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From: Russell Hendel <rhendel@mcs.drexel.edu>
Date: Sun, 27 Jun 1999 16:16:40 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: Should working women do Positive Time Bound Commandments

I recently cited Rav Hirschs theory of which commandments women are
exempt from: They are exempt from periodically recurring symbolic
commandments whose purpose is to (symbolically) strengthen one against
forces in the outside world which threaten to lead him astray (the idea
being that women are not as involved in the outside world and don't need
these reminders).

Wendy Baker and Gitelle Rapoport asked (v28n86) "But what about today when
many women are in the workforce?" I actually had a similar conversation
with Rivkah Slonim who told me that she didn't prefer Rav Hirschs theory
precisely because it is not relevant today with so many women in the
workforce (Wendy's and Gitelle's question).

However after thinking about it for a while I realized that if we accept
Rav Hirsch's observations as accurately descriptive of those
commandments that women are exempt from then indeed, we would encourage
women who work in the workforth to e.g. go out of their way to these
commandments which she is only optionally obligated to perform. As a
simple example a primary reason for Tzitzith is to prevent sexual
temptation (Nu 15:39). But if a woman is in the workplace and exposed to
these sexual temptations then she needs these reminders also--hence she
should wear them.

Another point: Michah Berger pointed out my omitting explaining why this
applies to PERIODICALLY RECURRING commandments. The answer is because
these commandments are only SYMBOLIC strengtheners against outside
influences --they are not actual acts (such as eg charity) that we do to
prevent evil.  But then its the nature of symbolic acts that they are
done periodically.

A final point: Josh Hoffman(v28n88) says "Look at all this
confusion--why not go back and say that women are exempt from positive
time bound commandments by Divine decree"--the answer is (As Rav Hirsch
points out) that there are too many exceptions to the rule (A Divine
decree couldn't have so many exceptions---rather, as I indicated, it is
an attempt by Chazal to formulate a unified hypothesis (similar to their
attempt to formulate a unified hypothesis to which birds are Kosher).

Russell Jay Hendel; Phd ASA: rhendel@mcs.drexel.edu
Moderator Rashi Is Simple; http://www.shamash.org/rashi/