November 19, 2023 • 60 mins
What if we told you that the Mitzvah of hair covering for Jewish women isn't simply about modesty, but is a powerful Mitzvah sparking a deeper connection to Hashem? Fayge Lieberman from England, a passionate educator and advocate of this Mitzvah, reveals how covering our hair ties back to the story of Adam and Chavah.
We journey across Jewish communities worldwide to understand the different types of hair covering. As we delve deeper into the conversation, we also explore the concept of the body as a sacred vessel, reflecting the soul's sanctity. The act of covering isn't just about physical modesty; it's about aligning the body with the soul, fostering a profound respect and appreciation for ones Neshamah. As we wrap up the episode, we shed light on the profound impact of hair covering, not just for the women who practice it, but also its ripple effect on future generations. Tune in and discover the power and beauty of this mitzvah!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:07):
Hi and welcome to our podcast, bodies and Souls
Conversations for the JewishWoman.
Good morning and welcome tothis episode of Bodies and Souls
.
Your host for today is RifkiBoyarski and Sarah Lowenthal.
Today we have Faye Liebermanjoining us, all the way from
England, and we're so excitedbecause this is a topic that I
(00:28):
feel is very important now inthe climate of Eritreal, and we
just finished our three-partseries on the Myths of a Woman
and I think this is a reallynatural transition into the next
step and I think, especially inthe climate today where women
are strengthening themselves andcovering their hairs and you
see, all over in differentcommunities, women are starting
(00:49):
to cover their hair inside theirhouse with a tichel, with a
sheathal so I think that it's anatural next step for a lot of
women who are thinking what canI do to help my brothers and
sisters in Eritreal?
So hopefully, as we go throughour conversation today, we're
going to get a depth ofunderstanding for this powerful
mitzvah and we're going to walkaway feeling inspired and
(01:09):
empowered.
So, faye Lieberman, can youstart off by telling us a little
bit about yourself and how yougot into doing what you're doing
?
Speaker 3 (01:16):
Okay, so I'm Faye Lieberman.
I live in England, my husbandis, and I've been a Robin Rebson
here in London now for about 40years about 38 years Before
that we lived in there.
We got married with a Montrealfor a year and a half.
I've been teaching for manyyears and I taught many, many
colours, and one of the colourscame to me once and said that
(01:37):
she wants to cover her hair, butshe didn't know very much about
it.
She still wanted to weartrousers, which is pants by you,
so she didn't know if that washypocritical and she wanted to
know.
Now I had.
I looked around for books and Icouldn't find any books that
covered the topic properly, so Istarted collating material
myself.
At that time I had a very, verylittle material, but I gave her
(02:02):
.
I learnt with her.
At the end of the colourclasses.
I learnt with her about haircovering and Baruch Shem, she
covered her hair and thenafterwards I offered it to every
colour and slowly words startedgoing around and I did classes
all over London, outside Londonas well, and really, really
connected with Smith's Faire.
I think it's absolutely.
(02:23):
The more I learn about itmyself, the more I find it
incredible and, such as Chuss.
I'm now in the process.
I've been doing this for manyyears in the process of writing
a book, because I found thatthere's not one book that goes
across the board, and also Ifound I've given a lot of these
classes to modern orthodoxgroups or people who are
(02:44):
starting.
It's amazing when people comeup to me in all sorts of places
and say I'm covering my hairafter your share.
I do it in depth, with sources,and so I decided I'm going to
try and write a book.
But writing a book is muchharder than speaking, so it's
taking a long time, but I hope,mr Shem, it'll get there.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
And I think that what's going to pop out to a lot
of people is what popped out tome and, I think, a lot of
people who are living ininsulated communities, where we
see a lot of people who are likeus and observing like us, when
we see people observing thingsthat are so specific, like hair
covering, and we see that maybethey might not be keeping other
things, like they're wearingpants and then their hair
covering and I think you see alot of that more in like Israel
(03:25):
or you know places where there'sa little bit more of
differentiation in how theexpression is of your Yiddish
guide, so maybe that makes moresense.
But I think people probablywould be taken aback to hear
that there are women who arecovering their hair and covering
their hair fully, but theymight not be at an observance
level that you expect them to be.
Why, how, like, what would youexplain the hair covering?
(03:49):
What is this mitzvah and how?
Is it really a standalonemitzvah that it can be that
you're struggling with otherareas but you're covering your
hair?
Speaker 3 (03:59):
Okay.
So a lot of people conflatehair covering with sneers and
say that one covers hair becauseit's nears.
Sneers is definitely part of it, as I explained a little bit
later, but that's not the reasonspecifically we cover hair.
The reason is it's actually amitzvah.
Sneers is more of a middler andI'll explain the difference
soon.
And there is a command to theShulchan.
(04:21):
Aura says a woman should not goto Peru, but Rocheba Shook she
should not go in a public placewith her hair uncovered.
A married woman, and many, manyother sources as well.
So it is definitely anobligation for a woman to cover
her hair.
And I've just traced a littlebit through from the beginning.
I like to look at the sourcingof the beginning.
So when Ottoman hava, whenGhan-e-dan, as we know, they
(04:43):
were not, so not clothed, theywere their bodies and the Nisham
, as their souls, werecompletely as one.
There was no, there was nodifference in how they reflected
their feelings in their bodiesand their souls.
In fact, the Rebbe says thatthe most personal parts were as
holy as the Tafilin, the armthat was in Tafilin.
And it says in the Torah ofElias by Shashi they were not,
(05:05):
as they were not ashamed.
After Yitmeid hadas, somethingchanged and it they hid.
And Hashem did the first,chesed open, chesed for them and
made clothing for them.
And it's interesting becausethe word for clothing is lvush
and the word for shame isleibosh.
Okay, not be ashamed.
(05:26):
And the concept of shame is youknow what is shame?
Shame is not guilt.
Shame is when the Nishama andthe guv do not feel aligned.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
Before the Chet they felt aligned just for clarity
for people who are listening.
Your Nishama is your soul andyour guv is your body that's
right.
Speaker 3 (05:43):
Yeah, the another word for clothing is beged,
which also is similar to theword bogad, which means to
betray, because clothing canbetray the real you.
So when people cover themselves, they're not covering their
bodies, they are revealing theessence of their souls.
So it's much deeper than justputting something over your body
(06:06):
.
So, adam and Chava, as a resultof losing that connection
between body and soul, they thenhad different to konim,
different rectifications theyhad to undertake in order to
bring themselves back to thatplace.
So Adam Adams was very muchconnected to his ability to
provide kranasa said, to workthe ground and things connected
(06:29):
to that.
And Chava, his wife, was verymuch connected to her personal,
to her marriage, to bearingchildren and also to her
personal comportment.
So the Gomorrah in the Talmudand the Riven tells us that one
of the 10 things that Chava hadto do was a Tufaka Aval.
She had to cover herself like amourner, and Rashi explains
(06:49):
that to me that she had to.
She had to cover her hair andthe reason is when, when God
created her, her hair, he tookher hair and he presented to
Adam with her hair.
He's in a sort of a braid and aspire and and the Gomorrah says
actually that when it saysVayivin Eschava, he built her
(07:10):
and in the seaside towns theyused to call, call, use the word
Vayivin as in building and hebuilt a spy in her head and that
hair.
That hair represented thediscipline that she could hold,
the boundaries that she couldmaintain in her home.
And once they sinned, that went, and that's one of the things
(07:32):
that has to be rectified throughwomen.
There are different things thathave to rectify through men,
and so Chava had to.
From that moment on, a womanhad to cover her hair and we see
that that continued throughhistory.
Sarah, a mother, sarah, she wasin the, she was a very, she was
one of the Shluchas parexcellence.
(07:52):
She used to go and influencethe women while husband of
Romans, it brought in the men.
Yet when it, when the Torah,identified Sarah, it says he
neighbor, oh hell, she was anattend.
Not that she was an attend allthe time, she was a busy woman.
But Rashi says, malamah saidTznur, haitha taught us that she
was modest, she had dignity.
And then, in fact, when Rivgarcame to meet Yitzhak, the first
(08:15):
thing she did, when she glimpsedfrom afar and she saw Yitzhak,
it says but it's Kassas.
But if she, she covered herselfwith a scarf because she was
preparing herself for marriage.
Just incidentally, the word ifis an acronym for Amcha, yisrael
Tsrichim, parnasa.
Your people at Israel needParnasa, which means sustenance,
(08:38):
ability to live, and, and thethe Rebbe used to talk a lot
about the Bracha, the blessingof Parnasa for people who are
careful of hair covering.
But again, I'll take that soit's just an aside for the
moment.
The, the Gamora brings theTalmud in Brachas, brings not in
Brachas, sorry in Kasubos.
It explains about hair coveringand it asks the question what
(09:03):
is the difference between DasMoshe and Das Yehudis?
Das Moshe, explains, are lawsthat come from the Torah,
written black and white in theTorah.
Das Yehudis, with the laws ofYehudis, are laws that have been
passed through generations ofwomen and accepted through
generations of women, and theyvery much connect and relate to
(09:24):
that concept of modesty andpersonal, personal things like
Nidar, areas of Nidar for awoman.
So that that that's so.
It would seem that Das Yehudishas a much weaker strength in
terms of the obligation it's.
It's actually not the case.
The, the only difference is theconsequence of Das Moshe and
(09:44):
Das Yehudis, but that, but I'llleave that aside.
The Gamora asks what's Das Mosheof Das Yehudis and gives
examples.
For example, it says that awoman who, who is together with
her husband, she's in Nidarwhere she doesn't tie her food,
take my set, etc.
And Das Yehudis?
It says things to do withmodesty and it also includes she
(10:04):
goes outside with her hair andcover it.
The Gamora then that's sorry.
The Mishnah says that.
The Gamora then asks a questionabout that and says
Roshabharudharayasahi is nothair covering from the Torah,
and then it gives a.
It proves that by saying itrelates to the concept of the
(10:27):
Isha Sota, which is the waywardwoman who was, who was
potentially accused or thoughtof as having had an affair with
a man who was not a husband andshe was warned many times didn't
really happen in in in essence,but it was.
It was some sort of a processthat a woman who was warned
(10:50):
constantly not to secludeherself with another man and she
was brought into the baseAmigdash and one of the things
that the Torah in Bami Dibartells us which is where the
connection to hair coveringcomes from in the Torah is is
the koan had to bring her intothe special place and Uparah
Esrashah Isha had to uncover herhair.
(11:11):
Now there's an argument whatpara means, and I'm not gonna go
through all that now becausetime is.
I can sit here for five hoursand talk to you.
Para in some place in Torahmeans uncover some place.
It means unravel.
All the Mufarashim, all thecommentaries, agree that is.
The is the combination of bothhe first uncovered and then
unraveled.
And and Rashi and all theMufarashim of commentaries
(11:33):
explained that Rashi says Mikhan.
From here we learned thatuncovering a hair was a disgrace
for her.
So every woman had her haircovered because the sort of
Torah obligated.
So the Gamorah, the Talmud,explains that.
From here we learn that haircovering for a woman is an
obligation.
The question is how much andwhere, and that's where I'll
(11:57):
talk about that more if you wantme to later.
But that those are thequestions.
But according to every opinion,once a woman is married, her
hair has a different nature andtherefore she is obligated to
cover it.
Certainly in a public place.
And just by the way thatRamosha Feinstein identifies
that, any place that wherepeople are there, a home,
(12:21):
becomes a public place if you'rehaving people over.
So it's not necessarily theactual geographical occasion,
it's the people that are foundin that location.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
I find it very interesting that you're saying
any place where people are,you're not differentiating
between genders, and I thinkthat's a very missed like
there's always a discussion withpeople who are struggling with
their recovery of like oh, ifI'm in an all women's gym or if
I'm in an all women's space likea swimming pool, that just is
is their space in Halacha thereis.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
There is there, definitely there's.
There's different gradationsover here, so, for example,
location is definitely defined.
There's what you call shook,which is the public arena, which
is, you know, traditionally themarketplace, but anywhere where
people congregate.
Then there's the Mavui, whichis the alleyway, which is the
area where people went from the,from the public arena, to the
(13:14):
private.
Then there's the Khatser peopleused to live in homes with a
courtyard surrounding them wherethere were even less people.
And then there's the home andthe Halacha really discusses,
and there's a lot of differentdiscussions about that, a lot of
different ways of looking at it.
According to the stricteropinions, any of those outdoor
(13:37):
places considered public and shecould not uncover a hair.
Now the Gamorah Gamorah,gamorah Gamorah says that how do
we differentiate the dust moshit and dust mo shit aspects?
And and really what it is isthat her hair has to be covered.
According to dust mo shit, howshe covers it is more dusty
hoodies, so corn dusty hoodies.
It says she wear a kalta.
(13:59):
Kalta is like a partial haircovering where some of the hair
might be visible, but that's notaccording to all opinions.
