Greetings!

Thank you for your important responses! Only now did I find time to reply a bit, but I still haven’t managed to read the article you sent. In the meantime, though, I have a few comments and questions on your remarks, with your permission.

Before I get into the substance, I’ll just note that I haven’t read your critique of Rabbi Hayu”m, only heard about it. But in any case, precisely because you disagree, this whole discussion is of course more useful. And regarding what you wrote about “first-order and second-order halakhic ruling,” on that I actually agree one hundred percent that first-order ruling is preferable. And if you read my words carefully, you will see that all my claims regarding the main passages in Berakhot and Ketubot stand even without those sages I cited. It’s just that because I didn’t want to stand alone—especially on something so political and so highly charged, etc.—I wrote it in the form of a kind of “second-order ruling.” And of course you know the problems of freedom of speech in the Haredi and religious world today, unfortunately.

Regarding what you wrote, “What is the proof for this? Usually a warning is a Torah prohibition. And from the Rif’s version one cannot prove anything, since ‘Torah-level’ there means to exclude a derivation or more remote interpretation. Sometimes ‘Torah-level’ means what is explicit in the Torah as opposed to a Torah law that is not explicit. For example, in Bava Kamma 24, ‘dayyo is Torah-level,’ and there it is clear that the intent is not as opposed to rabbinic law, but that it is explicit in the Torah. And the same applies here”—I didn’t understand the question, since I brought explicit proof from Yad Malachi, Rules of the Talmud, Aleph rule 19. And likewise from the Sifrei (and I will answer your comment on that below) it appears that it is only an asmachta.

Regarding what you wrote, “Indeed, the view of Shevut Yaakov is that on the Torah level gathering the hair is sufficient (that is what a kalta is). But that is truly Torah-level. However, this is a lone opinion, and according to the other decisors that is not so,” a few points should be noted. Even if there is a Torah prohibition, the prohibition does not require covering, and therefore on that basis one cannot say that there is specifically an obligation of covering. So whichever way you look at it, a woman who goes out with her hair in braids (that is, with the hair gathered) is not transgressing; and if there is no Torah prohibition here, then one may go out even without gathering the hair. Furthermore, nowadays we do not say “an individual versus the majority—the law follows the majority,” as I wrote later in the responsum, see there. So one can rely on Shevut Yaakov if that is where the law appears to lean (in Maimonides’ language in the laws of Rebels), and you brought no proof at all for why one should not rule like him (the fact that it is a lone opinion is not proof). But with all due respect, the Rabbi was not precise, because this is not a lone opinion. Besides the fact that it is the plain meaning of the verse and the plain meaning of the Mishnah in Sotah, it also seems to be Rashi’s view (as I brought from his commentary in the responsum itself). And beyond that, we also have the implication of the Magen Avraham in subsection 3 on Shulchan Arukh, Orach Chayim 75 (and Arukh HaShulchan brought his words as practical law, that an unmarried woman must go out with her hair braided), and this is the language of Magen Avraham: “Virgins, whose way is etc.: This is difficult, for in Even HaEzer 21:1 it is written: ‘The daughters of Israel shall not go with uncovered heads in the marketplace,’ whether unmarried or married, and so too Maimonides wrote in chapter 21 of the laws of prohibited relations. Also, it is stated in Ketubot at the beginning of chapter 2: if she went out with a hinuma and her head uncovered, this is a sign that she had been a virgin. And it is forced to say that ‘unmarried women’ there means a widow, for if so it should have stated so explicitly. One may answer that ‘uncovered head,’ written in Even HaEzer, means that they undo the braids of their hair and go out into the marketplace, and this is forbidden even for an unmarried woman. And so Rashi explained in Parashat Naso on ‘and he shall uncover the woman’s head.’ Nevertheless, it must be said that unmarried women are not forbidden on the Torah level, for if you were to say that the verse also speaks of an unmarried woman, then she too should be forbidden to go with her head uncovered, since from there Ketubot chapter 7 derives that the daughters of Israel may not go with uncovered heads. Rather, the verse does not speak of an unmarried woman; it is only a matter of modesty for virgins not to go that way.” Even though he wrote that this is not Torah-level for unmarried women, still, since he thought that the plain meaning of the verse (following Rashi) obligates even unmarried women in arranging their hair, one could say that Magen Avraham agrees that the minimal Torah obligation is unbinding the hair from its braids. In truth, one might ask that Magen Avraham should have concluded from his own reasoning that indeed the covering of a married woman’s hair is not Torah-level, because then everything would fit together much better. But instead it would seem he pressed himself somewhat in order to defend the custom of Ashkenazic virgins not to cover their hair, and therefore, of necessity, wrote that this prohibition is not Torah-level for unmarried women—contrary to the plain meaning of the verse and of Rashi.

