: why has this increase in Torah learning for women occurred specifically in the recent era?” The Rebbe makes two points “1) each generation further from the Divine revelation at Sinai is on a "lower" level; and so there is an increasingly greater need to bolster it. 2) Nevertheless, he continues, the result has been a great good, an increase in Torah study; and this increase in Torah study by women he emphatically describes as one of the "positive innovations of the later generations.[22]"
Broadly, women have continued to be viewed as having a primary role as the “mainstay of the house” with responsibility to their families, although increasingly this is not to the exclusion of work outside the home, or a role in the community and even regarding the role within the home, the spiritual content of this is more emphasized. The Lubavitcher Rebbe, turns the following phrase on it's head, “Who is a Kosher woman? One who does her husbands will[23]”. The word for does, Oseh, can also mean makes, so the Rebbe renders it, Who is a Kosher woman? One who makes, influences and shapes, her husbands will, toward Torah study and good deeds.
To those of us imbued with equality as the highest value, this is jarring. One response is that the valuing of the public over the private relates to a western perspective that values fame, which acts as “an ethnocentric filter” at odds with the value of the private in a Jewish value system[24]. In the ideal world, men and women could be equally dedicated to their children and put their careers second. That is not likely to happen, instead the choices in families with children are usually between both parents fully joining the 'rat race” or the woman putting her children first. I admire and am grateful for the fact that many women, some religious, make the sacrifice of career for the nurturing of children. 
Perhaps most important are the voices of Jewish women themselves and the degree to which “Torah-observant women (are) struggling to reconcile two aspirations which are not easily joined. One is the longing for marriage and children, the other a passion for study and more active participation in communal life [25].

Rivka Slonim, in whose home I spent a delightful Simchat Torah some years ago, wrote; As I was growing up, there was nothing I felt was beyond my reach, except perhaps synagogue life as enjoyed by the men. This often seemed unfair, but there was an understanding that this was just the way it was... Yes, there were things I wished I could do. But I lived in a world of absolutes, the Torah world. I loved that world and I knew it to be true. If in a world of absolutes there were certain things a woman didn't do... I just wouldn't do them even if I wanted to. They never loomed all-important. The joy and potential for fulfillment in the Chassidic-Jewish lifestyle, coming from knowing who you are and having a sense of direction and purpose in life, was far more significant… I know that after all of the arguments, refutations and debate, something must speak to the soul[26].

Coming to a similar conclusion via a very different route was the story of Mickey Hirshberg. She was probably the first to establish the radical idea of a women only Minyan (public prayer) in 1971 and pushed many other boundaries, she describes her journey…  “A key transitional experience…a group of Americans would study Chassidut (mystical teachings) one evening a week with a Chassidic rabbi in Mean Shearim. If he had an address we didn’t know it; we knew only which courtyards to cross. He spoke no English and taught quietly and patiently in the simplest Hebrew. One warm evening a friend and I stayed after class to ask questions. His wife appeared with a glass of water which she handed me with a smile. Suddenly I was riveted to the floor. There was something intensely spiritual about the way that woman gave the glass of water. I didn’t want to leave. I wanted to grab her and shake her and beg to tell what the secret was, to say that I had been waiting for years and had to understand. ….I could no longer afford the luxury of alienating Torah-observant and Chasidic women who might bear the keys to locked doors I desired to open[27].  

Clearly there is a disconnect between the simple reading of sacred text and the lived experiences of observant Jewish women today, some of which a reportedly very positive. As a male, is it really my place to argue?




