Author Topic: Women wearing Phylacteries  (Read 8055 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline wonga66

  • Master JTFer
  • ******
  • Posts: 1039
Women wearing Phylacteries
« on: January 26, 2011, 06:36:05 PM »
A few exceptional women in history wore Tefillin eg Rashi's daughters, the Maid of Lublin





Is it a major or minor scandal for Orthodox Jewesses to put them on today? Or worse: is it an actually an abomination?

(I believe the women in these photos are Reform or Conservative trainee women "rabbis"!)

Offline Lisa

  • Forum Administrator
  • Silver Star JTF Member
  • *
  • Posts: 9373
    • The Urban Grind
Re: Women wearing Phylacteries
« Reply #1 on: January 26, 2011, 07:09:21 PM »
I'm against it.  Women are women and men are men.  We're not the same, and so we have different responsibilities and strengths.

Offline Kahane-Was-Right BT

  • Honorable Winged Member
  • Gold Star JTF Member
  • *
  • Posts: 12581
Re: Women wearing Phylacteries
« Reply #2 on: January 26, 2011, 09:21:55 PM »
This picture is an atrocity.   

Odds are not one of these women observes the laws of Shabbath.  And yet they put on tefillin and KIPPAS (No women wore kippas) because they want the cavod and they think it makes them "official" and "religious" looking.    It sickens me.

Offline muman613

  • Platinum JTF Member
  • **********
  • Posts: 29958
  • All souls praise Hashem, Hallelukah!
    • muman613 Torah Wisdom
Re: Women wearing Phylacteries
« Reply #3 on: January 27, 2011, 12:23:19 AM »
I too am against women wearing mens apparel.
You shall make yourself the Festival of Sukkoth for seven days, when you gather in [the produce] from your threshing floor and your vat.And you shall rejoice in your Festival-you, and your son, and your daughter, and your manservant, and your maidservant, and the Levite, and the stranger, and the orphan, and the widow, who are within your cities
Duet 16:13-14

Offline edu

  • Master JTFer
  • ******
  • Posts: 1866
Re: Women wearing Phylacteries
« Reply #4 on: January 27, 2011, 01:51:29 AM »
The Tefillin on the head of the woman in the second picture 2nd one to the left has the Tefillin too low.
Tefillin must not be lower than the hairline, that is to say the place where the roots of the hair start to grow out from the skull.
I was told that people who have become bald, should put the tefillin above that spot that once had hair roots, even though now they are gone.

I don't know what Rabbi Moshe Feinstein says about women and tefillin, because there are rabbis based on one version of the text of the gemara, who are more strict about tefillin than other commandments but at least on the tekhelet.com site at http://tekhelet.com/mois/TekWeb2002_files/frame.htm
I saw an interesting psak halacha of Rabbi Feinstein.
Quote
Women & Tzitzit:
The Mitzvah•The permission is granted to every women who wishes to fulfill even those mitzvot which the Torah did not obligate; and they indeed fulfill a mitzvah and receive the reward for the fulfillment of the commandment - and according to the custom of the Tosafot they may also say the associated blessing - for shofar, lulav.  And also tzitzit are applicable for a woman who desires to wear a four cornered garment - it should be different than a man’s garment - and by putting on it tzitzit, she fulfills this mitzvah (R. Moshe Feinstein, Iggeret Moshe, Orech Hayim 4:49, s.v. ibra d’ika).
There are others who argue against the position of Rabbi Feinstein on Tzitzit.
I also heard that Rabbi Feinstein in theory said having a minyan entirely made up women and only for the benefit of other women might be permissible. But it is also stated that this is true only if they are doing it for the sake of heaven and not for the sake of ideologies that are contrary to Judaism.
Again, even if what I heard is correct, other Rabbis have more stricter opinions and I don't take responsibility to tell anyone who is right or wrong.

Offline White Israelite

  • Ultimate JTFer
  • *******
  • Posts: 4535
Re: Women wearing Phylacteries
« Reply #5 on: January 27, 2011, 02:03:50 AM »
I'm not even going to attempt to pick apart another silly thread like this, Wonga is a troll, that's all I have to say, i'm going to sleep, goodnight.

Offline Kahane-Was-Right BT

  • Honorable Winged Member
  • Gold Star JTF Member
  • *
  • Posts: 12581
Re: Women wearing Phylacteries
« Reply #6 on: January 27, 2011, 06:21:19 AM »
The Tefillin on the head of the woman in the second picture 2nd one to the left has the Tefillin too low.
Tefillin must not be lower than the hairline, that is to say the place where the roots of the hair start to grow out from the skull.
I was told that people who have become bald, should put the tefillin above that spot that once had hair roots, even though now they are gone.

I don't know what Rabbi Moshe Feinstein says about women and tefillin, because there are rabbis based on one version of the text of the gemara, who are more strict about tefillin than other commandments but at least on the tekhelet.com site at http://tekhelet.com/mois/TekWeb2002_files/frame.htm
I saw an interesting psak halacha of Rabbi Feinstein.There are others who argue against the position of Rabbi Feinstein on Tzitzit.
I also heard that Rabbi Feinstein in theory said having a minyan entirely made up women and only for the benefit of other women might be permissible. But it is also stated that this is true only if they are doing it for the sake of heaven and not for the sake of ideologies that are contrary to Judaism.
Again, even if what I heard is correct, other Rabbis have more stricter opinions and I don't take responsibility to tell anyone who is right or wrong.

I'm quite sure that that psak of Rabbi Feinstein does NOT apply to women who do not keep the other mitzvot because in such a case it is most certainly for the sake of foreign ideologies and for cavod that they are doing it, rather than for tzidkuth.   

Online Zelhar

  • Honorable Winged Member
  • Gold Star JTF Member
  • *
  • Posts: 10689
Re: Women wearing Phylacteries
« Reply #7 on: January 27, 2011, 07:01:46 AM »
Why would anyone wear teffilin unless he/she has too, what's the point ? And the abomination is not that a woman wears it, but that she pretends that she has to wear it, which is like rewriting the Torah.

Offline Ari Ben-Canaan

  • Master JTFer
  • ******
  • Posts: 2284
  • "The Necromancers Could Not Stand Before Moses."
Re: Women wearing Phylacteries
« Reply #8 on: February 01, 2011, 03:27:32 AM »
About a month ago I was in a Conservative Shul for a "Bat Mitzvah".  Many of the women there had kippot and tallit on.  It was disturbing, and it gave me anxiety and vexation [as did the TWO women "rabbis"]. -- Thank goodness the reception afterward had an open bar!

The things I get myself into...

:P

"You must keep the arab under your boot or he will be at your throat" -Unknown

"When we tell the Arab, ‘Come, I want to help you and see to your needs,’ he doesn’t look at us like gentlemen. He sees weakness and then the wolf shows what he can do.” - Maimonides

 “I am all peace, but when I speak, they are for war.” -Psalms 120:7

"The difference between a Jewish liberal and a Jewish conservative is that when a Jewish liberal walks out of the Holocaust Museum, he feels, "This shows why we need to have more tolerance and multiculturalism." The Jewish conservative feels, "We should have killed a lot more Nazis, and sooner."" - Philip Klein