Regarding what you wrote about the rule I established, that “lo” means a recommendation and is not the language of prohibition—that this is “a problematic generalization. Sometimes that is so and sometimes not … it is enough for us that there are cases where a warning is a recommendation regardless of wording, and there is no need for such exacting proofs. This is obvious. The important question is whether here too, regarding head covering, that is the meaning, and for that we need proofs…” — I already wrote in another article to prove that there is such a rule, and that only in rare cases can one say that “lo” means “forbidden” (for example, when it comes after “ein,” as in the Mishnah: “One may not light with … nor with … nor with …” in tractate Shabbat). Be that as it may, I agree with what the Rabbi wrote, that “the important question is whether here too, regarding head covering, that is the meaning, and for that we need proofs,” except that since you are the one taking the stringent position, the burden of proof is on you to teach…

Regarding what you wrote on my claim that we do not find any punishment for this, not even disciplinary lashes, and that this is not proof—I agree that this claim alone is not proof, but in the context of the other claims there is something to it. The reason is that if there really were a punishment here (especially Torah lashes), you would not find anyone—not even Rabbi Hayu”m or Rabbi Moshe Malka of blessed memory—who could claim the matter is permitted. It is only because there is no punishment that all this debate can exist. That is obvious.

Regarding what you wrote, “But this is certainly a Torah law (even according to Maimonides’ well-known view, but this is not the place),” you were not precise, because in footnote 2 I brought Maimonides’ words about Dat Moshe and also the words of the Maggid Mishneh, and according to him “Dat Moshe” does not necessarily mean “a Torah prohibition.” Here are my words there: “Nevertheless, there is still room to say that it is an asmachta even according to Maimonides, because not every Dat Moshe is Torah-level; Dat Moshe also includes rabbinic prohibitions, as the Maggid wrote on Laws of Marriage 24:9(11): ‘Our master explained that when they said “feeding him produce that was not tithed,” then all the more so other forbidden things, for tithing nowadays is only rabbinic, as mentioned in chapter 1 of the laws of terumot’—these words of the Maggid are relevant to our matter.” I did not understand how you forgot the Maggid’s words here; they are well known and familiar.

Regarding what you wrote about the Sifrei, “Sometimes ‘remembrance’ indicates a Torah law, except that there is no proof from the verse because there is no explicit warning. That is what is called ‘a remembrance.’ So too regarding anointing being like drinking on Yom Kippur, in Mishnah Shabbat chapter 9, mishnah 4, where there are opinions that it is Torah-level despite the use of ‘remembrance.’ And similarly every verbal clarification such as kiddushin by money, where the medieval authorities wrote at the beginning of Kiddushin (Ritva there) that it is only a verbal clarification, but it is certainly a Torah law (even according to Maimonides’ well-known view, but this is not the place).” Even if there are sometimes Torah laws in cases called “remembrance,” in the context of the Sifrei there, they brought a verse from Samuel—from the Prophets/Writings and not from the Torah—as the “remembrance” for this, and from that it appears there is no Torah prohibition here. That is why they wrote there, “there is no proof for the matter,” but there is a remembrance of the matter—in the Prophets/Writings, from which we do not derive Torah laws. And regarding what you wrote, “As I noted, there is no proof here at all, especially since the Sifrei can disagree with our Talmud. Are you setting one man against another?!”—I agree that there can be a dispute between the Sifrei and our Talmud, but in my opinion there is no dispute at all according to the way I understood the Talmud. The simplest interpretation is the one that best fits all the sources, and we should assume a dispute only if we cannot reconcile them, or if the reconciliation is forced. According to the interpretation I wrote in the responsum, there is neither dispute nor forcing, in my humble opinion.

