How To Beat Your Wife <object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/yl8g8S6F3do&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/yl8g8S6F3do&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object> The Koran is clear and unmistakable. Exactly mirroring all legal systems that administer increasingly harsher penalties for continued wrongdoing, the Koran says the Husband should first verbally admonish her, next ground her to the bedroom like a child, and finally when all else fails, to beat her. 1. Give her a piece of your mind by scolding and rebuking her. 2. Ignore her, ground her to her room, starving her of sex, affection and attention. (This is recognized to day as a form of passive wife abuse) 3. Physically beat her. Six translations of Qur'an 4:34: 1. "Men are superior to women on account of the qualities with which God has gifted the one above the other, and on account of the outlay they make from their substance for them. Virtuous women are obedient, careful, during the husband's absence, because God has of them been careful. But chide those for whose refractoriness you have cause to fear; remove them into beds apart, and scourge them: but if they are obedient to you, then seek not occasion against them: verily, God is High, Great!" (Rodwell's version of the Koran, Quran, 4:34) 2. "Men have authority over women because God has made the one superior to the other, and because they spend their wealth to maintain them. Good women are obedient. They guard their unseen parts because God has guarded them. As for those from whom you fear disobedience, admonish them and send them to beds apart and beat them. Then if they obey you, take no further action against them. Surely God is high, supreme." (Dawood's version of the Koran, Quran, 4:34) 3. "Men are in charge of women, because Allah has made the one of them to excel the other, and because they spend of their property (for the support of women). So good women are the obedient, guarding in secret that which Allah has guarded. As for those from whom you fear rebellion, admonish them and banish them to beds apart, and scourge them. Then if they obey you, seek not a way against them. Lo! Allah is ever High Exalted, Great." (Pickthall's version of the Koran, Quran, 4:34) 4. "Men are the managers of the affairs of women for that God has preferred in bounty one of them over another, and for that they have expended of their property. Righteous women are therefore obedient, guarding the secret for God's guarding. And those you fear may be rebellious admonish; banish them to their couches, and beat them. If they then obey you, look not for any way against them; God is All high, All great." (Arberry's version of the Koran, Quran, 4:34) 5. "Men are the maintainers of women because Allah has made some of them to excel others and because they spend out of their property; the good women are therefore obedient, guarding the unseen as Allah has guarded; and (as to) those on whose part you fear desertion, admonish them, and leave them alone in their sleeping places and beat them; then if they obey you, do not seek a way against them; surely Allah is High, Great. (Shakir's version of the Koran, Quran, 4:34) 6. "Men are the protectors and maintainers of women, because Allah has given the one more (strength) than the other, and because they support them from their means. Therefore the righteous women are devoutly obedient, and guard in (the husband's) absence what Allah would have them guard. As to those women on whom part you fear disloyalty and ill conduct, admonish them (first), (next), refuse to share their beds, (and last) beat them (lightly); but if they return to obedience, seek not against them means (of annoyance) for Allah is Most High, Great (above you all). (Ali's version of the Koran, Quran, 4:34) Ali inserted the word (lightly) to soften what the Koran says. If Allah really wanted the word softly inserted, he should have done it himself.
Steven Weinberg: With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.
Good people don't do evil things with or without religion -- that is an oxymoron. Prof. Steven Weinberg should stick to what he knows best -- physics. Philosophy is not his area!
You are so silly Bernard! Did you think that by you killing the other thread titled "Why You Should Beat Your Wife!!" and starting this new one, you could promote your hate without being exposed for your hypocrisy?? Well, anyway, here is my reply to the other thread just to expose you further; Denying that there were (are) rabbis who prescribe wife beating under certain conditions is likewise a refusal to face the truth. The words I have never seen any sources permitting a wife to beat her husband. Does anyone know of any such sources? (please do not respond with sources permitting the beit din to flog; that is not what i am asking). As I stated, in my work with agunot I have many times witnessed, and continue to see today, rabbis sending women back to physically abusive husbands. In 1986 there was a conference on Women and Halakhah, in Jerusalem, organized by P'nina Peli. The rabbi who headed the Jerusalem beit din spoke, and before an audience of over 500 women (including me), and a few men as well, stated that merely because a man beats his wife, that is not sufficient cause to end a marriage. He reported sending a woman whose husband's beatings caused her to be hospitalized three times, back to him because he still loved her and wanted shalom bayit. He advised us to work at keeping marriages together instead of helping agunot to obtain their gittin. This past Sunday night I took six agunot to meet with a local rabbi. Each told her story. Two of the women had been physically attacked by their "husbands." One, whose husband is a jeweler and kept a gun in the house repeatedly threatened her with the gun, and bashed her face in with it. She still lacks a get after five years. The other had her ribs broken. This one is in civil court fighting over child custody, and her hsuband is bringing in a local rabbi to testify on his behalf. http://www.ottmall.com/mj_ht_arch/v16/mj_v16i01.html#CF Hello! But only after reading Prof. Naomi Graetz âs compelling book: âSilence is Deadly, Judaism Confronts Wifebeating,â did I realize how valid. The case Prof. Graetz makes , based on sources in the Talmud, the Mishnah and centuries of responsa of rabbinic authorities, is that, indeed, many Halachic authorities have not only done nothing to punish wifebeaters, but have actually condoned wifebeating, spelling out conditions in which it is not only permissible, but a mitzvah. Moreover, in our own day, current Halachic thinking makes it extremely difficult for an abused wife to get out of her husbandâs clutches if he persists in refusing her a divorce. The pioneering haredi rabbi who opened the first battered womenâs shelters for haredi women in Jerusalem, once told me of a conversation he had with a well-respected Sephardic rabbi: â What are you Ashkenazim making a big deal about?â the Rabbi complained to him, âAlmost every Sephardic husband beats his wife.â http://www.naomiragen.com/Column Archive/WifeBeating.htm Hello! ACCEPTANCE It is somewhat frightening that in recent times, patriarchy is being idealized by some contemporary Jewish women who are choosing a fundamentalist way of life in order to rationalize psychological paralysis which trapped the Jewish woman in an abusive relationship. [5] In the 80's, Jane Jacobs described the process of abdication in terms of "emotional economy". The female develops emotional commitment which is expressed through submission to the male. In return she gets love and emotional support. The reason this happens is that women are socialized to get self-validation through male approval. [6] Perhaps the worst consequence of this fundamentalist status quo is that it includes acceptance of wife-beating as natural. The view is often expressed that it is man's nature to be aggressive and woman's nature to suffer--and maybe she deserves it. In this world-view, beating is regarded as a means to an end. Battering can be justified-- on occasion, for it is a mitzvah to chastise one's wife for educational purposes. Battering might even be seen as a means to obtaining shelom bayit, domestic harmony. The communal unit is perceived to be more important than the individual. There have been many examples of acceptance of wife-beating in the Jewish community throughout the ages. We find the first such examples in the writings of the Babylonian gaonim. [6a] The Jewish woman has to wash, cook and grind in accord with what the rabbis have decreed. And when her husband enters the house, she must rise and cannot sit down until he sits, and she should never raise her voice against her husband. Even if he hits her she has to remain silent, because that is how chaste women behave. [7] Although Maimonides says a man should honor his wife more than his body and love her the same as his own body, and rules that a "Woman is not a captive and should be granted a divorce if her husband is not pleasing to her," he recommends elsewhere in the Mishneh Torah, that beating a bad wife is an acceptable form of discipline. [8] http://www.utoronto.ca/wjudaism/journal/vol1n2/v1n2grae.htm