Q. Dear Rov, I have a few questions concerning traveling by plane this days, when the planes are very often totally full.
If I'm given a seat between two women and I have already asked them if they would kindly change seats with me but they refuse, Do I have to offer them some monetary compensation to avoid the prohibition involved?
A. The source for this tradition is the Talmud Pesachim (111a) that teaches; Three should not be allowed to pass between two people walking along a road, and people should not walk between two of them, and one of them is a woman. Talmud Horios (13b) mentions that this is one of the ten acts that cause the forgetting of the Torah. Although this Halacha is quoted in Kitzur Shulchan Aruch (50: 8), although it is omitted in Shulchan Aruch, yet the minhag is kept.
Horav Shlomo Miller's Shlit'a opinion is that one does not to compensate monetarily the women to change seats if they refuse after being asked to kindly do so. (See questions 1655 and 2955),
Rabbi A. Bartfeld as revised by Horav Dovid Pam, Horav Aharon Miller and Horav Chanoch Ehrentreu Shlit'a.
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