You CANNOT go in with tips on nails!!
Nail polish is wanted too.....a manicure and a pedicure is something we get because we WANT to. but we have to take it off, for the mikwah.
Of course, she can't go in......this is a no brainer.
MG, you're citing the law. Congratulations. The issue isnt' the law. The issue is whether or not some mikva hag should be enforcing the law.
"They are possibly causing a person to transgress on a "Karet" of the Laws of Nidda, rather than allow her to be more lenient than them a bit"
Anyway, there might be mitigating circumstances that permit dunking with nail tips in this case. Worse, the woman might go home and commit an issur kores, if the mikva hag denies her entrance.
Anyone who wants to dunk should be allowed to dunk. It's her life. Her conciounce, and her sin if she does it wrong.
The mikva lady is a helper. Not a police woman.
DB, do you live your life according to the poskim on Kashrut.org? Because if you do, your Pesach must have been a hell of a lot easier to clean and shop for. Gotta love those Abadis.
No way. I don't pasken like they do, but real rabbis, too, would say most women work, too hard.
Anyway, do you agree with the point? That it isn't up to the mikva lady to decide who can dunk and who can't? That we should err on the side of cautian and let any woman dunk, whenever she wants, because the alternative is a Biblical prohibition?
To some extent, yes. I have an issue with overzealous mikvah ladies who feel that if a woman's nails are too long they cannot in good faith allow them to dunk. That is a situation where they become the mikvah police instead of the mikvah attendants. However, there are instances where one would be hard pressed to find a posek who would feel that a tevilah with that particular chatzitzah is considered an valid tevilah. I am not a posek (nor a poseket, for that matter), but I am sure that there are many poskim who feel that a tevilah with such a chatzitzah is as invalid a tevilah as one in a bathtub. In that case, is what Aaron Abadi says really true? Is it better to be tovel in a mikvah and THINK it is valid then not to be tovel at all? Is that really how Orthodox Judaism works? I dont think so. Apply this situation to ALMOST keeping kosher or ALMOST getting married. Does one little detail in these instances matter? Yes. Do we rely on a mashgiach or a mesader kedushin to put his foot down on these matters? I hope so.
Is it better to be tovel in a mikvah and THINK it is valid then not to be tovel at all?
That's not the case here. Abadi says their are poskim who would permit a dunking with tips, or who would not invalidate a dunking because of them
If that opinion exists - anywhere - the mikva lady has no right to demand a higher standard from her customer.
If that opinion exists - anywhere - the dunking is valid.
Do we rely on a mashgiach or a mesader kedushin to put his foot down on these matters?
1 - we CHOOSE the mashgiach and mesader kidushin we like best
2 - the mikva hag isn't a mashgiach or a mesader kidushin. She's a glorfied bathroom attendant. If a woman arrives and says, "my rabbi permits this" the hag's obligation is to say, "yes, yes sahib"
So if there is some Rabbi somewhere that says something is kosher (particularly interesting question considering Aaron Abadi's opinions on kashrut), then a mashgiach is required to certify it? Who says? Halacha IS about standards. And yes, I believe a mikvah lady DOES have a requirement to ensure that a tevilah is valid.
I. Don't. Agree.
DD, you seem comfortable pushing a relativist bent to every argument. If this is the Sephardic Mikvah's standard, then they are entitled to it.
The only thing that would make me feel otherwise is if I learned that for an extra $50 they'll let you dunk wearing a wetsuit (or tips for that matter).
SW, who don't you agree with?
By the way, DB, maybe this jibes with my "Middle-aged mom" image that I've been trying so hard to shed, but I find the term "mikvah hag" to be extremely offensive. And I love a little irreverence from time to time.
Ridiculous. A mikva is entitled to have in-house halakhic standards.
Still there are certain things that are permissible if a woman has a mark on her that "doesn't bother her" it doesn't matter. I had glitter nail polish on once and no matter what I did a few tiny flecks of glitter seemed to repear on my nails here and there. I really did not care but the mikva lady sent me back a dozen times to scrub my cuticles until they were literally bleeding. I was really ticked off but determined to get into the mikva somehow.
