Is it true a woman is not permitted to touch the Torah? - Rabbi Alon Anava

[Music] she saying that she heard for the first time that I said that a woman is like a sepher Tora that is she's holy she's like a queen and she's not she can't touch the seph Tora I didn't say she can't touch can touch theph T but to to read out of it and to to do what a man does she said it's the first time she heard that I that that a woman is like a queen and two queens cannot be together and rather she heard that a woman cannot touch a SE because she maybe she has rep period or stuff like that nonsense there's not one source in the Tor that you find that a woman is not allowed to be next to the seph T cuz she's in her cycle there's no such a thing that that's a whole different thing when the woman is not pure when the woman is not pure because of her cycle her husband can't touch her but that has nothing to do with the Torah even a man is not allowed to touch the parchment man that touch the parchment according to order to touch the parchment you want to move the parchment you hold it with a t or something you know how to touch the parchment unfortunately nowadays people touch the Tora like as if it's a toy there's no respect for the Torah I mean men are not allowed to touch the Torah what I'm saying is that listen first of all in the Torah there are many levels of explanations this is called of an acronym of what's called pareses is an orchard but the acronym ofes ISAT is what's called a simple explanation and then remes is a hint and Das is you dissect it and S is the secret so there's explanations of everything but the mystical explanation by a woman is not the the the doesn't allow her to go after the Tor not to touch the SE is because she's holy that's it if she has her cycle that's a whole different thing but this is not why a woman is not touching the Tor when they take out the seph T and they pass it around the women touch the seph T they kiss it kiss they can kiss it but you know they kiss it when the Torah is covered but that's not the reason if somebody tells us they don't know what they talking about and you know unfortunately in our generation people say oh I I I I heard it here I heard it there no just yesterday somebody called me and he told me I heard that this R I said this this and this so I said without a source it's not valid if you want to say people come now to and say the say yeah where pull the book and show me 99% of the people who standing here and say the Z say the says that every even saw it you want to say the Z says come and tell me which page it is I want to see with my eye and then I'll I'll see if it really says that so in our generation many people says oh I heard when we had when we were kids there was a game we called it broken phone telephone shab I tell you something you tell it to her you tell it to her you tell it to her that person is a completely different story so a person sits in a sh T and then he says I heard I heard I heard no such a thing the Torah is clear and obvious and everything you want to quote the Torah you say this is where I heard it this is where I learned it this is where I saw it you can come and say oh you know I I heard it no it doesn't work like that because 99% I'm not joking 99 of people they stand oh thear says like this and this midash says like that show me show me show me the source not long AG come somebody come and told me you know it says in this like this and like that said you know I never heard it I told him you know in which page yeah I I know which page so we pull out the and I read I told him you didn't understand it right yeah you're right it says the words but you didn't understand it right but at least here we have a source I can look and say oh no you didn't read it the right way but most people unfortunately especially in our generation people become religious unfortunately in our day people they became religious and two weeks later they become you know the speaker of the town and everybody comes to listen they don't even know nothing about the Torah and they come and oo and they throw big titles and they totally mislead the people and they teach also the things that it's I I never even heard of nonsense like that and where I live there's also a person comes the city of cabala he teaches kabala he doesn't know nothing he doesn't know nothing he doesn't even know where it it how can you teach cabala if you don't even follow the Torah so and the nonsense that I hear what people go there nonsense so unfortunately in our generation people come oh in the Z it says like this and like that don't quote if you don't know exactly the page and that you read it and understood it so people come and say oh I heard like this and like that no don't hear open the book show me where it says in the book then I'll believe you then I'll I'll see maybe there's an argument between two sources you know there's many sources rambam will say one thing and will come a different Rabbi and says no I don't agree with what rambam says but it has to be an explanation why he doesn't agree it has to be an explanation and you know sometimes it doesn't agree with one thing unfortunately in our generation everybody is everybody knows everything everybody knows the Torah inside out and the reality is nobody knows no nothing and they just throw things out there and becomes a whole big confusion and people say but I heard and my you know that I I used to teach I used to live in New York I had a group of Syrian men that every two weeks we had a 40 men one time one of them comes and tells me you know that the I my because we were talking about stealing in business cheating in business so he comes and tells me one I met a rabbi who told me that I'm allowed to steal from a gentile what I told him who told you that he said he said he didn't say the name doesn't matter the name he said I a certain Rabbi told me I'm allowed to steal from a gentile told him are you out of your mind who told you such a thing and I told him who's who's the muga who told you such a thing where does it say in the Torah that you're allowed to steal from a it says it doesn't says says Lov you know you're not allowed to steal from a dog even you're not allowed to steal from anything Lov is Lov don't steal told them Who's the who told you such a thing here you have two sins stealing and how dare you even who them I can't even fathom so people come and they're looking for the discounts it's very easy to find the discounts people look for the rabbis who give discounts why because I don't want to be so strict give me the easy way so the same way a lot of people try to find where to talk about the Tor so people say oh you know the Torah the woman she's impure Maybe I'm Wrong maybe there is a source to that but I never saw any source that says if a woman she doesn't go get called to the Torah because of that the point is that anything that somebody tells you we have bookshelves you go you open the book by yourself you read it and if you don't understand you go to the rabbi and you tell him I don't understand this line what does the Torah mean and you go what with the book says not what what somebody told you and that's the problem in our generation that I'm not exaggerating 90% is wrong wrong there's no Source stre in the Torah no Source in people are inventing things people are giving themselves discounts based on nothing people are now teaching and learning all sorts of nonsense now it's very popular everybody learns cabala nobody learns cabala trust me trust me my Rabbi is a very big mikal he sells on himself that he doesn't learn cabala how can you learn cabala nonsense how mean can learn some terminology and some explanations yes trust me you open it you're not going to understand one word one word you're not going to understand so yeah you can say some introduction about the concept or explain something but people are distorting the truth already to a pointed in our generation the toah that is delivered to people most of it is not even true and unfortunately you see in the internet every everybody becomes a speaker person becomes religious after two weeks that's it he's a rabbi he doesn't even know nothing that's the B and the problem is the Torah tells you you want to really know the you go to the book open the book you can't read you go to a a reputable Rabbi that will read you what it says and you derive your knowledge from there because B has a lot of misconception in many many different things so that's the problem that people are looking at religious people and they're saying oh that's repres represent God they don't represent God the Torah represents God it's very easy to put a keep on and to put a beard you go to the source you read from the source what you don't understand you find somebody to explain it to you and then you see that Tora is PIM it's pearls everything makes sense everything is unbelievable wisdom everything makes sense tell now to a woman I'm sorry you can't come next to the Torah cuz you are a queen oh now I understand why I don't have to put fine on why I don't have to wear T you explain to a person why they oh that makes sense love you didn't put me down you didn't insult me you didn't make me feel like I'm like this toora is only about respecting human beings [Music]