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Syag,
My apologies. When I said I “speak for the Lakewood woman” I meant that among Lakewood women, there is a significant number who would agree with me. I did not mean that all Lakewood women would agree with me. And that’s ok. I just don’t like Joseph’s sweeping assumptions that ignore reality.
Yes I am a frum woman.
And Jospeh, you can thank Betty Freidan and Gloria Steinem for allowing something like Lakewood to ever exist. (I never read Gloria Stienem and only ever read some snipptes from Betty Freidan, so you cannot say I got this “tainted hashkafa” from them.)
Joseph, please dont miss the point. It’s not about you being the “frum” hashkafa and me being the “feminist apikorus”. It’s about making you aware that you have no idea what you talking about with your grand assupmtions about what makes women happy and how they think. And yes, I speak for the Lakewood wife too. When it comes to this, I’m pretty sure I know better than you.
“Talk to the women of the 60s and 70s, how career turned out to be a bust.”
Hahaha. I know you didn’t speak to any of them, because then you would suddenly be surprised to see how wrong your are.
“Many that gave up child bearing years for career and they hate their careers and wish they had more children.”
Maybe, maybe not. I know women who had few children because of their career and today are perfectly happy with their decision. I know women who juggle large families and a career and are happy with that decision. And I know MANY women who devoted their lives solely to raising children and today regret not having a career.
“Our grandmothers had enormous respect for their fathers and husbands. Not so the women of this generation or even the last generation.”
Koheles: 7:10: (I’ll skip the hebrew-I’m sure you know this pasuk) “Don’t say the days before us were better than today, because not from wisdom are you asking this…”
We know that women were forced to tolerate many abuses from men in the past and were not always able to do anything about it-that’s a historical fact… so does that for you translate into respect?? Besides, respect is something to be earned, not something you get automatically because you are male. If you or the men in your life are feeling disrespected, then earn that respect instead of trying to keep putting women “in their place”.
“Our grandmothers had enormous respect for their fathers and husbands. Not so the women of this generation or even the last generation. If someone doesn’t think that feeds into divorce and confusion among the youth, then they aren’t thinking.”
So you think people are getting divorced because women don’t respect men?
“It does not value family, love, community – all the stuff women are good at.”
Family? Ok, you want women to raise the children. Love? I can tell you aren’t married. That’s 50/50 the man and woman. Community? What?? You want women to remain at home raising children. Not being community leaders. Not going to shul all the time. Not being part of any communal organization or chas v’shalom speaking in front of men. Nor having careers where they are leaders because it will “erode their natural sensitivities and softness”.
“It glamorizes career, when most people hate their jobs.”
Really? I don’t know what kind of people you hang around. But most of my friends like their job/career.
Jospeh, you need a serious reality check.
I am not going to argue with you on the halachic/hashkafic plane because we have different frames of reference and it’s a waste of time.
But for heaven’s sake, stop saying all these things as if you know. You are just parroting things you are reading without ever stopping to see if they reflect reality.
Sit down with some women and speak to them. Hear them and listen to what they have to say. If you do this with an open mind, you will find that much of what you are saying in not true. Your image of “the happy housewife” is often a woman on anti-depressants who would do well with a job to lift her out of the repitition housekeeping often entails. You will find that in the 21st century, a women doesn’t necessarily have to choose between a career and family. You will find that the children of homes where the mother did not work are not necessarily better off. You will find women with high-powered careers who have large families and nurse their babies (it’s not thaaaat limiting). Maybe you don’t speak to women and that’s fine. But then stop speaking about them as if you know anything on the matter.
The comtemporary women is a train wreck? Care to explain what that means? Do you know any “comtemporary women”?
I’m not sure why I am wasting my time on this, after all, you ARE Jospeh. But I encourage you to critically analyze the things you read (not sure if your hashkafa allows for that but whatever) and see if they match with reality.
I retract. Girl not talking on the dates is not a red flag. It is a MAJOR red flag, IMO.
On three of the four dates the girl said nothing? Red flag.
This is not usual shyness. Effectively, he went on one date with her. And then got engaged.
I would be very concerned about the personality of someone who doesn’t speak on the first three dates. Is she perhaps selectively mute?
Also, it’s great that the parents get along, but that’s like 10% of the shidduch, and that’s being generous. What about the other 90%? Shared goals, attraction, liking the other’s peronality, communication, ability to navigate disagreements…?
It seems like he doesn’t know much about her at all. Why get engaged like that?
“Kol kevudah bas melech penima”
Pshat – it is saying that the glory/worth of a woman is in her internal characteristics, not her external beauty. Meaning, don’t get too caught up with a woman’s externals, it’s within her character that her essence is. It’s the same for men, but generally, externals count more in how women are viewed.
Why does the most simple explanation escape people?
Ummmm… A jew who cares…have you not noticed the financial crisis that is happening now in Israel, mainly in the sector where men learn in kollel? They are NOT managing.
Enough of these miracle-promises. People need to choose their lifestlye based on facts and reality.
