We continue with the theme of recognizing what our jobs should be.
Rav Moshe Feinstein, in his sefer Igrot Moshe, has a beautiful teshuva/response going back about 40 years, when Women’s Lib was a new movement. Women were seeking equality, which meant equal jobs and rights for women. In the Jewish world this meant asking: Why shouldn’t ladies wear tefilin, or be hazzanim, or have an equal spot in Jewish, religious life?
Rabbi Moshe Feinstein writes that everyone has their job. Women have the job of raising their children. His words are:
שהיא מלאכה היותר חשובה לה׳ יתברך לתורה
They have the greatest, most important job for G-d and for his Torah: G-d put into the nature of women to raise their children.
How do we know? As we did have said before: In order to know what our roles are, we look at the person’s natural tendencies and abilities.
A woman has the ability to give birth to a child, to nurse the child. She has the patience that men don’t have. This is a natural phenomena. This is true of human beings, as well all of G-d’s creations as we mentioned previously.
As we have said, we can tell by our physical makeup what our jobs should be. Ladies have the physical makeup and qualities to be mothers. That’s why G-d gave them less time-bound Torah responsibilities. If they had to pray at certain times, with Tefillin, they wouldn’t be able to take care of their children. That job (child-rearing) is obviously more important than the tallet and tefilin because one pushes off the other.
This doesn’t change with the times. It may be that in today’s day and age, with more technology such as dishwashers, housework has gotten easier. But that doesn’t mean the roles or responsibilities have changed. You can’t fight it. The people that demand change are actually denying the validity of the Torah. Furthermore, the rabbi adds, these women aren’t fighting for more mitzvot. It’s not the mitzvot they want. They just want to complain.
He reiterates that Has V’Shalom, we shouldn’t think that women are less holy than men. They are 100% equally holy. Everything said about the greatness of men includes the greatness of women. Hashem said at Har Sinai כה תאמר לבית יעקוב -He mentioned the ladies first. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that because ladies have responsibilities in the home, they are less important. Everyone has a job. And all of this is not to say that women shouldn’t have jobs or make money on the side. But we must understand that there’s a fundamental role that women are supposed to be proud of. We look at our physical makeup to know our job. Women are created in a certain way to raise children. That’s their G-d given job. That’s fundamental. Of course, other work is fine. But no woman should feel like a second class citizen because she is a housewife or a mother. That’s a wonderful job with tremendous merits. As Rabbi Ades says, if a woman understands and appreciates what she does, she’ll see that throwing out the garbage is a service to G-d just like the Kohen taking the ashes out of the Bet HaMikdash. It’s all in the service to Hashem.
The Rabbis tell us there is no difference between bathing a child and shaking a lulav. How do we know? Because bathing a child trumps shaking the lulav.
Everyone has a job. Appreciate your job, and don’t look for someone else’s.