Names for body parts and bodily functions (merged)

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micki

Fri, Oct 29 2004, 8:36 am

Quote:

yiddishe mammas definitely did not use the yiddish vulgarity with their children!

excuse me motek but I think you have gone too far. I believe you owe an apology for insinuating that anyone who chooses to use a word to decribe private areas is not "yiddishe" or going according to torah. english, hebrew, or yiddish. I'd like to hear a psak that children are not allowed to have a name or their body parts.
please remember torah is not an anatomy book. it is a guide to learn from.

and this site is not an "ask the rabbi" if proudmom or anyone else out there wanted the halachic terminology for it then they would ask their rav. they are asking here for practical advice from other mothers.

Motek

Fri, Oct 29 2004, 10:47 am

hold it! I didn't write just "any word". I wrote that yiddish mammas did not use the yiddish vulgarity - the slang word in yiddish when training their kids, understand?

please go ahead and ask a rav what to call children's private parts, I'd be interested in knowing what a rav (or rabbis, if there's a diff. of opinion) says.

Torah, as you say, is a guide to learn from, and more than that, it contains all wisdom. After all, G-d "looked into the Torah" and created the world.

and again, as I wrote to you earlier, I am not recommending that mothers use the Torah terminology when training their kids

my "practical advice" is don't name it, it's not necessary, and I'm glad to see Freilich agrees.

gryp

Fri, Oct 29 2004, 10:56 am

thanx motek and frielich, you really helped me. my dilemma is solved!

Ozmom

Sat, Oct 30 2004, 10:05 am

Motek

a couple of examples
In chumash: Shafcha - aiver

in Gemarah: oma - aiver

and there is more.

There is nothing wrong or dirty in calling it what it is

my husband says that osa makom is slang, a modern invention. So just because you called it that in Kallah classes doesn't say thats the what we should be teaching our kids.

ForeverYoung
Guest

Sun, Oct 31 2004, 1:21 pm

it's only as dirty as people make it.

I explained to my kids when they asked, simply, this how boys & girls are. These are private areas, etc. I still do not know how to call my daughter's, as I feel term vigina is too explicit & corresponds only to the s-xual function of aiver (anatomocally, girls do not pee from vigana either, but boys do from aiver).

Also, we live in a very priverted world. If somebody makes inapropriate advances at a child, the child should be able to verbalise it!!!
My neighbour's mother is a social worker, she dealt w/ a kid who was molested in a yeshiva bathroom by an older student!!!!!!!!!!!!
(lo Aleinu, G-d forbid)

Also, how would you deal w/ boys (and occasionally girls) who discover the pleasure of touch there? You can't pretend they don't exist. Don't make a big deal about it, & your kids will be just fine.

Motek

Sun, Oct 31 2004, 2:03 pm

Quote:

In chumash: Shafcha - aiver

you're referring to parshas Ki Seitzei 23:2 where it says that a "petzua daka" and a "chrus shafcha" may not marry a Jew from birth

Rashi explains that "petzua daka" means his "beitzim" [lit. eggs] meaning testicles are injured or crushed, and "chrus shafcha" means that his "gid" is ripped. Gid (like the prohibition of eating the gid ha'nashe) is nerve or sinew or tendon, and is not a special word to name that private part

Quote:

in Gemarah: oma - aiver

please provide a source, and if you have any more, please - with sources

Quote:

my husband says that osa makom is slang, a modern invention.

slang? modern?

Rashi in Shemos 35:23 uses it and it's used in the Gemara!

Rashi also uses "beis ha'rechem" - literally, "house of the womb" so the word "rechem" for womb or uterus is used.

Quote:

There is nothing wrong or dirty in calling it what it is

I explained how our Torah and later Jewish sources davka do not refer to these private parts by name. This is the Jewish approach.

Quote:

Also, how would you deal w/ boys (and occasionally girls) who discover the pleasure of touch there

there's a thread on that called Boys will be Boys

Ozmom

Mon, Nov 01 2004, 3:59 am

motek, I think it was somewhere else it said it in chumash, I''ll wait for my husband to come home and find it
regarding the slang, yes and shulchan oruch also uses it but its still a slang and when I say modern I don't mean 21st centuary modern, I mean modern versus chumash.

in regards to us calling it according to Torah, even if what you are saying is true that Torah doesn't give a name,(which I don't think is true but I will look up some more sources) even so, The Torah doesn't dictate everything we must do, torah makes room for some individuality in our lives,
for instance, there is no mention of computers or internet in the Torah so according to what you are saying, we shouldn't all be in here even discussing this!!!!
for more on this topic please refer to my post in intellectual stuff, I have a paragraph devoted to this, under how pious one should be

Motek

Mon, Nov 01 2004, 4:31 pm

Quote:

regarding the slang, yes and shulchan oruch also uses it but its still a slang

the Gemara and Shulchan Aruch use slang? That's the first I've heard of it ... shock

Sounds bizarre to me. Perhaps you will explain.

the sole reason why the terms were used in Kalla Class (though she named them in English first, so girls who knew the English terms would understand her) is because this is how Jews refer to them. She deliberately made this very point.

Quote:

The Torah doesn't dictate everything we must do

since you raise the identical issue that was raised in the Independence and Control thread, I will quote myself from that thread. The question posed there was:

Quote:

why does there have to be a source in the torah?

and I responded (with minor changes):

Quote:

It's fundamental to our beliefs that Hashem looked into the Torah and created the world ("histakel b'oraisa u'bara alma") and as the mishna in Avos says, "turn it [Torah] and turn it, for everything is contained within it" ("hafoch ba, v'ha hafoch ba, foch ba, d'kula ba").