I will never wear glitter nail polish again but that was unacceptable. That happened years ago but if that happened now I would have a Rav on the phone before the lady could even look at my hands.
Tips do seem extreme to me, but I understand the guys issue.
And yeah the term "hag" is offensive. These women give up a lot of their spare time and probably have to see a lot more than any person should ever have to look at.
So if there is some Rabbi somewhere that says something is kosher (particularly interesting question considering Aaron Abadi's opinions on kashrut), then a mashgiach is required to certify it? Who says? Halacha IS about standards.
The mikva lady is not a mashgiach. And if a mashgiach allows something that isn't kosher into his kitchen, by his lights the kitchen is no longer kosher. That's not the case with the mikva.
DB, you seem comfortable pushing a relativist bent to every argument. If this is the Sephardic Mikvah's standard, then they are entitled to it.
Do you even know what the word relatavist means? And anyway they _emphatically are not_ entitled to their standards IF these two conditions are met (a) relaxing the standard does no damage to the facility (you can't treif a mikva) and if (b) there's a very real danger that refusing to relax the standard (and allow the woman to dunk according to a lenient position) will lead her to violate a d'oyraysa. That's the case here. They stood on ceremony for no good reason; as a result they may have caused a woman to violate an isser kores. Outrageous.
Ridiculous. A mikva is entitled to have in-house halakhic standards.
Rediculous yourself. You can't "treif up" a mikva so what possible difference does it make if a woman who isn't supposed to uses it takes a dunk? And anyway in this case, she's allowed to dunk, and she meets the requirements of a lenient position. Why in the world would you drive a woman away from the mikva if she meets the lenient position? That's outrageuous.
And yeah the term "hag" is offensive
Fine no more hag
Our mikva in North Miami Beach allows women to tovel with false nails.
The mikva lady does not make her own halachic decisions, and we have a rav on call for shailos.
I assume that the mikva attendants in Brooklyn also have a rav whom they follow. On the assumption that the mikva lady is following the psak she herself was told, your anger at her is misplaced.
Once a friend complained to me that a non-frum visiting lady from out of town was turned away from our mikva, and this friend made the same angry argument made here--that by turning away the lady, she was maybe causing someone to engage in an aveirah with a penalty of kareis.
When I asked the mikva lady about it, she told me that the woman in question had never heard of doing a hefsek tahara, bedikos or anything. She was clearly not religious. She had been using the mikva improperly in her home town for years, and had never learned the dinim of taharas hamishpacha.
No one there had ever said anything to her. Were they really helping her? It's the doctor with the sugar pill all over again.
Thank you Toby Katz.
Toby, your case it not relevant to the case with the tips. In the case with the tips she meets a lenient opinion, and she should not be denied access -- especially when you consider that she can't possibly damage the mikva!
As for your case, the woman should be told the law - of course - but if, even then she chooses not to keep it, that's between her and God. Since allowing her into the mikva does no damage to the mikva what's the harm? If the woman is making an informed decision, really what's the harm?
Going forward, folks PLEASE distinguish between case a (woman meets halachic standards, but perhaps not the standards of that particular mikva woman) and case B (woman does not meet normative standards)
I say:
Case A - LEt her dunk. She's following a legitimate lenient opinion, and unlike the case of a kosher kitchen, letting her use the mikva does no damage to the mikva, nor does it affect other dunkers
Case B - Tell her the law. Be direct and complete. If she insists on dunking anyway: MYOB. She can't harm the mikva, but denying her access might very well harm *her* relationship with Judaism
Wow. Mark it down. Toby Katz proved the Bears point! She demonstrates that nail tips meet the lenient opinion! And if so, why the hell should the woman be kept out. She's following her rav, meeting his opinion, and can't hurt the mikva so let her swim!!
The fact that once upon a time a woman who "had never heard of doing a hefsek tahara, bedikos or anything" really has no bearing on this case. Why did Toby bring it up?
To muddle the issues, perhaps?
It's asinine to compare religious law to medical fact, meaning Toby's suger pill analogy is asinine, too.
