35
votes
Does Judaism consider women inferior?
This is a fair question. You are far from the only person who feels this way.
As an Orthodox woman who respects the traditional prohibition on Talmud study for women, as well as the many other Jewish ...
- 19.6k
32
votes
Does Judaism consider women inferior?
In addition, women are exempt and even discouraged from a large number of mitzvas that are central to Jewish practice, such as praying three times a day and laying tefillin.
This is close to ...
- 97.3k
17
votes
May a man marry the women with whom he committed adultery?
No. See Mishnah Sotah, 5:1:
כְּשֵׁם שֶׁאֲסוּרָה לַבַּעַל, כָּךְ אֲסוּרָה לַבּוֹעֵל, שֶׁנֶּאֱמַר (שם) נִטְמְאָה, וְנִטְמָאָה, דִּבְרֵי רַבִּי עֲקִיבָא. אָמַר רַבִּי יְהוֹשֻׁעַ, כָּךְ הָיָה דוֹרֵשׁ ...
- 34.1k
16
votes
Accepted
Ship of Theseus in Halacha
This is known in Talmudic literature as panim chadashot ba'u lekan (lit. "a new face has come here"), and is the topic of discussion in Eruvin 24a.
The upshot of the discussion is that, at ...
- 41.8k
14
votes
When, halachically, does a sect of Judaism become an independent religion?
Rav Aharon Lichtenstein zt"l wrote an essay / teshuvah titled "Brother Daniel and the Jewish Fraternity" (Judaism 12:260-280, Summer 1963). Brother Daniel was a Catholic monk who ...
- 9,388
13
votes
Accepted
How could Rav be disproved?
I thought to answer as follows:
When the Gemara answers that Rav is a tanna, that is when the question is on Rav alone. In this case the question is on a joint statement of Rav and Shmuel. (Whether ...
- 49.1k
13
votes
Source why ביאה is not an option for שליח קידושין
R' Elchonon Wasserman in Kovetz Shiurim (Kesuvos 74a) brings this question from R' Akiva Eiger, and explains how the Kiddushin of Biah is fundamentally different from Kessef and Shtar, and why that ...
- 7,891
13
votes
Why were Er and Onan punished if they were under 20?
This exact question was asked by the Tosafist R. Yehuda Ben Elazar in his commentary to Genesis 38:10:
וא"ת למה נענשו ער ואונן והלא לא היו אלא בני ח' שנה כדאי' בסדר עולם ואמרי' בית דין של מעלה ...
- 49.1k
13
votes
Accepted
Rabbi Shlomo Goren and the Langer Case
R. Goren wrote a 200 page book explaining his position (linked in Joel K's answer). If you're looking for something shorter and easier, R. J. David Bleich discussed this topic in the first volume of ...
- 49.1k
12
votes
Accepted
Why do we don a tallit before laying tefillin?
This is a good question, and really it's probably a better question than the answers out there.
For context, we have to realize that this question (order of operations for donning Tzitzit and ...
- 97.3k
12
votes
Accepted
Is "tzaar ba'alei chaim" from the Torah, and if so what's the source?
The question of whether tza'ar ba'alei chaim (the prohibition of causing undue pain to animals) is biblical (mideoraita) or rabbinic (miderabbanan) is the subject of significant debate in Bava Metzia ...
- 41.8k
12
votes
Is the first of the 10 Commandments considered a mitzvah?
Rambam in Yesodei HaTorah ch. 1 explicitly uses this as the source for the commandment to know of Hashem’s existence.
יְסוֹד הַיְסוֹדוֹת וְעַמּוּד הַחָכְמוֹת לֵידַע שֶׁיֵּשׁ שָׁם מָצוּי רִאשׁוֹן. ...
- 34.1k
11
votes
Accepted
Can online smicha programs theoretically be valid?
Define "theoretically valid". They do leave someone with the book-knowledge we demand of rabbis, and therefore someone with online semichah should not feel like a charlatan if he expects people to ...
- 9,388
11
votes
Accepted
Is making someone believe you came to see him, while you were really there anyway, allowed?
This seems practically identical to a problem posed in Chullin 94b:
Mar Zutra the son of Rabbi Nahman was once going from Sikara to
Mahuza, while Raba and Rabbi Safra were going to Sikara; and ...
- 1,936
10
votes
Why did God need to command the Jews not to kill?
A Medrash states that G-d offered the Torah to the children of Eisau. They rejected it, saying they could not accept this very commandment against murder. This begs the question: Eisau's descendants ...
