סוגיא דפריעת הראש

Last week I read a post from blogger "Bad Rabbi" (he's listed among my links as "רב שאינו הגון". In the Oct. 14 2007 post) about the subject of covering of the hair for women, from a Judaic/halachic perspective.The background for this requirement is well known; the bible (Numbers 5) has a prescribed method to deal with a ‘woman who has gone astray’. Basically the suspected woman should be brought to the priest, and it then states “ופרע את ראש האשה”, which can be understood as “then he should unbraid her hair”, or “then he should uncover her hair”. Rabbi Solomon ben Isaac of Troyes (1040-1105) suggests that simply it is perhaps more likely to mean ‘he should unbraid’, but from a semantic perspective it can really go either way.

The Talmud (Ketuboth 72a) comments; "then he should uncover the woman’s hair"- and "if so", it states, "then we see it once was covered- if it once was covered, then it should always be covered. From here we can infer" says the Talmud, "that G-d would want a woman to have her hair always covered".

The author of the ‘Bad Rabbi’ blog had difficulty in understanding the logic of this talmudic derivation; “Let us review the logic:

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1. The hair of the woman in ‘The Sotah’ story was uncovered by the Kohen

2. If her hair was uncovered, then it must have been covered to begin with

3. If her hair was covered, then it must have been covered all the time

4. If her hair was covered all the time, then ALL women’s hair must have been covered at all times

5. Therefore all women must have their hair covered!”, to quote his understanding.

But he adds “…does it follow that just because a woman’s hair was uncovered in that act of judgment then all women’s hair must from then on be covered? Maybe the fashion of the time three thousand years ago was to keep hair covered. Does this mean that we must keep with that fashion even now? Should we wear exactly what they were wearing too? Thank goodness the story does not describe the color and the dress this woman was wearing, or else, the rabbis would have required women to wear that dress as well!A more respectable argument for covering of hair could have been made on grounds of modesty. The rabbis could have said that modesty in dress includes covering hair. Certainly those women who wear hats or otherwise cover their hair tend to be less flamboyant then those who flaunt their hair. An argument could have been made that a dignified woman should cover her hair out of modesty. Unfortunately, when asked, Rabbis always point to ‘The Sotah’ story for justification for this law, and only add the modesty issue as an afterthought.”

I pondered his argument against the logic of the Talmud on and off for a few days. Initially I thought- that his whole understanding of the halachic process was faulty; the Talmud here is not trying to prove that it is a biblical imperative for a woman to cover her hair, it cannot be suggesting that- for we know such a thing is not one of the 613 Divine Laws. Rather this form of proof in the Talmud is called an "אסמכתא" ("a leaning"). The point of bringing an asmachta is not to prove something biblically, but just to provide a verse that somewhat assists our idea. But that is not THE proof for woman’s head covering.

It is known to all reading this, that most observant Muslim women cover their hair. It would seem to us that this would be based on the Koran, or perhaps only in the Hadith. When one searches through the Koran though, to one’s surprise, he finds no such verse instructing women to cover their hair!

Why is it then that all observant Muslim women have their hair covered? From the simple understanding that the Koran felt it was understood (in that time and place, at least- I.e. seventh century Saudi Arabia) that women cover their hair. This was understood by all. The Koran does state though, that women should generally be modest. The prophet (Mica 4:8) also bequeaths man to ‘walk modestly with g-d’.

So if the argument can be made that woman should cover their hair, because she had it covered, the argument can also be made that if Moses was wearing shoes, we all should be wearing shoes. True, but who among us is not wearing shoes? It is understood.

That is what I thought at the time. But still that argument is slightly (I stress- slightly faulty) because times and norms change. There is a famous Hassidic dictum that "how do we know that Moses wore a ‘shtreimel’ (the fur hat that Hassidim wear)? For it says “ and Moses came out"!...would Moses come out without a shtriemel?!”. Rabbi Dr. Josef Breuer (1842 –1925) in his book ‘The Jewish Marriage’ brings up this problem. He writes “you might say that the practice of covering the hair does not seem to be a custom followed by Jews only; it is the common heritage of the orient, and thus it brings to mind the inferior position of woman in the east and the degradations that were associated with the harem”. After convincing the Jewish woman that this is a practice of Jews, he adds “And even if upon superficial examination there might be some truth in this argument- might it not be possible that two persons might engage in the same practice, but each for quite different reasons that the other? Does not the oriental also pray…, does not he have temples priests and prophets- and still, would you be so thoughtless as to consider identical certain phenomena and concepts which, while seemingly alike, actually represent ideas diametrically opposed to each other by virtue of the spirit in which each is performed?”

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(I personally wish to add to his words that the New Testament also testifies to the fact that women of the orient were expected to cover their hair in the time of Paul, for he writes (I Corinthians 11.5) "But every woman that prayeth or prophesieth with her head uncovered dishonoureth her head: for that is even all one as if she were shaven". this is not kept in actuality by most Christians today for the very reason that it was 'only said for that time', though there is a movement today among Evangelical Christians to bring the practice back).

Though the original problem still lingers; but then it hit me- the Bad Rabbis whole premise is off. It does not say that anyone ever uncovered anyone else’s hair. It says ‘this is what you should do in this situation’. In fact there is a wording of our prestated Talmudic derivation on this verse in the Midrash. The Midrash Sifri (ibid.) formulates “this is to teach you that a woman’s hair should be covered”, not “it was covered”, but “should be covered”! In other words the Torah is telling us “this is what you should do in this situation…then uncover her hair”, i.e. I expect her hair to be covered then.

Ah but the eyes of those who do not wish to see will always be blind! For all time, those who have discarded and mocked the commandments which we understand to be of Divine origin, did so out of ignorance and an unwillingness to learn!

עבד