[2] Aly, W (2007) People Like Us. How Arrogance is Dividing Islam and the West. Picador-Pan Macmillan, Australia
[3] Rashi’s explanation
[4] Exodus 35:25
[5] Talmud Yoma 66b, translation is from http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Talmud/yoma6.html with modifications where I thought the flavor of the original Aramaic can be better conveyed
[6] Rav Sherira Gaon, cited by Maharatz Chayes, brought in the commentary to Yoma p. 66b3, Schottenstein Edition/Artscroll (1998), Brooklyn NY,
[7] R. Eliezer was asked: When the he-goat had become sick, might he be taken on the shoulders? He replied: The he-goat was so healthy that it could bear away you and me together. They asked him again: When the conductor had become sick, may another be appointed? He replied: Let us be healthy; do not ask us about a case of sickness. They asked him again: If after having been pushed down he did not die, shall he go down and kill him? He gave them as answer the verse in Judges v. 31: "Thus may perish all Thy enemies, O Lord."… R. Eliezer was asked whether a certain man would enjoy the world to come. He replied: You inquire of me concerning that man (he named a different man). They asked of him again: May a shepherd rescue a sheep carried away by a lion? He replied: Do you ask me of a sheep? They asked him again: May the shepherd be rescued from the lion's mouth? He answered again: You ask me only of the shepherd. They asked him again: May a bastard be heir of his father? He asked them: May he espouse his dead and childless brother's wife? They asked him: If he possesses a house, must a memorial of the Temple's destruction be left, when his house is whitewashed (an ell is left bare)? He answered: I think you ask me whether his grave is to be whitewashed? His replies are explained by his unwillingness to speak on matters for which he did have not a tradition, this is followed by the incident with the woman. If the same reason applies to all the cases, it would see that putting the explanation at the very end would be the logical place. Putting the explanation before the case with the woman suggests to me that the reason for this last case might be different.
[8] Jerusalem Talmud Yoma chapter 3:4, Bamidbar Rabba 9
[9] Meiri, Beit Habechira Vol. 4, p 166, Kedem (1978) Jerusalem
[10] Rabbenu Chananel, on Yoma
[11] Jerusalem Talmud, ibid
[12] Talmud Shabbat 33b
[13] A fuller study of the portrayal of converts would be useful. The Torah repeatedly forbids discrimination and mistreatment, of converts or strangers, even verbally, Yet the portrayal of converts while at times glowing and affirming is sometimes quite negative. The attribution of the Golden Calf to the “mixed multitude” that Moses converted is one example. I wonder why we need to the know the name and ancestry of the person responsible for the “leak” from this conversation . 
[14] Perhaps also worth taking into account that he made this assessment in a situation where he was in fear for his life.
[15] Zolty, S. P, (1993), And all your children Shall Be learned, Jason Aronson, Northvale NJ, cited in a review by Frankiel, T., in Wellsprings, Winter 1994
[16] Talmud Nida 45b, Bereshit Rabba 18:1
[17] Genesis 2:22
[18] Tosafot Harash on Nida 45b, Etz Yosef on Bereshit Rabba
[19] Sefer Chasidim 313, brought in Torah Shlaima, Vol 23 p. 25 note 90.
[20] R. Israel Meir HaKohen (Kagan), Likkutei Halachot, Sotah 20b: Cited in Levy, B. J., Transforming Women's Torah Learning- A New Wave in Educating Jewish Women,  http://www.chabad.org/theJewishWoman/article_cdo/aid/338925/jewish/Transforming-Womens-Torah-Learning.htm "It seems that all of this [prohibition against women learning Torah] applies only to times past when all daughters lived in their fathers' home and tradition was very strong, assuring that children would pursue their parents' path, as it says, ‘Ask your father and he shall tell you.’ On that basis we could claim that a daughter needn't learn Torah but merely rely on proper parental guidance. But nowadays, in our iniquity, as parental tradition has been seriously weakened and women, moreover, regularly study secular subjects, it is certainly a great mitzvah to teach them Chumash, Prophets and Writings, and rabbinic ethics, such as Pirkei AvotMenorat Hamaor, and the like, so as to validate our sacred belief; otherwise they may stray totally from God's path and transgress the basic tenets of religion, God forbid."
[21] Prominent in their pursuit of this path is centrist orthodoxy. For fuller explorations of this, see “Torah Study for Women- Rabbi Aharon Lichtenstein”  Reprinted from Ten Da’at Vol. III No. 3 pp.7-8, http://www.lookstein.org/articles/torah_study_for_women.htm
[22] "Al Devar Chiyuv Neshei Yisrael B'Chinukh u-veLimmud ha-Torah 5750 [1990]." Sefer haSichot, Vol. 2 (Brooklyn, N.Y.: Kehot, 1992), pp. 455-459. Cited in Handelman, S. Putting Women in the Picture, adapted from The Chabad Movement in the Twentieth Century, eds.Yitzhak Kraus and MosheHallamish (Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press, 2005) with permission of the editors. http://www.chabad.org/theJewishWoman/article_cdo/aid/161694/jewish/Putting-Women-in-the-Picture.htm
[23] Tana Dbei Eliyahu Rabba 9, Remah, Even Ezer end 69
[24] Krengel, S. (1990) Exploring the Hidden, Wellsprings, February-March, p.4 Lubavitch Youth Organization Brooklyn New York
[26] Slonim, ibid
[27] Hirshberg, M, (1989), From Feminism to Chasidism, Wellsprings, Av-Elul 5649, August-September, p.17, Lubavitch Youth Organization Brooklyn New York.