I'm just going to the.
You know the very bare bonesand they're definitely are her
terrain for people to cover lessand and not as carefully
amongst Khatserim it's not thecase it's.
(14:19):
It's much stricter.
Now explain later why.
But there is a differentiationbetween men and women because
there isn't Halacha a difference, but when one understands why
hair is important to be covered,it doesn't really make a
difference.
In other words, strictlyspeaking, halachically, there is
a difference between showing,exposing hair to a man, a woman,
(14:42):
a married woman exposing a hairto a man and exposing a hair in
front of a woman.
But from the Kabbalistic andHasidic perspective it's not the
case.
And even so, in the Gamorah weknow the story of Kimchis.
Kimchis was a woman who lived atime of second base on Medar, a
second temple, and she marriedher to have seven sons who all
(15:06):
potentially could be Kohanim,gdolem, high priests, now
normally a Kohan Gaddal had todie before the next one took
over, but they all were able tofill in for each other.
Now that was Nakhis, beyond,because she was, it never
happened to anybody else, andthe Khachamim came to her and
asked her how she merited suchan incredible, incredible gift
(15:28):
of Nakhis like this, and shesaid and beyond my Loro'u, kale
Kora Spaces, kale Sari, thewalls of my home, the beams of
my home never, ever witnessedthe strands of my hair and the
response was many did that andthey didn't have that merit.
In other words, this was common.
Now why was she especiallyrewarded with sons who were
(15:52):
Kohanim Gdolem?
So Rashi says in that Gamorah,the Gamorah Yashami actually,
that we have the Pasukh, that inTehillim, that Kul Kvudah
Basmelev Penima.
The beauty, the dignity of awoman is her inner part, her
inside, who she is, mishpa ZahavLe Busha.
She wears gold garments and aKohan Gaddal also wore gold and
(16:17):
therefore that was specificallythe reward also, very
specifically also, is that themain service of a Kohan Gaddal
was inside the KodishaGdashanium Kippa.
That's where he reconnected inprivate.
And because she was evencareful in the privacy of her
home to be careful, she meritedthat merit.
Just as an aside, it said thatthe mother of the Khazanish and
(16:43):
the whole family are all very,very, very great people.
When she was in the 1900s inEurope, they didn't have much
money.
They once asked Khazanish howdid your mother merit to have
such great children?
They were very short on money,but one thing her mother did was
that she never uncovered herhair ever and when she washed
(17:05):
her hair she used to hire twowomen to block the vision of the
sink, so she would wash herhair without anyone seeing and
he believed that was her.
That was a Schuss.
So definitely the Gamora bringsthat, but Hasidist and Kabbalah
definitely bring the concept ofwhy hair is so powerful and
(17:26):
therefore, because of itsincredible power, cannot be
uncovered at all and should beconsistently covered.
From the Halachic standpointthere are definitely leniencies
if one wants to look for the.
There are definitely lenienciesfor how much and where, and
that's why there are people whosay that it's not necessary
always to cover it.
(17:46):
But, as I say, certainly theRebbe was very, very adamant
about hair being coveredcarefully all the time, bringing
the quoting, always quoting theZohar and the Zohar the book of
the Zohar, which was a keyKabbalistic work, explains the
(18:07):
Rebbe, interesting enough, never, ever highlighted the
negativities of not coveringhair.
He always lets focus on thepositive and he says the brachis
, the blessings that come fromin terms of pranasa, in terms of
children and generations ofchildren, and the success of
one's husband, both physicallyand spiritually, and the brachis
(18:29):
that are just enormous.
I always say to people ifsomebody told you to eat
cucumbers for a month and you'dget all those things.
You eat cucumbers all month,right, it's just that hair
coverings a lot harder.
But certainly the Rebbe wasvery, very adamant about being
very, very careful about even inthe very innermost parts of
your home to be sensitive tothis.
Speaker 1 (18:51):
Just to be clear, because you're being a little
euphemistic when we're talking,the innermost parts of the home
you're talking about, even inyour bedroom, if you're able to
do that Is that.
Is that?
Am I listening and hearingcorrectly?
Speaker 3 (19:02):
Okay, so.
So there are again gradationsin the bedroom.
There are, you know, peoplethere, some people very careful
at all times in the bedroom whenthey're sleeping, when they're
intimate.
Speaker 1 (19:13):
I want to clarify we we we defined the parameters
Halaqa glee, that they're ratherwide, but we also are now
saying that there is benefit forbeing careful, even in spaces
where Halaqa glee, it might beokay to uncover, and that's
right.
That's it.
So I think another thing thatI'm hearing you say is a lot of
(19:35):
positivity and sometimes whenwomen are approaching their hair
covering, they feel a littlebit of negativity because hair
is so personal, and then they'llhear things like oh, it's airba
or oh, it's so.
It shouldn't be a mix show formen.
Sometimes you hear these typeof things and I think that
there's so much you keep sayingthe positive power of hair and
(19:56):
due to its spiritual power, andso I think that part of the
discussion of why would we evenbe careful in these spaces has
to has to connect it to Well,what is the power of the hair,
what is the positivity thatwe're trying to access?
And, aside for it just being achannel for pernaça, etc.
What is it?
Speaker 3 (20:15):
Yeah, power that happens in your hair, okay, I
mean it's not ever concerned, Iis concerned.
It's gonna like touch on thatbecause I think people you know
we have to we can't ignore that.
There is that the gamar andbrahmas brings three things that
are considered ever, everdoesn't.
Ever doesn't mean it's bad,ever means powerful.
It has tremendous power.
So it's the, the woman's hair,it's her voice and it's the top
(20:39):
of the arm and top of the leg.
And it comes.
Gamar is different, so maybethe lower part of arm, the low
part of her leg as well, but Iwon't go into that.
And and the gamar, when itbrings that, it uses it.
It brings three psukkim fromdifferent parts of Tanath to
prove its point.
And when it talks about hair,it says it brings the postingsha
(20:59):
asherim song of songs that saysSaareh kaedah haizim
shigalshumahar, gillad.
Your hair is like a flock ofgoats that cascades down the
mountain of gillad.
So it's underscoring that hairis erotic, hair is beautiful,
hair is intimate.
It's not, the hair is bad, hairis so powerful and so beautiful
.
And if you look at Contemporaryculture about hair and you said
(21:21):
what's special about hair?
Hair defines the woman.
Okay, so the only part, thewoman's creative beauty.
We don't have hair because itkeeps you warm.
In fact, you ask somebody to todescribe somebody, more often
than not they'll say she's aredhead, she's a dark, she's got
blonde.
She's blonde because that issomething hair power is, much is
(21:44):
.
You know, hair contact isBecomes comfy for eye contact.
It's the first thingsubconsciously noticed.
You know, I used to teach in ahigh school where there were, as
a mixed high school, most a lotbecause weren't religious.
I used to observe the girlswhen they used to be around the
boys and and and the.
The body language with the hairwas incredible.
(22:04):
You know, they said flip thehead back and take the, the, the
bubbles out, and and and shakethe heads and it's something
that people know, they have,they have a hair conveys
language.
It's very, very powerfullanguage with hair and it's a
subconscious thing and peoplewill spend.
I mean, the hair industry isworth billions because if
somebody tells Somebody thatyou'll find this product will
(22:27):
actually make your hair looklike this and that's your dream,
you will buy that product.
It's very powerful and thenatural hair, the hair that you
know, the wind blowing through ahair, the, the, the feeling of
the hair, is the first.
You don't put on makeup.
You know your.
Your outfit is not perfect Ifyour hair pinch your hairdresser
and your hair looks amazing.
(22:48):
You feel confident.
It does create confidence andthat's why it's so, so tragic
when people lose their hairthrough conditions like alopecia
or or God forbid cancer andthey have to have kemen, their
hair falls out.
That's that.
That's one of the things thatreally bothers women
tremendously when their hair,because hair does give them a
(23:10):
sense of feeling and andPositivity.
And even throughout the culture, throughout the culture that
history you go through historyin every single period of time
You'll find the way they used toput the effort into dressing up
their hair with all thedifferent accessories and
different colorings and powders.
(23:31):
And Was high, it was poofed, itwas wide it was, and even tell
you, look at photos you even canactually identify periods of
time through the hair people arehave on their heads much more
than the clothing or the orthings around them.
People put effort into intohair coloring, the hair styling,
(23:51):
into hair cutting.
Even eyebrows, for example, andeyelashes are so important to
women.
A lot of people used to thinkin the past that they were just
Strips of hair over your eyes.
People realize that eveneyebrows can can change the
whole feel and the whole look.
Hair really is the crown thatwoman never takes off.
It's it's that feeling of I'vegot something really Important.
(24:16):
And every woman knows thatintrinsically, even those who
don't mind messy hair.
There's a statement being madewith messy hair.
It's not that everybody has tohave the same feeling about how
the hair has to look, but mostpeople, subconsciously, are
making a statement with theirhair much more than any other
area.
So so Hair is very, very, veryimportant and because of its
(24:39):
power, it has a tremendousability to be intimate.
So it's not the hair's bad orthat's why we cover it.
As I said in the beginning, wewe don't cover parts of our body
.
We reveal our national musclesbecause when you look at
somebody, you see something much, much deeper through.
(24:59):
When the parts are covered thatshouldn't be revealed, the
depth is really is reallyabsorbed and people see you
differently.
We all know that.
We all know that.
We all know that our hair meansa lot to us and it is a very,
very hard mix, but it's probablyone of the more difficult ones.
I think snus generally is, buthair covering is extremely
(25:20):
difficult and People really webattle with it and struggle with
it, but I see it as a bigprivilege because it does
something to you.
That's very, very special On avery deep level and it's a
sensitivity I think once womenand I have I have a community
and People often women startcovering the hair some a lot of
(25:42):
women cover their hair ready,but some of them don't, and it's
interesting how they suddenlyfeel that I just want to cover
my hair.
I feel something inside medoesn't come from and doesn't
come from.
I saw a shadow that I love.
It comes from something inside.
They feel very connected tothemselves and they want to do
(26:02):
something, and hair covering isoften what, how they, how they
plug in.
It is a very deep mitzvah andthat's why it's hard, because
it's so deep I love the, therevealing part, rather than
covering.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
I think that's such a powerful point to connect to.
As you cover your hair to say,well, I'm not actually covering
anything.
I'm redeemed, I'm revealing thedeepest parts of my soul.
Now let's talk about the haircoverings that women do use, and
I think you see a lot morevariations outside the United
States.
Why would some Communities andwomen prefer to cover with a
(26:36):
tichel and some communities andwomen prefer to cover with a
sheytal?
Why and is there a Place inHalakha for covering certain
parts of our hair, like I seesome communities, they cover,
like almost with a very thickband, but the back is not
covered.
Some people will specificallycover the back like what are
what are the Differentiationsbetween what we're covering our
(26:59):
hair with?
Speaker 3 (27:00):
Right, okay, so again , you know we are Jews and
therefore there's a 10 Jews, 20opinions, we, there are a lot of
opinions around and but I'mgonna stick to what the Halakha
says and then move on from thatStrictly.
Halakha speaking, a woman hasto cover her hair outside.
How she covers her hair, thatare different views.
Some would say that she coversit.
(27:22):
You know, in the old days theconcept of a sheytal started.
Actually, we can, we can traceit back time, the Mishnah women
that the mission at thecommission, the Gamarra, talks
about, the fact that are youallowed to carry is, is is
wearing a wig, a Sheytalconsidered to carrying on
sharpest, I mean, so you have tohave an a-room.
(27:42):
And it was Answered.
It wasn't considered.
It was fine Now wide.
In fact, it wasn't even properwigs for a lot of people it was
a hair extensions.
A woman whose hair was sparse,was would cover, would wear
something on her head to make itlook thicker.
So it wasn't necessarily a fullwig.
You know, it could have been a,it could be a wig, a bit of a
(28:03):
wig with it with a scarf on top.
There have been variations overover the centuries, that's for
sure.
Now certain communities believethat Shaitals are not
necessarily modest and womenshould cover their hair with a
scarf or a, and you can gothrough different communities.
Some have a double covering.
That also has its source inHalacha, and some some will wear
(28:26):
certain types of snudes andscarfs and and Spitzels and
tickles and there's all sorts ofvariations.
Friday's, friday Jews and aradio stuff was very, very
adamant that women should neverwear a shawl, except if they
were divorced or widowed, thatthey could have a heta for that.
They continue cut, they shouldcontinue to come the hair, but a
shawl would be permissible.
(28:48):
I think the rebel was that theloudest voice in the amongst,
amongst Opinions in terms of,specifically, a shawl, and we
all know he said that the reasonis because when you're wearing
a scarf, a Bit can slip back andit doesn't look so bad, so you
wouldn't be so bothered by it,and a shawl that would not
(29:08):
necessarily be look veryattractive.
It's interesting.
