{"id":1692,"date":"2018-08-02T00:40:16","date_gmt":"2018-08-02T04:40:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/utj.org\/viewpoints\/?p=1692"},"modified":"2020-12-06T17:09:19","modified_gmt":"2020-12-06T22:09:19","slug":"partnership-prayer-and-the-essence-of-orthodoxy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/utj.org\/viewpoints\/2018\/08\/partnership-prayer-and-the-essence-of-orthodoxy\/","title":{"rendered":"Partnership Prayer and the Essence of Orthodoxy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Partnership Prayer and the Essence of Orthodoxy<\/strong><\/p>\n

By: Rabbi Alan J. Yuter<\/p>\n

Please comment on and share on this Facebook post<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Partnership prayer groups aim to maximize women\u2019s participation in communal prayer to what its community takes to be Halakhah\u2019s red lines.\u00a0 Mustering every technical legal loophole that can be found, women act as cantors for Qabbalat Shabbat, they serve as Torah readers, they receive aliyyot to the Torah, and communal prayer begins with the quorum of ten men and ten women.\u00a0 While taking their nod and example from the liberal, egalitarian movements, these semi-egalitarian communities chose to locate themselves within \u201cOrthodoxy,\u201d or Traditional Jewish law.<\/p>\n

I. The Hardline Mainstream Opposition to Partnership prayer<\/strong><\/p>\n

At http:\/\/torahmusings.com\/2013\/01\/partnership-minyanim\/<\/a> (full article at https:\/\/www.torahmusings.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/partnership-minyanim.pdf<\/a>), Rabbi Barry Freundel, an unusually energetic, urbane, and learned modern Orthodox rabbi before he fell from grace in scandal, strongly opposed Partnership prayer. The positions he held never deviated from the mainstream modern institutional Orthodox ritual consensus, but he positioned himself as an enlightened spokesman for that consensus.<\/p>\n

Women have been forbidden in Ashkenazi Orthodoxy, which R. Freundel takes to be a religiously binding category called \u201cTradition,\u201d to participate in many public rituals, like slaughtering animals. In popular practice, this social \u201cTradition\u201d is allowed to override the Oral Torah canonical Tradition, which explicitly permits women to slaughter animals [mHullin 1:1].\u00a0 Jewish law requires that important women recline at the seder<\/em>, but by usage this rite is barely tolerated by R. Isserles [OH 472:4]. Based upon a reform of Rabi\u2019a<\/em>, a leading Tosafist decisor who believes that post-Talmudic usage is<\/em> authorized to override Talmudic norms, and anticipating the legal \u201cmethod\u201d of Conservative Judaism, R. Isserles argues that since we do not usually recline when we eat in Western culture, women\u2014but, curiously, not men\u2014are exempt from the requirement to recline at the seder<\/em>.<\/p>\n

However, one would think that Rabi\u2019a is<\/em> not empowered to override rabbinic rules any more than are contemporary rabbis. If no one need recline at the seder<\/em>, then this ruling would apply equally to women.\u00a0 Note well that this \u201cTradition,\u201d i.e. Rabi\u2019a<\/em>\u2019s reform, is invoked to limit women\u2019s ritual activity.<\/p>\n

By not requiring<\/em> women to perform the invitation to say the after-meal blessing, and by forbidding a women’s reading of the Scroll of Esther, some within the Orthodox community, in the name of social<\/em> \u201cTradition,\u201d ignore the Halakhic<\/em> Tradition.\u00a0 It is one matter to forbid women to observe what is permissible; it is quite another to invent a Talmudically unattested\u2014and therefore illegitimate\u2014blessing, \u201con hearing\u201d rather than \u201con reading\u201d the Esther Scroll. By being \u201caccepted\u201d by the community of the committed, these reforms become Street Culture Orthodoxy. While R. Freundel\u2019s claims<\/em> are referenced as if they are Halakhah<\/em>, the attentive reader realizes that for Freundel, Street Culture Orthodoxy carries the valence of a canonical culture.\u00a0 Violating this iteration of \u201cTradition\u201d threatens, at least for its adherents, Orthodox Judaism\u2019s living, sacred essence.\u00a0 Ironically, what is presented as official religion Orthodox doctrine, when unpackaged, is in reality a patriarchal culture that adopted a Reconstructionist mindset; God\u2019s will is revealed in the communal Orthodox consensus, but not in a plain sense understanding of the Oral Torah canon.<\/p>\n

Since this Orthodox Street Culture is called \u201ctradition,\u201d it is reified by association into virtual canonicity and is not subject to review. Accordingly, we are reminded that \u201cthe custom of Israel is Torah\u201d in Medieval Ashkenaz. But according to official religion Orthodoxy, Torah is \u201cthe word of the Lord\u201d [Isaiah 2:3], not the conventions of culture. As a consequence, commandment benedictions may not be recited before the performance of any act that has not reached the legal threshold of formal Torah or Rabbinic commandment, indicating that authentic Orthodox Judaism is based upon public rules and not private social or elite religion tastes, policies, or intuitions.<\/p>\n

