Igros Moshe (E.H. 04:032.9):Shaking hands with women as greeting. It is obviously prohibited as I have written previously (O.C. 113) because of concerns for sexual arousal and pleasure. However I wrote (E.H. 56) that if you see religious Jews who are lenient to judge them favorably and assume that they are relying on the absence of sexual arousal and pleasure but I also wrote there that it is difficult to rely on this. I don’t see any inconsistency between prohibiting shaking hands but permitting riding on buses (E.H. 2:14) since there is no affection involved there for almost everyone
But see Rav Henkin, zt"l, in Bnei Banim where he does notes that lack of sexual interest is a permitting factor.
ReplyDelete