Oy, again with history. Look, throw your darts at history and we can pull anything up, from men who took care of the children to men who never touched a kid. Honestly, it isn't "history" it is today that counts.
My father changed diapers, so did a lot of men "in the past".
I am far from being a historian but any Jew can't ignore that what we do today rests on mesorah of generations. So don't call it history. Call it life. What people are claiming here is that :
"if you aren't putting what you learn INTO practice then you aren't doing learning right."
But the only examples they are giving of "putting it into practice" is taking on household chores. So I am asking but you aren't answering. For generations men did not take on household chores but practiced their learning doing other things. Why do you think that the only way to practice their learning is to change diapers and make sponja? Some of you seem to be really hooked on this equality business. Since when are men and women created equal, since when are their tasks on this earth equal? I am surprised to hear that from frum women. Since when have Jewish women gotten so weak that they can't clean a house if their husband doesn't do sponja along with them or instead of them?
And I repeat, when I am commanded to spend as much time as I can learning torah I will divide up the cleaning chores with my husband. If a wife is too delicate to do it, then get a cleaning woman! But let your husbands learn as much as they can in their free time!
Ditto HindaRochel...
or let's go back to making people strong by letting the weaker ones die before adulthood. Sad but efficient.
Quote:
or diaper babies or make sponga. That means that they didn't put the torah they learned into practice?
when something somewhere isn't on the radar, it's not on the radar
Quote:
to create a torah household one has to have personal examples.
Yup, hence helping his wife a lot. If we should help strangers, we should help a person we committed to treat better than ourselves. Men who run after strangers to invite them or whatever, but don't touch a chore, make me laugh.
Priorities differ according to hashkafot. Torah is bigger than us, but it is davka a Torah of life, and some schedules described are not life, or at least not decent life for many women (most women I know, plus some on here?).
Quote:
If a family decides together to share chores, that doesn't give a man a ptor from limud torah daily. Therefore it is chessed for a wife to take on more than her husband to free some or most of his time from the domestic so that he can learn.
I don't see the link. First sentence, except emergency, sure. Second sentence, to me, no way with little kids. Not for the wife to make free time for the husband's mitsva, and certainly not most of his time at home! If his rav rules he needs to learn 5 hours a day, well, that's for him to find a way without putting it on the wife. How could he even learn with a free mind knowing what he causes??
Im still having a hard time with women who say that a working mother needs to do everything a SAHM does but after work. I don't except that a husband can't do half his share unless he is not home.
I am sorry but learning is a nice thing for men but also a luxury. It should not be done on his wife's cheshbon. The ideal is that a mother is home with her children and maintains the home. Once that is not able to be accomplished then the women/men roles need to be reevaluated.
If a woman/mother can work all day that sure as hell a man can get off his butt and learn how to do laundry, dishes, grocery shop and cook meals.
I am married to a born and bred south african and if he can cook and do laundry then any man can learn to do it too. If you don't know anything about south african life, then know this he and all of his friends grew up with maid. His mother only cooked dinner if the maid was off and she only worked part time. I asked him why his parents never sent him to jewish school and he said that his parents couldn't afford it. CULTURE!!!!
I haven't been reading this whole thread, but I skimmed parts and this post struck me as very problematic. It's good you wrote it, pickle lady (what do you pickle best?). It raises awareness that some women among us are missing some fundamentals. I know others have responded, but I am also going to "have a bash" as my Dad would say, meaning "have a turn," without "bashing," of course.
"learning is a nice thing for men"
A nice thing for men? It's the one thing that men feel like doing the least. The yetzer hara most opposes it.
More than anything else. Because nothing has the eternal value that one word of Torah has. They do get protection from it. Protection from pooranios and, uniquely (as in not from any other mitzva) protection from the yetzer hora. They sustain the world with it, bring the shechina down with it, and earn techiyas hameisim with it. It is the thing that will bring shechina down and enable the rebuilding of the beis hamikdash. The Beis HaMikdash cannot be built purely out of abstaining from loshon hora, as many seem to believe. There must be dedicated Torah learning in sufficiently large numbers.
