Tznius Standards: Clear Halacha or Personal Interpretation? What’s Required and Why It’s Being Ignored

Hi,

I enjoy listening to your podcasts. I appreciate that you don’t shy away from controversial topics. You provide an important service to the frum community. I recently listened to your tznius episode (523). I feel this is a very important issue for people to understand. I liked that your guests addressed the issue in a very sensitive and understanding way.

However, I did feel that you failed in one of your stated objectives which was to figure out what are the minimum requirements of tznius for women’s dress, specifically in regards to the Modern Orthodox community. The only guest that you really asked this question to (Rabbi Ostroff) is a chareidi Rabbi who holds the “Bais Yaakov” definition of tznius that is not accepted by many in the Modern Orthodox community. An astute listener will pick up that one of your other guests, Rabbi Manning clearly disagreed with Rabbi Ostroff’s minimum lines (such as whether the lower leg needs to be covered), but you did not highlight this or ask Rabbi Manning for his opinion on the minimum definition.

There are definitely other even more lenient opinions. For example, Rabbi Mordechai Willig holds that only the women’s torso is an objective minimum ervah that needs to be covered. Rabbi Willig holds that anything else is subjective and based on community standards. You can listen to an in depth shiur that he gave on the topic here: https://yutorah.org/lectures/lecture.cfm/723915 Something like that would be a much better answer to your listener’s question that prompted the episode and a real limud zchus on those that don’t follow “Bais Yaakov” tznius guidelines (depending on the community). In Israel as well, there are many poskim in the Dati Leumi community that have various degrees of leniencies in this matter. See https://www.deracheha.org/dress-2-the-details/ for some examples.

Thank you.