Women should not wear any red, orange, bright yellow, bright green, gold, silver, flesh-colored or shiny clothing. Arms must be covered to at minimum below the elbow, but sleeves should not be baggy or loose. “How much better and pleasant is it” to cover the entire arm all the way to the hand.
Rabbi Shlomo Aviner
Originally published at 11:20 pm 1-1-2013
Leading Zionist Orthodox Rabbi Issues Hyper-Restrictive Women’s Modesty Rules
Shmarya Rosenberg • FailedMessiah.com
“How beautiful and pleasant the modesty of a daughter of Israel is,” Rabbi Shlomo Aviner, a leading Zionist Orthodox rabbi wrote last week in a booklet, “B’Ahavah U’ve’Emunah,” “With Love and Faith,” he issued dictating the rules of modest dress for women, the Jerusalem Post reported. By covering the body, Aviner purred, the soul is honored.
He then went on to detail the specific rules he believes women must follow.
Women should not wear any red, orange, bright yellow, bright green, gold, silver, flesh-colored or shiny clothing, Aviner wrote.
Arms must be covered to at minimum below the elbow, but sleeves should not be baggy or loose.
Why?
Because arm movement can expose the area of the arm above the elbow.
But, Aviner averred, “how much better and pleasant is it” to cover the entire arm all the way to the hand.
Skirt length must be 4 inches below the knee.
Aviner also dictated stocking thickness, the type of allowable shoes and their color, along with other details.
“Clothing should cover the entire body, it should not be transparent, it should not be tight, and it should be quiet and reserved,” Aviner reportedly wrote.
Aviner, who is viewed as conservative by many of his colleagues, was publicly criticized by some of them for the publication of the booklet.
Rabbi Yehuda Gilad, a dean of the Zionist Orthodox Maalei Gilboa Yeshiva and a prominent leader in Zionist Orthodoxy, said that Aviner’s “obsession with modesty is not modest.”
Gilad also doubted the booklet would cause women to change their current mode of dress.
In an op-ed, Rabbi Ronen Neubert, the director of the liberal leaning Zionist Orthodox Beit Hillel organization, attacked Aviner’s modesty directives as “intrusive, humiliating and immodest,” noting that it was proper for female educators to talk about modesty with their students.
Rabbis, Neubert said, should stay out of it.