Jeremy Rosen
Making Sense of the Bible: Can its Ancient Text be Relevant Today? Numbers 28:52, Women’s Rights
Summary
Study the text of the Bible weekly with Jeremy Rosen through a combination of traditional, critical, and personal perspectives. No knowledge of Hebrew or the Bible is necessary. You may use any Bible text you may have or you can go to sefaria.org. This week will begin with Numbers 28:52, women’s rights.
Jeremy Rosen
Manchester-born Jeremy Rosen was educated at Cambridge University England and Mir Yeshiva in Jerusalem. He has practiced as an orthodox rabbi, as principal of Carmel College in the UK, and as professor at the Faculty for Comparative Religion in Antwerp, Belgium. He has written and lectured extensively in the UK and the US, where he now resides and was the rabbi of the Persian-Jewish community in Manhattan.
Normally the answer is given that women are mentioned only when they have a very, very significant role. Remember the nurse of Rebecca is mentioned. But if they play an important part, they’re mentioned, and if they don’t play an important part, they’re not. The men are mentioned because we are dealing in a tribal male heritage world in which it’s tribes that define the community and also decide property and where that property goes.
There is another reference to the role of women, women gathering earlier on at the entrance of the tabernacle. There was an area within the tabernacle itself which was a courtyard before it, and the layperson could go there. There’s also some discussion as to whether there was a difference between the Mishkan, the tabernacle, and the Ohel Moed, the tent of the gathering. If there was a tent of the gathering, that had to be open to everybody. Whereas on the other hand, the Mishkan was limited both to priests and to people who were in a state of purity, of tahara.
There’s no mention of this in the Torah, but by the time you get to the Talmud, you have a much more sophisticated and complicated way of dealing with inheritance. So as you know, you could get married without a contract, according to the Bible. But when you had to have a ketubah, the marriage document laid down laws that protected the wife and her money. According to Talmudic law, the husband could benefit from the property. So he could take rents, but the property technically remained hers. So therefore, the laws of inheritance that we have today protect the assets of the wife, and she can decide how they’re going to be passed on.