So I've thought about this alot and I think what the rebel
was trying to underscore, forgenerations in the future as
well, was how important is tocover one's hair properly,
because leaving hair incapitalistic terms is Is a
channel through which divinelight comes in the world.
(29:30):
So God has very powerful divinelight with very high voltage
and it has to come into thisworld and hair is one of the
mediums through which it getssqueezed into, it gets, it gets
pushed through the strands ofhair.
It's very, very, it'sconceptual, it's hard to
understand it, but we're toldthat hair is a channel and
(29:52):
therefore, because hair embodieswith it such powerful light and
energy, godly and divine energy, it's very, very we have to.
We have to protect it in a way.
And that's why, specifically, amarried woman, once a woman
gets married and she is increative mode, she's able to
(30:14):
create with her husband she thenhas to protect her hair even
more than before, even more.
And in fact, the word the hairin Hebrew, which is se'ar, has
same shares, the same letters asshahar, which means gate, and
she creates the gates throughwhich she protects the energy
that comes through her, throughher husband, into the family,
(30:37):
through her creative energy.
Now, the rebel was very, veryparticular about wearing a
shaytel, and even not evenwearing a shaytel with a hat.
There is a story that he saidyou know, could, if you have a
half a shaytel, it's halfbreakfast.
Obviously, not a shaytel,necessarily indoors but when a
woman goes out the house, alwaysa shaytel in order not to allow
(30:58):
any hair to be shown.
Now, in terms of how much somewomen cover the front, some the
back, the real heather that, thereal heather that is accepted
in a lot of circles, is theheather of Moshe Feinstein,
which says he explains becauseit says tefach, be'isha, e'ervah
.
A tefach measurement, which islike a hand breath measurement
(31:21):
of a woman, is considerede'ervah In erotic stimulus.
Therefore, less than a tefachand it's very specific how much
is less around the front ispermissible to be uncovered.
The Rebbe never accepted thatand the Rebbe was very adamant
that it's not acceptable.
But this was ahetero-Moschelfreinstein.
Some people say that it was avery specific hetero of a
(31:43):
specific person.
It wasn't a general hetero Interms of the back, the
Moschelfreinstein only said thefront, the forehead and the ears
.
I have a lot of women who saythey have their hair covered on
the front and not the back.
There's hair sticking out andin my shurim on this they've
asked me this and I said andthey said this Rabbi, that Rabbi
(32:05):
allows it.
I have asked Rabonim from allcommunities and I've never got
anyone who told me that it'sokay.
The only hetero that isacceptable across the board
across, not across the board,but by a lot of people from a
very strong source is theMoschelfreinstein, who says two
fingers' breadth at the front,two fingers' worth at the front
(32:27):
and the sides.
No one's ever said the back.
The reason why some people doit is they say that it says that
the hair is ever and not thehead and therefore, because it's
a less than a teffaf, it's okay.
There's all differentjustifications, what people,
that people have, but certainlyin Chabad it was never
(32:48):
acceptable and in all Hasidiccommunities it wasn't.
When I teach people, I dosometimes, depending on who it
is, on this area, on this topic,I do sometimes say start with
that, because they wanna startsomewhere and it's not all or
nothing.
Also, a lot of women I findthey'll start off by wearing a
(33:09):
shatel on shabbos.
Most of those women cover fullyall the time in a very short
space of time because, as I say,it sensitizes them to who they
are and to the essence of theirshabbos.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
I'm interested in hearing your thoughts about lace
shatels.
I love my lace shatel.
I look back to when my shatelwas an inch off my head and I
think to myself it's so obviousthat I'm covering my hair, and
here it's so not.
In fact, when the lace shatelsfirst came out, I remember being
in crown height and my eyeswere popping out.
(33:46):
I couldn't believe what I wasseeing.
I went over to somebody this isa true story and I said to her
your shatel is amazing, tell mewhere it's from.
And she looked at me and shesaid I'm not wearing a shatel,
I'm not married.
I couldn't tell the differencebetween who was wearing one and
who wasn't, and I'd love to hearwhat Rabana was saying, or even
(34:08):
your personal hashtag about thelace.
Speaker 3 (34:13):
Okay, I wanna just give a little bit of a some
clarity about shatels and thetiniest aspect of shatels.
So one has to cover one's hair.
How one covers is connected tothe idea of modesty and seers.
So if a woman covers her hair,whatever her community decides
(34:36):
is okay or acceptable,appropriate, she needs to feel
that she's covering her hair.
Okay, she needs to know she'scovering her hair.
Then she has to also know thatthe covering just like any woman
who I have.
Invariably when I talk aboutthis, I have women who say to me
who are not yet covering, whoare saying, yeah, but you look
(34:57):
at these women with theirshatels, they look much prettier
than my hair.
That looks a mess.
So I say hair covering is likeclothing.
We're not expected to cover ourbodies.
How we cover our bodies has tobe connected to modesty.
Okay.
So you can't say, oh, herclothing looks much more
(35:21):
attractive than her body andtherefore it's not okay.
She something in her changeswhen she's covering because
she's revealing something deeperin her and it's the same thing.
However, I have a general ruleIf the wig walks into the room
before you do, you're notwearing the right wig.
In other words, you have tocompliment that shatel you can't
(35:43):
look like.
The shatel is like soextraordinarily out of the
ordinary that it just almostfeels like it's detached you.
You have to be a completeperson, looking beautiful within
and without.
In terms of lace, there'sdefinitely a very big discussion
about this.
The reason there's a discussionabout it?
(36:03):
Because in some communitiesthey believe that a shatel, in
order to be a shatel, has tolook like a shatel.
In other words, when theystarted wearing a shatel at the
time of the mission of Gomorrah,they looked like shatels.
They did not look or I havegreat ground as in Russia looked
like they're wearing shatels.
I don't know if I necessarilyagree with that and I'm very
(36:23):
careful of my words because Idefinitely respect the views of
every robber in their communityand everyone should follow that
and I wouldn't say that'sridiculous.
It's not ridiculous.
Kolakavod's people who aresensitizing themselves to
dignity and to modesty and tointernal understanding of who
(36:48):
they are as a Jewish woman, buta woman, every woman knows she's
wearing a shatel, whether it'slace or not.
Lace.
I would say lace.
Personally, I would say laceshould be lined, because if
you're wearing lace that isunlined you can see the hair and
that's a problem halachifli.
So lace should be lined, butcertainly in Chabad it's not as
(37:10):
soon as it's a problem and inmany communities it's not either
.
I don't necessarily think.
I think women should feelattractive.
There's no law that says awoman should feel awful.
A woman should feel.
When a woman feels attractive,she feels good about herself.
But she should feel attractiveand not attracting and not
provocative.
And just like her clothingshouldn't be provocative, so
(37:33):
should her shatel not beprovocative.
But if it makes her feel goodand within her community I have
a lot of colours, if only andsay what's the rules about lace?
I say you have to beat your ownrough.
You can't.
I don't think it's a blanket,but certainly if a woman, a lot
of lace shatels are very, veryrefined and there's a lot of
(37:54):
non-lace shatels that don't lookrefined at all.
So I don't know if it's thelace or not lace.
I think that lace needs to belined in order for hair not to
be visible.
And that also goes with theconcept of long shatels.
When a shatel is too long andit just hits the eye, I'm not
(38:15):
saying long shouldn't be allowed, but I'm saying when any shatel
is too long, too wild, too inthe face.
It doesn't really actuallycreate a wholesomeness with the
women wearing it.
It's just separate.
And therefore every womanwearing a shatel should consider
does this reflect the real meor is it something attached for
(38:36):
me?
Can we?
Speaker 2 (38:37):
talk about length for a minute.
Can we go more into that?
Because I know that in somecommunities length can also be
contested.
Some people feel that it's notsnis to have hair that's longer
than shoulder length, and someof these shatels are so long, so
beautiful.
So again, is that a questionthat one should ask the rest.
Speaker 3 (39:04):
Okay.
So even the communities thatare contesting it also are
critical of single girls havinghair that's very long, because
it can be attracting, it couldbe sending the messages that
we're not trying to send.
Again, I'm not a post sec.
I don't pass on what peopleshould wear, but I do respect
(39:28):
different communities and I dorespect, I think, when it comes
to just wear something thatmakes you look like if you don't
feel good, it doesn't matter,as long as you're wearing
something on your hair, I don'tnecessarily agree.
I think a woman has to feelbeautiful.
It's a very, very importantproblem to feel beautiful, to
feel attractive to herself, tofeel like she's walking out of
(39:49):
the house and she just feelsgood.
When your shatels are mess andyou just don't feel the same as
if you just had it washed andblowed and you feel just like
it's just, there's a goodfeeling.
But one does always have toconsider the concept of being
(40:10):
Senua and what it entails.
I spoke earlier about theconcept of when Azm al-Habba
were in Ghanayden, the idea thatthey were not clothed and they
had to be clothed to bring backa tick on the rectification for
their bodies and souls Clothingwhen they were in Ghanayden,
their bodies and souls were veryaligned, and clothing allows
(40:33):
that to happen.
It allows to bring.
So that's why the Kohen Goddolf, example, had to wear the
clothes in the service of theBaisame Darshan Temple, because
it would align his body with hisavodah, his service to Hashem.
The clothing itself created anaura of holiness.
It wasn't like it was him, andthen there was a clothing.
(40:56):
The clothing itself createdthat and that's why in every
area.
It's why a talis can create.
When a man puts a talis on, itbrings him to a state of mind to
fill in.
And women, in all the clothingthey wear, also creates a state
of mind.
I think that's also true in avery spiritual way, but also
physical way, and physicality isreally spirituality as well.
(41:18):
You can't really separate them.
So when a woman feels reallygood about herself, she is ready
to do what she has to do.
However, there are boundariesand boundaries are very, very
important.
It's very important to theproblem with.
Once you start lessening aboundary, it just goes downhill,
(41:40):
and that's where a lot ofpeople oh, it's a bit longer,
it's a bit less, it's a bit morerevealed.
One has to always ask oneselfthe question am I lessening the
boundaries so I'm less sensitiveto the fiducia of what I'm
doing, or am I being honest withthe boundaries?
(42:02):
So I'm actually sensitizingmyself to what, why I'm covering
my hair in the first place.
Speaker 1 (42:09):
So one of the things that's very interesting here is
you speak about the beauty,right, and I think that women
should feel beautiful, need tofeel beautiful when doing
everything that they're doing.
It's an integral part of ouridentity and I actually I speak
a lot to middle schoolers rightnow because I feel very
passionately that that's thebeginning of their self identity
, and if we talk about you knowwe're not, you know we're not
(42:32):
getting at a point where theyalready are struggling.
We can talk about this, and oneof the things that I talk about
is feeling good in your bodyand feeling positive in your
body, and I bring SNES up as anexample because I think there's
sometimes we subscribe orascribe to societal norms of
(42:53):
beauty which are alwaysfluctuating, and when you're
trying to be beautiful in thesense of what others are
dictating to you is beautiful,you sometimes feel objectified
and you sometimes feel likeyou're not authentic.
You're not authentic to who youare.
So I think that an importantdifferentiation when we're using
the word beautiful is what arewe talking about?
(43:14):
We're talking about a level ofself dignity and self respect
and a revealing of your innerauthenticity.
So it's not necessarily whenwe're saying a shagal has to be
beautiful.
We're not saying it has to bebeautiful according to societal
norms.
It has to express the beauty ofwho you are.
So it shouldn't be old andratty and tatty and whatever.
(43:36):
It should match you and itshould look what it's supposed
to be.
But that doesn't mean it has tobe very bad at measurements.
Speaker 3 (43:44):
Beautiful is very subjective.
Some people will say that pink,spiky hair is beautiful and
that's very subjective.
To what people?
We do have a very clearguideline and that's what Halafi
gives us, the guideline.
Our teachers give us theguidelines and we have to really
be very loyal to that.
I was just talking today.
(44:04):
I do a course here in schoolsin what's year six, which I
guess in America is six orseventh grade.
Over here they finish year six,they go to high school in year
seven, which is seventh grade,when they're about 11, 12.
And it's a course on thegrowing up course.
(44:24):
It's called doing a whole bunchof schools and talk about the
physical, spiritual, emotionaland social changes and
development.
So I talk, so I do it's like awhole program and I explain to
them the concept.
The body in a shaman.
I say your body is like awalking, safe etura.
It's like something so holy andspecial.
That's why you value it If yousee a safe etura.
(44:46):
In short, it's you're socareful how you handle it, such
beautiful coverings, you do it,such respect and in fact,
anything that you really value.
If you have an antique, youdon't leave it on the kitchen
table, you put it behind glassin a special case, manuscripts,
anything of real value that youreally think is important, is
handled and given the care andcovered in the correct and
(45:09):
appropriate way, not because youare hiding it.