"For men" It's quite nice for their wives too. Who have a place for all of eternity for the Torah they enabled their husbands to learn. It isn't any nicer living homeless and hungry in a spiritual cardboard box for eternity than it is to live homeless and hungry in a physical cardboard box in this world. Make no mistake about it. Torah is your parnassa. Have bitachon that everything will be OK, in this world. But the next world? That you have to take care of.
"... but also a luxury."
I don't want to be harsh, but you are really missing an important part of your education. My Rebbe says that electricity is a luxury, although I have a hard time figuring out how to live without it. But learning? Rashi, on the first possuk of the Torah tells use that the possuk is telling us with the very first word that the world was created for Torah and for Yisrael. The Torah teaches us that the world would cease to exist if Torah learning ceased to exist. Torah learning is really not a luxury.
"It should not be done on his wife's cheshbon." Right. Let him have the seichel to marry someone who values Torah and let him do it with her agreement.
"The ideal is that a mother is home with her children and maintains the home" Later, you cite culture and your ability to overcome it. Now, where do you get this ideal from if not from culture? Where in the Torah does it say that children must only be by their mother the whole time? That having your kids spend a few hours a day with another caring, G-d fearing adult and play with some other kids is ossur? I really don't recognize that ideal as a Torah ideal. There may be an inyan of tznius to stay at home and to be careful about what environments one places oneself in. But to have one's kids always home with you rather than have your husband learn sometimes? No such inyan, as far as I understand.
Since when are men and women created equal, since when are their tasks on this earth equal?
Always equal, but different mitsvos. Never heard anything different from a credible rav.
Quote:
But let your husbands learn as much as they can in their free time!
It's not asked from most of us. Period. Don't push your customs, please. Since when is it assur to just learn daily and now you need to learn all the time? I totally believe some do, like you, but please don't push it on those who don't have this rule.
Last edited by Ruchel on Sun, Jul 31 2011, 10:45 am; edited 1 time in total
WHEN in history. My father did help out in the house. My fil took care of the outside of the house. A lot of men did take their turn in changing the babies diaper, giving the baby a bottle, etc. so mom could nap. They also may not have made dinner on a nightly basis, but many men did the special meals (barbecues etc.)
At some points in history MOMS weren't taking care of their children, depending on what group the mom belonged to etc. etc.
Barbara, every branch of Orthodox Judaism believes that a person must practice a Torah lifestyle in his daily routine. You seem to imply that for MO, that is equivalent to actually learning Torah, thus fulfilling that particular mitzva (limud Torah). If that is true, it is a huge, fundamental difference from mainstream Orthodoxy, in which learning Torah is a requirement for men outside of incorporating Torah into everyday life.
That's not what she said, she said for MO it takes place alongside limud Torah. Eg. 2 hours of Torah study and 2 hours home with family, rather than seeing the hours home with family as wasted time that could have been spent learning.
She didn't say it, she implied it. 2 hours learning and 2 hours with family is not MO, it is accepted by everyone I know. I can't think of anyone who would consider that wasting time. In fact, my mainstream Orthodox dh actually got quite fired up this Shabbat about men who learn extensively, and are not actually that serious about their learning, at the expense of doing something else productive. It can't be a cop-out.
The question is, what if there are only 2 hours total? How does he divide it then? Barbara seems to be saying learning Torah comes further down on the list. You get to it eventually, but only if it does not interfere with family time, relaxing, cooking/shopping, and coaching the kids baseball team. Those are all well and good, but learning should not be on par with mending the socks, I.e. when I have the time.
A nice thing for men? It's the one thing that men feel like doing the least.
Not many men I know. Maybe they should get guidance on what and how to learn.
EvenI explained it well. Because men are required to learn, on a regular basis, the yetzer hara to avoid it is extremely strong. This goes for men who are accomplished learners and actually love learning, as well. Maybe the men you know don't share this with you (I'm not sure why they would), but I have heard enough to believe it's true, and I understand it.
Today, after we took a family trip to Dunkin Donuts, my dh went to yeshiva to learn. Later on, we plan on going to the zoo together. Could my dh have spent that hour or two relaxing at home? Yes, and I'm sure he would love to. I commented how lucky he was to get to spend a solid couple of hours immersed in learning, and then realized that for him, it isn't always easy to see it that way. He is required to learn. He spends hours every day doing so. For me, learning is a rare treat (who has the time to do it on a regular basis? women are not commanded for a reason. . . ), but for him, it's a must. He does it out of love, but there is certainly a sense of obligation that brings with it a resistance.
