Ask your Posek and report back

It is my strong halachic opinion (I am not a posek, and my comments are not LeHalacha and not L’Maaseh) that any male who is (also) attracted to the same gender, should be absolutely forbidden to go to the Mikvah, other than in exceptional circumstances where it is necessary and only then, when they are the only person in the Mikvah, and supervised from outside, to be so (in a quiet tzniusdik way so as not to embarrass)

Ask your Rav for his Psak on such a matter. Point out that Shulchan Aruch already wrote that it is forbidden to stay alone (Yichud) with a male, if there is a concern that they have proclivity towards same gender attraction. Your Rav may not want to reveal his name (everyone seems to want to go under the radar today) but I’d be interested to know what your Posek, anywhere in the world, feels is the Halacha for someone in the class above.

(If Mikvaos are re-architectured, things may change. I’ve argued they should be)

Author: pitputim

I've enjoyed being a computer science professor in Melbourne, Australia, as well as band leader/singer for the Schnapps Band over many years. My high schooling was in Chabad and I continued at Yeshivat Kerem B'Yavneh in Israel and later in life at Machon L'Hora'ah, Yeshivas Halichos Olam.

7 thoughts on “Ask your Posek and report back”

    1. Mark, I assume we have not met, but why Reb “Itche” … you are the only one who has every called me that. I’ve of course been called horrible things, though.

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  3. I presume you’re making a sevara based on heterosexual men: if they can’t bathe with women, then homosexual men shouldn’t bathe with men? I don’t know whether that argument is valid, though: any heterosexual woman may (in theory) be susceptible to advances from any heterosexual man. In contrast, only a minority of men would even contemplate forbidden relationships with another man. But even if this argument is correct, the possibility of homosexual arousal in a mikveh isn’t something that our ancestors were concerned about, and I don’t think we should introduce a measure that would humiliate some members of our community.

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    1. Joe,
      Yichud amongst men is strictly forbidden and appears in the Nosei Kelim of the Shulchan Aruch, if there is a chashah of males being attracted to each other.
      It follows a fortiori, then when men walk naked in a Mikveh, this is no place for someone with tendencies.
      I did stress that there should be a Tzniusdik way to accommodate and not embarrass them.
      I don’t expect that any Rav would pasken this way PUBLICALLY, lest it be seen as biased …

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