And if you believe the body isbeautiful because I shank raced
it as a as the case for the souland they align together as one
to serve him, then you'll findways to express that in a real,
authentic way and you won't.
First of all, there's no shamein the body.
Everything is very, very Goddoesn't create anything that's
(45:32):
bad, it's beautiful.
But what we value, we encaseappropriately in the correct
things we will say is a veryinteresting medrush.
I'm not sure where it comes from, but I heard we very careful
about modesty.
And there's another which isthis time you know that we're in
now there's another society,the Islamic society, is very
(45:54):
careful about the modesty To theextent the very religious ones
they cover.
I don't know about in America,but if you see they wear that he
jobs and their whole face iscovered and it just just about
can see through some smits inthe eyes.
Now they cover and we cover whynow they cover with robes where
the shape of their bodiescompletely not.
We don't believe in that,because we believe that there's
(46:16):
nothing wrong with the body.
We don't have to hide the body.
We have to cover, as I said,reveal something deeper.
But why don't we cover ourfaces if the face could be
stunningly beautiful, and wedon't cover our faces?
Because the face contains theeyes and the eyes are winded to
the soul and so you can never,ever deviate by looking at some
(46:39):
space.
The face is a very, very holypart and if we believe that our
body is is holy and thereforeneeds different treatments in
different areas, I told veryspecifically that, even though
hair is very holy I'm not goingto go into the whole thing now
because the Kabbalah explainswhy a woman's hair, dofka has to
be covered.
I don't know how much time wehave, but it's a woman's hair
(47:00):
dofka, has to be covered, notbecause it's bad, because it's
got.
It contains a very high energyand therefore has to be covered.
And, interestingly enough,kabbalah says that it shouldn't
be cut completely, shouldn't beshaved, like in some communities
where they do shave their hairbecause they feel that that
links to the, to the idea of thebeams of the house should never
(47:24):
see any strands of hair.
And if there's no hair, there'snothing to see.
But Kabbalah does not mandatethat because even though the
head, because the hair has highenergy, it needs to be contained
by the cover.
That's the woman, the marriedones hair, but not completely
eliminated.
But if we believe that thatbeauty is how Hashem dictates
(47:46):
beauty, because Hashem createdus, he understands what beauty
is and therefore he says youwant to reveal that real beauty,
that not that very, very, notthat very superficial beauty
only, but something that hasreal essence, then I'll give you
the recipe and that's why wehave to follow it.
Do we understand it?
(48:07):
Always no, and it doesn'talways make sense and it's hard,
very, very, very hard.
But it and that's why I saidearlier that ceases a midder, it
sensitizes us to who we reallyare and that is why you'll find
I always tell girls this thatthere are people walking the
streets with very little on inthe summer.
(48:29):
They don't, they're notsensitive to their body and like
a girl who is sensitive withwill never, will never walk in
the street with half thosethings missing, half his clothes
missing, not because they'reembarrassed, because they
understand that this is notreflective of who they are.
So we have our guidelines ofwhat beauty is you asked earlier
(48:51):
.
You know what's beauty?
Yeah, the world has, and itfluctuates, it's true, because
what looked beautiful 100 yearsago is not necessarily beautiful
now, and that's why we have avery specific boundaries which
we must uphold.
Speaker 2 (49:05):
It's interesting.
My mother used to say growingup that you can trust a woman's
castress based on her SNEES.
She used to say we grew up inOttawa so we weren't sure whose
house we could eat at whosehouse we couldn't.
So I had always thought shemade that up, but she decided
someone could.
Speaker 3 (49:22):
No, it's true.
A lot of our bonn will say thatthe woman who's careful had
Seneas.
It shows Eurasian Mayan, and awoman who has Eurasian Mayan can
be implicitly trusted withAkashras.
It's not mathematical.
There are women who are veryweak, who are not so careful yet
, and yet they're very careful,akashras, and they're women who
(49:44):
are and are not.
But generally it boils down toEurasian Mayan.
Fear of heaven is very much aninner appreciation, and so is
Seneas.
It goes hand in hand.
Eurasian Mayan and Seneas areboth very much part of the inner
self.
No one can measure EurasianMayan.
(50:06):
It's something that you haveinside you.
That's the concept of Kymfesand the Gamora.
She was careful.
She was given Sons KohalimGhazalim because she was careful
when no one was looking, notwhen everybody was looking, and
that's why she merited DhafkaKohalim Ghazalim and not other
rewards, because she understoodwhat it meant to be careful when
(50:28):
no one is looking, not just outthere.
So it's a very much asensitivity that people develop,
and I feel that people whosesensitivity is a little lost
will become much less careful inthese areas.
Speaker 1 (50:43):
So it's a very interesting thing to think about
and to ponder, but I wonder, asour time here is nearing an end
, I wonder if there is somestory that you find, aside from
Kymfes, which we spoke aboutseveral times, maybe something
that women can relate to alittle bit more Are there?
Is there a particular story orcase that you've been involved
(51:06):
in.
Speaker 3 (51:06):
I can mention a couple quickly.
So there's a story of theRehbar Ashab.
There was a decree that I can'tremember the year, I haven't
got in front of me the datesometime 1800s, where the
Russian authorities forbadewomen to wear their hair
covering, which was calledknuffin.
It was some sort of scarf theywrapped around their heads.
Undependency of death orimprisonment.
(51:27):
I don't know exactly what thepunishment was, but very, very
severe, and many, many womentook off their hair coverings.
They were, you know, which wecan't judge, but they did.
There was some very loyal womenwho didn't.
Now, 10 years later, there wasthe decree of the Cantonists,
where they used to kidnap Jewishboys to be taken to the army
(51:50):
for 25 years and be rustifiedcompletely, forget under torture
, forget any connection toJudaism and also forget their
families, which was a very, verytragic time for the Yiddin in
Russia at the time.
The Rehbar Ashab mentioned thatthose women who had the
(52:12):
Miserysnafesh had their cellsacrificed not to discard their
hair coverings with the oneswhose children were saved.
Now, I didn't make that up, butdefinitely we're told, and the
Zohar says, that women who havethat, because it is
Miserysnafesh, it's very hardhave tremendous bracha that
(52:34):
comes out of it.
Another story I'll tell you thathappened very recently,
somebody that I know she is afrom-woman but I would say
modern from.
You know, the modern Orthodoxcommunity.
Lovely lady, her son went toYashiva and became very, quite
much more sort of Kharedi, asshe would say, and he was in
(52:57):
Yashiva four years, which wascompletely not in line with how
they you know Yashiva for a year, possibly two, and then
university.
But he stayed four years inIsrael in Yashiva, came back and
he said I'm coming.
Before he came out, he said I'mcoming back, I want a shidah,
not that I should like hang outand meet a girl, I want a proper
, regular shidah.
And she panicked and shethought how do I do this?
(53:20):
I don't know how to do this.
That's not how she met herhusband.
She always promised him by hisbummer.
He asked her to cover her hair.
Who's already starting to getinto that?
And she said I can't do it.
But she said when you're aboutto get engaged, at your
engagement I will cover my hair.
She didn't know how to go aboutthe whole shidah thing.
(53:40):
So she thought you know whatI'll do.
The other thing she went to the.
She didn't want to buy anexpensive shaddle because she
thought, even though she couldhave, she thought I'm never
gonna really wear it.
So she went to somebody who'ssecondhand shaddles and lovely
lady in the area and she saidyou know, I feel very strange
doing this, but you know, shetold the story about her son and
(54:00):
she says oh, what's your sonlike?
And she said I've got a girl.
Her son comes back, meets thegirl.
Three weeks later they'reengaged.
She wore the shaddle and I mether.
She wore the shaddle at thewedding and her husband told the
story at the wedding.
I met her recently.
She was living in my area andshe said to me that's it, I'm
wearing a shaddle.
I feel it now.
(54:20):
I always wanted to, but this is, I see, yad Hashem that I took
on this huge thing for her itwas huge and her son has a
beautiful marriage.
So it's just a nice story toshare.
It was a very everybody wasvery excited about the story.
Then one more thing that touchedme hugely.
(54:42):
When I read it and I can't findwhere I read it, but I know
that I read it the rebel wasvery, very particular when he
was the days that he was besidea condition that the girl had to
commit to wearing a shaddleafter she was married.
In those days wearing a shaddlewas very difficult for most
women when in the time I thinkit was in the 60s and many
(55:05):
people couldn't stand by it.
So this a bocher came to theRebbe and said he wants the
red-green side condition.
And the Rebbe said is she gonnawear a shaddle once she's
married?
And he says she doesn't want to.
He said I can't be a misalignedcondition.
Anyway, the bocher very muchwanted her to two days before
(55:26):
the wedding or a day before hecomes back to the Rebbe, and
those days people could go intothe Rebbe to talk to him.
And he says she's agreed towear a shaddle.
The Rebbe says sorry, it's toolate.
It takes me four days to summonfour generations of Rebbein to
come to the Chuppah with me.
When I do a Chuppah I'm reallysorry.
A day before is too late.
And I thought that was such anincredible thing because the
(55:49):
Rebbe didn't only do it becauseit looked good, or it was his
communal mink hard to do it.
He really believed that it madea difference in bringing up not
only one's children, as it saysin the Zahar, it will affect
children, children's children,all generations, and the analogy
(56:11):
it brings and also the Medrishbrings this analogy.
It says Eschach Geffen Peria,your wife will become like a
fruitful vine by Akasebe SechaB'nech silezeisim sabvishnecha.
She'll have the children whowill be like olive plants round
her table.
Why olive plants?
Because olives are good in thesummer, in the winter, all year
round.
And then it continues in theTehilim there Orei vanim of
(56:34):
Necha Shalom Ali, israel.
See children and children'schildren and have peace in
Israel.
So that takes you back to thebeginning of your discussion
when you say that this issomething people are taking on
for help with our situation.
Eric Desroul, and please goMashiach.
It's tremendous.
People don't know the impact ofwhat it does for a family.
(56:56):
When a woman is careful abouthair covering, it's not just a
cosmetic change in how youappear.
It has an effect.
The Zaheho is not just a randomand it has many capitalistic
and many, many, many sources.
I mean, obviously I haven't gotthe time, but please call my
book comes out.
(57:17):
You can buy it and seeeverything in it.
The impact of hair covering ishuge, not only for yourself and
not only for your husband, butfor your grandchildren, and I
don't think anyone wants to missout on that.
I can tell you from experience.
You always want to have enoughto be a grandchildren as well as
your children.
So I would definitely say Ibelieve it's a great product.
(57:40):
Just go there and get it andwear it with pride.
Speaker 2 (57:44):
Powerful, powerful.
Thank you for sharing thisstring of stories and all the
wisdom and insight that you'vegiven over.
It's interesting because yousaid back then the mix of hair
covering was hard.
I come across women and I caneven remember times in my life
where the mix of hair coveringis hard too.
It can get expensive.
(58:05):
You don't like how your shadescame out, you don't like how you
look in it, and I actually dothis thing, I self-talk.
So every morning when I put onmy shades I tell myself I love
my shades, I love doing this mixof that and it's helped also
increase, like, my positivefeelings towards covering my
hair, because it still can bereally hard it is.
Speaker 3 (58:28):
I mean I miss.
I'm married nearly 40 years fora shem and I still miss that
feeling of driving and the windgoing through my hair.
I miss it a lot.
But I tell you what I would sumit up in one word and that's
attitude.
It's like everything,everything is about attitude.
You know raising children anddoing mitsis and learning and
(58:52):
having kushrists and sharperseverything's attitude.
You have the right attitudes.
We can do it.
Speaker 2 (58:59):
I mean, I mean thank you so so much.
I, griffy and I are so gratefulto you for giving of your time
today.
If our listeners want to get ahold of you, we actually have a
really engaged crowd.
Usually there's a lot ofquestions coming our way into
our podcast interviewees.
So if they do want to get ahold of you, what's the best way
(59:21):
for them to do that?
Speaker 3 (59:22):
So I have an email address, but I'm very, very busy
.
I can't constantly answerquestions and they say I am
putting it in a book and I'mreally desperate to get it out
there soon.
It's just I've got a millionother things that I'm doing as
well, so it's a time thing, butif they want to, they need to.
I'm passionate about thismitzvah and if it means that
somebody can increase theirobservance of this mitzvah and
(59:45):
their love for this mitzvah,then I definitely will.
My email address isR-E-B-L-I-E-B.
It's Rebleeb as in RebedtonEvenman.
R-e-b-l-i-e-b at gmailcom.
Speaker 2 (59:58):
You just gave out your email.
I just said a couple ofthousand women across the world.
Speaker 3 (01:00:02):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (01:00:03):
Thank you.
Speaker 3 (01:00:04):
My friends in a crash .
Thank you so much.
Thank you so so much.
Stop with all the amazing work.
Keep going.
["the Last Song of the Year"].
Speaker 1 (01:00:21):
Thank you for listening.
