Chava Rom
Men’s and women’s clothing speak different languages.
The Torah prohibits women from wearing men’s clothing and vice versa. Unlike a man’s wardrobe, a woman’s closet contains all the colors of the rainbow and every style; our nature cannot tolerate monotony. A woman’s eye distinguishes thousands of shades. We must be able to express the entire range of feelings, bring color to the world around us, and bring joy to ourselves, our loved ones, and those around us.
In the Torah, a woman is compared to the moon, a symbol of constant renewal and rebirth.
Women constantly want something new; “chodesh”—the lunar month, to which the female cycle is linked—comes from “chadash,” meaning “new.” A woman is changeable, as are her clothes. Every morning we wake up and look for changes in the mirror, as though something could have changed during 8 hours of sleep. Our clothing reflects our mood and how we feel.
There are times when a woman likes nothing and wants to hide and wrap herself entirely in black, and there are times when she feels beautiful whatever she puts on. You may be surprised to learn that this is also connected to a woman’s physiology: changes in a woman’s mood affect, among other things, her attitude toward clothing. We can prepare for the days that are difficult for us if we listen to our inner voice.
Halachah states that a husband must give his wife clothing and a piece of jewelry for every festival, regardless of whether she still has a perfectly decent dress from the previous year. And nowhere does it say that he must buy himself a new suit for the festival if he already has one.
Through clothing, we women, more than men, put ourselves into a particular frame of mind: a beautiful dress puts us in the festive mood of Shabbat, while a formal everyday suit puts us in a businesslike mood.
For a woman, having something new is one of the conditions for feeling festive. We can cultivate a sense of renewal within ourselves even without a new dress, through serious, deep work on ourselves, but the Torah always speaks of working with the material world and using it to attain spiritual heights.
The Jewish people are distinguished by three qualities: modesty, compassion, and readiness to help.
These qualities are innate in a Jewish woman. Our main task is to preserve our natural modesty; by nature, a woman understands what is worthy of her and what is less so, what brings her closer to holiness and what distances her from it. But everything we see, everything around us, and especially what we wear affects our perception of modesty. Like the moon, we reflect what we see: the colors of nature around us, or the dynamism of the city. The Hebrew word for moon is levanah, meaning “white.” A white surface reflects the entire spectrum of the light that falls on it, just as the moon reflects the light of the sun.
We must recognize the danger of the outside world’s influence, since, willingly or unwittingly, we reflect everything that comes into our field of vision. Pictures in magazines, our mother’s clothing, fashion during our teenage years, our friends’ wardrobes—all of these together often shape our style. Over time, we change it as new looks, colors, and combinations come into view. The environment we live in becomes our norm. How fortunate are those who live in a healthy, observant Jewish environment.
A woman’s wardrobe speaks of her belonging to a particular social circle.
The basic need to belong to society often helps us get used to details of clothing that we do not always find comfortable or personally appealing. But just as knowing the notes in music allows you to play in your own unique way, so too, in clothing, the rules of tzniut and of society leave us enormous scope for expressing our individuality.