The issue isn't damaging the mikva. The observer ("mikva lady") is their to ensure a kosher tevila. Necessarily the mikva has halakhic standards for what that means. A mikva cannot be expected to maintain everyone else's lenient position.
That said, I believe a different situation is in order when there are no alternatives. When there is one mikva available no one has a right to impose their stringencies on anyone, in my opinion. That is hardly the case with the mikva of Avenue S.
Frankly, I've seen women drive away from there on Friday night, so its not as if that mikva has a fantical purity test.
Does a person not love God because they wear tips?
If God were present, for real, what do they think He would say? Would nail polish be relevant?
I am banging my head against a *&^ing wall here..
Seems to me these ladies are threatened by other women's beauty.
We should be celebrating each other's beauty, not repressing it.
Oh DB, this is really so unbelievably stupid and heart-breaking.. You've done it again....
All that debating.. Oy! 
Seems to me, the bottom line, if we were all in a state of devotional love and heart-surrender to God, there is nobody can stand in the way betwen us and God. Nobody should have that right, and we should GIVE nobody that right.
If you really Love, it all dissolved into meaninglessness anyway, and there is only love left behind.
I spoke to (the mikvah lady)_________ who gave me the, "I'm just following orders" routine. That's the same excuse that the Nazis were using.
Whatever else you have to say about this incident, don't you think comparing the mikvah lady to a Nazi is a bit overboard?
Also, Toby Katz, the point is that the woman had her own psak saying this was not a chatzitza, so there was no reason to prevent her from immersing. The case you brought was completely irrelevant. The purpose of a mikvah lady is not to enforce the psak of her own Rav, it's simply to make sure that the person going to the mikvah does not have any chatzitzas and is completely underwater.
Chandira: Are you even Jewish? There's something called halacha, which is the basis of Judaism. Not "devotional love and heart-surrender" whatever that means.
So, Chandira describes what Judaism means to her, and you tell her what the basis of Judaism is for everyone and question whether she is even Jewish because she deviates from your definition, is that it, Joe?
Is the question here really about tips? I don't think so. The question here is whether the women who work at the mikva are there to ensure that every tevilah is a kosher tevilah, or just there, as DovBear puts it, to be "glorified bathroom attendants". I think it is the former. And yes, I do think they have the right to uphold certain standards of preparation before immersion in their mikvah. However, the point that I do have to concede to you DB, is that the analogy od Kashrus IS a flawed one. A woman who immerses in an invalid manner does NOT "treif" up the mikvah, as unkosher food does to a kitchen. So there is a real difference there.
Chandira is coming from a different perspective. Mine is somewhat different too.
I was brought up in a home where Taharat Mishpacha (Family Purity) was observed. My mother went to Mikvah until, at age 35, she had to have a hysterectomy. Boy, did she NOT miss the whole Nidda laws and restriction.
Chandira - If you think the Mikvah details are stringent, you ain't seen nothing yet. My best friend in college called me in tears one day because, newly married, she now had to MAIL HER PANTIES to her Rabbi because she had spotted between periods. She was mortified. But she and her husband had no idea if they could have sexual relations or not.
(Sexual relations -- and in fact any physical contact -- are prohibited during the woman's period and for several days afterwards, and permissable again only after she goes to the Mikvah. That's an over-simplification, but that's what I can give you for now.)
It does seem strange to think, though, that what is unacceptable under one Rabbi is acceptable under another; thus the punishment of "karet" (being cut off from the Jewish people) will or will not be enforced, depending on the rabbi you follow. Is God, who is the only being who can enforce karet, keeping a list of who follows which rabbi?
Rav Chaim Ozer has a Teshuva that says they should let them be Toivel in such a case, but that it shouldn't be encouraged.
Mirty--What is important is that you have a Rav that you trust, and whose opinions you always follow
"If God were present, for real, what do they think He would say? Would nail polish be relevant?
I am banging my head against a *&^ing wall here.."
Yeah, but chandira, you don't think god cares about going to the mikva in the first place, cuz it's all in the heart.
