Orthodox Judaism treats women like filthy little things

If a man and a woman are drowning in a river, first they'll save the man, 'who is obligated to perform more commandments,' whereas a woman's 'wisdom is only in the spindle.' In fact, 'words of Torah should be burned rather than being given to women.'

By Yossi Sarid (Israeli writer) • Haaretz newspaper: December 30, 2011

Read this article in Hebrew: http://www.haaretz.co.il/opinions/1.1604955

"We will direct your attention to (Talmud) Tractate Shabbat, which does a good job of summing up halakha's attitude toward women: 'a sack full of excrement with a bleeding hole."

If you would like to know the source from which your brothers derive their brazen behavior, go over to the study hall and open a page of Talmud. It's true that the Torah has 70 faces, but the trend of these faces is clear: The source of the pollution is in halakha (Jewish law) itself. 

What is happening in Beit Shemesh and its satellites is not "contrary to halakha," it is mandated by halakha. And the rest will be told to the grandmothers, daughters and granddaughters. 

Anyone ignoramus knows that the Torah's "ways are ways of pleasantness," that "the honor of a king's daughter is within," and that "proper behavior comes before the Torah," but it's worth knowing more. It's worth knowing that a woman is unfit to be a judge, and is also unfit to give testimony. She is unfit for any public position with authority. "Thou shalt appoint a king over thee" - a king and not a queen. A daughter, commanded the sages, must not be taught Torah, because "the mind of woman is not suited to be taught, but [only] to words of nonsense." Women are light-minded and have little knowledge. 

And if a man and a woman are drowning in a river, first they'll save the man, "who is obligated to perform more commandments," whereas a woman's "wisdom is only in the spindle." In fact, "words of Torah should be burned rather than being given to women." 

A man must say three blessings every day during morning prayers: He thanks God "that He didn't make me a gentile, that He didn't make me a woman, that He didn't make me an ignoramus." And it's not proper to speak to a woman too much, since "all her conversation is nothing but words of adultery," and whoever talks to her too much "causes evil to himself and will end up inheriting hell." And let's not even talk about the fate of someone "who looks even at a woman's little finger." 

The extremists who spit at women, who call themselves Sikarikim, learned their lesson 101 times and learned it well: A husband would do well not to let his wife go outside, into the street, and should restrict her outings "to once or twice a month, as necessary, since a woman has no beauty except by sitting in the corner of her house." Because inside the house - very deep inside - her glorious honor awaits her: "Every woman washes her husband's face and feet and pours him a cup and prepares his bed and stands and serves her husband. And any woman who refrains from doing any of these tasks that she is obligated to perform - is forced to do them." Some recommend forcing her with a whip or by starvation "until she gives in." And needless to say, she is at her husband's disposal whenever he is overcome by a desire "to satisfy his urges with her." And if she continues to rebel, he always has the right "to divorce her without her consent." 

And there are many similar halakhot, only a few of which we have collected here. Nor have we cited everything in the name of the ones who said them, for lack of space. The readers are invited to find the references on Shabbat - and to browse around - on their own; this is a good opportunity for study. 

We will direct your attention to Tractate Shabbat, which does a good job of summing up halakha's attitude toward women: "a sack full of excrement" with a bleeding hole. Some people will seek to console themselves: It's true that this is the halakha both m'doraita (from the Torah ) and m'drabanan (from the rabbis ), but that is not what is taught nowadays. 

But it suffices to listen to the sermon the sage Rabbi Ovadia Yosef delivered five years ago, based on the well-known halakhic work Kitzur Shulchan Aruch:  "A man must take care not to walk between two women or between two dogs or two pigs, and men should also not allow a woman or a dog or a pig to walk between them." 

Treating women as impure and filthy begins with halakha and continues with actions.  As long as the religious and ultra-Orthodox (Israeli political) parties - Shas, United Torah Judaism, Habayit Hayehudi and National Union, none of which have any women in the Knesset - are not disqualified, their nakedness will continue to sing out and the nakedness of the land will be revealed. (End quote from Yossi Sarid). 

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Learn more about the Kitzur Shulchan Aruch and Orthodox Judaism's subjugation of women: read Judaism's Strange Gods

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Michael's Hoffman's Truth Mission is solely supported by the sale of his books, newsletters, CDs and DVDs,  and your financial support. 

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David P. Goldman's brazen buncombe about the roots of West's law

Practically every word Mr. Goldman has written below, in his article for Asia Times, is either a lie or a deception. Can you spot them? We invite readers of Michael Hoffman's Judaism Discovered to submit responses to Goldman's devious misrepresentation of Judaism, which is so patently fraudulent it constitutes an insult to the intelligence of the reader. We will publish in this blog one or two of the best refutations of Goldman's drivel. Our latest Revisionist History Newsletter issue no. 52 analyzes the concept of the "Hebrew Republic" in the West, and challenges the myth which Goldman (and Michael Novak and Eric Nelson) retail, that Judaism is synonymous with the Old Testament and that the heritage of freedom bequeathed to the West by Biblical jurisprudence is a legacy of Talmudic Judaism. Only an audience bereft of the most basic knowledge of the subject matter could be suckered by such brazen buncombe. Talmudic Judaism, with its Pharisee-derived Mishnah, and its Babylonian Talmud, is the very antipode of the law of Yahweh's Old Testament.

Mr. Goldman advances, with typical Pharisee conceit, the moral superiority of Talmudic Judaism over Islam, attempting what no con man before the modern era could achieve, a linkage between the murderous violence and rabbinic dictatorship of Talmudic Judaism, and the Christian West's heritage of freedom and liberty.

Wife-beating, sharia, and Western law

By David P. Goldman | Asia Times | May 25, 2010

...(Muslim) Sharia (law) resembles Halakha (Judaic law), but by construction, for the same reason the Koran resembles the Torah: it is derived from it, with self-serving adjustments (Ishmael becomes the heir of Abraham rather than Isaac). But the principles of the two legal systems are radically different. That is why Jewish observance of Halakha never has clashed with the legal systems of modern democracy while sharia inevitably must conflict, and in the most intractable and intimate way, that is, in matters of family law.

The term "law" applied to Judaism and Islam means entirely different things to radically different peoples. Civil law rests ultimately on the state's monopoly of violence. In Muslim states, civil and religious law are identical, such that sharia courts hold the sword of the state. No Jewish religious court has had the capacity to inflict violence since the 1st century CE; the first detailed codification of Jewish law appears in the 3rd century in the Mishnah. The rabbis of antiquity explicitly put in abeyance ancient applications of violence, such as the injunction to kill a rebellious son (Deuteronomy 21:18-21); the Talmud (Sanhedrin 71a) states that no Jewish court ever handed down such a sentence. Killing of rebellious children, as noted, happens in Muslim countries, and is sadly frequent among Muslim immigrant communities in the West.

Jewish law, though, requires no adaptation to modern Western law, for modern Western law ultimately derives from Jewish principles, as Harvard's Eric Nelson most recently showed in his 2010 book The Hebrew Republic, and Michael Novak explained in his 2002 volume On Two Wings. Jewish law proceeds from God's Covenant with each member of the Jewish people. The notion of an intermediate sovereign, such as Islam's "governor" of the family, is inconceivable in Jewish law, for there is only one Sovereign, the King of Kings. The powers of the earthly sovereign derive from God and are limited by God's laws. The American founding notion of "inalienable rights" stems from the Hebrew concept of covenant: a grant of rights implies a Grantor, and an irreversible grant implies a God who limits his own sovereignty in covenant with mankind. (End quote)

Mr. Goldman is senior editor at First Things

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