Women and the Study of Torah: A Responsum by Rabbi Zalman Sorotzkin of Jerusalem

WOMEN AND THE STUDY OF TORAH: A RESPONSUM BY RABBI ZALMAN SOROTZKIN OF JERUSALEM David Ellenson and Elissa Ben-Nairn Introductory Considerations Patriarchal cultures have regularly assigned separate spheres of influence to men and women. In general, such cultures have reserved the public arena for men and designated the domestic realm as the proper area for the activity of women. Jewish civilization, as Susan Grossman and Rivka Haut have pointed out, has been no exception to this pattern. Indeed, Grossman and Haut have shown how the biblical phrase KoI kevudah bat melekh penimah (Ps. 45:14), understood as meaning, "The king's daughter is all glorious within," has been employed in rabbinic literature to justify the position that the legitimate venue for women's activity is the home. As Grossman and Haut put it, "This verse has been cited as proof that ... women have divinely ordained roles that preclude any public activity."1 Study of course is a different matter than public office or public roles. However, as a result of this role-assignation for men and women, the realm of Torah study within traditional Judaism has throughout history remained the near-exclusive province of men. Undoubtedly, students of gender would state that this is so precisely because the implications such study possesses for the exercise of public positions of power and authority are considerable. In classical Jewish religious civilization, one unlettered in the law could hardly hope to exercise control in communal affairs. Indeed, the source of Jewish religious authority has traditionally been grounded in a mastery of classical Jewish legal texts. Assignment of women to the domestic sphere has therefore naturally placed a concomitant limitation on the access granted women to the study of traditional Jewish legal-literary texts, for allowing women such access would have facilitated expression of a female public voice. Nashim:A Journal ofJewish Women's Studies and GenderIssues, no. 4. © 2001119 David Ellenson and Elissa Ben-Naim In light of these gender-role considerations, it is hardly a surprise that the ideal position allotted women in the field of Torah study has not been that of active participants in the educational process, but rather that of domestic facilitators for husbands and sons. The following passage from the Babylonian Talmud, Berakhot 17a, justifies and reflects these notions and attitudes regarding gender roles and status: Whereby do women earn merit? By making their sons go to synagogue to learn Scripture and their husbands to the House of Study to learn Mishnah, and waiting for their husbands until they return from the House of Study. Consequently, the statement of Ben Azzai in BT Sotah 20a, "A man is obligated to teach his daughter Torah," was not cited in traditional Jewish society as providing a warrant for establishing schools for the Jewish education of girls. Rather, the attitude expressed by Rabbi Eliezer on the following page (Sotah 21b) - "Anyone who teaches his daughter Torah, it is as if he taught her tiflut (licentiousness)" - was more often quoted as a compelling rationale for denying women access to Torah study.2 Despite this, there have been women of great Jewish learning possessed of religious authority throughout Jewish history.3 Furthermore, as the notion of gender equality has spread throughout the modern world, the opportunity as well as the necessity for women to participate actively in the realm of advanced text study has grown considerably even in traditional Jewish circles. Historians such as Paula Hyman and Deborah Weissman have provided ample documentation of and explanation for this phenomenon, and today unprecedented numbers of women are involved in serious Jewish textual study.4 A number ofJewish legal authorities have applauded these developments. Others have opposed them.5 In this essay, we present a responsum by Rabbi Zalman Sorotzkin (1881-1966) on the question of women and the study of Torah which reflects how and why the classical attitudes of rabbinic civilization were challenged, and arguably altered, as a result of the Jewish encounter with modernity. 77ie Sorotzkin Responsum in Orthodox Writings on Women and Torah Study While the Sorotzkin responsum is hardly the only modern responsum concerning the question of women and Torah study, this text bears careful 120 Women and the...