Reaction to Article, "Orthodox Judaism treats women like filthy little things" (אשה או כלב או חזיר) 30/12/2011

By Shlomo Riskin

Shame on you, Yossi Sarid, for having written such a vitriolic, boorish and anti – intellectual attack on the Talmud, one of the most comprehensive and pluralistic studies in law and theology known to humanity! How dare you, Yossi Sarid, extract from out of the 7,711 Talmudic folio pages of Biblical commentary and conversation (compiled from 100 BCE- 800 CE) specifically those few and unrepresentative passages most foreign to the modern ear – and specifically those passages which have been rejected from normative Jewish law and practice?

Shame on you, Yossi Sarid, for having conveniently left out the words of Ben Azzai that "it is incumbent upon every man to teach his daughter Torah" (Mishnah Sotah 20a), a ruling which is responsible for the myriads of Orthodox women's seminaries teaching Torah (and, in many, even Talmud) on the highest of levels today in Israel! How dare you, Yossi Sarid, overlook Deborah, the first woman judge in Biblical history, and Salome Alexandra (139-67CE), the queen who ruled over Judea (without a King) during the Golden Age of the Second Commonwealth to the praise of all of the Talmudic Sages?

Shame on you, Yossi Sarid, for neglecting to mention that the first Alimony and Life Insurance Benefit Policy for women in history was drafted by the Sages of the Talmud, and was made part and parcel of our marriage ceremony for the past 2000 years in the form of the Ketubah! How dare you, Yossi Sarid, forget to report that in virtually every Orthodox Jewish home the ritual Friday evening mean is introduced with the entire assemblage singing the "Woman of Valor" passage from the end of the Biblical book of Proverbs, depicting women not only as presiding over the household but also as successful and even international businesspeople?

Shame on you, Yossi Sarid, for falsifying facts by omitting the normative Jewish laws forbidding a man from having relations with his wife without her consent as well as from divorcing his wife without her consent!

How dare you, Yossi Sarid, overlook the Talmudic adage that "a man must love his wife like himself and respect her more than himself," and the Talmudic urging that "a man must first satisfy his wife sexually before he satisfies himself"?

Above all, shame on you, Yossi Sarid, for joining with the Middle Age Inquisitioners who wrote similar anti-Talmud and anti-Jewish canards, hell-bent on burning the Talmud, expelling the Jews and destroying Judaism!