"So, Chandira describes what Judaism means to her, and you tell her what the basis of Judaism is for everyone and question whether she is even Jewish because she deviates from your definition, is that it, Joe?"
oh hogwash. He questioned that because she offered a thoroughly Christian interpretation of what God stands for. (She didn't write about what "judaism means to her" either, she said what "god" means to her.) And she is free to understand God however makes sense to her! But she is not free to call her views orthodox, or to impose her conception of religion on orthodox jews. And this really over the top:
"Seems to me these ladies are threatened by other women's beauty.
We should be celebrating each other's beauty, not repressing it. "
Yeah, right, the women here are threatened by the idea of a woman in nail tips. You are so toasted, and so smug, and so .....brainwashed it's not funny.
"I had glitter nail polish on once and no matter what I did a few tiny flecks of glitter seemed to repear on my nails here and there. I really did not care but the mikva lady sent me back a dozen times to scrub my cuticles until they were literally bleeding."
She did you a favor. Leftover glitter is probably a bigger shayla than nail tips, *even if you don't care* and aren't makpid. And she figured you didn't know that, as I figure. Can you find someone to be matir? Sure, especially if the rav is only going to hear about it on the phone, and not see it, and not know what you are describing. And it might be OK. But what she figured is that you are a religious woman, you won't go home and have sex without being in the mikva, and that next month, the worst that might happen is that you go to some other mikva. That's not necessarily the case with the woman with nail tips, and it's appropriate for a mikva lady to use her judgement about that sort of thing.
I don't think that mikva ladies have any business indulging an observant woman, who has pictures from seminary and everything, who the mikva lady thinks is under the impression that something is less tricky a shayla than it is and wants to be maykil. There are lots of people who go and pasken for themselves and don't know what they are doing. Of course, the mikva lady may not know better, but odds are she's seen it before and *does* know better. Mikva ladies might not be responsible for things that people *come in* knowing they are relying on a heter (as with nail tips), especially people not from their community. But when people have a shayla on the spot, and they start paskening for themselves that they are "sure" some rabbi will be matir, she can't let that happen.
"You CANNOT go in with tips on nails!!
Nail polish is wanted too.....a manicure and a pedicure is something we get because we WANT to. but we have to take it off, for the mikwah.
Of course, she can't go in......this is a no brainer."
No it's not a no brainer. Not tips and not nail polish that is unchipped. Rabbi Abadi has a decent case.
The no-brainer is that leftover glitter is a trickier question.
DB,
Your compatriot--,your competitor.
You had the last discussion with him,
eemie: " So, Chandira describes what Judaism means to her, and you tell her what the basis of Judaism is for everyone and question whether she is even Jewish because she deviates from your definition, is that it, Joe?"
For me, it's a matter of respect. As a liberal Jewish woman, I have no business telling observant Jewish women that the should ignore important matters of halacha becuase they might "feel like it". I have no business judging this whole mikveh lady issue at all. So I'll refrain from doing so
Oh please anonymous- you think I don't know any halacha?! I'm going to chalk that up to sexism but you are SOOOO out of line.
I know what I'm talking about. There is absolutely no mitzva to make a woman bleed to get off what might be considered a chatiza, especially one which was totally unnoticed prior to the mikva lady holding up my hands under the bright lights time and again.
If you want to say that the mikva lady has the right to refuse me for any reason she sees fit I'll buy that but to accuse me of not knowing halacha when you don't even know me really irks me.
It's tragic that important moral issues at the heart of the family relationship -- which is at the heart of civilization -- are being left to the cold free market system of competing mikvas, on the one hand, and the isolated wilderness of out-of-town, on the other.
When elected president, I promise that the Federal Department of Health and Moral Services will assure the highest national standards for Family Purity Education and Training. The Almighty has given our Great Nation too many blessings for us to allow His love to be squandered at the hands of Nazis, New York Times reporters, or the Dictatorships of Relativism who would impose their so-called "morality" on our upstanding women of mikvahs.