We hope you enjoyed and grewOriginal music of Shamilznigin
provided by Chaz and David KTech.
Speaker 2 (01:00:28):
We look forward to your input, feedback and
suggestions.
We also have partnershipopportunities available.
Please email info atbodiessoulscom.
Again, info at bodiessoulscomwith two S's.
Speaker 3 (01:00:47):
Thank you ["The Last Song of the Year"].
Hi and welcome to our podcast, bodies and Souls
Conversations for the JewishWoman.
Good morning and welcome tothis episode of Bodies and Souls
.
Your host for today is RifkiBoyarski and Sarah Lowenthal.
Today we have Faye Liebermanjoining us, all the way from
England, and we're so excitedbecause this is a topic that I
(00:28):
feel is very important now inthe climate of Eritreal, and we
just finished our three-partseries on the Myths of a Woman
and I think this is a reallynatural transition into the next
step and I think, especially inthe climate today where women
are strengthening themselves andcovering their hairs and you
see, all over in differentcommunities, women are starting
(00:49):
to cover their hair inside theirhouse with a tichel, with a
sheathal so I think that it's anatural next step for a lot of
women who are thinking what canI do to help my brothers and
sisters in Eritreal?
So hopefully, as we go throughour conversation today, we're
going to get a depth ofunderstanding for this powerful
mitzvah and we're going to walkaway feeling inspired and
(01:09):
empowered.
So, faye Lieberman, can youstart off by telling us a little
bit about yourself and how yougot into doing what you're doing
?
Speaker 3 (01:16):
Okay, so I'm Faye Lieberman.
I live in England, my husbandis, and I've been a Robin Rebson
here in London now for about 40years about 38 years Before
that we lived in there.
We got married with a Montrealfor a year and a half.
I've been teaching for manyyears and I taught many, many
colours, and one of the colourscame to me once and said that
(01:37):
she wants to cover her hair, butshe didn't know very much about
it.
She still wanted to weartrousers, which is pants by you,
so she didn't know if that washypocritical and she wanted to
know.
Now I had.
I looked around for books and Icouldn't find any books that
covered the topic properly, so Istarted collating material
myself.
At that time I had a very, verylittle material, but I gave her
(02:02):
.
I learnt with her.
At the end of the colourclasses.
I learnt with her about haircovering and Baruch Shem, she
covered her hair and thenafterwards I offered it to every
colour and slowly words startedgoing around and I did classes
all over London, outside Londonas well, and really, really
connected with Smith's Faire.
I think it's absolutely.
(02:23):
The more I learn about itmyself, the more I find it
incredible and, such as Chuss.
I'm now in the process.
I've been doing this for manyyears in the process of writing
a book, because I found thatthere's not one book that goes
across the board, and also Ifound I've given a lot of these
classes to modern orthodoxgroups or people who are
(02:44):
starting.
It's amazing when people comeup to me in all sorts of places
and say I'm covering my hairafter your share.
I do it in depth, with sources,and so I decided I'm going to
try and write a book.
But writing a book is muchharder than speaking, so it's
taking a long time, but I hope,mr Shem, it'll get there.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
And I think that what's going to pop out to a lot
of people is what popped out tome and, I think, a lot of
people who are living ininsulated communities, where we
see a lot of people who are likeus and observing like us, when
we see people observing thingsthat are so specific, like hair
covering, and we see that maybethey might not be keeping other
things, like they're wearingpants and then their hair
covering and I think you see alot of that more in like Israel
(03:25):
or you know places where there'sa little bit more of
differentiation in how theexpression is of your Yiddish
guide, so maybe that makes moresense.
But I think people probablywould be taken aback to hear
that there are women who arecovering their hair and covering
their hair fully, but theymight not be at an observance
level that you expect them to be.
Why, how, like, what would youexplain the hair covering?
(03:49):
What is this mitzvah and how?
Is it really a standalonemitzvah that it can be that
you're struggling with otherareas but you're covering your
hair?
Speaker 3 (03:59):
Okay.
So a lot of people conflatehair covering with sneers and
say that one covers hair becauseit's nears.
Sneers is definitely part of it, as I explained a little bit
later, but that's not the reasonspecifically we cover hair.
The reason is it's actually amitzvah.
Sneers is more of a middler andI'll explain the difference
soon.
And there is a command to theShulchan.
(04:21):
Aura says a woman should not goto Peru, but Rocheba Shook she
should not go in a public placewith her hair uncovered.
A married woman, and many, manyother sources as well.
So it is definitely anobligation for a woman to cover
her hair.
And I've just traced a littlebit through from the beginning.
I like to look at the sourcingof the beginning.
So when Ottoman hava, whenGhan-e-dan, as we know, they
(04:43):
were not, so not clothed, theywere their bodies and the Nisham
, as their souls, werecompletely as one.
There was no, there was nodifference in how they reflected
their feelings in their bodiesand their souls.
In fact, the Rebbe says thatthe most personal parts were as
holy as the Tafilin, the armthat was in Tafilin.
And it says in the Torah ofElias by Shashi they were not,
(05:05):
as they were not ashamed.
After Yitmeid hadas, somethingchanged and it they hid.
And Hashem did the first,chesed open, chesed for them and
made clothing for them.
And it's interesting becausethe word for clothing is lvush
and the word for shame isleibosh.
Okay, not be ashamed.
(05:26):
And the concept of shame is youknow what is shame?
Shame is not guilt.
Shame is when the Nishama andthe guv do not feel aligned.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
Before the Chet they felt aligned just for clarity
for people who are listening.
Your Nishama is your soul andyour guv is your body that's
right.
Speaker 3 (05:43):
Yeah, the another word for clothing is beged,
which also is similar to theword bogad, which means to
betray, because clothing canbetray the real you.
So when people cover themselves, they're not covering their
bodies, they are revealing theessence of their souls.
So it's much deeper than justputting something over your body
(06:06):
.
So, adam and Chava, as a resultof losing that connection
between body and soul, they thenhad different to konim,
different rectifications theyhad to undertake in order to
bring themselves back to thatplace.
So Adam Adams was very muchconnected to his ability to
provide kranasa said, to workthe ground and things connected
(06:29):
to that.
And Chava, his wife, was verymuch connected to her personal,
to her marriage, to bearingchildren and also to her
personal comportment.
So the Gomorrah in the Talmudand the Riven tells us that one
of the 10 things that Chava hadto do was a Tufaka Aval.
She had to cover herself like amourner, and Rashi explains
(06:49):
that to me that she had to.
She had to cover her hair andthe reason is when, when God
created her, her hair, he tookher hair and he presented to
Adam with her hair.
He's in a sort of a braid and aspire and and the Gomorrah says
actually that when it saysVayivin Eschava, he built her
(07:10):
and in the seaside towns theyused to call, call, use the word
Vayivin as in building and hebuilt a spy in her head and that
hair.
That hair represented thediscipline that she could hold,
the boundaries that she couldmaintain in her home.
And once they sinned, that went, and that's one of the things
(07:32):
that has to be rectified throughwomen.
There are different things thathave to rectify through men,
and so Chava had to.
From that moment on, a womanhad to cover her hair and we see
that that continued throughhistory.
Sarah, a mother, sarah, she wasin the, she was a very, she was
one of the Shluchas parexcellence.
(07:52):
She used to go and influencethe women while husband of
Romans, it brought in the men.
Yet when it, when the Torah,identified Sarah, it says he
neighbor, oh hell, she was anattend.
Not that she was an attend allthe time, she was a busy woman.
But Rashi says, malamah saidTznur, haitha taught us that she
was modest, she had dignity.
And then, in fact, when Rivgarcame to meet Yitzhak, the first
(08:15):
thing she did, when she glimpsedfrom afar and she saw Yitzhak,
it says but it's Kassas.
But if she, she covered herselfwith a scarf because she was
preparing herself for marriage.
Just incidentally, the word ifis an acronym for Amcha, yisrael
Tsrichim, parnasa.
Your people at Israel needParnasa, which means sustenance,
(08:38):
ability to live, and, and thethe Rebbe used to talk a lot
about the Bracha, the blessingof Parnasa for people who are
careful of hair covering.
But again, I'll take that soit's just an aside for the
moment.
The, the Gamora brings theTalmud in Brachas, brings not in
Brachas, sorry in Kasubos.
It explains about hair coveringand it asks the question what
(09:03):
is the difference between DasMoshe and Das Yehudis?
Das Moshe, explains, are lawsthat come from the Torah,
written black and white in theTorah.
Das Yehudis, with the laws ofYehudis, are laws that have been
passed through generations ofwomen and accepted through
generations of women, and theyvery much connect and relate to
(09:24):
that concept of modesty andpersonal, personal things like
Nidar, areas of Nidar for awoman.
So that that that's so.
It would seem that Das Yehudishas a much weaker strength in
terms of the obligation it's.
It's actually not the case.
The, the only difference is theconsequence of Das Moshe and
(09:44):
Das Yehudis, but that, but I'llleave that aside.
The Gamora asks what's Das Mosheof Das Yehudis and gives
examples.
For example, it says that awoman who, who is together with
her husband, she's in Nidarwhere she doesn't tie her food,
take my set, etc.
And Das Yehudis?
It says things to do withmodesty and it also includes she
(10:04):
goes outside with her hair andcover it.
The Gamora then that's sorry.
The Mishnah says that.
The Gamora then asks a questionabout that and says
Roshabharudharayasahi is nothair covering from the Torah,
and then it gives a.
It proves that by saying itrelates to the concept of the
(10:27):
Isha Sota, which is the waywardwoman who was, who was
potentially accused or thoughtof as having had an affair with
a man who was not a husband andshe was warned many times didn't
really happen in in in essence,but it was.
It was some sort of a processthat a woman who was warned
(10:50):
constantly not to secludeherself with another man and she
was brought into the baseAmigdash and one of the things
that the Torah in Bami Dibartells us which is where the
connection to hair coveringcomes from in the Torah is is
the koan had to bring her intothe special place and Uparah
Esrashah Isha had to uncover herhair.
(11:11):
Now there's an argument whatpara means, and I'm not gonna go
through all that now becausetime is.
I can sit here for five hoursand talk to you.
Para in some place in Torahmeans uncover some place.
It means unravel.
All the Mufarashim, all thecommentaries, agree that is.
The is the combination of bothhe first uncovered and then
unraveled.
And and Rashi and all theMufarashim of commentaries
(11:33):
explained that Rashi says Mikhan.
From here we learned thatuncovering a hair was a disgrace
for her.
So every woman had her haircovered because the sort of
Torah obligated.
So the Gamorah, the Talmud,explains that.
From here we learn that haircovering for a woman is an
obligation.
The question is how much andwhere, and that's where I'll
(11:57):
talk about that more if you wantme to later.
But that those are thequestions.
But according to every opinion,once a woman is married, her
hair has a different nature andtherefore she is obligated to
cover it.
Certainly in a public place.
And just by the way thatRamosha Feinstein identifies
that, any place that wherepeople are there, a home,
(12:21):
becomes a public place if you'rehaving people over.
So it's not necessarily theactual geographical occasion,
it's the people that are foundin that location.
Speaker 1 (12:31):
I find it very interesting that you're saying
any place where people are,you're not differentiating
between genders, and I thinkthat's a very missed like
there's always a discussion withpeople who are struggling with
their recovery of like oh, ifI'm in an all women's gym or if
I'm in an all women's space likea swimming pool, that just is
is their space in Halacha thereis.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
There is there, definitely there's.
There's different gradationsover here, so, for example,
location is definitely defined.
There's what you call shook,which is the public arena, which
is, you know, traditionally themarketplace, but anywhere where
people congregate.
Then there's the Mavui, whichis the alleyway, which is the
area where people went from the,from the public arena, to the
(13:14):
private.
Then there's the Khatser peopleused to live in homes with a
courtyard surrounding them wherethere were even less people.
And then there's the home andthe Halacha really discusses,
and there's a lot of differentdiscussions about that, a lot of
different ways of looking at it.
According to the stricteropinions, any of those outdoor
(13:37):
places considered public and shecould not uncover a hair.
Now the Gamorah Gamorah,gamorah Gamorah says that how do
we differentiate the dust moshit and dust mo shit aspects?
And and really what it is isthat her hair has to be covered.
According to dust mo shit, howshe covers it is more dusty
hoodies, so corn dusty hoodies.
It says she wear a kalta.
(13:59):
Kalta is like a partial haircovering where some of the hair
might be visible, but that's notaccording to all opinions.
I'm just going to the.
You know the very bare bonesand they're definitely are her
terrain for people to cover lessand and not as carefully
amongst Khatserim it's not thecase it's.
(14:19):
It's much stricter.
Now explain later why.
But there is a differentiationbetween men and women because
there isn't Halacha a difference, but when one understands why
hair is important to be covered,it doesn't really make a
difference.
