Wife/Mother sitting at head of shabbos table?

Home Forums Decaffeinated Coffee Wife/Mother sitting at head of shabbos table?

Viewing 41 posts - 1 through 41 (of 41 total)
  • Author
    Posts
  • #604440

    On special occasions, like my birthday or our anniversary, my Husband asks me to sit at the head of the shabbos table, in his usual place. I am wondering if anyone sees a problem with this since I never saw this anywhere else? Also, if we have guests that particular shabbos, do we need to “explain” that this is an exceptional shabbos – not to be “maras ayim” of being feminist c’v?

    #890723
    shlishi
    Member

    Can a King allow anyone else to sit on his throne?

    #890724
    yitayningwut
    Participant

    I think we pasken like Shammai in your case.

    #890725
    WolfishMusings
    Participant

    My mother sat at the head of our Shabbos table for twelve years.

    -42, let me guess…. Hitler sat at the head of his table too, right?

    The Wolf

    #890726
    yytz
    Participant

    “Can a King allow anyone else to sit on his throne?”

    I was just reading in Orchos Tzaddikim, Gate of Humility, in which the author relates a story of a king who got up among his subjects and fixed a lamp. They asked him why he would do that, because it would seem beneath his dignity, and he replied “I arose a king and returned a king.”

    In any event, men are supposed to honor their wives more than themselves, and sitting at the head of a table on a birthday or anniversary seems like a reasonable way to do that.

    #890727
    pcoz
    Member

    you’d better be careful if it’s like shlomo’s throne as you could end up with a broken leg from the lion if you don’t get on the right way

    #890728
    shlishi
    Member

    Wolf: Why do you fail to mention the most relevant fact that your mother was the only parent figure at the table?

    yytz: And wives are supposed to fear their husbands and treat him as a King. (As Rambam and many others mention.)

    #890729
    WolfishMusings
    Participant

    Wolf: Why do you fail to mention the most relevant fact that your mother was the only parent figure at the table?

    It didn’t seem like it would be relevant to the OP.

    And, in the end, what does it matter? The fact is that she did sit at the head of the table. And, for a number of years, she also made kiddush/hamotzi and havdala for us.

    The Wolf

    #890730
    Curiosity
    Participant

    All these feminist posts by Golden Trolling are getting really old. They aren’t funny or amusing, and they’re causing machlokes and might be making people nichshal in questioning Klall Yisrael’s traditions when nobody in the CR finds a good enough source to justify our own minhagim that have held for thousands of years. Not to mention The Wolf is getting sucked into this pro feminist trap like a planet into a blackhole. For goodness’ sake I am requesting we drop the feminist instigation, and endless trolling please.

    #890731

    “Rebbetzin”, your problem is that you’re looking at other people for what is right and wrong.

    Your husband wants to be mechabed you!

    #890732
    pcoz
    Member

    is that curiosity transmitting from mars?

    #890733

    I think you are all missing the point.

    Each parent has their roll in their home and in their raising of their children. There is not enough space here to go into all the details, but…

    For whatever reason, the father’s/husband’s place is at the head of the table. The mother plays a different roll at the seuda, sitting with her children etc., for whatever reason. This is in no way, ch”v, showing that a mother’s/wife’s roll is any less important than the roll of the man. It is just a different roll, albeit at least as important.

    When a husband “honors” his wife to sit in his seat, he is sending a message that sitting in that seat is more honorable, chashuv, and important than sitting where his wife usually sits. This sends a message to the children that husband/ father is king. Mommy/wife is slave. This is not a good message!

    Children must realize that even though their father and mother have different rolls in their homes, they are both equally important. Maybe their mother does not sit at the head of the table because she is showing more of the ahava, the softer hand which the children need. The father is showing more of a fear- yirah- which the children also need. The children need the mothers softness and their father’s firmness. They are both equally important.

    Don’t give over the wrong message. Don’t let children think that Mommy is not as important as Totty, and for Mommy’s b-day she gets to be as important as Totty for a day.

    This is not a good message! Not a good idea!! Both parents are important for what they do!!

    #890734

    Shlishi:

    “yytz: And wives are supposed to fear their husbands and treat him as a King. (As Rambam and many others mention.”

    I pray to god you wrote that in a casual manner. FEAR their husbands?! Do we live in Iran? Where does fear come in to a healthy, productive, & stable marriage? Honor? Yes. Love? Of course. Be inspired by? Absolutely. FEAR?!

    #890735
    shlishi
    Member

    NOMTHW: Yes, fear in the same sense one is to fear their father or, lehavidl, Hashem. Rambam and many many meforshim say this. See the other thread where the sources are quoted to a great extent.

    #890736

    I’m getting a troll vibe (pun intended) here…

    #890737
    WolfishMusings
    Participant

    Yes, fear in the same sense one is to fear their father or, lehavidl, Hashem. Rambam and many many meforshim say this. See the other thread where the sources are quoted to a great extent.

    Then I guess that in addition to being a horrible person, I am a rotten parent who has abused his kids because he did not make them afraid of him. Further proof that I am an apikores and a waste of human DNA. A dog is better than I am — at least a dog knows how to properly take care of it’s pups, as opposed to me who just messes them up further and further with every passing day.

    The Wolf

    #890738
    Sam2
    Participant

    Shlishi: Wrong. Fear is not the proper translation of Mora. Awe would be a much better translation.