2 hours learning and 2 hours with family is not MO, it is accepted by everyone I know. I can't think of anyone who would consider that wasting time.
Freidasima's husband has to learn all the time he's not working. There must be others. I pray to G-d it is discussed before serious commitment.
Quote:
The question is, what if there are only 2 hours total?
I think in all cases it is a shaila. Go to your rav, with your wife, and discuss. Maybe he'll say one hour of learning. Maybe he'll say two, and then the husband has to make his own effort too. Maybe he has commute time, use it. Lunch time, use it. Breaks, use them. Maybe he will be allowed to make up for some days where he learns less on the week end.
Just, be a mentsch, not everything on wifey's cheshbon, even if she learned to accept everything it is not right!
First all of MB what you write warms my heart. Because until now neither you nor other chassidish women have written that their working husbands are kovei itim daily. If they are, that's wonderful! And that's just what I was talking about. But you can imagine that if it is never mentioned until now I can't be a mind reader especially when a chassidish poster writes that limud torah is a luxury!
And it was also a response to posters who wrote that during the week they never saw their fathers learn, but they only had a chavrusa for two hours once a week on Sunday.
If a man is helping with the children and has four hours and then goes out for two hours to learn, that's wonderful! That's definitely kovea itim. But in practice that's not what often happens
I hate to break it to you FS, but not every frum man is kovea itim. There are many men out there that will learn, but not daily or nightly and maybe once a week on shabbat. Some men come home wiped. They are just too tired to go back out and learn something.
I know many men who are this way and that does not mean that there is anything wrong with them. They learn when they are able.
There also are men who just dont have it in themselves to want to learn nightly. Can you imagine coming home from work at 7 pm, having supper, unwinding for a bit and then going out again at 9? SOme men just can not hack it. I am married to one such man. He would fall right to sleep if he were to do that. BUT that being said, my husband goes to a shiur every shabbat and listens to a short shiur at mincha every day. That is his limud.
Not every person or couple or family is kovea itim. Thats just life.
there is certainly a sense of obligation that brings with it a resistance.
I think it's a personality thing, and not a learning thing.
I sometimes resist to obligations. Others don't see it as a problems. Others even are more committed because of it. Especially a religious obligation, because they see it as for their own good.
Barbara, every branch of Orthodox Judaism believes that a person must practice a Torah lifestyle in his daily routine. You seem to imply that for MO, that is equivalent to actually learning Torah, thus fulfilling that particular mitzva (limud Torah). If that is true, it is a huge, fundamental difference from mainstream Orthodoxy, in which learning Torah is a requirement for men outside of incorporating Torah into everyday life.
That's not what she said, she said for MO it takes place alongside limud Torah. Eg. 2 hours of Torah study and 2 hours home with family, rather than seeing the hours home with family as wasted time that could have been spent learning.
She didn't say it, she implied it. 2 hours learning and 2 hours with family is not MO, it is accepted by everyone I know. I can't think of anyone who would consider that wasting time. In fact, my mainstream Orthodox dh actually got quite fired up this Shabbat about men who learn extensively, and are not actually that serious about their learning, at the expense of doing something else productive. It can't be a cop-out.
The question is, what if there are only 2 hours total? How does he divide it then? Barbara seems to be saying learning Torah comes further down on the list. You get to it eventually, but only if it does not interfere with family time, relaxing, cooking/shopping, and coaching the kids baseball team. Those are all well and good, but learning should not be on par with mending the socks, I.e. when I have the time.
It may not be on par with mending the socks but in some households it is not the first thing that the husband/father does when he comes home. Nope.
I have to say that someone earlier wrote that how can a jewish family have children living by example if they dont see their father learning? And all I can say is, what the heck? I come from a family where my father made an effort to be there for us when he came home at night, to help us with homework if we needed or to help my mother (both parents worked and still do, full time) with dishes or whatnot. He learned every sunday for two hours, every shabbat morning after the hashkama minyan for almost 3 hours and one night a week for an our or two (depending on how tired him and his chavruta were). I saw a religious home, only good and by example. Why would someone thing that just because not all men learn every single night it is a terrible thing? It is just not something that all frum men do.
