Why cover your hair?

leah233

Sun, May 06 2018, 9:32 am

Is she asking (1) does the Torah actually say to (2) why does the Torah say to(3) why do you cover it when you have friends who don't.

It is difficult to explain this to a six year old but my answers would be as follows

(1)Yes it is a mitzvah that

(2)before Hashem created the world he saw the world would be better if followed and

(3)I do not know why some people do not keep it

amother

Taupe

Sun, May 06 2018, 10:25 am

amother wrote:

I told someone (my dd is too young) that I cover because According to halacha it’s required, and there are those that don’t bec they rely on leniencies that I don’t.

I don't judge what anyone else does though just want to point out that since it is a Torah-level obligation, I don't think there is any leniency to rely on to completely uncover.

amother

Aquamarine

Sun, May 06 2018, 10:58 am

where does it say in the torah that you have to cover your hair? I believe the source was from isha sotah and I believe that some people hold that her hair was "let down" or something like that instead of uncovered so they hold that the hair doesn't have to be covered. It's been a while since I learned this. I cover my hair fully because the rabbis I hold by say that you have to. I find that much is not so black and white.

amother

Taupe

Sun, May 06 2018, 11:05 am

amother wrote:

Most mitzvos deoiraisa are not black and white written in Chumash.
A Torah level-obligation is something that chazal explain as sourced from the Torah. It's clearly written in gemara that hair covering is required. Torah sh'bal peh is just as much part of the Torah as Torah she'beksav.
A Rabbinical obligation, on the other hand, is something stipulated by Rabbonim as an extra precaution to what is learned from the Torah.

(I'm not trying to change the way anyone does things. I'm pointing it out because OP is asking why we cover.)

southernbubby

Sun, May 06 2018, 11:36 am

But the topic is how to explain various levels of Orthodox observance to a small child. If she was asking about someone who wasn't frum, we could explain that not everyone had a chance to go to a Jewish day school and learn about the Torah and if the child was asking about someone who had grown up frum but was no longer frum, we could say that right now the person is having trouble being frum so we have to be patient while they figure it out.

Now in the case of an Orthodox person who has a different view point about hair covering, why wouldn't it work to tell the truth; that different rabbonim had different opinions (you have to explain to a little kid what the word opinion means) and that this person's rabbi doesn't tell her that it is important but ours does say that it is important.

Throughout her life she will encounter frum people who don't all hold the same way. Some will be more lenient and some more stringent and some may actually be doing it wrong but understand themselves to be right but at the moment, it is best to tell her that this person has a different rabbi with a different standard.

amother

Jetblack

Sun, May 06 2018, 3:08 pm

Women must be covered and be protected from the outside world just as you would protect a sefer torah. Covering our hair is part of tzniut intended to protect the kedusha inherent in Jewish women. This is a primary issue for women.

Jewish women are holier than any other being because jewish souls come through them and thus they already have a built in direct connection between them and Hashem, that must be protected from the tumah in the outside world.

non jews and animals don't have the capacity to connect that jews do and men don't have the connection that women inherently have. Women are created holier. Jewish men have to do a lot of maasim that we don't in order to create and strengthen that connection. We already have it we just need to protect it and maintain it and tzniut is a big part of that.

If other women are not doing it, they are doing wrong. But we don't judge, each of us has our own path and not everyone is lucky enough to be educated about it. Everyone does as much or as little as they can and we just worry about ourselves and our maasim.

That' what I tell my daughter.

southernbubby

Sun, May 06 2018, 3:20 pm

amother wrote:

That is also very beautiful but little kids ask a lot of questions about things that they notice so how would you explain that to such a young kid? Kids also ask why black people are black and why special needs children are different? Everything has to be on the level that the little child can understand and also be sensitive to the fact that children often repeat things to other children or in front of people.

amother

Papaya

Sun, May 06 2018, 3:20 pm

amother wrote:

a 6 year old???

amother

Olive

Sun, May 06 2018, 4:14 pm

southernbubby wrote:

This is lovely too.

I told my kids since little that we all serve Hashem in different ways.
Little did I know then that her daddy will stop being religious at some point and she will therefore meet all kinds of people across the religious and not religious spectrum .

amother

Beige

Sun, May 06 2018, 11:54 pm

amother wrote:

What is the source you speak of? Anyways the Gemara is derived from the Mishnah based on rabbis discussions so your argument doesn’t hold true.

There’s a lot of naievete going on this post. I sincerely hope you don’t teach your children that some people don’t cover their hair because “they didn’t grow up frum”, but rather that there are different opinions and different rabbanim.

heidi

Mon, May 07 2018, 3:32 am

I don't think anyone holds that covering your hair is a mitzva dioratya. At most, it's a dirabbanan.
I think I would tell a 6 year old that we all serve Hashem in our own way. I cover my hair bcz. I learned that it's a mitzva for married women to do so. Some other people learned differently and so they do what they learned.
That's it. She's 6 for goodness sake.

amother

Taupe

Mon, May 07 2018, 3:38 am

heidi wrote:

Covering the majority of the hair is definitely considered a biblical obligation. A biblical obligation doesn't have to be spelled out right in the Torah to be such.

http://www.yoatzot.org/questio.....=1942

erm

Mon, May 07 2018, 4:24 am

In parshas Korach we see that On originally was part of the rebellion but at the end was not punished.
The Talmud in Sanhedrin 99b tells us that, as it happened, On's wife had the insight and intuition to see through Korach's evil scheme, and attempted to persuade her husband not to rebel against Moses, the leader of the Jewish people. Even after hearing her sound arguments, however, On told his wife that he had no choice since he had taken an oath to join Korach, and he couldn't turn back now. So On's wife decided to take matters into her own hands. She fed On a really good meal, and got him intoxicated with some strong booze. While he was sleeping inside the tent, she sat herself down at the entrance to the tent, with her hair fully uncovered. She knew that any minute, Korach would come by to pick up her husband for their planned rebellion against Moses. When Korach and his entourage came and saw her hair exposed, they immediately turned away from her tent, and left On to sleep through the entire rebellion and its aftermath.

We see from this story that married Jewish women always covered their hair in public, to the point that seeing a woman with her hair uncovered sitting outside her tent was shocking and caused men to turn aside to refrain from looking at her.

The Biblical source for married women covering their hair in public can be found in Parshas Naso (see Numbers 5:18; see also the Talmud in Kesubos 72a), and the great majority of Jewish women throughout history embraced this special tradition. [Divorced or widowed women are also required to cover their hair, although some Halachic authorities hold that their obligation is Rabbinic.]