(The large image at the top is a re-imagining of a classic painting that shows a group of male scholars in heated Talmudic debate (smaller image). Hopefully the image and arguments about whether or not it is appropriate will add to the discussion)

Thursday, February 17, 2011

Embracing the Unknown and alternatives to scientific knowledge /the case of the Golden Calf

Egyptians and others who care about what happens there are facing the unknown. There is an ancient impulse to seek linear knowledge, evidence based, “scientific” information about what is and what will be. This essay argues that having clear knowledge is not always appropriate and that some times it is useful to embrace the unknown or “traditional knowledge” of people with a variety of skin tones including the darker shades.
In 1999, the Nuer and Dinka tribes of Southern Sudan had been waging war, killing each other and destroying each others’ cattle. An American Christian, Bill Lowery, and others from the New Sudan Council of Churches brought chiefs from the two sides together, at great risk to the chiefs themselves. One of the rituals involved participants spitting into a gourd filled with water. When it came to Bill, he spat into it too. When everyone had spat, they splashed the water on each other. The spittle on the tongue is meant to be the coldest part of a person, and splashing it symbolised cooling off the hot bodies, charged with the ‘heat of conflict’. Bill asked the chiefs to tell stories they heard from their fathers’ mothers about how conflicts were resolved in the past. They sat opposite each other, divided by a rope representing the Nile, and discovered the wisdom of their respective ancestors was very similar. They told stories about what was done to them, and finally were asked what they ‘remembered’ for the future of their daughters’ sons.
After three days of story telling, they reached the point of decision. Bill warned his team that this was not a time to give advice. In the end the decision was a ‘no-brainer’. The logical conclusion was ending the fighting. One of the oldest chiefs told Bill, “I have been to many meetings with the United Nations. Never before has anyone asked me what I think[1].”
It is plausible to suggest that the wise UN people were arrogant, but I suspect that they suffered from this need to have a linear “scientifically” documented plan with neat graphs that might not have allowed for listening to old black men. One liberated brown gentleman, India‘s first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru, had this to say. “It is science alone that can solve the problems of hunger…of superstition and deadening custom…the future belongs to science and those who make friends with science”[2]. 
This impulse may have also been at work when the ancient Israelites, not long after hearing God’s command “Do not make for your self any image[3] demanded “make us Elohim that will go before us[4] then created and bowed to a Golden Calf.  The common understanding of this is reflected in the Midrash that “the Egyptians would carry their gods and sing before it and see it before them. Make us a God like the gods of Egypt and we will see it before us”[5]. The word Elohim can mean God but it can also mean a guide as we find when a reluctant Moses is told to speak to the Jews with Aaron as his spokesman, he is told that “you will be for him an Elohim[6][7].  The Jews were seeking a replacement for Moses who failed to come back from the mountain.
They thought it would have a higher power to tell them the future, to stand instead of Moses to lead them and tell them what will happen to them[8]. Alternatively, the purpose of the calf was “like Teraphim (statue like objects) that were used in witchcraft to tell them their needs[9]”. In direct contravention of “do not have diviners, (using lucky or unlucky times or omens)…be wholesome with God”[10].  
The Golden Calf was to serve as a focal point for prayer for the Israelites, “just as we do today in our places of worship, taking pride in their stones and mortar” Just as we turn our hearts to “heaven” in prayer. In this view the problem was not so the calf which in its meaning was not that different to the Cherubim on the holy ark but rather creating their own symbol not commanded by God[11]. Aaron states that tomorrow there will be a feast to God, because the spiritual content remained unchanged, only there was a small concession to concreteness of worship[12].
The quest to uncover mysteries engages Moses as well and he asks God to “show me your glory[13]” by which he meant “show me how you lead the world[14]”, seeking to understand divine justice, reward for the righteous as well as the tranquility of the wicked[15].
God responds to this request by explaining that no man can see His face and live. Instead God offers to “I will put you in the cleft of the rock[16] where Moses will see “God’s back” but not his face. Then He will “shield (Moses) with  the palm of his hand on him until He passes”.  The face, back and hands are metaphors that indicate that there are some secrets that must remain closed even to Moses.
The place in which Moses has this experience, hosts another visitor years later in the dramatic story of Elijah in the cave[17].  Elijah arrives in the very cave and asks him “"What are you doing here, Elijah?". Elijah replies that he had “been zealous for the Lord, the God of Hosts, for the children of Israel have forsaken Your covenant... they have killed Your prophets by the sword..” Again the theme of passing plays out. God tells Elijah, “"Go out and stand in the mountain before the Lord, Behold! the Lord passes”. Then there is a great and strong wind splitting mountains and shattering boulders before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. And after the wind an earthquake-not in the earthquake was the Lord. After the earthquake fire, not in the fire was the Lord, and after the fire a sound of silence[18]. Whatever God’s message was to Elijah with all of this, curiously God repeats his original question. "What are you doing here, Elijah?" Elijah’s response is identical with the one he offered before this dramatic display. I wonder if this is part of the reason our sages teach us that forever more Elijah is required to attend every circumcision where the covenant is affirmed. Perhaps observing imperfect people ambiguously cleaving to God is a good correction to Elijah’s judgmental “black and white” certainty.  
Moses is changed forever by this experience and having “Gods hand on him”. Moses did not know it but the skin of his face shone with rays of light, Aaron and the sons of Israel were afraid to approach him. For most of the rest of his life he would need to have some concealment of his own, covering his face with a mask or veil. If we understand the veil metaphorically then rather than adding to the mystery detracted from it by “putting a mask on the ideas and presenting them in a way that the people could understand[19]”. Thus, Moses having sought to uncover the mystery and having being touched by it, must now protect others from mystery, giving physical interpretations to spiritual ideas, thus concretizing the ethereal.     
While the scientific method can help us communicate and put a man on the moon, it is not the tool for the ultimate questions of life. Embracing the unknown or seeking traditional knowledge each have their place. The Ultimate knowledge of God is (to know that) we don’t know[20].


