Shelach Lecha - Why Tzitzit?

Yes, Jewish Women Can Wear Tzitzit Too By Abby Seitz 2019

I don’t wear a yarmulke when I pray, so I didn’t feel compelled to wear one every day. But I did feel drawn to tzitzit. In the Torah, God commands the Israelites to attach fringes to any four-cornered garment so they would have a physical reminder to obey the commandments. Tzitzit are traditionally worn by men, although some women have taken on the practice. At the time, I was struggling with my observant lifestyle. I felt like I was clocking in enough Jewish hours in the classroom and didn’t need to dedicate my free time and weekends to doing more Jewish things. At the same time, I believed Jewish law was binding and provided valuable guidance and structure to my everyday life, and I thought the fringes hanging down at my sides could remind me of that.

I decided to give it a try.

The undershirts with tzitzit I could buy in a store are designed for men and would fit poorly, so I cut up an H&M tank top and knotted my own tzitzit to the corners.

It’s been two months since I started wearing tzitzit. People stare at me and do double takes every day. Teenage boys on the street and some creep in a car have tried to take photos of me. Old men on buses and in bakeries have interrogated me about why I, as a woman, think I can do a mitzvah that is “only for men.” To be fair, I’ve also had lovely conversations with friendlier Israelis about my undergarment choices.

But again, I wasn’t doing this for other people. When I look down and see those white fringes resting against my American Eagle jeans, I’m forced to take a moment to think about the two worlds I am straddling — secular and religious — and the choices I make to maintain each of those lifestyles.

On cold mornings when I don’t want to get up for prayers or those boring Shabbat afternoons when I can feel my phone begging to be checked, my tzitzit remind me of the laws and customs that have preserved Jewish culture and religion for 3,000 years, and that every choice I make as a traditional-egalitarian Jew can play a tiny role in keeping that tradition alive.

Akkadian Prayer - A Shuilla: Gula 1a trans. Alan Lenzi

1. O Gula, most exalted lady, merciful mother, who dwells in the pure heavens,

2. I call out to you, my lady, stand nearby and listen to me!

3. I seek you out, I turn to you, as the hem of my god(’s) and goddess(’s garment), I lay hold of your (garment’s) hem...

(sissiktu, “fringe, hem.”)

'What Do Tzitzit Represent? by Prof. Rabbi Marty Lockshin'

In 1981, in an article titled “The Tassel and the Tallith,” Jacob Milgrom showed how ancient Near Eastern literature and art teach us the importance of the hem of a person’s garment. “It is an extension of its owner’s person and authority.” “The more important the individual, the more elaborate the embroidery of his hem.” Milgrom draws our attention to the scene in 1 Samuel 24:3-21 when David cuts off the hem of Saul’s garment and later feels remorse for doing so, while Saul concludes “Now I know that you [David] will indeed reign.”

What was the reason for David’s remorse and for Saul’s response? The answer rests in the meaning of the hem: it was an extension of Saul’s person and authority. David felt remorse for taking it because God had not so ordered. Saul, however, regarded it as a sign from God that his authority had been transferred to David: he was now cut off from the throne....

If tzitzit turn those who wear them into members of the nobility, Israelites who wear them, following the command of the Torah, should see themselves as aristocrats, and understand that their lofty status comes from God. This is possibly what the Torah means by seeing tzitzit and being reminded of God’s commandments.

Milgrom explains that the tekhelet thread on the tzitzit functions similarly. While there are many suggestions as to what precise color tekhelet is, Milgrom sees it as “dark purple-blue,” a color associated cross-culturally with royalty. We know that there was a well-developed industry in Lebanon and Northern Israel for making purple dye from the hillazon, a type of snail. Purple dye was expensive, so wearing purple clothing was often a sign of nobility.

The Torah assumes that every Israelite would be able to afford a thread dyed with purple-blue. However, as Milgrom writes, “The Jewish community following the two Roman wars [i.e. in the second century C.E.] was so impoverished that many could not afford even the one blue-dyed cord” and thus the commandment was fulfilled beginning then without the tekhelet thread. As a result, the precise formula for making tekhelet was lost. For most of the last two thousand years, Jews fulfill this mitzvah without the tekhelet thread that is an intrinsic part of the Torah’s description of the mitzvah.

In addition to the importance of an elaborate hem and the use of a tekhelet thread, Milgrom explains a third aspect of the nobility/aristocracy explanation of tzitzit. The classical rabbis already noticed that tzitzit either often are or perhaps are supposed to be shaatnez— made from the forbidden mixture of linen and wool. They assumed that the Israelite’s garment itself would be made of linen and the added threads or tassels would be made of wool....Milgrom agrees with the rabbis that tzitzit involve an infraction of the rules of shaatnez. Why this exception?

Milgrom argues that shaatnez is forbidden to Israelite commoners as it is reserved for the priestly class in Judaism, some of whose clothes are, according to the instructions in Exodus 28, made of a combination of wool and linen. Only on their tzitzit may Israelite commoners have shaatnez.

It is a conscious attempt by the Torah to encourage all Israelites to aspire to a degree of holiness comparable to that of the priests. . . . The fact that the cord is woolen and blue marks it as a symbol of both priesthood and royalty, thereby epitomizing the divine imperative that Israel become ‘a priestly royalty and a holy nation’ (Exod 19:36).

Milgrom concludes that tzitzit is the epitome of the democratic thrust within Judaism, which equalizes not by leveling but by elevating: all of Israel is enjoined to become a nation of priests.

Shelakh-Lekha, The Five Books of Miriam by Ellen Frankel phd