Q&A: Violate one period of niddah so that he will keep many
Violate one period of niddah so that he will keep many
Question
Dear Rabbi, hello,
There is a secular girl I know with whom I want to build a relationship. As is generally the way among secular people, I assume she will want to have relations before marriage.
I accept the law of a concubine, but I think it will be hard for me to ask her to immerse in a mikveh at an early stage of the relationship without turning her off from the idea of being in a relationship with me.
So the question is: does a shower count as a mikveh on the Torah level, so that it would then be permitted to violate niddah only on the rabbinic level when the goal is to create a relationship for the sake of being fruitful and multiplying, which is a Torah-level commandment? (And one could also relate to the idea of marriage, which is a commandment according to certain halakhic decisors.) And we are speaking only about a temporary situation, one that I would not agree to continue after intimacy is created. (In that case it would come out that I am causing her not to lead some other partner she may have into the sin of niddah, and overall I would be reducing transgressions, in the style of “desecrate one Sabbath for him so that he will keep many Sabbaths.”)
(I do not see this as a “lie” that I am not saying that later on I will ask her to immerse. That is the way of courtship—that not everything is said at the beginning.)
Thank you very much.
Answer
Hello,
I completely oppose this policy, even if it were possible (and it is not). Just as you are prepared to pay prices for it, she too should be expected to pay prices for you. If you want to live a life of intimacy, then please do so properly and marry in accordance with Jewish law.
In simple terms, this is also not possible under the law of a concubine (see the debate surrounding Zvi Zohar’s article in Akdamot).
A shower is of course not a mikveh and is of no use whatsoever.
And it has no connection at all to “desecrate one Sabbath for him” for many reasons. In particular, we do not say to a person, “Sin so that your fellow may benefit.”