[1] Lowery, W. (2010). Related to me in by Bill Lowery in late night Conversation at the Third World Peace Forum, Yogyakarta, Indonesia. http://southsudanfriends.org/News/Update991122.html. Accessed 7 June 2010
[2] Appleyard, B. (1992) Understanding the Present, Science and the Soul of Modern Man, p.3 Picador/Pan Books, London
[3] Exodus 20:4 in the Ten Commandments
[4] Excodus 32:1
[5]  Pirkey Drabbi Eliezer 45, cited in Torah Shelaima, volume 21, p 85.
[6] Exodus and later 7:1
[7] Interpretation brought in Torah Shlaima, Volume 21, Miluim p. 206, seems to be quoting Ibn Ezra, not clear to me from the text.
[8] Ralbag, Torah Shlaima ibid
[9] Rashbam, in Torah Shlaima ibid
[10] Deuteronomy 18:10-12
[11] Kuzari 1:37, cited in Nachshoni, Y (1988) Studies in weekly Parsha, Sh’mos p.573, ArtScroll, Brooklyn NY
[12] Ibn Ezra as understood by Nachshoni, Y, ibid p.574
[13] Exodus 33:18
[14] Midrash Tanchuma Yashan, Vaetchanan 3
[15] Shemot Rabba 45:5
[16] Exodus 33:22
[17] Talmud Pesachim 54a, quoting Kings I Kings - Chapter 19. Ten things were created on the eve of Shabbat between the sons (twilight), these are…and the cave in which both Moses and Elijah stood. Moses as it states and “I will put you in the cleft  of the rock and with Elijah “and he went till the mountain of God, Horeb and came there to the cave and rested there”.
[18] The Hebrew is Kol Demama Daka, which literally means a sound, a silence, that is fine. The late educator Mr. Max Wallhouse, of blessed memory, translated it as the “Sound of Silence” which is the best translation I can think of. The more common translation is “a small still voice”.
[19] Rabbi A. Alrabi, Drashot Torah – Rabbi Shem Tov son of Rabbi Shem Tov, Ralbag, discussed in Torah Shelaima, Kasher, M, Torah Shelaima, volume 22, Miluim, p 181
[20] Mimonedes


Thursday, February 10, 2011

Egypt – what is the right question for a Jew?

Elation and ambivalence
For many Jews the chaotic uprising in Egypt elicits our natural affinity with the oppressed, perhaps even evokes the drama of our own Egyptian liberation, complete with the chaos of the plagues. For some the joy is tempered by fear. What are the right questions for a Jew to ask?

It is good for the Jews?
Perhaps this is not the best question. It is one that survival instincts have programmed in Jewish minds.  Jews have paid a bloody price for events that were not “about us” regardless of what was happening, be it crusaders setting out to capture Jerusalem, or Chmielnicki rising up for the peasants. Times have changed, we are no longer the 'niggers' of the world. Yes, anti-Semitism persists but the power dynamic and scale of persecution is dramatically different.

Jewish woman: The black taxi driver called me a kike (when he was not happy with the tip).
Black Woman: You can get a taxi, when I wait for a cab they don't stop[1].