FFBBT613 – What does your husband plan on doing after a few years of learning in kollel?
I agree that parents should have minimal shaychus in a shidduch. And yes, I agree with oomis that the current shidduch system infantalizes young men and women who are presumably ready to get married.
As for external apprearances, I know many beautiful, thin girls who cannot get dates because boys’ mothers asphyxiate their own sons by “deciding” what their sons need.
Young men – take control of your life and handle your own shidduchim.
Also, it wouldn’t hurt for everyone to understand that shidduchim works in our world in a way that’s analogous to how it works in the secular world. Think, “mate value”, attraction, etc… This is just a reality. So in the secular world a young man with a high-paying job has a high mate value and in the frum world a serious learner has a high mate value. So it’s different things that contribute to mate value, but the concept is the same.
It’s important to understand this so that you don’t fall into the trap of thinking that “frum people are above this”.
And as for attraction – the COUPLE needs to find eachother attractive. What the boys mother thinks is irrelevant.
“The emergence of women taking on men’s roles en masse is a very new and somewhat isolated phenomenon. It is of no coincidence that the push to have women take on men’s roles in our Orthodox Jewish culture happened at the exact particular time and place in history as the former. Our culture is particularly porous to out environment these days, and this is an obvious side effect.”
Why do you think this is a bad thing? You speak about this as if it is some sort of poison. Any new situation that emerges that isn’t spelled out black and white somewhere in the gemara or what not presents such a monstrous threat to hashkafa… and the gut reaction is to fight without even thinking about what you’re fighting.
“Curiosity: That picture looks awfully like it was taken in Eretz Mitzrayim, circa our slave age.”
Except that women today are happy to have more opportunity and contribute to society at large. Don’t make us out to be “nebach”s.
Just keep in mind that there are many couples out there who do not have good shalom bayis that are married to each other, and you wouldn’t necessarily know about it. How is that any better than someone who has divorced parents?
Not that you shouldn’t weigh divorced parents, but bear in mind that just because the parents are married – doesn’t mean they’re happily married.
I always wanted to be a doctor. But that’s not a profession for a frum girl, especially a really shtark one. Everyone told me instead to do PT, OT, ST, and of course – PA. They said PA would be perfect! Less school, you do the same things as a dcotor, and you have more time for family – my imaginary family because I wasn’t even married at the time. But l’chalchila, it would be best would be if I didn’t even go to college. Going to college would taint my neshama in certain ways, and my children just won’t be the same. And maybe I wouldn’t get as good of a zivug because my ruchniyus would definitely take a blow – even – of I didn’t see it.
How vulnerable we are in our youth. Not that there is anything wrong with any of the professions above, but if you davka want to be a doctor, those won’t cut it.
Well, be”h, I will be starting medical school this August.
“On many issues it is a posek or rav that needs to make the decision. This is an issue of aseh lecho rav and should be decided on with his rav.”
No Lior, he needs to make the decision on his own. On a matter like this, rabbonim are for consulting, not for telling you what to do.
Reb Dovid is looking for a rav to tell him what to do and I’m poiting out that HE needs to make the decision.
Reb Dovid,
If all else is well between the two of you and this is the only real issue, I wouldn’t think it’s wise to drop the shidduch because of it.
It depends on what kind of rav you want him to be, but if he’s involved with her, she needs to be comfortable with him. I doubt she’ll care if he is only paskening shailos about kashrus and the like, but if it’s anything more personal or hashkafic, SHE needs to feel comfortable with him.
I actually think she handled it pretty well. She is not telling you that YOU have to in any way limit your sheichus to him. She is telling you that she is not comfortable having him as her mentor.
For the record, don’t rely on anyone to make the decision for you. Not this rav. Not any other Rav. Make sure you have the spine to make your own decisions.
not that I personally mind this discussion, but for those who are “super-senstitive” to tznius, this is exactly what I meant about these discussion not being tzanua… as Sam2 tries to evade what exactly what that form of “clothing” is referring to
I think that nitpicking on what “exaaaaactly” is and is not tznius…. is not tznius.
“How does someone walk, talk, or act b’tznius?”
You don’t walk or talk b’tznius. Rather, you avoid walking or talking in a way that isn’t tznius.
“Lowering standards is certainly not a segulah to invoke rachmei Shamaim.”
Apparently, it invoked rachamei shamayim for me. Happily married to a wonderful person.
Baskah, listen to peeople like me, who have tried it with success. You won’t go off the derech. Nothing will happen. It’s not any less tznius than going on a date. You don’t need the stamp of a shadchan to make the ecnounter kosher.
logician,
“if I have a stimulating Torah thought, my wife will often be the wrong person for me to turn to for sharing”
That’s ok. When my husband has a torah chiddush I’m the first person he turns to. And vice versa as well. You can think it’s odd. And my husband has some impressive credentials i will not list here.
As per the ramabam, he was portraying a sitation that existed in his days; duh…most women were not capable of learning for whatever reasons, such as, lack of education for women in general, tremendous amount of time needed to be spent on homemaking (not necessarily child-rearing, as in those times raising children was not considered a full-time endeavor)
But today things are DIFFERENT. I’d say that the amount of women who are capable of learning is not a minority anymore.
