Q&A: A Strange Moral Question
A Strange Moral Question
Question
I have a Haredi neighbor in my building, and she has the practice of not riding in the elevator with men. Every time I go in, she gets out.
Sometimes she has been waiting for the elevator for a while, and then I suddenly arrive and “snatch” the elevator from her. On the face of it, I obviously shouldn’t need to take that into account. But at the end of the day, a religious norm like this is imposed on her (in her view), and however I look at it, she is standing there with a baby in her arms waiting for the elevator before I arrive, and then I come and force her to wait again for the elevator.
What is one obligated to do, and what would you recommend doing in practice? There’s a part of me that sometimes wants to teach her a lesson about the absurdity and let her wait there with the baby in her arms—why is her belief my fault? But then I remind myself that, from her perspective, this view is forced on her, and in the end I am the condition causing her to have to wait for the elevator.
Answer
I don’t know what to tell you. On the face of it, it would be nice to let her go up, but this silliness really is irritating.
Discussion on Answer
There’s no need to get carried away and go overboard. A person has the right to act according to his understanding, even where there is a dispute. Thank God, people don’t present Beit Shammai as ignoramuses. And this is really not causing harm to others, because she gets out when he arrives. Beyond that, is there any halakhic decisor who forbids it? I doubt it.
That’s exactly what I said. I’m not aware of any halakhic decisor who forbids it, and therefore she is presenting all of them—the decisors—as ignoramuses. In addition, since I live in a place where this scene is common, usually the woman does not give way to the man’s benefit, but rather prevents him from getting on.
In my case she doesn’t prevent me physically or verbally. Sometimes she even steps away from the elevator when she sees me approaching. It’s the awkwardness that keeps me from getting on.
The stringencies of this woman are causing harm to others—not only toward the neighbor whom she delays, but also toward the halakhic decisors who permit riding together in an elevator, by making them look like ignoramuses.