I have only heard the term kovea itim in connection to charedi jews (sorry to generalize, but those are the only people who have ever mentioned such a phrase to me) so I am a bit shocked to hear some MO people saying it too.
2 hours learning and 2 hours with family is not MO, it is accepted by everyone I know. I can't think of anyone who would consider that wasting time.
Freidasima's husband has to learn all the time he's not working. There must be others. I pray to G-d it is discussed before serious commitment.
Quote:
The question is, what if there are only 2 hours total?
I think in all cases it is a shaila. Go to your rav, with your wife, and discuss. Maybe he'll say one hour of learning. Maybe he'll say two, and then the husband has to make his own effort too. Maybe he has commute time, use it. Lunch time, use it. Breaks, use them. Maybe he will be allowed to make up for some days where he learns less on the week end.
Just, be a mentsch, not everything on wifey's cheshbon, even if she learned to accept everything it is not right!
FS's husband comes across as someone who WANTS to learn as much as possible. She is fully supportive, and I don't see the problem there. I would not say all families should commit to that, though.
And I'm not saying anything is coming at the wife's cheshbon. If a man has 2 hours, perhaps he should learn part of it and be with his family part of it. Or, if his wife can't do that much on her own, he should pitch in even more with the family. My point is, watching the game and having beers with his friends should not come first. I don't always have that much time to relax. It's a luxury.
About friends and this type of free time, I'm 100% with you that TO ME it's not important and certainly goes last.
It seems to me FS says her husband learned he HAS to learn all the time, hence why she tells others that it is the halacha (though she is not the type to push her customs so I'm very lost in the discussion...). A personal choice, with spouse agreement, kol hakavod! But you don't push a personal agreement on others and certainly not so strongly. I must say I don't get this discussion and it seems most don't either?
BUT that being said, my husband goes to a shiur every shabbat and listens to a short shiur at mincha every day. That is his limud.
Not every person or couple or family is kovea itim. Thats just life.
Why doesn't this count as kovea itim, at least to a certain extent?
Shabbat I find that sad. That's what children see. what mommy and daddy do. We talk so much about chinuch, good Jewish education. How much tuition costs, especially in America, how people have to ask for tuition breaks, how impossible it is these days to send four kids to yeshiva at the prices that exist etc.
it's a real problem. I'm not negating or mocking it chas vesholom.
But chinuch begins first and foremost at home. Not seeing what one learns in school carried out at home is a real problem. And good Jewish schooling teaches the centrality of torah actions but also of plain ordinary Limud Torah in daily life! Daily! Not weekly, daily.
Why is a woman who comes home from a full time job and a commute who is "wiped" expected to then take care of her kids, give supper, wash the kids and put them to bed? And this is if she has a full time maid taking care of the house! What would anyone say if a woman would say "I am wiped, I just cant find it in me to shower the kids or even feed them. All I want to do is chill out in front of the TV or sleep".
Yeah well. too bad. It's not on the cards unless you can afford a full time housekeeper and childminded. So go get an au pair. I don't know of too many people who have them here, including full time working mothers. It just goes with the territory. And you know what? No matter how exhausted we are, we find the strength not only to serve supper but to smile at our kids, listen to them, wash them, put them in to pjs and sit and talk with them (or as other mothers than I do, read to them) and only then...when that is all over and the supper dishes are washed and a few other things do we then "collapse in front of the TV or go to sleep".
Same in my book for men. Unless they are doing physical labor and are literally physically falling off their feet (although the men I do who do physical labor even at 50 were in such good shape that they davka didn't come home falling off their feet!) there is no reason they can't open up a sefer at home and learn at least daf yomi for half an hour a day.
If they have "no inclination"? That's really sad. As EvenI wrote (Even! We finally agree on something!) the yetzer horo works hard at trying to keep men from limud torah. So you have to push yourself. I have seen my husband yawning away but finishing a sugyia, pushing himself for torah. I saw my father who worked long hours do the same. It's how we were taught, it's surely what my father was lucky to see his father and his father's father do as well. And it's how we teach our kids. By example.
