Feminism in Jewish spirituality

Whole Earth Review, Summer, 1992 by Drorah O'Donnell Setel

The patriarchal aspects of Judaism always turned me off as a kid: old men praying to another old man, with the women separated from the men by a curtain as they sat by themselves on the other side of the room. Males were supposed to thank God that at least they weren't born female.

When we started looking at women's spiritual traditions around the world, Adam Phillips got us in touch with Drorah Setel, a scholar, educator, writer and activist whose researches confirm that Jewish feminism is not a contradiction in terms, but rather an old, deep, little-known tradition.

Of Sephardic and Ashkenazic heritage, Setel is a rounding member or B'not Eysh, a Jewish feminist spirituality collective, and New Jewish Agenda. She serves on the advisory boards of Tikkun magazine and the National Havurah Committee, and was Jewish Chaplain of Wesleyan University in 1989-90.

Setel creates a variety of rituals, celebrations, and scholarly works that weave together Jewish and feminist traditions. She has organized and led Rosh Chodesh groups, as well as a variety of traditional and new life-cycle rituals. She currently lives in Seattle, and is obtaining her doctorate in religious studies from Yale. --Howard Rheingold

IN THE PAST TWENTY YEARS there has been a sometimes quiet, sometimes loud, but mostly unperceived revolution in North American Jewish spirituality, based on feminism. New prayers, rituals, and language to address divinity are some of the more obvious changes. Equally important are new forms of spiritual leadership, changes in communal authority, and even telling details such as services held in circles rather than hierarchically ordered arrangements. This article addresses some of the sources and implications of these transformations.

The development of contemporary Jewish feminist spirituality has rested on three approaches to tradition. The first is reinterpretation: a reexamination of known sources from feminist perspectives. On a philosophical level, Jewish feminists have found areas of significant convergence between Judaism and feminism. The most important of these is an underlying perception and valuing of interrelationship. Just as the basic feminist insight that "the personal is political" emphasizes the connections among all those aspects of experience we have been taught to see as separate and oppositional, the heart of Jewish theology is the affirmation of the unity of all being. Daily observances and communal authority, which are the basis of the rabbinic concept of halachah (literally, "pathway," but usually translated as "Jewish law") tie in well with feminist values of community and personal empowerment to create social change. Both perspectives reflect a desire to notice the extraordinary present in the mundane and to be aware of the daily choices involved in our lives, which constantly create and re-create the larger world. Finally, the link between personal liberation and social change implicit in the understanding that "the personal is political" has been a hallmark of Jewish thought since biblical times. In contrast to models of spirituality that emphasize detachment or otherworldliness, Jewish spirituality is rooted in the interrelationship among study (in the larger sense of learning and teaching), prayer (including reflection, shared visions and communal celebration), and social work for justice.

Feminist reinterpretation has also been applied to more obvious areas of Jewish history and texts. One way of doing this has been to look at known but disregarded evidence of Jewish women's lives. Two important examples of historical reinterpretation are Bernadette Brooten's demonstration of women's leadership roles in the early synagogue movement and Chava Weisler's reclamation of the body of Yiddish women's devotional literature known as techinas. On a more popular level, Sondra Henry and Emily Taitz were pioneers in collecting and making accessible historical writings, including religious texts, by Jewish women from biblical to early modern times. [1]

Textual reinterpretations have pointed to the absence of concern for female experience present in most biblical and rabbinic teachings. At the same time, feminists have sought to identify and reclaim those materials based on women's lives or those that have had an impact in areas such as reproductive rights, sexuality, and communal authority. There has also been a reevaluation of the theological implications of ancient texts. For example, the biblical divine name YHWH, commonly translated "Lord," is a form of the verb "to be" and more accurately rendered "Source of Being" or "Creator." In this case, sexist language has not only obscured a more inclusive concept, but has altered a traditional spiritual insight as well.

A second Jewish feminist approach is research and reconstruction in previously unexplored areas of women's experience. Again, this Serves to make visible that which has been hidden or ignored. Ethnographic studies of the re-

ligious practices and beliefs of traditional women, such as the use of amulets and rituals at Rachel's Tomb, have contributed to a wider definition of Jewish heritage. [2] Customs that have been trivialized as "superstitions" or bubbe meises (Yiddish for "grandmothers' stories," i.e., "old wives' tales") illuminate women's Judaism as part of a larger, ancient flamework of popular traditions, in contrast to the official religion of the rabbis. Feminist reconstructions of the origins of Judaism in ancient Israel are another example of research that questions longstanding assumptions about the status of women and the nature of Jewish beliefs.