    #890739
    MDG
    Participant

    NOMTHW,

    Fear does not mean being afraid, like a he’s a tyrant. It means, in our modern terms, to have respect like not sitting in his place, not contradicting his words, etc. All this (and more) is written in the Shulchan Aruch, Yoreh De’ah 241.

    #890740
    computer777
    Participant

    A rectangular table has two “heads”, where does it say that a wife can’t sit on the other head of the table?

    #890741
    shlishi
    Member

    Sam: This isn’t a debate over the semantics of the translation. We can both agree that the “mora” means that she should not sit in her father or husbands seat. And she should stand up when her father or husband comes into the room.

    #890742
    Sam2
    Participant

    Shlishi: I’m not disagreeing with any Halachos. That was not the implication I got from your post though. I apologize if it was just my misinterpretation. (And, by the way, if you want to be M’dameh Kavod for a husband to that for a father, then the husband can be Mochel on her sitting in his seat.)

    #890743
    Bubby B
    Participant

    In our early years of marriage we often spent Shabbos at my husband’s Rebbie’s house (this person was his Rebbie in High School – Mesivta, and my husband maintained a close kesher with him. He and his wife, used to sit next to one another in arm chairs, at the long side of the table further from the entrance to the dining room. I thought it a very nice way of doing things, and now being a Bubby, I still think so.

    Bubby B

    #890744
    Whiteberry
    Member

    I’m not sure I understand this thread. While certainly not universal, in many, many homes the wife/mother always sites at the head of the table. right across from the husband/father who sits at the other head.

    #890745
    oomis
    Participant

    I sued to sit at the other head of the table. Then I realized I really preferred to sit next to my husband. He sits at the head, and I, to his immediate right. Is this really so important that we need to debate it?

    “Morah” means to be in awe of, not necessarily to be afraid. And the Torah speaks of Morah Eim v’Av. We should not fear our parents, but we should hold them in awe and with kovod. It is hard to feel safe with a human being who makes us feel afraid of him or her.

    #890746

    i know of a choshuve yid’ a cousin of my father, who sits with his wife side by side at the top

    #890747
    apushatayid
    Participant

    “I sued to sit at the other head of the table.”

    You must have really wanted to 🙂

    #890748
    WolfishMusings
    Participant

    I sued to sit at the other head of the table

    You went to court over this? And does a court even have jurisdiction over this? 🙂

    The Wolf

    #890749
    oomis
    Participant

    “I sued to sit at the other head of the table.”

    You must have really wanted to 🙂 “

    APY and Wolf – see what happens when I post when I have not had enough sleep?

    #890750
    147
    Participant

    We just procured a round table, & my neighbor has a square table rather than a rectangular table.

    Could someone explain me, where to sit the father & grandfather & mother & grandmother & rabbi on this round table, so that no-one’s place on the hierarchy is in anyway diminished whatsoever from the Kovod due to him/her?

    BTW this table is non returnable, so please don’t answer me to return the roundtable and go & procure a rectangular table.

    #890751
    Curiosity
    Participant

    147 – trolling?

    #890752
    Sam2
    Participant

    Curiosity: All his posts are trolling, some just slightly less so than others.

    #890753
    mewho
    Participant

    when u sit at the head do u get served?

    if u do, then its worth it.lol

    #890754

    “NOMTHW: Yes, fear in the same sense one is to fear their father or, lehavidl, Hashem. Rambam and many many meforshim say this. See the other thread where the sources are quoted to a great extent.”

    I still disagree with you. A husband should not be feared. I don’t know where this concept came from. Spouses should be respected, admired, cherished and honored.

    Fear? Please..

    #1710564

    Round table for the seder, so everyone is sitting at the head table does not acknowledge the special role of “bizchus noshim tzidkoniyos” in the merit of the righteous women did we become redeemed from Mitzrayim. Certainly at the seder, the woman of the house should sit at the head of the table.

    #1710588
    Forshayer
    Participant

    On Pesach my wife and I both sit at the head of the table. However she does not get the royal treatment of having the washing cup and bowl brought to her at the table. But that is only because she is bringing the above to her Father who comes to our Seder every year. Another interesting note about Pesach. The Sedarrim are the only 2 Shabbos or YomTov meals that the Rebba here in Forshay eats with his whole family sitting together at one table. That includes men and women, boys and girls.

    #1710601
    iacisrmma
    Participant

    does he place he kiddush cup and challah in front of you also? If you are at the head of the table…..

    #1710602
    iacisrmma
    Participant

    BTW, my mother is an almanah an to this day when home for shabbos sits in her seat, not the head where my father sat.

    #1710611
    eli lev
    Participant

    as bob grant said ” sick and getting sicker”!!!

    #1710760
    ChadGadya
    Participant

    A round table is certainly best for the pesach seder, so that no knight should be different from any other knight!

    #1712973
    Reb Eliezer
    Participant

    Whether a woman should recline see SA O’CH (472,4)

    #1715066

    These days women go to Bais Yaakov, seminary, hold jobs and support their husbands in kollel, as such the women have a din of “isha chashuva’ (an important/prominent woman) which SA requires to recline. Besides, which husband is suicidal enough to tell his wife, “Honey, you don’t need to recline because you are not choshuv (like me).” Such a husband will be sleeping in the sukkah – even if he is a Lubavitcher…

Viewing 41 posts - 1 through 41 (of 41 total)
  • You must be logged in to reply to this topic.