- 5,310
10
votes
Accepted
What is the difference between a takana and a gezera?
The following taxonomy of kinds of halachic ruling was culled from the Rambam, Hilkhos Mamrim ch. 2, and includes thoughts learned at a shi’ur given by R’ Yonasan Sachs (who was then of RIETS, now of ...
- 9,388
10
votes
Who is the Ba'al Nefesh of the Mishnah Berurah?
R. Herschel Schachter quotes an informative anecdote (in this essay):
Rabbi Yehuda Amital (shlit”a) relates that when he was a teenager learning in yeshiva, when the students learned Mishna Berura ...
- 11.9k
10
votes
Accepted
What happens to the debts after Shmitat Ksafim?
Summary
The answers to both of your questions (1. Does shemitat kesafim annul the loan, or merely forbid the lender from claiming? and 2. Does shemitat kesafim happen automatically?) would appear to ...
- 41.8k
10
votes
Accepted
Maggid Mishnah on relying on approximations for π and √2
The Maggid Mishnah in Hilchos Shabbos (17:26) says that one may rely on π=3
It actually is commenting on the Rambam's statement that a circle of circumference three has diameter one. It says that ...
- 73.7k
9
votes
Why was a bat kol able to settle the dispute between Battei Hillel and Shammai?
The Encyclopedia Talmudit entry on “Bas Qol”, the paragraph about its impact on halachah focuses on the apparent conflict between the conclusion one would get from the Tanur Akhnai story and from the ...
- 9,388
9
votes
Where are there discussions about Torah commands that nobody is known to have broken?
There are 3 mitzvot in the Talmud-Gemara Sanhedrin 71a, 1 in Makkos 7a and 1 in Mishna Zavim 2,2 in which the required procedure of punishment have never been enacted by the sanhedrin, due to lack of ...
- 11.4k
9
votes
Rabbinic Opinions on Smoking, before the 1950's
Both the Pnei Yehoshua (Shab. 39b s.v. בא״ד ואמר-אמנם) and R. Yaakov Emden (Mor U'ketzia §511) were clearly under the contemporary impression that smoking was not harmful, rather it carried multiple ...
- 11.9k
9
votes
Accepted
If a Mesorah for letter pronunciation is rediscovered, would we have to change our pronunciations?
כִּי-אָז אֶהְפֹּךְ אֶל-עַמִּים, שָׂפָה בְרוּרָה, לִקְרֹא כֻלָּם בְּשֵׁם יְהוָה, לְעָבְדוֹ שְׁכֶם אֶחָד. (צפניה ג:ט)
For then will I turn to the peoples a pure language, that they may all call ...
- 97.3k
9
votes
Do Rabbis admit emotional involvement in their rulings?
There are plenty of instances in which poskim relate their personal feelings in a psak. The first that came to my mind is R. Ovadia's famous ruling (Yabia Omer vol. 6, Even Ha-Ezer #3) that widows of ...
- 11.3k
9
votes
If an AI is programmed to be a Rabbi learn all that is required for a Semikhah or to be Jewish, if it makes a blessing does it count?
I think that there are a few points worth clarifying here.
The Torah was given to humans, not machines. Even if a machine were somehow to attain consciousness (if that is even possible) and "...
- 2,138
8
votes
Accepted
What is the basis that allows Rabbis to create laws?
Sources For Rabbinic Authority
There are several divergent approaches to this.
Rambam (Introduction to MT: 26) is of the opinion that Rabbinic legislation falls under the rubric of "Do not stray ...
- 35.4k
8
votes
Why did God need to command the Jews not to kill?
If not for the prohibition, murder would carry no defined penalty in civil courts. The Torah prohibition makes murder always a capital crime. Same with stealing - if there was no explicit mitzvah, ...
- 5,310
8
votes
Hiddur Mitzvah for a la'av - does it exist?
First, a parallel to the idea behind the question: The Maharal in Gur Aryeh writes that the Avot fulfilled only positive mitzvot but not negative ones because there is no value in refraining from ...
- 14.3k
8
votes
Not to paaken from the aruch hashulchan
The implication of his introduction is the opposite. He says (or rather approvingly quotes opinions that) you can't pasken from the Shulchan Aruch because of its brevity, and you first have to learn ...
- 31.8k
8
votes
Accepted
Regurgitating Living Forbidden Species
At the end of perek Gid Hanashe (103 IIRC) in Chullin, the gemara cites a question concerning what is considered eating. Do we say its the benefit of the throat or the digestion of the stomach? The ...
- 41k
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