"Dignity of the congregation" as a defense mechanism: a halakhic ruling by Rabbi Joseph Messas.

This article seeks to cast light on a halakhic responsum of Rabbi Joseph Messas, one of the great halakhic authorities of the twentieth century in North Africa. The responsum deals with the questions of whether a barrier between men and women in the synagogue is necessary, and of whether women may be "called up" to the Torah. It offers a new understanding of the concept of "the dignity of the congregation" as well as fascinating accounts of Jewish women being called to the Torah, wearing the attire of Muslim women. Through analysis of this responsum, I shall map out various views and understandings of "the dignity of the congregation" and look at R. Messas's position through the prism of contemporary gender research.

I wish herein to examine a halakhic responsum that considers the development of the prohibition against women's participation in the public Torah reading in the synagogue and suggests that the concept of "the dignity of the congregation," the rationale usually cited for not giving women aliyyot to the Torah, has masked the true reason for this prohibition. At the same time, I will attempt, by focusing on the subject of aliyyot for women to the Torah, to map the diverse positions that have been taken regarding kevod hatzibbur, "the dignity of the congregation." (1)

Kevod hatzibbur is invoked in connection with six prohibitions cited in the Talmud: against reading publicly from a humash (i.e., a scroll containing only one part of the Pentateuch; BT Gittin 60a); against a kohen ascending the platform to bless the congregation with his shoes on (BT Sotah 40a); against the Torah being read in public by a minor dressed in ragged clothes (BT Megillah 24b); against rolling a Torah scroll (to the part that is to be read) in the presence of the congregation, which is thereby subjected to the inconvenience of waiting (BT Yoma 70a); against the prayer leader removing the cover from the ark (BT Sotah 39b); and against women and minors being called up to the Torah, a practice permitted in the Tosefta but prohibited by the Talmud (BT Megillah 23a).

The nature and meaning of this concept of "public dignity" or "the dignity of the congregation" have drawn the attention of academic (2) and rabbinic (3) writers alike. The issue, moreover, is inextricably tied to the contemporary (and ideological) halakhic examination of the place of women in the synagogue and in Jewish society generally. (4)

I do not presume here to enter into the historical debate regarding the Talmud's understanding of the term kevod hatzibbur; I will not investigate the transformations in the usage of the term from the time of the Talmud through the early and late middle ages and into modernity; (5) and I do not intend to enter into the contemporary debate over halakhic practice. My purpose here is to add an additional layer to the analysis through a new reading of a largely overlooked (6) ruling by one of the greatest North African sages of the twentieth century, Rabbi Joseph Messas. His ruling, I believe, affords us a novel perspective on the concept of "the dignity of the congregation."

Discourse regarding the invocation of kevod hatzibbur with reference to the prohibition against women being called to the Torah has been of two sorts. First, the term has been understood to express the sexual tension involved in women being called up in the presence of men. That is the rubric under which Rabbis David Novak and Moshe Meiselman (7) wrote about the issue, and Rabbis Mendel Shapiro, David Golinkin, Yehuda Herzl Henkin and others have noted this point as well.8 The scope of the sexual concern regarding a woman being seen and/or heard by an audience of men has been analyzed by several halakhic decisors, some seeing it as pertaining only to singing by women, while others regard it as encompassing speech as well. In a responsum on the prohibition against a woman lecturing in public before men, Rabbi Samuel Halevi Wosner describes the harm in hearing a woman's voice:

 
   And even to hear the voice of [a woman] or to see her hair is 
   forbidden, implying [that this is so] even if it is not the 
   voice of singing ... and haga'on [the author of] Be'er Sheva 
   [R. Yissachar Dov Eilenberg, 1570?-1623] has spoken out regarding 
   this at the end of his book Responsa Be'er mayim fayyim, 
   [section]3, and see also Sefer Hatam sofer [by R. Moshe Sofer, 
   1762-1839] on this. They inferred this from the [rabbinic] statement 
   that a woman's voice [is nakedness], that a part of the voice 
   arouses desire, and that is because it is written [Song of Songs 
   2:14] "Let me hear your voice ..." See Berakhot 25a. (9)