For added clarity, a certain rabbi drew my attention to the words of Rabbi Yitzhak Simcha HaLevi Horowitz of blessed memory (5629/1869 – 4 Tevet 5696 / December 30, 1935), rabbi of Hartford, Connecticut, USA, and what he wrote in his book Yad HaLevi (on Maimonides’ Sefer HaMitzvot) regarding women’s head covering nowadays, and his responses to those who challenged him in the journal Degel Yisrael. I thought his words might interest you, and so I attached them to the email. In my opinion it is very interesting that there was an Ashkenazic rabbi who permitted uncovering the head.

With respect and with blessings for a joyful Shushan Purim,

Greetings and abundant salvation to you.
Now that my wine has worn off and it is possible to discuss practical Jewish law properly, I returned to your words. Because of lack of time, I’ll address briefly only a few of the points that still require clarification:

1. It is very unlikely that Dat Moshe refers to rabbinic prohibitions. That goes against the plain sense of the Talmud, and it would take very strong proof to claim otherwise. In the Maggid Mishneh there it is not really written, and even if it is, his words are very forced. As is known, Maimonides in his code does not deal specifically with nowadays, so “feeding him untithed produce” is truly Torah-level. Moreover, in the case of feeding him, it is a prohibition of “do not place a stumbling block,” and even causing someone to stumble in a rabbinic prohibition is plainly a Torah-level violation of that prohibition (for it is no less than causing him to stumble over a physical obstacle). And even nowadays there is room to say that this is considered Dat Moshe because in the essence of the law it used to be Torah-level, and therefore even now it is considered Dat Moshe. That is not the case with head covering, whose status has not changed.
2. In the Talmud they say “her head uncovered” is Torah-level. According to some views, this means not gathered (according to Shevut Yaakov), and according to the overwhelming majority of views it means not covered (I do not remember which Rashi you were referring to, but as far as I recall there is no contradiction to this in Rashi there). I have no argument with you that according to this lone view, covering is rabbinic (and only gathering is Torah-level). But in any case, when the passage there says “Dat Moshe,” it means Torah-level—each one according to his position.
3. Even a verse from the Prophets/Writings can serve as a verbal clarification for a Torah law, and there are quite a number of examples of this (“And Zedekiah son of Chenaanah made for himself horns of iron,” acquisition by exchange; “Your navel is like a rounded goblet; let no mixed wine be lacking,” and many more examples of this kind).

Greetings,

Indeed, the matters require clarification, and I thought a great deal about your questions. I’ll answer your first two questions together.

Regarding what you wrote, “It is very unlikely that Dat Moshe refers to rabbinic prohibitions. That goes against the plain sense of the Talmud and requires very strong proof to claim otherwise.” On the contrary, it is most reasonable that Dat Moshe includes both Torah prohibitions and rabbinic prohibitions together. For if one looks at the Mishnah, Dat Moshe deals with trickery and causing a stumbling block, meaning that a man’s wife causes him to transgress prohibitions, whereas Dat Yehudit refers only to modesty customs practiced by Jewish women. And if she transgresses Dat Moshe or Dat Yehudit, she loses her ketubah. According to your approach, would you say that she loses her ketubah only if she caused him to stumble in Torah prohibitions, but if she caused him to stumble in rabbinic prohibitions (for example, poultry cooked with animal milk while telling him the milk is almond milk or the like), she still keeps her ketubah—but if she behaved against modesty custom, she loses her ketubah?! Does that seem reasonable to you?! Certainly not! Still, even though this reasoning seems very strong to me, one does not issue a halakhic ruling from reasoning alone without proofs and sources. And I must thank God that in His providence, when I was looking for something in the later authorities related to the laws of Passover just two hours ago, I found a strong proof on the basis of which one can say that there is no Torah law in our passage in Ketubot regarding uncovering the head. I photographed the source, and these are the words of Meiri as brought in the responsa Chazon Ovadia (by Rabbi Ovadia Yosef) part 1 on matters of the Passover Seder night, siman 1 (pp. 11–12) in a note:

image.png
image.png

And he brought that this is also in Ketubot 72, “and her head uncovered,” from Meiri, and Terumat HaDeshen according to Maimonides, and according to this it is only an asmachta, just as I wrote in my responsum—and blessed is He who directed me correctly. This answers your first two questions as well, including what you asked, “In the Talmud they say ‘her head uncovered’ is Torah-level,” in addition to the reasoning I raised here with God’s help.