The fact that we don't see every last thing contained in Torah is not a reflection on the Torah, but a reflection of our lack of knowledge.

I would like to make an important distinction between values/hashkafa and anything else. To explain - our Jewish values are conveyed by the Torah, Nach, Mishna, Gemara, and later commentaries, and is transmitted (mesorah) from one generation to the next. Brain surgery, computers, electricity, the Internet, sliced bread, etc. though all in Torah, are less readily accessible through Torah.

And when the ability to do brain surgery is developed, it's allowed, because Torah says a doctor can heal you. And when electricity is discovered, rabbonim had to rule on its use on Shabbos.

When it comes to chinuch, which is the topic here, our only way of knowing how Hashem wants us to educate our children is by what He tells us in His Torah. Even if you want to glean advice from non-Torah sources, it's vital that anything presented without Torah sources be viewed with Torah eyes to see whether it is indeed compatible with Torah.

so even if you don't see specific guidelines about what age, or how, to toilet train, or what to call private parts, it doesn't mean we're free to do as we please and we are permitted to accept what the secular experts have to say should we choose to do so. They have advice? Fine. The question must be - is this compatible with Torah.

as to your post that you refer to, I'm sorry to say (but you brought it up) that much of it opposes basic Judaism (for example, the mitzva of Kodoshim Tihiyu) and is incompatible with basic Chassidic philosophy as in Tanya and the teachings of the Lubavitcher Rebbe.

Ozmom

Tue, Nov 02 2004, 12:46 am

much of what I said motek was based of what the lub Rebbe said

Tefila

Tue, Nov 02 2004, 12:51 am

Quote:

Also, we live in a very priverted world. If somebody makes inapropriate advances at a child, the child should be able to verbalise it

"I tell my children that noone is allowed to touch them etc unless it is somone you know and we know kids the halach not to touch our private parts it applys to anyone unless you need the bathroom or to wash". and no I don't go into details I tell them this matter of factly! I just don't get graphic with what to call it etc I tell them if anyone starts they should'nt feel scared to tell us. Rolling Eyes

What a world that we have to warn our kids conc these atrocities.
And yes we can still be aidel-refined in our speech !

Motek

Tue, Nov 02 2004, 9:21 am

Ozmom wrote:

much of what I said motek was based of what the lub Rebbe said

if you could go back and provide sources, it would help us clarify that

Tefila

Tue, Nov 02 2004, 10:23 am

Quote:

The fact that we don't see every last thing contained in Torah is not a reflection on the Torah, but a reflection of our lack of knowledge

and

Quote:

When it comes to chinuch, which is the topic here, our only way of knowing how Hashem wants us to educate our children is by what He tells us in His Torah. Even if you want to glean advice from non-Torah sources, it's vital that anything presented without Torah sources be viewed with Torah eyes to see whether it is indeed compatible with Torah

well said motek Smile

Tefila

Tue, Nov 02 2004, 3:36 pm

Quote:

would you not be the one to talk to them about the facts of life etc...?

Rochel Leah what has naming body parts got to do with becoming a teenager and since you did bring it up Yes certain things we do tell but only nesseccary things and not how the goyshe books tell us but how the Torah teaches us And I yep I make plenty mistakes embarrassed

that is why we have Rabbanim for explaining and showing us when we can sometimes go wrong Exclamation

proudmom

Tue, Nov 02 2004, 3:44 pm

So should I leave my daughter alone and let her call it the way she is or should I correct her?

Tefila

Tue, Nov 02 2004, 3:48 pm

If you don't feel comfortable with what you have read conc Torahs loshon then speak to mashpiah or rav Smile

proudmom

Tue, Nov 02 2004, 4:39 pm

I dont feel comfortable to speak to a Rav about this situation that is why I post it here.

Tefila

Tue, Nov 02 2004, 5:25 pm

Proudmom I understand! motek provided sources and if you can tell your daughter in an nice loshon what to call these areas you would have taught her speech on a refined level

Yael

Wed, Nov 03 2004, 1:11 pm

last night I had a long discusion with a well respected woman here about this, she said: (to get to the point) that there is nothing wrong with calling private parts by a baby name. the point is that we dont use a coarse name, that we refine it in some way, b/c the torah did teach us to speak in a clean and refined manner. so a baby name is a refinement and its fine, as the child gets older and has no need to use the name on a regular basis, you SHOULD teach her that we speak in a nice way and dont refer to these parts for no good reason.
yes, proudmom, you should correct her, and give her a name to use, and also explain that we speak nicely and dont talk about it all the time. that its not funny to go around yelling out the names.

Rochel Leah

Wed, Nov 03 2004, 2:04 pm

:

quote="freilich"]as they get older thru other kids they anyway learn real names but in our house in our mikdash we are carefull with the language we use even with babys.[/quote]

you are right that they have nothing to do with each other, but as you had mentioned in a previous postythat they are going to learn the names anyway through other kids- so they could also learn the facts of life from other kids- so I was asking wouldnt you be the one that they hear it from...from someone they trust and look up to.

Tefila

Wed, Nov 03 2004, 2:18 pm

Quote:

so they could also learn the facts of life from other kids- so I was asking wouldnt you be the one that they hear it from...from someone they trust and look up to

Rochel Leah That sort of thing they would hear from us the correct version, the Torah one just b/c we speak aidel - refined it doesnt mean we dont speak shock

just find a more refined way to get the exact message across... in secular terms this would be could diplomacy
Talking about diplomacy who won u.s presidency? Smile

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