blaming the women

The Slonimer Rebbe knows what caused the tragedy in Meron.

The Rebbe reportedly said today that clearly Heaven is imploring us to pay attention to the horrible mixing of genders in the holy site of Meron, specifically in the yahrtzeit celebration of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai. the situation, he said, is horrible, and must be urgently dealt with.

The Rebbe says that many years ago there was a tragedy there on the yahrtzeit and many died, and the batei din decreed that for a number of years women should not go to Meron on Lag B'Omer at all. After a few years they were unable to extend the decree any longer, for various reasons, but we definitely must re-establish this decree.

The Rebbe said that the tragedy happened at the Toldos Ahron lighting, which itself is a place that is careful about this issue, but "once the destroyer has permission to do damage, he does not differentiate between righteous and wicked....

Far be it from me to argue with the Rebbe, and I offer no alternative explanation that i think is better than his... but I do have questions.

How did he come to the conclusion that it is the fault of the women, when no women were to be seen in that area at all. Watch any of the videos and you wont see any women participating in the area. Yes, he explained they were elsewhere and once they caused the genie to be let out of the bottle the genie can go anywhere.  But with no women in the area, how did he come to this conclusion?

Further, with only men in the area, and only makes counted among the victims, perhaps it is the fault, in some sense, of men, and not women. Maybe men should be banned from Meron on Lag B'Omer and only women allowed to attend.

If the Batei Din, a long time ago, were authoritative enough to make such a decree and then not to extend it, for reasons he did not tell us, who are we to say it must be reinstated? They declared it over - if they did the right thing by setting the decree, they probably did the right thing as well by ending it (considering that he considers them authoritative).

Before Lag B'Omer there was publication of a complaint of a very small and narrow section and walkway created for women somewhere in the area. At the time I thought that it sounded like the organizers sort of treat Kever Rashbi on Lag b'Omer like Uman on Rosh Hashana - men only, and women should not be there. The massive crowds of men make it inappropriate for women to be there. The Rebbe's suggestion would solidify that saying men have a right to celebrate with their form of spiritual inspiration but women do not. 

This is actually one of the points indirectly made by opponents to the suggestion, or demand, that the State must take control of the Kever Rashbi site from the religious authorities that control it (legally the State has no hand in this site, among others, and several religious groups do control it via what they call "hekdesh"). They say that with the control being held privately by the hekdesh and the religious authorities, they have the authority to set the rules according to religious dictates. If, however, the State takes over, they will have to follow the rules and priorities set by their secular society, including gender equality, sort of like the fights going on at the Kotel and all around the country (ie on the bus, in shuls, divorce courts, becoming rabbis, etc)  - whether women will have equal footing or have to stand back for the mens sensibilities. 

It is not surprising that the women are being blamed, even though they were nowhere near the area, but I would like to understand more how he came to this conclusion.

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