As for the third question, regarding what you wrote—“Even a verse from the Prophets/Writings can serve as a verbal clarification for a Torah law, and there are quite a number of examples”—even if so, that does not seem to be the plain reading of the Sifrei, though this still requires further consideration. The reason is that regarding the verse in the Torah they explicitly wrote that there is no proof for the matter, and in that context it is hard to say that we have here a “verbal clarification” for a Torah law, because if so, then there is proof for the matter when one reads the Torah verse together with the verse from the book of Samuel. But if we say that there is here only an asmachta from the Torah, in my opinion it fits better. But all this is only what seems to me; in truth I admit that perhaps you are right on this point and I need to look into it further. Still, you must bring proof that here there is a verbal clarification for a Torah law, like the stringent view everywhere.

As for what you asked about the use of “S.T.,” I saw fit to expand on this a bit because in my opinion many people do not understand the correct and historical meaning of the term “Sephardi.” Indeed, personally, my father is of Ashkenazic origin (although we know that his paternal grandfather had citizenship from the Ottoman Empire, we do not know exactly whether he was Sephardi or Ashkenazi). But as a baal teshuvah, when he married my mother he adopted her customs, such as eating rice and legumes on Passover, and he does not eat fish with milk or cheese (by the way, in my opinion that is completely permitted even for Sephardim without annulment, but this is not the place). And we generally prayed on Sabbaths and holidays only in a Sephardi synagogue with my maternal grandfather. My mother is Iraqi and a little bit (one quarter) Yemenite.
But I thought it was important to clarify a few things because of the above. I wrote a university thesis on how Jews from the Middle East and North Africa identified themselves. And the term “Sephardi” is not (generally) geographic* or (ever!) racial, according to blood and DNA (perhaps today, but that is only due to the influence of European racism, in my opinion). Rather, it refers to a certain shared culture, worldview, and tradition, more or less. Therefore many whose ancestors had no connection at all to the Iberian Peninsula called themselves Sephardim and also wrote “S.T.” See the book Rabbi Israel משה Hazan: The Man and His Thought by Professor Hacham Yosef Faur of blessed memory, who cited in note 1 on p. 11 the words of Rabbi S.Y. Rapoport in his introduction to Machberet HeArukh, that Rabbi Abraham son of Maimonides refers to Rabbenu Chananel and Rabbenu Nissim (even though they were from Kairouan and not from “Spain”) as “Sephardim,” and that Rabbi Yeshaya D’Trani called Rabbenu Saadia Gaon “Sephardi” (!) even though he was from Egypt and then Babylonia in the Geonic period. See further there. And in my thesis (in English) I brought additional proofs. The same is true among Ashkenazim: many of them, or perhaps most of them, were not themselves or through their ancestors from Germany, but rather it is a shared culture and tradition, not a race or lineage. Enough said.

*In a few cases we do find that there were those who occasionally distinguished between the actual exiles from Spain and the Jews who had been in the Middle East and North Africa before the expulsion, whom they called “Musta’arab” in Judeo-Arabic. But this is relatively rare, and apparently they distinguished only when there was a need to do so (see, for example, Beit Yosef to Orach Chayim siman 270).

I just wanted to note that I personally enjoyed our discussion very much, and I very much want to meet the honored Rabbi when I visit Israel (maybe next year, God willing).

