Time-triggered positive commandments as conversation pieces
Mishnah Qiddushin 1:7 exempts women from time-triggered positive commandments, ritual obligations that devolve upon a Jew at certain given times and not others. These include recitation of the shemaʿ, tefillin, shofar, lulav, sukkah, ṣiṣit, and according to some, the paschal sacrifice. Although the...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Print Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
College
2007
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| In: |
Hebrew Union College annual / Jewish Institute of Religion
Year: 2007, Volume: 78, Pages: 45-90 |
| RelBib Classification: | BH Judaism HB Old Testament |
| Further subjects: | B
Rabbinic Judaism
B Mishnah B Halacha B Legislation Theology B Woman B Torah |
| Parallel Edition: | Electronic
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| Summary: | Mishnah Qiddushin 1:7 exempts women from time-triggered positive commandments, ritual obligations that devolve upon a Jew at certain given times and not others. These include recitation of the shemaʿ, tefillin, shofar, lulav, sukkah, ṣiṣit, and according to some, the paschal sacrifice. Although the Talmud offers no explicit rationale for this exemption, a number of explanations have been suggested from the Middle Ages onward. Some have argued that women are exempt from these commandments because they are likely to interfere with household duties; according to others the exemption of women is a sign of their social inferiority; still others have suggested that certain spiritual or physical qualities of women can account for this exemption. This essay will demonstrate that these explanations are not really relevant to the category and its constituent miṣvot. The original reason for the exemption, alluded to in halakhic midrashim, is that women are exempt from Torah study, and the sole purpose of these symbolic rituals is to serve as "conversation pieces"—representations of abstractions that engender discussion. It is this discussion that is deemed Torah study. Since women are not obligated to study Torah, they need not perform these rituals whose purpose is to trigger Torah study. |
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| ISSN: | 0360-9049 |
| Contains: | In: Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, Hebrew Union College annual / Jewish Institute of Religion
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