In other words, strictlyspeaking, halachically, there is
a difference between showing,exposing hair to a man, a woman,
(14:42):
a married woman exposing a hairto a man and exposing a hair in
front of a woman.
But from the Kabbalistic andHasidic perspective it's not the
case.
And even so, in the Gamorah weknow the story of Kimchis.
Kimchis was a woman who lived atime of second base on Medar, a
second temple, and she marriedher to have seven sons who all
(15:06):
potentially could be Kohanim,gdolem, high priests, now
normally a Kohan Gaddal had todie before the next one took
over, but they all were able tofill in for each other.
Now that was Nakhis, beyond,because she was, it never
happened to anybody else, andthe Khachamim came to her and
asked her how she merited suchan incredible, incredible gift
(15:28):
of Nakhis like this, and shesaid and beyond my Loro'u, kale
Kora Spaces, kale Sari, thewalls of my home, the beams of
my home never, ever witnessedthe strands of my hair and the
response was many did that andthey didn't have that merit.
In other words, this was common.
Now why was she especiallyrewarded with sons who were
(15:52):
Kohanim Gdolem?
So Rashi says in that Gamorah,the Gamorah Yashami actually,
that we have the Pasukh, that inTehillim, that Kul Kvudah
Basmelev Penima.
The beauty, the dignity of awoman is her inner part, her
inside, who she is, mishpa ZahavLe Busha.
She wears gold garments and aKohan Gaddal also wore gold and
(16:17):
therefore that was specificallythe reward also, very
specifically also, is that themain service of a Kohan Gaddal
was inside the KodishaGdashanium Kippa.
That's where he reconnected inprivate.
And because she was evencareful in the privacy of her
home to be careful, she meritedthat merit.
Just as an aside, it said thatthe mother of the Khazanish and
(16:43):
the whole family are all very,very, very great people.
When she was in the 1900s inEurope, they didn't have much
money.
They once asked Khazanish howdid your mother merit to have
such great children?
They were very short on money,but one thing her mother did was
that she never uncovered herhair ever and when she washed
(17:05):
her hair she used to hire twowomen to block the vision of the
sink, so she would wash herhair without anyone seeing and
he believed that was her.
That was a Schuss.
So definitely the Gamora bringsthat, but Hasidist and Kabbalah
definitely bring the concept ofwhy hair is so powerful and
(17:26):
therefore, because of itsincredible power, cannot be
uncovered at all and should beconsistently covered.
From the Halachic standpointthere are definitely leniencies
if one wants to look for the.
There are definitely lenienciesfor how much and where, and
that's why there are people whosay that it's not necessary
always to cover it.
(17:46):
But, as I say, certainly theRebbe was very, very adamant
about hair being coveredcarefully all the time, bringing
the quoting, always quoting theZohar and the Zohar the book of
the Zohar, which was a keyKabbalistic work, explains the
(18:07):
Rebbe, interesting enough, never, ever highlighted the
negativities of not coveringhair.
He always lets focus on thepositive and he says the brachis
, the blessings that come fromin terms of pranasa, in terms of
children and generations ofchildren, and the success of
one's husband, both physicallyand spiritually, and the brachis
(18:29):
that are just enormous.
I always say to people ifsomebody told you to eat
cucumbers for a month and you'dget all those things.
You eat cucumbers all month,right, it's just that hair
coverings a lot harder.
But certainly the Rebbe wasvery, very adamant about being
very, very careful about even inthe very innermost parts of
your home to be sensitive tothis.
Speaker 1 (18:51):
Just to be clear, because you're being a little
euphemistic when we're talking,the innermost parts of the home
you're talking about, even inyour bedroom, if you're able to
do that Is that.
Is that?
Am I listening and hearingcorrectly?
Speaker 3 (19:02):
Okay, so.
So there are again gradationsin the bedroom.
There are, you know, peoplethere, some people very careful
at all times in the bedroom whenthey're sleeping, when they're
intimate.
Speaker 1 (19:13):
I want to clarify we we we defined the parameters
Halaqa glee, that they're ratherwide, but we also are now
saying that there is benefit forbeing careful, even in spaces
where Halaqa glee, it might beokay to uncover, and that's
right.
That's it.
So I think another thing thatI'm hearing you say is a lot of
(19:35):
positivity and sometimes whenwomen are approaching their hair
covering, they feel a littlebit of negativity because hair
is so personal, and then they'llhear things like oh, it's airba
or oh, it's so.
It shouldn't be a mix show formen.
Sometimes you hear these typeof things and I think that
there's so much you keep sayingthe positive power of hair and
(19:56):
due to its spiritual power, andso I think that part of the
discussion of why would we evenbe careful in these spaces has
to has to connect it to Well,what is the power of the hair,
what is the positivity thatwe're trying to access?
And, aside for it just being achannel for pernaça, etc.
What is it?
Speaker 3 (20:15):
Yeah, power that happens in your hair, okay, I
mean it's not ever concerned, Iis concerned.
It's gonna like touch on thatbecause I think people you know
we have to we can't ignore that.
There is that the gamar andbrahmas brings three things that
are considered ever, everdoesn't.
Ever doesn't mean it's bad,ever means powerful.
It has tremendous power.
So it's the, the woman's hair,it's her voice and it's the top
(20:39):
of the arm and top of the leg.
And it comes.
Gamar is different, so maybethe lower part of arm, the low
part of her leg as well, but Iwon't go into that.
And and the gamar, when itbrings that, it uses it.
It brings three psukkim fromdifferent parts of Tanath to
prove its point.
And when it talks about hair,it says it brings the postingsha
(20:59):
asherim song of songs that saysSaareh kaedah haizim
shigalshumahar, gillad.
Your hair is like a flock ofgoats that cascades down the
mountain of gillad.
So it's underscoring that hairis erotic, hair is beautiful,
hair is intimate.
It's not, the hair is bad, hairis so powerful and so beautiful
.
And if you look at Contemporaryculture about hair and you said
(21:21):
what's special about hair?
Hair defines the woman.
Okay, so the only part, thewoman's creative beauty.
We don't have hair because itkeeps you warm.
In fact, you ask somebody to todescribe somebody, more often
than not they'll say she's aredhead, she's a dark, she's got
blonde.
She's blonde because that issomething hair power is, much is
(21:44):
.
You know, hair contact isBecomes comfy for eye contact.
It's the first thingsubconsciously noticed.
You know, I used to teach in ahigh school where there were, as
a mixed high school, most a lotbecause weren't religious.
I used to observe the girlswhen they used to be around the
boys and and and the.
The body language with the hairwas incredible.
(22:04):
You know, they said flip thehead back and take the, the, the
bubbles out, and and and shakethe heads and it's something
that people know, they have,they have a hair conveys
language.
It's very, very powerfullanguage with hair and it's a
subconscious thing and peoplewill spend.
I mean, the hair industry isworth billions because if
somebody tells Somebody thatyou'll find this product will
(22:27):
actually make your hair looklike this and that's your dream,
you will buy that product.
It's very powerful and thenatural hair, the hair that you
know, the wind blowing through ahair, the, the, the feeling of
the hair, is the first.
You don't put on makeup.
You know your.
Your outfit is not perfect Ifyour hair pinch your hairdresser
and your hair looks amazing.
(22:48):
You feel confident.
It does create confidence andthat's why it's so, so tragic
when people lose their hairthrough conditions like alopecia
or or God forbid cancer andthey have to have kemen, their
hair falls out.
That's that.
That's one of the things thatreally bothers women
tremendously when their hair,because hair does give them a
(23:10):
sense of feeling and andPositivity.
And even throughout the culture, throughout the culture that
history you go through historyin every single period of time
You'll find the way they used toput the effort into dressing up
their hair with all thedifferent accessories and
different colorings and powders.
(23:31):
And Was high, it was poofed, itwas wide it was, and even tell
you, look at photos you even canactually identify periods of
time through the hair people arehave on their heads much more
than the clothing or the orthings around them.
People put effort into intohair coloring, the hair styling,
(23:51):
into hair cutting.
Even eyebrows, for example, andeyelashes are so important to
women.
A lot of people used to thinkin the past that they were just
Strips of hair over your eyes.
People realize that eveneyebrows can can change the
whole feel and the whole look.
Hair really is the crown thatwoman never takes off.
It's it's that feeling of I'vegot something really Important.
(24:16):
And every woman knows thatintrinsically, even those who
don't mind messy hair.
There's a statement being madewith messy hair.
It's not that everybody has tohave the same feeling about how
the hair has to look, but mostpeople, subconsciously, are
making a statement with theirhair much more than any other
area.
So so Hair is very, very, veryimportant and because of its
(24:39):
power, it has a tremendousability to be intimate.
So it's not the hair's bad orthat's why we cover it.
As I said in the beginning, wewe don't cover parts of our body
.
We reveal our national musclesbecause when you look at
somebody, you see something much, much deeper through.
(24:59):
When the parts are covered thatshouldn't be revealed, the
depth is really is reallyabsorbed and people see you
differently.
We all know that.
We all know that.
We all know that our hair meansa lot to us and it is a very,
very hard mix, but it's probablyone of the more difficult ones.
I think snus generally is, buthair covering is extremely
(25:20):
difficult and People really webattle with it and struggle with
it, but I see it as a bigprivilege because it does
something to you.
That's very, very special On avery deep level and it's a
sensitivity I think once womenand I have I have a community
and People often women startcovering the hair some a lot of
(25:42):
women cover their hair ready,but some of them don't, and it's
interesting how they suddenlyfeel that I just want to cover
my hair.
I feel something inside medoesn't come from and doesn't
come from.
I saw a shadow that I love.
It comes from something inside.
They feel very connected tothemselves and they want to do
(26:02):
something, and hair covering isoften what, how they, how they
plug in.
It is a very deep mitzvah andthat's why it's hard, because
it's so deep I love the, therevealing part, rather than
covering.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
I think that's such a powerful point to connect to.
As you cover your hair to say,well, I'm not actually covering
anything.
I'm redeemed, I'm revealing thedeepest parts of my soul.
Now let's talk about the haircoverings that women do use, and
I think you see a lot morevariations outside the United
States.
Why would some Communities andwomen prefer to cover with a
(26:36):
tichel and some communities andwomen prefer to cover with a
sheytal?
Why and is there a Place inHalakha for covering certain
parts of our hair, like I seesome communities, they cover,
like almost with a very thickband, but the back is not
covered.
Some people will specificallycover the back like what are
what are the Differentiationsbetween what we're covering our
(26:59):
hair with?
Speaker 3 (27:00):
Right, okay, so again , you know we are Jews and
therefore there's a 10 Jews, 20opinions, we, there are a lot of
opinions around and but I'mgonna stick to what the Halakha
says and then move on from thatStrictly.
Halakha speaking, a woman hasto cover her hair outside.
How she covers her hair, thatare different views.
Some would say that she coversit.
(27:22):
You know, in the old days theconcept of a sheytal started.
Actually, we can, we can traceit back time, the Mishnah women
that the mission at thecommission, the Gamarra, talks
about, the fact that are youallowed to carry is, is is
wearing a wig, a Sheytalconsidered to carrying on
sharpest, I mean, so you have tohave an a-room.
(27:42):
And it was Answered.
It wasn't considered.
It was fine Now wide.
In fact, it wasn't even properwigs for a lot of people it was
a hair extensions.
A woman whose hair was sparse,was would cover, would wear
something on her head to make itlook thicker.
So it wasn't necessarily a fullwig.
You know, it could have been a,it could be a wig, a bit of a
(28:03):
wig with it with a scarf on top.
There have been variations overover the centuries, that's for
sure.
Now certain communities believethat Shaitals are not
necessarily modest and womenshould cover their hair with a
scarf or a, and you can gothrough different communities.
Some have a double covering.
That also has its source inHalacha, and some some will wear
(28:26):
certain types of snudes andscarfs and and Spitzels and
tickles and there's all sorts ofvariations.
Friday's, friday Jews and aradio stuff was very, very
adamant that women should neverwear a shawl, except if they
were divorced or widowed, thatthey could have a heta for that.
They continue cut, they shouldcontinue to come the hair, but a
shawl would be permissible.
(28:48):
I think the rebel was that theloudest voice in the amongst,
amongst Opinions in terms of,specifically, a shawl, and we
all know he said that the reasonis because when you're wearing
a scarf, a Bit can slip back andit doesn't look so bad, so you
wouldn't be so bothered by it,and a shawl that would not
(29:08):
necessarily be look veryattractive.
It's interesting.
So I've thought about this alot and I think what the rebel
was trying to underscore, forgenerations in the future as
well, was how important is tocover one's hair properly,
because leaving hair incapitalistic terms is Is a
channel through which divinelight comes in the world.
(29:30):
So God has very powerful divinelight with very high voltage
and it has to come into thisworld and hair is one of the
mediums through which it getssqueezed into, it gets, it gets
pushed through the strands ofhair.
