More on B’nai Niddah

Remember how I wrote an article for Jewschool about how baalei teshuvahs are considered almost a separate lower class than regular FFB Jews because their parents did not go to the mikvah? Remember how all the frummies — including our frum friends from Beyond BT and an op-ed from Rabbi Shafran — suggested that my insistence that there was a stigma over this (so-called) Ben Niddah issue was at the very least being greatly exaggerated and that the facile denials by the “Gedolim” of character flaws and defects listed in the Talmud were enough?

Well, Rabbi Horowitz, a major force for improvement in the frum world has posted a letter describing how a child of Baal Teshuvas is actually harassed for this very issue (among others). I say it is for this very issue, since a pet name in the bulling process is for the other kids to actually call him, “Ben Niddah.”

Although, from the beginning, their child encountered some minor problems in school, when he entered the fourth grade, “the roof fell in.” According to the parents, he was taunted mercilessly and ostracized by his classmates, who often called him horrible names.

“Ben Nida was a favorite,” the father said, referring to the fact that, because the parents were BTs, the child was accused of being conceived without regard to the laws of family purity, a mortal insult in the hareidi world. “That name they could only have heard from their parents at home.”

I have stated before that those liberal Jews and converts who enter the haredi world risk entering a quasi-caste system, particularly those from modest backgrounds.

I stand by my assertions.

I invite Rabbi Horowitz, Aish HaTorah, and Beyond BT to join me in discouraging liberal and secular Jews and converts from joining your ultra-Orthodox ranks. Do the right thing, and admit that the black hat world is simply no more welcoming to outsiders than it is appropriate.

Do it for the children like little “Ben Nida.”

Related: Rabbi Harry Maryles’ “Second Class Citizens“