Ruchel, I am laughing. My husband does many things other than learn. Right now as he asleep on the sofa with the tv blasting out the weather report because his shiur was moved up today and he was up at 4 AM and is exhausted. Remember I wrote that he helps clean off, takes out the garbage, moves heavy things in the house, helps me carry up bundles from the car (too heavy for me), helps hang laundry? So it's not like he learns torah every single minute he isn't at work. He deals at home with calls from work, deals with donors, and our lives are a kind of seamless connection of work, home, family, mitzvos and limud torah. In the opposite order.
Tired is not quite the same as no inclination. It IS sad that people sometimes have to come home exhausted, but it is true.
FS, YOU said a man in your shitta needs to learn all or almost all his non working time. Certainly not me! Now you say only half an hour or one hour or two hours. I don't get it, you kept saying every free moment, even if it means not helping much around, which is quite different even from 2 hours.
You don't know any woman who will skip the bath, serve something from microwave, skip the night reading and certainly don't do housework if too tired?? I don't know anyone who never has this.
And I still think that even if a man has no great inclination to learn a good wife can gently nudge him in that direction by saying "Chaimkeh, I'll wash the kids and wash the dishes, why don't you open a sefer for a little while and learn a bit at the table, it'll be good for the kids to see you learn and after that maybe if I have koyach I'll start baking that chocolate cake with special frosting that you like...if you learn long enough the cake will be out of the oven and we can have some even hot!"
Yeah I know, now you are going to bash me and say that is treating your husband like a kid giving him a treat to leaarn. But you know what? There is a reason that in cheder you usually coated letters with honey and let the three year old lick them so that he would know that torah is sweet.
I have seen women do this. I don't have to B"h. But sometimes when I hear of things my husband is doing or learning or teaching it makes me so happy that I just want to do something special and extra for him, even if I don't have the koyach at all. As Even I wrote, it is our sachar! it is our olam habo! So why shouldn't I make it extra sweet for my husband?
And yes, torah isn't just limud torah, they go side by side and you can't give up either of them. It's learning torah AND living torah. My husband gave kollel yom shishi friday morning and came home a lot later than usual. I asked him what happened and he told me that afterwards he walked to the merkaz to go to the post office for something. On the way back he saw one of the shul's regulars, a man in his 80s, near one of the stores trying to flag down a taxi. He had gone after kollel yom shishi into the mercaz and done a bit of shopping and it was too much to carry home at his age. Its only four long blocks and no taxis were stopping for him so my husband said to him that he will carry the packages home. The older man demurred, after all my husband is almost 60 himself and slight, but he took the packages and walked the older man home, slowly, walked him up his three flights and brought everything into the house for him, and only that came home himself.
So yes, my husband lives torah but also learns torah and I do my best to make it sweet for him. When I heard that story I was so moved that I went into the kitchen to make something additional special for shabbos that I usually don't make and that I know he likes. And I told him it was the way I could show him how proud I am to have someone like him as my husband and how much I love him for who he is.
A bit of chocolate double cake goes a long way in showing love. Same for helping your husband get over any yetzer horo that keeps him from wanting to learn, even a little bit, daily. Chochmas noshim bonto beiso - a woman's wisdom builds her home. You just have to know how to go about doing it. Try it.
And I still think that even if a man has no great inclination to learn a good wife can gently nudge him in that direction by saying "Chaimkeh, I'll wash the kids and wash the dishes, why don't you open a sefer for a little while and learn a bit at the table, it'll be good for the kids to see you learn and after that maybe if I have koyach I'll start baking that chocolate cake with special frosting that you like...if you learn long enough the cake will be out of the oven and we can have some even hot!"
Davka this may work for a tired man, but a no inclination one will probably still not have inclination.
Also not sure how much this learning will be serious as opposed to passing time with an opened sefer to have the cake.
Quote:
There is a reason that in cheder you usually coated letters with honey and let the three year old lick them so that he would know that torah is sweet.
At 3, right? Sure.
Quote:
even if I don't have the koyach at all.
From what you say, you don't really know what no koyech at all means! Because no koyech means NO KOYECH. Your eyes get closed, your head spins, you HAVE to stop or you fall. It's NOT "geee I'm tired".
CULTURE!!!!