It's very, very, it'sconceptual, it's hard to
understand it, but we're toldthat hair is a channel and
(29:52):
therefore, because hair embodieswith it such powerful light and
energy, godly and divine energy, it's very, very we have to.
We have to protect it in a way.
And that's why, specifically, amarried woman, once a woman
gets married and she is increative mode, she's able to
(30:14):
create with her husband she thenhas to protect her hair even
more than before, even more.
And in fact, the word the hairin Hebrew, which is se'ar, has
same shares, the same letters asshahar, which means gate, and
she creates the gates throughwhich she protects the energy
that comes through her, throughher husband, into the family,
(30:37):
through her creative energy.
Now, the rebel was very, veryparticular about wearing a
shaytel, and even not evenwearing a shaytel with a hat.
There is a story that he saidyou know, could, if you have a
half a shaytel, it's halfbreakfast.
Obviously, not a shaytel,necessarily indoors but when a
woman goes out the house, alwaysa shaytel in order not to allow
(30:58):
any hair to be shown.
Now, in terms of how much somewomen cover the front, some the
back, the real heather that, thereal heather that is accepted
in a lot of circles, is theheather of Moshe Feinstein,
which says he explains becauseit says tefach, be'isha, e'ervah
.
A tefach measurement, which islike a hand breath measurement
(31:21):
of a woman, is considerede'ervah In erotic stimulus.
Therefore, less than a tefachand it's very specific how much
is less around the front ispermissible to be uncovered.
The Rebbe never accepted thatand the Rebbe was very adamant
that it's not acceptable.
But this was ahetero-Moschelfreinstein.
Some people say that it was avery specific hetero of a
(31:43):
specific person.
It wasn't a general hetero Interms of the back, the
Moschelfreinstein only said thefront, the forehead and the ears
.
I have a lot of women who saythey have their hair covered on
the front and not the back.
There's hair sticking out andin my shurim on this they've
asked me this and I said andthey said this Rabbi, that Rabbi
(32:05):
allows it.
I have asked Rabonim from allcommunities and I've never got
anyone who told me that it'sokay.
The only hetero that isacceptable across the board
across, not across the board,but by a lot of people from a
very strong source is theMoschelfreinstein, who says two
fingers' breadth at the front,two fingers' worth at the front
(32:27):
and the sides.
No one's ever said the back.
The reason why some people doit is they say that it says that
the hair is ever and not thehead and therefore, because it's
a less than a teffaf, it's okay.
There's all differentjustifications, what people,
that people have, but certainlyin Chabad it was never
(32:48):
acceptable and in all Hasidiccommunities it wasn't.
When I teach people, I dosometimes, depending on who it
is, on this area, on this topic,I do sometimes say start with
that, because they wanna startsomewhere and it's not all or
nothing.
Also, a lot of women I findthey'll start off by wearing a
(33:09):
shatel on shabbos.
Most of those women cover fullyall the time in a very short
space of time because, as I say,it sensitizes them to who they
are and to the essence of theirshabbos.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
I'm interested in hearing your thoughts about lace
shatels.
I love my lace shatel.
I look back to when my shatelwas an inch off my head and I
think to myself it's so obviousthat I'm covering my hair, and
here it's so not.
In fact, when the lace shatelsfirst came out, I remember being
in crown height and my eyeswere popping out.
(33:46):
I couldn't believe what I wasseeing.
I went over to somebody this isa true story and I said to her
your shatel is amazing, tell mewhere it's from.
And she looked at me and shesaid I'm not wearing a shatel,
I'm not married.
I couldn't tell the differencebetween who was wearing one and
who wasn't, and I'd love to hearwhat Rabana was saying, or even
(34:08):
your personal hashtag about thelace.
Speaker 3 (34:13):
Okay, I wanna just give a little bit of a some
clarity about shatels and thetiniest aspect of shatels.
So one has to cover one's hair.
How one covers is connected tothe idea of modesty and seers.
So if a woman covers her hair,whatever her community decides
(34:36):
is okay or acceptable,appropriate, she needs to feel
that she's covering her hair.
Okay, she needs to know she'scovering her hair.
Then she has to also know thatthe covering just like any woman
who I have.
Invariably when I talk aboutthis, I have women who say to me
who are not yet covering, whoare saying, yeah, but you look
(34:57):
at these women with theirshatels, they look much prettier
than my hair.
That looks a mess.
So I say hair covering is likeclothing.
We're not expected to cover ourbodies.
How we cover our bodies has tobe connected to modesty.
Okay.
So you can't say, oh, herclothing looks much more
(35:21):
attractive than her body andtherefore it's not okay.
She something in her changeswhen she's covering because
she's revealing something deeperin her and it's the same thing.
However, I have a general ruleIf the wig walks into the room
before you do, you're notwearing the right wig.
In other words, you have tocompliment that shatel you can't
(35:43):
look like.
The shatel is like soextraordinarily out of the
ordinary that it just almostfeels like it's detached you.
You have to be a completeperson, looking beautiful within
and without.
In terms of lace, there'sdefinitely a very big discussion
about this.
The reason there's a discussionabout it?
(36:03):
Because in some communitiesthey believe that a shatel, in
order to be a shatel, has tolook like a shatel.
In other words, when theystarted wearing a shatel at the
time of the mission of Gomorrah,they looked like shatels.
They did not look or I havegreat ground as in Russia looked
like they're wearing shatels.
I don't know if I necessarilyagree with that and I'm very
(36:23):
careful of my words because Idefinitely respect the views of
every robber in their communityand everyone should follow that
and I wouldn't say that'sridiculous.
It's not ridiculous.
Kolakavod's people who aresensitizing themselves to
dignity and to modesty and tointernal understanding of who
(36:48):
they are as a Jewish woman, buta woman, every woman knows she's
wearing a shatel, whether it'slace or not.
Lace.
I would say lace.
Personally, I would say laceshould be lined, because if
you're wearing lace that isunlined you can see the hair and
that's a problem halachifli.
So lace should be lined, butcertainly in Chabad it's not as
(37:10):
soon as it's a problem and inmany communities it's not either
.
I don't necessarily think.
I think women should feelattractive.
There's no law that says awoman should feel awful.
A woman should feel.
When a woman feels attractive,she feels good about herself.
But she should feel attractiveand not attracting and not
provocative.
And just like her clothingshouldn't be provocative, so
(37:33):
should her shatel not beprovocative.
But if it makes her feel goodand within her community I have
a lot of colours, if only andsay what's the rules about lace?
I say you have to beat your ownrough.
You can't.
I don't think it's a blanket,but certainly if a woman, a lot
of lace shatels are very, veryrefined and there's a lot of
(37:54):
non-lace shatels that don't lookrefined at all.
So I don't know if it's thelace or not lace.
I think that lace needs to belined in order for hair not to
be visible.
And that also goes with theconcept of long shatels.
When a shatel is too long andit just hits the eye, I'm not
(38:15):
saying long shouldn't be allowed, but I'm saying when any shatel
is too long, too wild, too inthe face.
It doesn't really actuallycreate a wholesomeness with the
women wearing it.
It's just separate.
And therefore every womanwearing a shatel should consider
does this reflect the real meor is it something attached for
(38:36):
me?
Can we?
Speaker 2 (38:37):
talk about length for a minute.
Can we go more into that?
Because I know that in somecommunities length can also be
contested.
Some people feel that it's notsnis to have hair that's longer
than shoulder length, and someof these shatels are so long, so
beautiful.
So again, is that a questionthat one should ask the rest.
Speaker 3 (39:04):
Okay.
So even the communities thatare contesting it also are
critical of single girls havinghair that's very long, because
it can be attracting, it couldbe sending the messages that
we're not trying to send.
Again, I'm not a post sec.
I don't pass on what peopleshould wear, but I do respect
(39:28):
different communities and I dorespect, I think, when it comes
to just wear something thatmakes you look like if you don't
feel good, it doesn't matter,as long as you're wearing
something on your hair, I don'tnecessarily agree.
I think a woman has to feelbeautiful.
It's a very, very importantproblem to feel beautiful, to
feel attractive to herself, tofeel like she's walking out of
(39:49):
the house and she just feelsgood.
When your shatels are mess andyou just don't feel the same as
if you just had it washed andblowed and you feel just like
it's just, there's a goodfeeling.
But one does always have toconsider the concept of being
(40:10):
Senua and what it entails.
I spoke earlier about theconcept of when Azm al-Habba
were in Ghanayden, the idea thatthey were not clothed and they
had to be clothed to bring backa tick on the rectification for
their bodies and souls Clothingwhen they were in Ghanayden,
their bodies and souls were veryaligned, and clothing allows
(40:33):
that to happen.
It allows to bring.
So that's why the Kohen Goddolf, example, had to wear the
clothes in the service of theBaisame Darshan Temple, because
it would align his body with hisavodah, his service to Hashem.
The clothing itself created anaura of holiness.
It wasn't like it was him, andthen there was a clothing.
(40:56):
The clothing itself createdthat and that's why in every
area.
It's why a talis can create.
When a man puts a talis on, itbrings him to a state of mind to
fill in.
And women, in all the clothingthey wear, also creates a state
of mind.
I think that's also true in avery spiritual way, but also
physical way, and physicality isreally spirituality as well.
(41:18):
You can't really separate them.
So when a woman feels reallygood about herself, she is ready
to do what she has to do.
However, there are boundariesand boundaries are very, very
important.
It's very important to theproblem with.
Once you start lessening aboundary, it just goes downhill,
(41:40):
and that's where a lot ofpeople oh, it's a bit longer,
it's a bit less, it's a bit morerevealed.
One has to always ask oneselfthe question am I lessening the
boundaries so I'm less sensitiveto the fiducia of what I'm
doing, or am I being honest withthe boundaries?
(42:02):
So I'm actually sensitizingmyself to what, why I'm covering
my hair in the first place.
Speaker 1 (42:09):
So one of the things that's very interesting here is
you speak about the beauty,right, and I think that women
should feel beautiful, need tofeel beautiful when doing
everything that they're doing.
It's an integral part of ouridentity and I actually I speak
a lot to middle schoolers rightnow because I feel very
passionately that that's thebeginning of their self identity
, and if we talk about you knowwe're not, you know we're not
(42:32):
getting at a point where theyalready are struggling.
We can talk about this, and oneof the things that I talk about
is feeling good in your bodyand feeling positive in your
body, and I bring SNES up as anexample because I think there's
sometimes we subscribe orascribe to societal norms of
(42:53):
beauty which are alwaysfluctuating, and when you're
trying to be beautiful in thesense of what others are
dictating to you is beautiful,you sometimes feel objectified
and you sometimes feel likeyou're not authentic.
You're not authentic to who youare.
So I think that an importantdifferentiation when we're using
the word beautiful is what arewe talking about?
(43:14):
We're talking about a level ofself dignity and self respect
and a revealing of your innerauthenticity.
So it's not necessarily whenwe're saying a shagal has to be
beautiful.
We're not saying it has to bebeautiful according to societal
norms.
It has to express the beauty ofwho you are.
So it shouldn't be old andratty and tatty and whatever.
(43:36):
It should match you and itshould look what it's supposed
to be.
But that doesn't mean it has tobe very bad at measurements.
Speaker 3 (43:44):
Beautiful is very subjective.
Some people will say that pink,spiky hair is beautiful and
that's very subjective.
To what people?
We do have a very clearguideline and that's what Halafi
gives us, the guideline.
Our teachers give us theguidelines and we have to really
be very loyal to that.
I was just talking today.
(44:04):
I do a course here in schoolsin what's year six, which I
guess in America is six orseventh grade.
Over here they finish year six,they go to high school in year
seven, which is seventh grade,when they're about 11, 12.
And it's a course on thegrowing up course.
(44:24):
It's called doing a whole bunchof schools and talk about the
physical, spiritual, emotionaland social changes and
development.
So I talk, so I do it's like awhole program and I explain to
them the concept.
The body in a shaman.
I say your body is like awalking, safe etura.
It's like something so holy andspecial.
That's why you value it If yousee a safe etura.
(44:46):
In short, it's you're socareful how you handle it, such
beautiful coverings, you do it,such respect and in fact,
anything that you really value.
If you have an antique, youdon't leave it on the kitchen
table, you put it behind glassin a special case, manuscripts,
anything of real value that youreally think is important, is
handled and given the care andcovered in the correct and
(45:09):
appropriate way, not because youare hiding it.
And if you believe the body isbeautiful because I shank raced
it as a as the case for the souland they align together as one
to serve him, then you'll findways to express that in a real,
authentic way and you won't.
First of all, there's no shamein the body.
Everything is very, very Goddoesn't create anything that's
(45:32):
bad, it's beautiful.
But what we value, we encaseappropriately in the correct
things we will say is a veryinteresting medrush.
I'm not sure where it comes from, but I heard we very careful
about modesty.
