The Wig and Orthodox Judaism: A review essay of Lynne Schreiber's Hide and Seek: Jewish Women and Hair Covering

By Rabbi Alan Yuter
Posted Friday, February 10, 2006 • Modified Tuesday, February 21, 2006

In Lynne Schreiber's Hide and Seek: Jewish Women and Hair Covering, the reader is introduced to a ritual observed by almost all seriously religious Orthodox women. One Yeshiva University rabbi referred to the woman's head covering as "the badge of the Orthodox woman." Schreiber's work is honest, inclusive, non-judgmental, and informed of the "facts." We will survey the facts as they appear in the Jewish canonical documents, which are the writings of the written and oral Torah and which came to closure c.a. 500-600 C.E. Talmud rulings are canonical, but subsequent opinion is provisional and is measured against the Talmudic benchmark.

Orthodox Judaism affirms that it represents the living culture that originated at Mount Sinai. The recent discovery that human hair wigs produced in India might be associated with pagan rituals moved the ritually intense Orthodox to examine the woman's head covering obligation. We will examine [a] how the wig is viewed by official Judaism's canonical documents, [b] how the wig is presented in one Orthodox day school, [c] how the wig is viewed by leading rabbis, [d] how the wig is applied by Lubavitch Judaism, and [e] how might account for the gap between canonical and social Orthodoxy. The Talmud permits a wig to be worn in a properlyenclosed courtyard. Maimonides allows the wig to be worn in the relative privacy of an eruv courtyard so that a woman's husband would not see his wife in less than her full beauty. Another view forbids the wig even in a court enclosed by an eruv. In Talmudic law, an eruv may be erected in a courtyard and not in fully public areas like wide streets.

Medieval Ashenazi authorities extended the Talmudic license to allow an eruv in a semi-public area to a public area that carries less than 600,000 passers-by. For those who do not accept the community eruv, there would be no license for a woman to wear a wig in public. Those who do not use the eruv and who nevertheless require their wives to wear wigs reflect communal convention, not Talmudic law. The saintly Lubavitcher Rabbi Menahem Mendel Schneerson, applying the Zohar [Naso], insisted that all hair be covered and that the wig is the most effectitve way to accomplish this goal. According Orthodox doctrine, only a court greater in wisdom and numberhas a right to overturn a Talmudic ruling. Hence R. Schneerson's intuition carries no greater valence than that of R. Eliezer the Great, whose divinely inspired intuition was confirmed by a Divine oracle but nevertheless rejected as a valid legal opinion. Any appeal to a private revelation not accepted by the Sanhedrin's public promulgation is, without recourse to demonstration cannot be accepted, either de facto or de jure, as oral Torah.

The most lenient position regarding women's head covering was argued by R. Yosef Mesas of Haifa, who contended that the woman's head covering requirement is depends upon the husband's will. R. Ovadya Yosef, who forbids women's wigs for Sefardic and Ashkenazi Jews, argues that a man who does not insist that his wife wear the wig at the onset of his marriage may not divorce her for not doing so subsequently. R. Yosef likely was aware of R.Mesas's view, given his penchant for thorough research. R Mesas's opinion is, at first glance, problematic because the anonymous Talmud defines this obligation as Torah derived, or de-oraita. Maimonides, who is Sefardic, and R. Moses Isserlein, who is Ashkenazic, both view this obgliation to be less than Biblical. One of the greatest rabbinic scholars of Yeshiva University, the late Rabbi M. S. Feldblum, wrote that Maimonidean rulings which contradict the the Babylonian Talmud are Aramaic, anonymous, and likely post-Talmudic glosses. The passage that refers to the head covering obligation as de-oraita shares these qualities. For Maimonides, the Talmudic rulings of Rabina and Rav Ashi, who conclude the legislative work of the Talmud, are binding and may not be challenged. Opinions and rulings of post-Talmudic rabbis are, however, subject to review. Unlike Maimonides, R. Avraham Karelitz categorically rejected this method and ruled that one may not use new, "modern" information or manuscripts to overturn "traditional" or historically accepted usage. Maimonides would counter that one may not legislate correct law with inadequate information. While the text critical method is too subjective to create new law, it serves to explain odd rulings of great medievalist sages who seem to contradict Talmudic rulings.

Schreiber summarizes the views of many authorities, allowing them to speak in their own voicew, revealing their learning and sociology. The Hassidic R. Mayer Schiller discovers that in the "consensus of the authorites" a woman's head covering is an obligation, and that may authorities do permit the wig. He fails to consider the concerns of those who reject the wig usage. Instead, he defers to the to the consensus of rabbis he deems worthy. Rabbi Yosef's trenchant, exhaustive, and conclusive argument outlawing of the wig goes unaddressed, likely because Schiller's Hassidic Orthodoxy canonizes his community's leaders who, being canonical, do have the authority to override the Talmudic canon.

Susan Tawil reports that she was never informed about the "leniency" regarding showing a hand breadth of hair. Her name, which means "long" in Arabic, indicates that she or her husband are Sefardic but the Yeshiva community they inhabit never informed them regarding the range and reasoning of Halakhic opinion. Instead, it is taught that the wig is a badge of pious identity.We also learn about Miriam Apt, who re-adopted the wearing the wig later in life. Her mother wore the wig, albeit unhappily. Particularly poignant is Erica Brown's contribtution. She is conflictned between her religious commitment, which requires the head covering, and her individuality, which rejects the practice. If Orthodoxy can justify the wig, musts must find a place for Erica Brown's position as well.