I would like to take this opportunity to assure my Jewish brethren that just as I am committed to extending President Bush's loving policy of encouraging adoption of 3-day-old embryos and of ensuring that the Federal Government allows no obstacles to those with a faith-based conviction that all copulation should leave to pregnancy and/or death, I will ensure that holy baptism of the Jewish Family Purity will not be sullied with the sordid waters of laxity, lenieny or lust.
Clarification issued 8:02pm Office Press Secretary of Bill Frist: President Frist promises not to increase taxes whatsoever to fund the baptism of Jewish purity program. Increased econmic activity will expand the marketplace through tax cuts on luxury goods. the purity baptism grant program will be administered by the bureau of reclamation, which makes sense if you think about it. reclaiming family values one mikva at a time.
Reclaiming family values one mikva at a time.
Good one. LOL
New platform: "No niddah left behind"
This is not the worst Mikva scandal in Jewish history. There is a far better one in a gemara in berachos.
So lets play name that Rabbi !!
This Rabbi was fond of watching women in the Mikvah (no, this is not a joke, don’t take my word for it, look it up, it’s in there), to make sure they were dunking correctly.
When he was pressed by his Talmudic peers about the overt sexual nature of this habit, he replied, “They are all like white geese in front of me”.
Whatever that means.
Anyway, 2000 years ago our religion found it fit to sanction a mikvah that superceded the laws of Tznius, to satisfy the unusual (to say the least) pastimes of one of it’s contributing Rabbinic scholars, it seems wholly likely that Judaism should at least meet it’s abundance of “tip” wearing followers halfway.
"Oh please anonymous- you think I don't know any halacha?! I'm going to chalk that up to sexism but you are SOOOO out of line."
any halacha? THIS halacha. Why do you think I'm sexist, btw. I'm sure many of the men here haven't studied the relevant halachos thoroughly either, as none of the men set you straight. Where is the sexism in thinking that the mikva *lady* might have more experience and even knowledge than you (and the men and women who didn't correct you) do?
"I know what I'm talking about. There is absolutely no mitzva to make a woman bleed to get off what might be considered a chatiza, especially one which was totally unnoticed prior to the mikva lady holding up my hands under the bright lights time and again."
You're right that there is no mitzva to make a woman bleed. But you're wrong that something by definition is not a chatzitza if getting it off would make you bleed. That's a rule of thumb that people repeat, where the "will it bleed" is a stand-in for OTHER questions, and that mikva ladies (if we are beating up on them) like to repeat, but it's not a conceptual category. You've heard this said in other contexts - when the potential chatzitza is part of the body (eg small pieces of cuticle) and cases where it never served any function. The question is whether you'd remove it if it were easy to remove.
Thank you for confirming that you were relying on a rule of thumb as though it were some kind of conceptual basis of halacha, and that you indeed did not understand the problem properly.
The bright lights are not relevant unless they are brighter than lights that you see under any other conditions (which is not the case in most mikvas). If she took out a microscope or a magnifying glass, you'd be correct to protest.
"If you want to say that the mikva lady has the right to refuse me for any reason she sees fit I'll buy that but to accuse me of not knowing halacha when you don't even know me really irks me."
I said that you don't realize that THIS question is not as simple as you think it is, and you've confirmed that, so cut the outrage out. The horrible assumption that *I* made about you was that IF you realized that the mikva lady was likely correct that you were extrapolating incorrectly, that you would not be so blase' about things.
If I'm wrong about you, and you wouldn't care, then I guess I have the wrong idea about you...But I think I'm right and the only issue here is that you think you know better than the mikva lady, and of course, in this case, the mikva lady was correct to see glitter as the sort of shayla where it's virtually impossible to get a clear heter, (unlike nail tips), and to keep you cleaning your nails until the glitter was gone.
The lights were brighter than normal.
And she looked more closely than I ever do.
Also, I don't feel that your anonymous sanctimonious tone does much for me in terms of proving your case for halacha and it is on my nerves. I was not blase, I was bleeding- there is a difference.
