Tzitzis=Success

I wrote a bit ago about how the Sh'ma seems to be a testament to the failure of human-kind (in its current form) to be able to internalize the Torah, but I think that there is more. So here's more. You don't like it? God gave you a "back" button for a reason, you know.

The third chapter of the Sh'ma prayer is about the fringes that we are commanded to place on the corners of our garments. Why corners you ask? Well the text says (Numbers, 15:39), "That shall be your fringe; look at it and recall all the commandments of the LORD and observe them, so that you do not follow your heart and eyes in your lustful urge." The presence of these tzitzit, the fringes, is supposed to help us control our emotions and fight the temptation to follow our baser instincts, and sin. The next verse continues this "thread" (HA!) and says, "Thus you shall be reminded to observe all My commandments and to be holy to your God." The resisting of the urge to sin will then draw us towards the abiding by all the divine commandments.

There is an intricacy in Jewish law which removes a particular category of obligation from one part of the community -- women are absolved of the performance of positive commandments that are time bound (mitzvat aseh shehaz'man grama). The reason actually gets to the point here. Women are not required to observe this group because they have a different set of obligations (admittedly social rather that ritual) which are considered more pressing. But I think it goes further. Women, it seems, are on a higher spiritual level, maybe because they are expected to be surrounded constantly by the socio-religious obligations and concepts, or maybe because there is something inherent in them which is categorically different and does not need the same positive commandments in order to bring about the larger compliance.

The purpose of tzitzit, according to the above quoted text, is to reduce the urge to sin, specifically, to go astray after lusts. If women are exempt, then there must be no need for that kind of reminder. Why? Because women, it seems, are less susceptible to those urges and negative drives. Women are less tempted towards that genre of sin. Women have somehow internalized that kind of awareness that men can only achieve through the donning of an external reminder. Women can move towards the observing of all other commandments without this particular trigger, unlike men, for whom, the verse says, need the fringes so that they then observe all the commandments. Note that this cannot be turned into "but women, if this paragraph does not apply to them, need not remember the Exodus." That idea is repeated elsewhere as a binding obligation on men and women and in this paragraph it is not causally linked to the fringes; it is an identifying mark related to God, who is relating all the laws.

I'm not trying to justify any patriarchy and I'm not trying to be condescending to women by saying "you are special." I'm just pointing out how, on one particular level within the Jewish construct, the status of women is placed as above that of men. So why do women have to say that paragraph at all? Well, strictly speaking, they don't because even saying it is time bound (and if they take it upon themselves, they need only say the first 2 lines). This makes one wonder if, in fact, the entire Sh'ma=Fail argument only applies to men. Men need the external in terms of teaching (the intellectual outsourcing) and the physical (the wearing of a piece of clothing as reminder).