Women's Education (Part 1: The Previous Rebbe's Letters)

This is Igris, and today we are going to begin part one of a two-part topic on women's education.

One of our earliest shiurim years ago discussed the establishment of Acha Satmimim and N'shei Benes Chabad, organizations that promote women's education.

And there we skimmed over a few letters about the importance of women learning Torah, particularly in this generation.

But we've never given it a full treatment, which is a bit of a surprise, because something like half of our audience online are women.

By the time we're done, I think some people might be surprised also by just how much Torah the Rebbe gives to women.

It is hard to come up with a genre of Torah that the Rebbe does not want them learning.

He encourages halacha, chassidus, gemara, the reasons behind mitzvahs, sometimes to the consternation and surprise of Rabbanim.

We're going to eventually see Yichidus with the Belzer Rebbe, where our Rebbe makes some of these claims, and you can tell that while the Belzer Rebbe is being polite, he finds a lot of them shocking.

But this isn't really the Rebbe's project.

The idea of women's education being front and center really goes back to the Friedrich Rebbe, and maybe even earlier.

So part of our series is going to focus, in Mirtza HaShem, on the Friedrich Rebbe's emphasis on women's education.

And that's what we're going to do today, Mirtza HaShem.

And the next shiur will continue by focusing on the Rebbe's letters on this subject.

It's an enormous subject, with letters in every volume, sichas in every year, on the subject of women's education.

The hope is to hit the main points and leave with a clear shita.