The author (left) and her son at the Museum of Natural History in New York // Courtesy of Frieda Vizel On Saturday, I was walking on Amsterdam Avenue in New York City, crossing over to the other side with my son Seth when a man with white stubble and a New Jersey accent stopped me…
Mainstream Orthodoxy has been taking pains to publicize its disapproval of partnership minyanim, Orthodox prayer groups where women lead some of the prayers and read from the Torah. Yeshiva University threatened to withhold ordination of a graduating student who held a partnership minyan in his home. Large, leading Orthodox institutions like the Orthodox Union and…
An Israeli group of Orthodox feminists voiced its opposition to moving non-traditional women’s prayer to a new egalitarian area. The Kolech-Religious Women’s Forum sent a letter this week to a special government committee headed by Cabinet Secretary Avichai Mendelblit saying that its members would not be willing to pray in a female minyan in the…
Two of the prime players who have been locked in struggle over how Jews should be allowed to pray at the Western Wall have a complicated relationship with the recent grand compromise that Jewish Agency leader Natan Sharansky has offered to solve their dispute. Both Anat Hoffman, whose group, Women of the Wall, seeks to…
As a rule, my husband and I don’t pray in non-egalitarian settings (or, at the very least, in ones that don’t count women in a minyan). So while I have been following the progress of partnership minyanim with respect and interest for a number of years, I hadn’t participated in one on a Shabbat morning…
It’s nice to see influential men increasingly protest the absence of women presenting at major Jewish events. In the publication eJewishPhilanthropy.com, Shaul Kelner writes a powerful essay about his pledge to refrain from participating in any all-male panel discussions, and to make his involvement conditional on the inclusion of women. Kelner, an assistant professor of…
I was in Jerusalem twice last month — both times to pray at the Western Wall. The first was for the monthly Rosh Hodesh service of Women of the Wall, and the second was for a family bar mitzvah. Unfortunately, neither prayer services went smoothly. I have been active in Women of the Wall for…
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