When I was 17, a matchmaker introduced me to my future husband. My family and I knew it was an auspicious match from the get-go: The boy and I were both Satmar Hasidism; we came from the same town, Kiryas Joel; we were socialized in similar circles, and we observed the same religious rules. But…
Sheitels, or wigs for Orthodox women, come in different colors and styles to match women’s preferences — they are short and neat, long and wavy, matronly and sexy. Maintaining the freshness and vibrancy of a sheitel requires a skilled sheitel makher, a wig stylist. It’s a demanding job that calls for loads of patience, talented…
Just because I wear pants, it doesn’t mean I lack dignity. Or self-respect. Or even modesty. Which is why I find pieces, like this one, suggesting that dignity for a woman means excessive body-cover, so offensive. When rabbis or anyone else claim that women need to cover their skin, their elbows, ankles and necks for…
I actually spent the past hour playing sheitel-macher — combing out a long, blond wig, much the way Tali Farkash described in the article that sparked this blog-debate. See my post here and Rabbi Broyde’s response here I was doing it for my 7-year old daughter because tomorrow is “wig day” in school. No, they…
Elana Maryles Sztokman, in her recent Sisterhood blog post titled “The Case Against the Sheitel,” seems to be mistaken in her critique of the wigs that many married Orthodox women choose to wear. Sheitels are a model of how Jewish law is supposed to function and change. We will know that the Arab world has…
“Do you like the blond better? With or without the ponytail?” Wig-shopping is the new initiation into religious life for women, writes Tali Farkash, a Haredi columnist for Ynet who alternates between defending religious life and kvetching about it. If women used to accompany brides to the mikveh in order to welcome them ritualistically into…
If you want to be a religious Jew today, you have to have money — a lot of it. There’s no way around it, and it’s especially obvious at this time of year. Perhaps it was different way back when, but in Orthodoxy Version 2010, you need two of everything in the kitchen, including two…
Walk down Cedar Lane in the heavily Orthodox enclave of Teaneck, N.J. and she beckons you to come hither — with her long, luxurious locks and feathery bangs coquettishly hiding her eyes. This is seduction on the street or, rather, in the shop window. The mannequins in the wig shop have some of the sexiest…