And there's another which isthis time you know that we're in
now there's another society,the Islamic society, is very
(45:54):
careful about the modesty To theextent the very religious ones
they cover.
I don't know about in America,but if you see they wear that he
jobs and their whole face iscovered and it just just about
can see through some smits inthe eyes.
Now they cover and we cover whynow they cover with robes where
the shape of their bodiescompletely not.
We don't believe in that,because we believe that there's
(46:16):
nothing wrong with the body.
We don't have to hide the body.
We have to cover, as I said,reveal something deeper.
But why don't we cover ourfaces if the face could be
stunningly beautiful, and wedon't cover our faces?
Because the face contains theeyes and the eyes are winded to
the soul and so you can never,ever deviate by looking at some
(46:39):
space.
The face is a very, very holypart and if we believe that our
body is is holy and thereforeneeds different treatments in
different areas, I told veryspecifically that, even though
hair is very holy I'm not goingto go into the whole thing now
because the Kabbalah explainswhy a woman's hair, dofka has to
be covered.
I don't know how much time wehave, but it's a woman's hair
(47:00):
dofka, has to be covered, notbecause it's bad, because it's
got.
It contains a very high energyand therefore has to be covered.
And, interestingly enough,kabbalah says that it shouldn't
be cut completely, shouldn't beshaved, like in some communities
where they do shave their hairbecause they feel that that
links to the, to the idea of thebeams of the house should never
(47:24):
see any strands of hair.
And if there's no hair, there'snothing to see.
But Kabbalah does not mandatethat because even though the
head, because the hair has highenergy, it needs to be contained
by the cover.
That's the woman, the marriedones hair, but not completely
eliminated.
But if we believe that thatbeauty is how Hashem dictates
(47:46):
beauty, because Hashem createdus, he understands what beauty
is and therefore he says youwant to reveal that real beauty,
that not that very, very, notthat very superficial beauty
only, but something that hasreal essence, then I'll give you
the recipe and that's why wehave to follow it.
Do we understand it?
(48:07):
Always no, and it doesn'talways make sense and it's hard,
very, very, very hard.
But it and that's why I saidearlier that ceases a midder, it
sensitizes us to who we reallyare and that is why you'll find
I always tell girls this thatthere are people walking the
streets with very little on inthe summer.
(48:29):
They don't, they're notsensitive to their body and like
a girl who is sensitive withwill never, will never walk in
the street with half thosethings missing, half his clothes
missing, not because they'reembarrassed, because they
understand that this is notreflective of who they are.
So we have our guidelines ofwhat beauty is you asked earlier
(48:51):
.
You know what's beauty?
Yeah, the world has, and itfluctuates, it's true, because
what looked beautiful 100 yearsago is not necessarily beautiful
now, and that's why we have avery specific boundaries which
we must uphold.
Speaker 2 (49:05):
It's interesting.
My mother used to say growingup that you can trust a woman's
castress based on her SNEES.
She used to say we grew up inOttawa so we weren't sure whose
house we could eat at whosehouse we couldn't.
So I had always thought shemade that up, but she decided
someone could.
Speaker 3 (49:22):
No, it's true.
A lot of our bonn will say thatthe woman who's careful had
Seneas.
It shows Eurasian Mayan, and awoman who has Eurasian Mayan can
be implicitly trusted withAkashras.
It's not mathematical.
There are women who are veryweak, who are not so careful yet
, and yet they're very careful,akashras, and they're women who
(49:44):
are and are not.
But generally it boils down toEurasian Mayan.
Fear of heaven is very much aninner appreciation, and so is
Seneas.
It goes hand in hand.
Eurasian Mayan and Seneas areboth very much part of the inner
self.
No one can measure EurasianMayan.
(50:06):
It's something that you haveinside you.
That's the concept of Kymfesand the Gamora.
She was careful.
She was given Sons KohalimGhazalim because she was careful
when no one was looking, notwhen everybody was looking, and
that's why she merited DhafkaKohalim Ghazalim and not other
rewards, because she understoodwhat it meant to be careful when
(50:28):
no one is looking, not just outthere.
So it's a very much asensitivity that people develop,
and I feel that people whosesensitivity is a little lost
will become much less careful inthese areas.
Speaker 1 (50:43):
So it's a very interesting thing to think about
and to ponder, but I wonder, asour time here is nearing an end
, I wonder if there is somestory that you find, aside from
Kymfes, which we spoke aboutseveral times, maybe something
that women can relate to alittle bit more Are there?
Is there a particular story orcase that you've been involved
(51:06):
in.
Speaker 3 (51:06):
I can mention a couple quickly.
So there's a story of theRehbar Ashab.
There was a decree that I can'tremember the year, I haven't
got in front of me the datesometime 1800s, where the
Russian authorities forbadewomen to wear their hair
covering, which was calledknuffin.
It was some sort of scarf theywrapped around their heads.
Undependency of death orimprisonment.
(51:27):
I don't know exactly what thepunishment was, but very, very
severe, and many, many womentook off their hair coverings.
They were, you know, which wecan't judge, but they did.
There was some very loyal womenwho didn't.
Now, 10 years later, there wasthe decree of the Cantonists,
where they used to kidnap Jewishboys to be taken to the army
(51:50):
for 25 years and be rustifiedcompletely, forget under torture
, forget any connection toJudaism and also forget their
families, which was a very, verytragic time for the Yiddin in
Russia at the time.
The Rehbar Ashab mentioned thatthose women who had the
(52:12):
Miserysnafesh had their cellsacrificed not to discard their
hair coverings with the oneswhose children were saved.
Now, I didn't make that up, butdefinitely we're told, and the
Zohar says, that women who havethat, because it is
Miserysnafesh, it's very hardhave tremendous bracha that
(52:34):
comes out of it.
Another story I'll tell you thathappened very recently,
somebody that I know she is afrom-woman but I would say
modern from.
You know, the modern Orthodoxcommunity.
Lovely lady, her son went toYashiva and became very, quite
much more sort of Kharedi, asshe would say, and he was in
(52:57):
Yashiva four years, which wascompletely not in line with how
they you know Yashiva for a year, possibly two, and then
university.
But he stayed four years inIsrael in Yashiva, came back and
he said I'm coming.
Before he came out, he said I'mcoming back, I want a shidah,
not that I should like hang outand meet a girl, I want a proper
, regular shidah.
And she panicked and shethought how do I do this?
(53:20):
I don't know how to do this.
That's not how she met herhusband.
She always promised him by hisbummer.
He asked her to cover her hair.
Who's already starting to getinto that?
And she said I can't do it.
But she said when you're aboutto get engaged, at your
engagement I will cover my hair.
She didn't know how to go aboutthe whole shidah thing.
(53:40):
So she thought you know whatI'll do.
The other thing she went to the.
She didn't want to buy anexpensive shaddle because she
thought, even though she couldhave, she thought I'm never
gonna really wear it.
So she went to somebody who'ssecondhand shaddles and lovely
lady in the area and she saidyou know, I feel very strange
doing this, but you know, shetold the story about her son and
(54:00):
she says oh, what's your sonlike?
And she said I've got a girl.
Her son comes back, meets thegirl.
Three weeks later they'reengaged.
She wore the shaddle and I mether.
She wore the shaddle at thewedding and her husband told the
story at the wedding.
I met her recently.
She was living in my area andshe said to me that's it, I'm
wearing a shaddle.
I feel it now.
(54:20):
I always wanted to, but this is, I see, yad Hashem that I took
on this huge thing for her itwas huge and her son has a
beautiful marriage.
So it's just a nice story toshare.
It was a very everybody wasvery excited about the story.
Then one more thing that touchedme hugely.
(54:42):
When I read it and I can't findwhere I read it, but I know
that I read it the rebel wasvery, very particular when he
was the days that he was besidea condition that the girl had to
commit to wearing a shaddleafter she was married.
In those days wearing a shaddlewas very difficult for most
women when in the time I thinkit was in the 60s and many
(55:05):
people couldn't stand by it.
So this a bocher came to theRebbe and said he wants the
red-green side condition.
And the Rebbe said is she gonnawear a shaddle once she's
married?
And he says she doesn't want to.
He said I can't be a misalignedcondition.
Anyway, the bocher very muchwanted her to two days before
(55:26):
the wedding or a day before hecomes back to the Rebbe, and
those days people could go intothe Rebbe to talk to him.
And he says she's agreed towear a shaddle.
The Rebbe says sorry, it's toolate.
It takes me four days to summonfour generations of Rebbein to
come to the Chuppah with me.
When I do a Chuppah I'm reallysorry.
A day before is too late.
And I thought that was such anincredible thing because the
(55:49):
Rebbe didn't only do it becauseit looked good, or it was his
communal mink hard to do it.
He really believed that it madea difference in bringing up not
only one's children, as it saysin the Zahar, it will affect
children, children's children,all generations, and the analogy
(56:11):
it brings and also the Medrishbrings this analogy.
It says Eschach Geffen Peria,your wife will become like a
fruitful vine by Akasebe SechaB'nech silezeisim sabvishnecha.
She'll have the children whowill be like olive plants round
her table.
Why olive plants?
Because olives are good in thesummer, in the winter, all year
round.
And then it continues in theTehilim there Orei vanim of
(56:34):
Necha Shalom Ali, israel.
See children and children'schildren and have peace in
Israel.
So that takes you back to thebeginning of your discussion
when you say that this issomething people are taking on
for help with our situation.
Eric Desroul, and please goMashiach.
It's tremendous.
People don't know the impact ofwhat it does for a family.
(56:56):
When a woman is careful abouthair covering, it's not just a
cosmetic change in how youappear.
It has an effect.
The Zaheho is not just a randomand it has many capitalistic
and many, many, many sources.
I mean, obviously I haven't gotthe time, but please call my
book comes out.
(57:17):
You can buy it and seeeverything in it.
The impact of hair covering ishuge, not only for yourself and
not only for your husband, butfor your grandchildren, and I
don't think anyone wants to missout on that.
I can tell you from experience.
You always want to have enoughto be a grandchildren as well as
your children.
So I would definitely say Ibelieve it's a great product.
(57:40):
Just go there and get it andwear it with pride.
Speaker 2 (57:44):
Powerful, powerful.
Thank you for sharing thisstring of stories and all the
wisdom and insight that you'vegiven over.
It's interesting because yousaid back then the mix of hair
covering was hard.
I come across women and I caneven remember times in my life
where the mix of hair coveringis hard too.
It can get expensive.
(58:05):
You don't like how your shadescame out, you don't like how you
look in it, and I actually dothis thing, I self-talk.
So every morning when I put onmy shades I tell myself I love
my shades, I love doing this mixof that and it's helped also
increase, like, my positivefeelings towards covering my
hair, because it still can bereally hard it is.
Speaker 3 (58:28):
I mean I miss.
I'm married nearly 40 years fora shem and I still miss that
feeling of driving and the windgoing through my hair.
I miss it a lot.
But I tell you what I would sumit up in one word and that's
attitude.
It's like everything,everything is about attitude.
You know raising children anddoing mitsis and learning and
(58:52):
having kushrists and sharperseverything's attitude.
You have the right attitudes.
We can do it.
Speaker 2 (58:59):
I mean, I mean thank you so so much.
I, griffy and I are so gratefulto you for giving of your time
today.
If our listeners want to get ahold of you, we actually have a
really engaged crowd.
Usually there's a lot ofquestions coming our way into
our podcast interviewees.
So if they do want to get ahold of you, what's the best way
(59:21):
for them to do that?
Speaker 3 (59:22):
So I have an email address, but I'm very, very busy
.
I can't constantly answerquestions and they say I am
putting it in a book and I'mreally desperate to get it out
there soon.
It's just I've got a millionother things that I'm doing as
well, so it's a time thing, butif they want to, they need to.
I'm passionate about thismitzvah and if it means that
somebody can increase theirobservance of this mitzvah and
(59:45):
their love for this mitzvah,then I definitely will.
My email address isR-E-B-L-I-E-B.
It's Rebleeb as in RebedtonEvenman.
R-e-b-l-i-e-b at gmailcom.
Speaker 2 (59:58):
You just gave out your email.
I just said a couple ofthousand women across the world.
Speaker 3 (01:00:02):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (01:00:03):
Thank you.
Speaker 3 (01:00:04):
My friends in a crash .
Thank you so much.
Thank you so so much.
Stop with all the amazing work.
Keep going.
["the Last Song of the Year"].
Speaker 1 (01:00:21):
Thank you for listening.
We hope you enjoyed and grewOriginal music of Shamilznigin
provided by Chaz and David KTech.
Speaker 2 (01:00:28):
We look forward to your input, feedback and
suggestions.
We also have partnershipopportunities available.
Please email info atbodiessoulscom.
Again, info at bodiessoulscomwith two S's.
Speaker 3 (01:00:47):
Thank you ["The Last Song of the Year"].
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