What I meant was the mivka lady should have called a rav before she made me bleed over some glitter I didn't even see. I was happy to try and remove it again the first three times she asked me (each time I didn't see there was any left at all). Once you are drawing blood and by causing tears in my cuticles (another possible chatziza) you are treading on thin ice.
many of the sefardic women who use that mikva are not even frum some even drive there friday night.the chillul hashem here is massive.oh' lah'noo
You can argue (I won't, but it can be done) that driving to the mikva is preferable to putting off mikva.
One leads to an issur koret; the other is a rabanun.
Driving is d'oraita - combustion engine, anyone?
The (Conservative) Rabbinical Assembly ruled:
"...As we have already indicated, participation in public service on the
Sabbath is in the light of modern conditions to be regarded as a great
_mitzwah_, since it is indispensable to the preservation of the religious
life of American Jewry. Therefore it is our considered opinion that the
positive value involved in the participation in public worship on the
Sabbath outweighs the negative value of refraining from riding in an
automobile."
I read the discussion in Klein's (Conservative) Jewish Religious
Practice some time back. He writes that the movement recognizes that
although some have tried, from the point of specific Halachic argument
its very hard to allow this using the normal Halachic rules. What they
decided to do was to use "Horat Shaah" (temporary decree) and "Eit
Laasot LaHashem Hoferu Toretacha" (literally "There is a time to make
for HaShem so they have broken Your Law"): the concept that special
times require extra-Halachic measures. Classically, the model for this comes from Eliyahu on Har Carmel, when he built an alter outside of the Mikdash because of a special need to counter the Baalists. The analogy to today is that if they do not allow this, thousands and thousands of Jews will have no exposure to Judaism whatsoever.
it is not that they are mechllal shabus for the mitzvah.these are sefardim not reformed jews.to them orthodoxy is the only authentic form of yahadus,they are mechlalel shabus anyway and are coming to the mikva bec. the bais yosef promised brechos to shomray taharas meshpacha.
Anon - I wasn't arguing with you about what the Conservative movement says about driving on Shabbat; I was merely correcting this statement:
You can argue (I won't, but it can be done) that driving to the mikva is preferable to putting off mikva.
One leads to an issur koret; the other is a rabanun.
Anonymous | 05.23.05 - 10:13 am | #
"Once you are drawing blood and by causing tears in my cuticles (another possible chatziza) you are treading on thin ice."
the point here is that glitter is not a problem like torn cuticles (which if they are small and painful to cut are not a problem because they are a part of your body) and the mikva lady knew that and you didn't, which is why it's a good thing that she is more than a bathroom attendant.
And if you can't get it off, you might be ok b'dieved, and you might be better off going the next night. Just saying that you are blase about it being ok and the mikva lady knew what she was talking about and if you perceived that, you wouldnt be on the bandwagon of "they have no right." They have the right because their clientele is like you, and mostly DO care about getting it right.
"sanctimonious tone"
sanctimony is getting angry at posters who point out that you aren't in a position to pasken. Imagine such gall as to think that the average woman going to the mikva has memorized a lot of rules that cover things *most* of the time, but doesn't know enough to pasken on new situations! The chutzpah! The sexism!
Mirty That's horrific!!
Joe I'm not Jewish. Does "Chandira" sound Jewish??
Anonymous 5.22.05 I'm not Christian or any more brainwashed than you are. And I use my real name.
Goldaleah I can respect things that don't break people's heart, surely. But this? I'm sorry, I mean no disrespect, but it seems kind of petty.
There is an orthodox mikvah on Ave S in Brooklyn, NY that permits sephardic women to tovel with acrylic nails bec if they did not there would be no tevila at all. I believe it is not our right to say whether this is right or wrong - let's let G-d and their consciences deal with iot.
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There is an Orthodox Mikveh that accepts the rulings of a true orthodox rabbi. If the rabbi Permits Nail Polish she will be permitted. This Mikveh also opens late Friday afternoon so the women don't have to go out Friday Night and get sick from wet hair....
Sephardic Women always went to the mikveh in the day time, I don't understand why today they are not permitted.
Well this Mikveh is on Kings Highway between East 5th Street and Ocean Parkway.
I'm sure the haredeem will call it not Kosher, but Let Hashem Forgive those idiots and not judge them harshly
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