On the day on which my engagement became public, my beloved teacher, Professor Yosef Faur, taught the important responsum of Maharam alShaqar, who provides a thorough analysis of the head covering obligation. Before we were married, my wife-to-be studied with Mrs. Vicky Riskin, who like my mentor, taught that the wig is not a preferred hair covering option. My brother-in-law, Rabbi Stuart Grant, a student of the late R. Joseph Soloveitchik, also reported that R. Soloveitchik did not approve of wigs as a hair covering. I suspect that the late R. Soloveitchik, known well for his precision in reading the Talmudic text, came to the same conclusion as did R. Yosef. It is curious indeed that so many rabbis, [many of whom were taught by R. Soloveitchik!], laity, and Orthodox women taught at Yeshiva University's Stern College for Women, permit wearing elegant, expensive wigs to express "modesty," in violation of the tradition of their spiritual mentor. Furthermore, Rabbi Saul Berman taught my daughter at Stern College that the women's wig is problematic. I strongly suspect, but cannot at this time prove, that when Rabbi Sholom Eliashiv banned all wigs [a] he did so when it is unclear whether the hair cut in India was used in idolatrous cult, and [b] he outlawed synthetic hair as well as European blond hair as well, he was in fact trying to restore the precise the Lithuanian Talmudic tradition, and ban all wigs.

When teaching at a Hebrew Day School for high school Orthodox girls, a fellow instructor, himself a student of R. Soloveitchik and who was cited in Schreiber's volume as a teacher of a respondent, did not inform his students of the view that wig may not be used on Shabbat. The respondent claimed that this instructor presented "all opinions" This means that his presentation appeared to be objective, thorough, without polemic, and without "brainwash." Since I observed that R. Getzel Ellenson's important volumes on women's issues were in this rabbi's possession, I know for a fact that he was aware of the problems with the woman's wig. Apparently, he reported all the opinions that conformed to range of accepted practice that Orthodox sociology deemed "acceptable." When I mentioned to some girls that the Talmud seems to rule restrictively regarding the wig, and this "different" canonical opinion was "out of the closet," a wig-wearing administrator reprimanded me for [a] being wrong and [b] confusing the students. How could I be right if the great rabbis obviously rule differently?

The opposition of Lithuanian rabbis to wig was forgotten in America. I suspect but cannot as yet prove that the de facto tolerance of wigs in Lithuanian yeshiva circles in our time is due to the fact that many Orthodox women, upon coming to America, stopped wearing any head covering whatsoever and the Hassidic license became popular.

This administrator's position touches upon the very essence of what it means to be Orthodox. Officially, Orthodox Jews believe in God and the Torah law. The living religion stresses symbols, disciplines, and social pressure. Probative learning and questioning are discouraged because the pious Jew must nullify oneself and surrender to intuitively inspired intuition of great rabbis. The Soloveitchian "man of law" who, with confidence and freedom, probes for truth in the tomes of Talmud is cited as a culture hero to be cited with approval, but the laity ought not to question rabbis on the basis of canonical information. By making Talmudic information public in his Code, Maimonides caused a controversy by empowering Jews to ask informed questions. Religious knowledge is religiously and socially dangerous.

Torah is a religion of law and reason, and not human authority. Rulings must be referenced with Torah sources and may not be confused with socially conditioned expectations. It is indeed possible "for all the people to be in error." One famous Orthodox rabbi justified smoking, even though it is medically dangerous, "because great rabbis smoke." For this rabbi, the rabbinic person and not the rabbinic canon is the ultimate source of authority. A sin offering is presented not only by the simple Israelite, but the king, the court and the great priest. If Maimonides and R. Yosef ruled as they did, and R. Mesas ruled that there is no obligation whatsoever, the religiously honest approach must explain why, on the basis of a reasoned reading of the canon, that their reasons are inadequate if their views are to be rejected. If the teacher mentioned above presented "the range of opinion acceptable in our community," he would have been within his moral right. His selective presentation of women's hair covering under the guise of objectivity, without addressing the wig restrictions, is intellectually dishonest, religiously misleading and educationally unprofessional. For the sincere Orthodox adherent, it is the command of the Creator and not the command of the community that is ultimately binding. Lynne Schreiber's research uncovered the double-speak that makes Orthodoxy less credible than it ought to be; thoughtful Jews will rightly be skeptical of a religious community that justifies its beliefs and behavior by referencing sacred texts, but will discourage its adherents from confronting those texts when considering how their lives are to be lived.

Schreiber's volume's only deficiencies are its chattiness and its over reliance on secondary sources. Chattiness is a matter of taste. The second issue is more serious. R. Feinstein is quoted as requiring women to cover every strand of hair; in point of fact, he astutely distinguished between covering the hair and covering the head, and he allowed some hair to show. A philological reading of the canonical sources indicates that married Jewish women are indeed obliged to cover their hair outside of the domicile with a snood, hat, or kerchief, and because the Talmud so rules, the wig may be worn in a courtyard that is enclosed by a Talmudically acceptable eruv, which is rare in our time. Integrity requires that Jewry become aware of all the sources and be tolerant of those who disagree with their readings, whether on the right or left. R.Mesas's leniency is sufficient not to demand a divorce for a woman who will not wear a head covering, but it remains a minority and therefore less than normative report.

When asking a Hassidic rabbi why his wife wears a wig rather than a hat, he said, "my mother did this, my grandmother did this, my rebbe said to do it, so what else is there to say?" If R. Yosef were present, he would likely have cited Rashi to Leviticus 19:2, where it is recorded that one must disobey a parent [or teacher] if they tell you to disobey the law. The seriously religious Jew goes back to the sources while weighing intervening precedent. Authentic Tradition is not an accident of culture, it is the public law, no longer in heaven, that is within our mouths and our souls to affirm. In other words, we cannot be honest to God unless we are honest to ourselves.

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