Faith
The Story of Beruriah
Question
With respect, Rabbi, hello!
We were taught in school, a secular school, about the "story of Beruriah," and from what I understood, Rashi wrote this account. According to what our teacher explained, he did so because Beruriah was a woman, and it was not fitting, in his view, for there to be a woman of such high level in knowledge of halacha like the rabbis, meaning he did this because he thought the female sex was inferior and therefore wanted to "put her down" by writing this story. From what I understood, the story was that Rabbi Meir decided to test his wife, Beruriah, and he told one of the students in the beit midrash to seduce Beruriah, and Beruriah fell into sin, and because of this Rabbi Meir Baal HaNes died. My question is whether this story really happened. And if so, why did Rabbi Meir test Beruriah? After all, he placed an obstacle before her. And if this story is not true, did Rashi really think the female sex was inferior and invent this story? I would appreciate it if you could expand on the matter.
Thank you in advance.
Answer
Hello and blessings.
Of course, Heaven forbid that Rashi would invent anything. It is the fevered mind of the teacher that invents things.
Here are Rashi's words on the Gemara that tells that Rabbi Meir was forced to flee to Bavel: Rashi on Tractate Avodah Zarah, daf 18, amud bet
And some say, because of the incident with Beruriah - that once she mocked the statement of the Sages (Kiddushin 80b) that women are light-minded, and he said to her: By your life, you will ultimately admit to their words. He instructed one of his students to test her with a matter of sin, and he urged her for many days until she consented, and when this became known to her, she strangled herself, and Rabbi Meir fled because of the shame.
Rabbi Meir did not die; he fled.
Rabbi Meir wanted to prove to his wife that the words of the Sages are utterly true, and therefore he sent someone to seduce her, and of course even after she agreed to sin, nothing was done, because the student was only trying to seduce her but never intended at all to sin, and in practice he did not sin at all.
With blessings,
Benjamin Shmueli
