I found this gem on Matzav.com some time ago…
Since when does the Torah have to support Feminism? Why is it that so many women have a hard time understanding that they have their place in society much like men have their place in society? I really don;t understand why so many people get slammed for saying it; that’s how it’s always been! Women yell until they’re blue in the face about how unfair it is that men can have a career but they can’t, to which I say, “Gadol hametzuva v’oseh m’mi she’eno metzuvah v’oseh!” It’s true that “Bzeas apecha tochal lechem” isn’t a mitzvah, but then again, it was Adam’s curse, not Chava’s.
I really don’t understand why women would want to accept upon themselves an additional klalah on top of childbirth etc. Personally I would want to minimize on klallos, as a man, seeing as I think that women got the shorter end of the stick anyway. Keep childbirth, I’m fine with work, but why deal with both?
Never heard anyone refer (in a non-biblical way) to childbirth as a curse...
And what Mitzvos Aseh Shehazman Grama? Isn’t the reason why women are patur because they don’t have time in their day because they take care of children? Would it not stand to reason that if the reason no longer applied neither should the p’tur? Obviously I’m not saying that women who work should perform those mitzvos, but logically one could come to that conclusion.
If they worked they wouldn’t have time either, chances are they will get more demanding jobs than their husbands (due to glass ceiling they may get paid less)
And how about when their kids have issues in school or socially etc because they were raised by nannies and didn’t receive the attention they need? I mean, if women were given a p’tur specifically to take care of their children, then it once again stands to reason, logically, that they would be at fault if their kid as issues due to a mother who is never around.
So you mean to tell me that women with 9 kids are able to give all of their kids the proper attention, , anyone who’s spent any time in a frum community can see right away that many of the kids are left to run amok and never really get the proper amount of attention – whatever that may be.
But why is it so unpalatable for women to have a place in society that is not identical to a man’s? The whole premise of the feminist movement is flawed in its goals because men and women ARE different. Men have a purpose and women have a purpose. each is half of a partnership in building a bayis ne’eman. the man works, and the woman cares for the children etc. In mitzrayim the roles were reversed and that was considered cruel! It’s not that one is superior and the other inferior, each has a specific role to play in a successful partnership.
It would be so simple if this were the case in the frum community, but due to the Kollel life, many women are forced to work to support their husbands daily ancient legal debates about whose ox gored whose.
I suppose the grass is always greener on the other side, but seriously, don’t you women see your husbands come home after a full day’s work exhausted, force himself to go learn, come home again, quickly eat dinner, spend some time with the kids, then collapse into bed exhausted? Why would you want that? (Of course none of this accounts for Kolel wives…that’s a whole separate issue.)
Maybe the women want some intellectual stimulation beyond that of raising children, maybe they do want to come home exhausted from a day at work – I myself love coming home exhausted because I love my job and the more exhausted I am after work – the better I feel. Maybe the men are exhausted because they live in NY have to fend through hours of stop and go traffic to get to a job they hate.
Also all this talk about intellectual stimulation and women learning and all that jazz…there is plenty for you to learn without having to go to rabbi pauline’s gemarah glass. It’s out there, go find it. But of course…only once dinner is ready 😛
There is a lot of intellectual stimulation, but when’s the last time you saw a shiur for women in anything besides hashkafa or women’s issues – in the frum community? I would love to see some shiurim for women in shulchan aruch or some sort of in depth textual learning – but instead they give them agadata and BS type of mussar on how to be a better wife by serving their husbands dinner on time.
Find out more about frum feminism on 4torah.com
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