To R. Freundel\u2019s view:<\/p>\n

\u201cThe first point [in opposition to women leading the Kabbalat Shabbat prayers] is that the Hazan or prayer leader at a communal service helps fulfill the prayer obligation of the tsibur or community. Women have no obligation to be involved in tefillah be-tsibur (communal prayer). They, therefore, do not count towards a minyan for a required service such as Maariv. So too, they cannot lead a communal service because they cannot fulfill the obligation for men, who are required to pray communally.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

[Freundel\u2019s transliterations]<\/p>\n

Actually, the Partnership prayer groups could have pushed further and assumed an even more radical position. In Ashkenazi Orthodoxy, clapping and dancing are permitted on sacred days even though the Talmud explicitly forbids those acts on the Sabbath and Festival days. [bBetsa<\/em> 30a] Because times have changed and we are no longer expert in adjusting, fixing, or tuning musical instruments, the clapping and dancing restriction may, to this view, lapse into disuse. [Tosafot<\/em> ad. loc.<\/em> And Rabi\u2019a<\/em>, supra.<\/em>] If, as argued by medieval French rabbis, the law is allowed to \u201cchange\u201d with the times, since we now have printed prayer books and the cantor paces but does not pray in place of the congregant, the concern for a female cantor might even be addressed and overcome.\u00a0 The Partnership prayer groups want to stay within Orthodoxy\u2019s orbit and have avoided the tendentious casuistry typical of Conservative Judaism\u2019s ideological responsa by permitting women to lead only non-obligatory sections of prayer.<\/p>\n

Freundel continues:<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the major objections to a woman serving as a prayer leader is that kevod ha-tsibur (the respect of the community, or the respect due to the community or the respect that the community is required to give to G-d) will be violated. In response, adherents of partnership services argue that kevod ha-tsibur[sic.], either does not apply today or that it can be vitiated by the congregation foregoing or forgiving its honor.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That a congregation may waive its honor is confirmed when communities waive their honor when delaying repeating the standing prayer until the Rabbi completes his private prayers.\u00a0 The advancing of this communal honor claim reveals that there are unarticulated social <\/em>considerations at work, [a] that women\u2019s public role in prayer does not \u201clook\u201d Orthodox and, [b] in his apologia <\/em>outlawing Partnership prayer, R. Freundel would have cited Halakhic<\/em> statute when opposing these changes, and [c] Street Culture tradition is presented as if it were the canonical Tradition incarnate.\u00a0 In practice, the congregation has the right to waive its honor.<\/p>\n

Respect for human dignity carries sufficient warrant to override a particular negative Torah law [bBerachot<\/em> 19a and elsewhere], at least according to the Orthodoxy of the Oral Torah. The particular Torah law being addressed is lo tasur,<\/em> Deut. 17:11, which locates Oral Torah authority in Written Torah text.\u00a0 For the text based\u2014as opposed to Street Culture biased\u2014Orthodox Judaism, this is a real, authentic, Oral Torah norm.\u00a0 When a person is ill, the prohibition of Shabbat medication is waived. And when a person\u2019s dignity is diminished, then God\u2019s law supersedes the applicable rabbinic prohibition. This particular nomos<\/em>, or law, is encoded in Torah narrative<\/em>.\u00a0 Genesis 18:1-2 passes Abraham on the morality test when he leaves God waiting in order to attend to what he mistook to be three wandering mortals.\u00a0 The Judaism encoded in the canon endows human dignity with considerable normative valence.<\/p>\n

R. Freundel limits the personal dignity application issue to Orthodoxy\u2019s elite rabbinic consensus. This tactic reflects the hermeneutic strategy of an Orthodox elite that opposes changes in usage as if they are reforms of Jewish Law. But Jewish Law does not impose such a consensus upon rabbis who disagree. R. Freundel is uncomfortable with his Torah, because consensus conformity is, to his version of Orthodoxy, more essential than conforming to Torah\u2019s norms. In those community settings where there is no egalitarian pressure, Partnership prayer would indeed be inappropriate.\u00a0 Similarly, for those for whom personal dignity regarding their exclusion from communal prayer is an issue, Halakhah<\/em> would take, in their situation, the personal dignity disposition into account. A woman may properly refuse to give her paycheck to her husband, saying \u201cyou do not have to support me, and you should not expect me to service your person\u201d [bKetubbot 58b<\/em> and 70b].\u00a0 Jewish gender roles are therefore consensual: they express conventional, communal, expectations but are not mandated by Halakhic <\/em>statute.<\/p>\n

