Are Women Really Jewish?

The number of mitzvot from the Torah for which men are chiyuv and women are patur is rather small — about a dozen or so, with the exact number depending on whether you count head and arm tefillin as one mitzvah or two, whether you count evening and morning shema as one or two. The difference in the number of mitzvot is greater when you compare male Yisraelim to male Kohanim. Are male Yisraelim Jewish? Similarly, farmers in Eretz Yisrael (men AND women!) are chayev in about two dozen more Torah mitzvot than all the rest of us. Does that mean that they are Jewish and we aren’t?

“What makes someone Jewish?”

Whatever Hashem says…

and that’s that.

“Women … do not learn, daven, eat in the sukkah, or really do any of the mitzvos.”

They sure do.

(Unfortunately, the non-Orthodox have decided, as you have, that women are not “observed” enough in religion, & look what happened)

zeeskite: “Actually I think thm is MORE for Men.” ???

Perhaps, in some way, but women certainly have more of a specific obligation to keep it, differently from men. To be clearer, I should just have pointed out that generally we are taught from childhood that those are the big three for women because of Sara Imeinu’s example, and they are stressed much less for men.

K HI!!JEWISH WOMEN ARE JEWISH!! what are you hocking?? this is ridiculous!

Charliehall: I should have been more clear. When I said men do not have to keep these mitzvos “AS WOMEN ARE OBLIGATED TO” I meant they are not obligated IN THE SAME WAY: certainly, as i said, men can do those things, just girls are taught that those are THEIR mitzvos. Sort of: men CAN, but women MUST–the way that men must do those other things, and women can, but don’t necessarily have to. (and yes, i know my husband can take challah for me and he can light the candles for me…)

Jewish women don’t wear tzitzis or have a bris, or any of the other things you mentioned, because Hashem made us kirtzono. We are perfect the way we are and do not require those other accoutrements (that you do)in order to bring us to the level of kedusha that men need to work so hard to achieve. We are already there, just by virtue of our being Jewish women.

oomis1105: Would you say the same about goyim? They’re perfect the way HaShem made them, they don’t need mitzvos?

Who says so? 99% of them have broken every one of the sheva mitzvos b’nei Noach. When men say shelo asani goy or aved, they are specifying that these are people who do not have the chiyuv of mitzvos on them in the same way that we do, and they acknowledge Hashem’s chessed in giving us these responsibilities.

When they say it about WOMEN, they are really thanking Hashem that He let them off with JUST the need to do mitzvos, rather than the ohl of being pregnant, giving birth to, and raising the the next generation of our people. If even ONE man had to go through a pregnancy and childbirth, IMO it would be the end of the Jewish people. Or ALL people. I think they are just expressing their profound hakoras hatov for being let off that hook. 😉 I also think men do not really want to be on the same level of kedusha as women – it’s too hard for them to maintain that level on their own, hence the need for all the extra mitzvos. And boy am I SO not a B”Y girl!!!!!

This is a most disturbing thread

It reminds me of Chushim ben Dan, who was spared hearing a debate & was better off for it

“men CAN, but women MUST–the way that men must do those other things, and women can, but don’t necessarily have to”

Actually, that is incorrect. Not all Jewish men know this, but if they don’t have a woman lighting Shabat candles for them they must light themselves. If a woman OR a man bakes a sufficiently large amount of bread (CYLOR for the exact amount), no Jew can eat it until challah is taken whether the baker is a man or a woman. And of course both women and men must follow taharat hamishpachah.

oomis1105:

Again, we’ve had this discussion before, and before. Over and over again. Women are NOT HOLIER than men. And NO. Men are not ‘THANKING’ HaShem for letting them off the hook. That’s not what the brocho is all about. A little respect for Chazal who instituted Brochos.

thanks for the insight daas

Personally, we never bake enough bread to require taking challah

Eeees bakes just about every week and takes challah. And on the odd occasion that I make the challos for shabbos, I take challah from the dough.

The Wolf

a goy can take challah along with the leichter

pba just started this thread cuz he didn’t like having “member” as his subtitle, and he’s too “cool” to ask for his subtitle back. 😉

DY – pba claims that he takes hashkafa and halacha seriously.

anyways, can’t answer this question cuz in pba’s own definition of what is judaism he excludes what women do. it’s all in your definiton. if definition of Jew, means coming from Avraham, Yitzchok, and Yaakov, then women are also Jews. (which is how Torah defines Jews; thus we, men and women, are all B’nei Yisroel – we all are called “children of Ya’akov, whose name was changed to Yisroel). thus, reform, conservative, and orthodox whose mothers, etc. go way back to Yaakov are Jews. someone who did not convert appropriately and did not descend from a jewish mother isn’t Jewish, even if he has a bris, keeps shabbos, etc. etc.

if someone makes up their own definiton and therefore proves that women are not Jewish based on that definition, can’t argue. can’t argue with proofs when the basic theorem is all wrong.

choc,

thanks

Yes, I suppose this thread puts a bit of question mark on that.

i would put that line in BOLD if i knew how, so everyone can see it. unfortunately, the only thing i learned how to do in the CR was to italicize. 🙁

“Women are not Jew-ish. We are Jew – Isha. “

ROTF!!! Love it!!!!!

He was not pulling a Joseph. I am pretty sure it was his father posting, not him. If he were Joseph he would be posting himself under a different screenname

Michele Obama and Hilary Clinton are women.

Michele Obama and Hilary Clinton are not Jewish.

Therefore, women are not Jewish.

Simple logic!

YW Moderator – 42. I beg to differ. Your syllogism is neither simple nor logic.

Your categorical propositions, from which your conclusion is to be inferred, do not contain the very necessary defined structure of including, “All”, “Some”, or “No”. For example, “All” Michele Obamas are….or “Some” Michele Obamas are….. or “No” Michele Obamas are……Therefore…yadda yadda yadda….would make for valid propositions that can then be argued.

They are structurally incomplete and logically leading us to a faulty, albeit, humorous conclusion.

Nonetheless, I am just the messenger. You will have to take it up with Aristotle. It’s his gig. lol

oomis:

OK back to square one (that’s what 42 intended). So according to your (???) logic, goyim are more Jewish then Jews. They don’t need the mitzvohs that Jews do! Yisraelim are more holy than Kohanim, they don’t require those additional ‘reminders’…

Let me try to reiterate (again..)

The little Chazal I’ve come across CLEARLY state the opposite. A person’s Jewishness (halachakly) is evaluated by his/her Mitzvah OBLIGATION status. In the order a man says birchas hashachar. (goy, eved isha) – indeed that is the REASON for those brochos. A (real) Jewish woman, feeling a longing for this loss, submits her longing to HaShem’s decision, and says Sheasani Kirtzono. Any other attempt to misinterpret, misconstrue its real meaning is just that.

Is your left hand worse than you right hand? After all your right hand is stronger, you write with the right hand, so who needs left hands? Are left hands even part of the human body? Would you prefer two right hands and no left hands??

Just as the left compliments the right hand, so to a woman compliments a man? Does that make women any less? Of course not! They just have a different task in life, equally (or even more) important, just different!!