The rambam’s words are not absolute. Listen to his tone… he is saying that we don’t teach women BECAUSE their minds are not up it. NOT because it’s some absolute principle that needs to be adhered to.
Ben Levi,
By career, I mean a creative endeaor OTHER than the home and raising children. For me to be pre-occupied with running a home, and my husband agrees, is a waste of time. And by the way, I do a fantastic job at it. We are hoping, when the family gets larger, to have full-time help that takes care of as much of the household tasks as possible, so that I have more time to focus on my career which we think is more important than washing dishes. For me, running a home is like what cleaning a room is for a teenager. It needs to be done so you have the peace of mind that you are in a clean, organized environment. Period. There is nothing so holy about it. I am not the cohen gadol in the beis hamikdoes. And in no way is it something to be glorified as an occupation.
As per raising children, that’s different than household chores. But still, raising children is something we do as part of being wholesome human beings. But it’s an equal endeavor between a man and woman. If I end up spending more time with the children for whatever reasons, its for practical reasons that I can do something better. Not because in theory we believe that women should be involved in child-rearing the majority of the time.
People may find themselves being a full-time homemaker and parent at points in their life, but I don’t see that as an ideal to strive for.
did i understand correctly?
yiddishe taam:
“I believe if you look you will find one that will suit you.” Oh definitely. But that may require venturing out of certian zones.
I find it odd that anyone sees intellectual advancement of any group as detrimental.
DY, basically, you are saying: “Well yeah, we needed to teach girls horaas shaa or what not, but now we need to deal with the negative consequences… in an ideal world, a woman wouldn’t WANT or feel the NEED to learn or aadvance herself in ways out of the home.”
logician,
“I do think its absurd to encourage women to develop intellectually for 18 years, and then to think they’ll be ok to just shut off and be satisfied with diaper-changing.”
This should not be absurd if it’s in their true nature to find fulfillment in these types of tasks.
If the thing is really a fish, it’ll like the water.
“We have opportunities to learn all the time every hour of the day there are shiurim, learning groups, every shul has a ladies Shabbos shiur. So no one can say we can’t learn or we should turn our brains off.”
“Yiddishe taam”
Many of these shiurim, at least in my opinion, don’t count for much learning. They are inspirational talks meant to give you an emotional boost about torah or review of halachah that you can pick up on your own by reading a artscroll book. I’m glad you find them intellectually stimulating, but not everyone does.
“What was conflicting in the other thread was simple priorities were distorted (a women’s priority is her home) and that’s problematic and no Rav would endorse it.”
I did say that family and career, in my opinion, are equally important, not that one is more important than the other. Just wanted to clarify.
Furthermore, you do not know what every rav would say about people’s personal situations.
And by the way, you don’t need to be scared to refer to me. I am not insulted in the slightest.
“You can probably understand what is meant by finding a thread where an OP who is female ignores all enlightening, true responses to a misguided query, and insists on following her own faulty logic.”
Hmmmm… i wonder who you refering to.
not sure why that went through
“Rabbi Orlofsky and others I’ve heard as well have said that a woman needs to learn torah and mussar just to survive and not be drowned by tumah “in the air” nowadays “
dveykus, can u explain what he means by ‘tumah in the air nowadays’ and which type of torah-learning can serve as an antidote to this?
ubiqiotin,
I don’t know about you, but once learn a topic well, five years later, I may not remember every detail, but I it’s not the same as never having learned it before.
your attitude is reminiscent of an attitude I used to have, one that’s quite common of “yeah, I’ll be able to pick up all the stuff I need as I go along…jewish ppl are smart…”
Were these admissions officers doctors?
Whatever. I’m not arguing that you need every detail in the prerequsiite subjects in med school. I AM arguing that you need the prerequisites because you need a solid understanding of the sciences before you venture into modern medicine which is built on the sciences. You need a frame into which you can place all you learn in medical school. You need that foundation because you will need to make decisions based not just on random facts, but based on an understanding of how things relate to eachother.
Like learning the theory behind an equation, not just memorizing the equation and plugging in numbers. Goodness. Please don’t become a doctor with this attitude.
ubiquitin,
are you serious???
how would one understand how antibiotics work without knowing molecular biology?
how would one know anything in orthopedics without understanding torque, young’s modulus, and newton’s three laws…?
how would one know anything about an MRI without understanding how moving charged particles interact with a magnetic field?
how would one know anything about radioactive tracing without understanding half-lives and radioactivity?
how would one know anything about opthamology without an understanding of optics (physics)?
how drugs work without knowing basic organic chemistry?
neurology and nervous system without knowing general chemistry? (think polarization, depalarization)
respiration (aerobic and anaerobic) without knowing general chemistry?
The am haratzus of some frum people regarding general/secular knowledge is best embarrassing and at worst absolutely pitiful.
FFG, I find it insane that we even need to justify ourselves.
health, are you a medical doctor?