Freundel is concerned with the ubiquitous application of this human dignity rule because he fears the slippery slope. After all, a person might claim a loss of human dignity to avoid observing a rabbinic law. But this particular rule regarding human dignity applies to pill taking on the Sabbath as well. A person has the right to say that she or he is in pain. [mYoma 8:5-6]<\/p>\n

Freundel then writes that \u201cDaniel Sperber also wrote \u2026 that women could get aliyot. He makes direct and repeated use of kevod habriyot as a rationale for this practice in this article.\u201d Freundel argues that the slippery slope is real, that the passage was cited by Conservative rabbis, and he denies Rav Sperber, who for many, including me, is modern Orthodoxy\u2019s most learned authority, his rightful rabbinic title. I suspect that Freundel would have been a tad more respectful were he referencing the Lubavitcher Rebbe, R. Moshe Feinstein, or R. Soloveitchik. This slight is actually a very egregious violation. [bShabbat <\/em>119b and bSanhedrin <\/em>99b] One has a right to raise issues with R. Sperber\u2019s view, as I will below. But one must always do so with the requisite respect.<\/p>\n

Freundel has a right to contend that this technically not forbidden rite\u2014he has after all failed to cite a restricting norm\u2014is unwise, inopportune, or communally disruptive. I find it fascinating that R. Freundel is more collegial with the Orthodox feminists with whom he disagrees but is able to refute than he is with R. Sperber, in whose league he is not. When unable to argue with its opposition, Street Culture Orthodoxy in general, and R. Freundel in particular deride, defame, and dismiss, but do not address.\u00a0 The claim that Qabbalat Shabbat, once formalized as a regular part of the liturgy, assumes all of the restrictions of public prayer, is dubious indeed.<\/em> Were this rule really in force, pre-bar mitsvah boys would not be permitted to lead Qabbalat Shabbat prayers. The inventing of legal concepts and assigning normative valence to them is<\/em> the prerogative of the Bet Din ha-Gadol<\/em>, the great or Supreme Court, not the Adam Gadol<\/em>, the individual Great Rabbi. Since the authentic, canonical Tradition does not provide a norm that restricts women leading Kabbalat Shabbat<\/em> prayers\u2014at least that I could find\u2014it would be improper to regard the practice as non-Orthodox.<\/p>\n

I concur with R. Freundel\u2019s finding that \u201cthe Posek [legal decisor] has to be sensitive to the potential impact of his decision in the community, and frankly this development [the Conservative movement\u2019s use of R. Sperber\u2019s analysis of kevod habriyot<\/em> to support a lenient stance toward homosexuality] was, to my mind easily foreseeable.\u201d This argument provides a good reason to disallow partnership prayer in most communal Orthodox liturgical contexts; it is however a bad reason to restrict the practice in every<\/em> possible context.\u00a0 If we are permitted to suspend the Law and dance and clap on the Sabbath, we may permit, at least in theory, what in principle is not forbidden.\u00a0 My challenge to R. Sperber is that the Torah law that is waived when human dignity is compromised is lo tasur<\/em>, that Israel must treat canonical <\/em>Rabbinic authority with the gravity of Torah law. This principle would not apply to male homosexual acts, which are forbidden by an explicit Written Torah norm [Lev. 18:22], and lo tasur<\/em> would not apply.<\/p>\n

Failing to understand the penumbra, the legitimate field in which the human dignity principle applies, R. Freundel continues, \u201cI see no obvious reason to argue that a Rabbi should not officiate at an intermarriage. After all a restrictive approach is demeaning and causes pain both to the Jew in love and to her Gentile partner who is also God\u2019s creation. Since officiating at such a wedding is only rabbinically prohibited, kevod habriyot<\/em> should win out here as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

R. Freundel argues that in order to permit Partnership prayer, \u201cone would also need to claim that Kabbalat Shabbat is only tefillat rabim and not tefillah betsibbur; that teffilat rabim is an extension of tefillah beyihidut and not a minor form of tefillah betsibbur; that women count as part of rabim and that unlike the similar structure of zimun women can lead in a mixed setting here even though their basic hiyuv is different than that of a man. Given the overwhelming weight of our sources that oppose every one of those steps, it would appear that no legitimate halakhic conclusion can take the lenient position on this fundamental question central to the reality of Partnership Minyanim.\u201d<\/p>\n

This rhetorical exercise illustrates how unorthodox Orthodoxy has become.\u00a0 Freundel\u2019s transliterations of his Hebrew\/Aramaic citations reveal either an apathy toward or an ignorance of Semitic linguistics, which in medieval Judaism was called, not without irony, Masorah<\/em>, or \u201cTradition.\u201d Although Street Culture Orthodoxy presents itself as divine law, it is actually a folk religion of nostalgia and not a commitment to a Jewish Law worthy of the name. In response to R.\u00a0 Freundel\u2019s claims, we offer the following observations.<\/p>\n