With respect,

Greetings.
1. It is true that from examining the Mishnah it appears that Dat Yehudit refers to matters of modesty, but then the Talmud’s difficulty about head covering being Torah-level is unclear. What is the difficulty? Dat Yehudit is matters of modesty, whether Torah-level or rabbinic, and there is no reason to distinguish between a kalta and covering/uncovering the head.
2. I already wrote that causing someone to stumble in rabbinic prohibitions is plainly a Torah violation of “do not place a stumbling block” (for it is no less than placing a physical obstacle).
3. As for what you brought from Rabbi Ovadia and the Meiri: there he defines “Torah-level” as a rabbinic law that has a root in Torah law. But according to your approach, head covering has no root in Torah law at all and is entirely rabbinic, so why would it be called “Torah-level”?! Under pressure one could say because it has an asmachta in the Torah, but that is forced.
4. In many cases verbal clarification is a clarification of the language of the Torah learned from the Prophets/Writings (from the words of tradition). Therefore after the clarification you can always go back to the verse and claim that it is written in the Torah itself. Even so, they call this “verbal clarification” (see Ritva at the beginning of Kiddushin regarding “taking, taking” from the field of Ephron, and many more such examples).
5. Regarding the definition of rabbinic law, this is also connected to Maimonides’ well-known approach in the second root (that anything derived through exposition, and also anything from a law given to Moses at Sinai, is called “words of the Sages”), but this is not the place.
6. Regarding “S.T.”, I understand. It just still needs a bit of thought, since the term “pure” in that phrase would seem to relate to ethnicity and origin, not only to culture.
7. I just now saw words from Rabbi Ovadia who ties the label “Sephardim” to those who follow Maimonides the Sephardi in Jewish law. According to that, Rabbenu Chananel and the other sages who preceded Maimonides would require explanation.
8. I would be very happy for your visit when you are here. Please update me before you come to the Holy Land and we’ll coordinate.
All the best,

S.T. = sin tin = dust and ashes
or
S.T. = siman tov = a good sign
and not “pure Sephardi.”

You can see in some of the responsa of Moroccan sages that they write it this way explicitly and not as an abbreviation.

Happy festival and greetings!

Sorry for the delay, but the burden of public needs weighed heavily on me before Passover and I couldn’t find time to reply. Now I have a little rest, and I will answer, though unfortunately only very briefly.

In my opinion, the Talmud’s question was: “How can this be defined merely as custom, when it is possible to see an asmachta for it in the Torah?” And to that they answered: “Indeed, there is an asmachta, but not for the whole customary practice—only for a case where she goes out truly with her head uncovered, meaning (for example) without a kalta. But the rest of the covering customary among women is only the custom of the daughters of Israel.” Now the question and answer are understood according to my position.
It could be, and it could be not. Of course, the Maggid Mishneh apparently does not agree.
I was unable to understand your question. After all, asmachtot are also a kind of “words of the Sages.”
I agree that one can read it that way in some places, but it is not necessary that this is true in every case, including our passage. Therefore you have no clear proof against my claims.
I agree. But indeed this is not the place.
6-7. I always had the same difficulty you did—that apparently it sounds ethnic. But since we do not find evidence that they thought in ethnic terms (on the contrary, there is evidence they did not think of it as an ethnic matter, because we do not find that the exiles from Spain objected to sages from the East who had no roots in the Iberian Peninsula using “S.T.”), I have a theory, which I still need to research carefully. Namely, that “S.T.” at its beginning was connected to the Maimonidean and anti-Maimonidean controversy, because the Catalonians in northern Spain accepted upon themselves the authority of “our rabbis, the sages of France” or “our French rabbis” (see, for example, Ritva to tractate Avodah Zarah), whereas the Andalusians in southern Spain, who were Maimonidean, did not accept that, and used this term to show that they were “pure” in their views and followed only those of the tradition of Muslim Spain. They referred to sages who preceded the controversy as “Sephardi” even if they were not actually from Spain, in order to show that in their views they were “from the Maimonidean camp.” But of course this needs much more investigation. Please, I would be glad if you could send me the source for Rabbi Ovadia’s words about the term “Sephardi.”

For added clarity, from our discussion it has become clear to me that perhaps there really is a dispute between the Sifrei and the Babylonian Talmud, as you initially suggested. But one could say that the dispute is not as you wrote, but rather that according to the Babylonian Talmud there is at least an asmachta, whereas according to the Sifrei there is not even an asmachta. And of course according to my position, this makes no practical difference.

With respect and with blessings for a happy festival, holidays and times of joy,

It seems that we’ve more or less converged.
As for 3, the difficulty was about the term “Torah-level” according to your position. [For some medieval authorities there is also a difference in status between a rabbinic law that has scriptural support and an ordinary rabbinic law.]
As for 6-7, very interesting.
Happy holiday and all the best,