With the changed circumstances, I think the balance must shift a bit more to the second half of the great teaching. “If I am not for myself, who is for me, but if I am only for myself what am I?[2]

Pre-emptive self defence
Some would argue that the imperative of being “for myself”, not relying on others for our survival is the most relevant point here. I have never faced the horrors of war. I do not have the expertise to ascertain the potential threat of extremists cancelling the peace treaty with Israel and a renewal of major wars.  Instead, I will explore more generally relevant principles and sources.

The principle of self defence is articulated as follows. “If a thief will be found in a tunnel (that a thief might digs under the walls of a house), and he will hit and die, he has no blood. If the sun arose on him, he has blood”[3]. This is the source for the principle that if “someone comes to kill you, arise and kill him”. At the time this was written, there was no home insurance, banks or welfare so the assumption the thief “knows that a person will not stand and see his money being taken and be silent, therefore (the thief) came on the basis that if the owner of the money will stand up to him he will kill him”[4].  The exception to this principle, is if it is clear to the home-owner (represented by the metaphor of the rising sun) that thief will not kill him, the self defence justification for violence falls away[5].

This suggests that a clear risk justifies violence or other harsh defensive acts. How much risk justifies pre-emptive measures needs to be considered with a full understanding of the situation.

Respect and Suspect
Our guidance varies in relation to caution and trust. We are taught to judge every man to the side of merit[6]. Yet, we are told that “always, let every man be seen by you and a thief and (at the same time) respect them as if they were (the great) Rabban Gamliel[7]. A story illustrates this idea.

A man visited Rabbi Yehoshua, who gave him food and drink and showed him to (a place to sleep) on the top of floor. Rabbi Yehoshua removed the ladder beneath him. What did this man do? He got up at , spread out his robe, took vessels (belonging to R. Yehosha) bundled them into his robe, tried to go down, fell and broke his elbow. In the morning R. Yehoshua came and found him. Empty one! This is what people like you do? Said R. Yehoshua. “I did not know you took the ladder from under me”, the guest replied. He said to him, “don’t you know we were careful about you from yesterday[8].

We are also taught if one suspects the innocent they are punished in their body. As we see with Moses[9] who suspected that the Israelites “will not believe” him[10].  A judge is told to see litigants as wicked when they stand before him but as righteous after they have accepted the judgement[11]. I have not yet managed to get clarity with this[12] in general much less in the case of Egypt.

Is it good?
I think a better question is simply to ask if what is happening in Egypt is good. The answer must be yes, when we are talking about the removal of a tyrannical dictator, who reportedly employed 2 million secret police, yet failed to adequately protect minorities such as the Copts.

Judaism believes there are seven obligations for all people on the earth and one of these is the establishment of justice. I cried when the statue of Sadaam fell in Bagdad, as will so many liberated Egyptians when Honsi creates a space for justice to be pursued[13].

Freedom for any depends on freedom for all
Proclaim liberty throughout the land for all its inhabitants[14] the Torah states in relation to freeing slaves. Yet, surely the proclamation is one of freedom for slaves, why does it say “all its inhabitants? Penei Yehoshua explains, in any country where freedom is incomplete even if only a few are slaves, all the people are slaves. Slavery is an affliction which afflicts slave, master and by-stander. In todays global village, I think this can be applied more broadly.

As a Jew, I am thrilled that men and women in Egypt will soon be free. I pray this will indeed be the case and that will be good not only for the Egyptians but also for my brothers and sisters in Israel.



[1] Goldstein, T, (2001),’ I’m Not White’: Anti Racist Teacher Education for White Early Childhood Educators, Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood, Volume 2,  Number 1, 2001.
[2] Pirkey Avot, 1:14
[3] Exodus 22:1-2
[4] Rashi on Exodus 22:1
[5] Mechilta, Talmud Sanhedrin 62, an example of this is a father coming to rob his child.
[6]  Pirkey Avot 1:6
[7]  Masechet Kala Rabbati chapter 9
[8]  Ibid
[9]  Exodus 4
[10] Talmud Shabbat 97a and Talmud Yoma 19b 
[11] Pirkey Avot 1:8.
[12] A distinction is suggested in Kalla Rabbati between someone you know to whom we would apply the principle of “do not judge your friend until you have been in his position”, but strangers can be judged. The Talmud in Yoma would fit this interpretation because the context there is suspicion against a Kohen Gadol (high priest). It is harder to reconcile with the case of Moses suspecting the Jewish people as a whole, most of whom were strangers to him, it also does not sit well with “judging every man favourably” in Pirkey Avot 1:6
[13] I explored the Torah case for democracy in an earlier post http://torahforsociallyawarehasid.blogspot.com/2011/01/gods-way-halacha-shariah-vs-democracy.html
[14] Leviticus 25:10