Daughters of the King: Women and the Synagogue (A Survey of History, Halakhah, and Contemporary Realities)

WOMEN AND THE SYNAGOGUE IN MEDIEVAL CAIRO

Sara Reguer WOMEN AND THE SYNAGOGUE IN MEDIEVAL CAIRO During the Middle Ages, more than half the world's Jewish population was under the rule of Islam. The centers of Jewish learning and culture were situated in Moslem countries and were greatly influenced by classical Islamic culture, which had rediscovered the Greek philosophers and introduced new styles of poetry and literature. During the dassical period of Islam, from 900-1200 C.E., such luminaries as the philosopher and codifier Moses Maimonides and the poet-theologian Judah ha-Levi were so immersed in Islamic culture that they wrote some of their major works in the philosophical and literary styles then prevalent in the Moslem world. They even wrote in Arabic. Maimonides' Guide to the Perplexed and ha-Levi's Kuzari are just two significant examples ofthis body ofmedieval Jewish literature. Islamic culture influenced all aspects of Jewish life. Synagogue architecture ofthis period is a conspicuous example ofthis cross-cultural influence . Many synagogues in the Islamic world reflected the architectural characteristics of mosques, with columned halls, ornamental lettering, and internal courtyards.I However, throughout Jewish history, Judaism has always maintained its own sense of tradition and religious uniqueness . Therefore, although synagogue architecture reflected many aspects 52 History of Islamic architectural detail, it did not reflect the architecture of the mosque in one very important detail. In a society as segregated as that of Islam, women did not pray with men, nor did they enter a mosque during prayer. At the very beginning of Islam, women stood behind the men at Friday prayers. During the following decades, they prayed behind a screen. However, by the end of the Caliphate in 660 C.E., women no longer prayed in mosques. (Today, Moslem women usually do not participate in public prayer at all but pray privately.)2 This was never the case in the medieval synagogues of the Islamic world. Information from that period indicates that women not only attended synagogue reguarly, but were involved in synagogue life in several different ways. Much of the information regarding medieval synagogue life under Islam came to light at the beginning of the twentieth century with the discovery of a treasure house of primary source material, the Cairo Geniza. Jews do not destroy anything with God's name written on it; such pieces ofparchment or paper are usually buried. In medieval Cairo, this custom was extended to anything written in Hebrew. Instead of being buried, however, these items were placed in an attic of sorts in the Fostat Synagogue , in the older part of Cairo where most of the Jews lived; the arid conditions there preserved them.} After many years of study, scholars have pieced together a rather detailed picture of life in the Middle East during the Middle Ages. The most outstanding work on this topic is the multivolume opus of S. D. Goitein, A Mediterranean Society. In Fostat, known as Old Cairo, each synagogue had a women's gallery, known as bayt al-nisa, "house of women." This gallery was reached via a staircase that led up from a separate entrance to the synagogue. Perhaps it was hoped that this type ofconstruction would preclude the habit oftalking and socializing that may have been a problem in the synagogue since its inception.4 Men and women socialized both before and after prayer in the synagogue courtyard.' The courtyard was a central feature of the medieval synagogue, which, like the ancient synagogue before it, was generally part ofa compound or complex ofbuildings built around a courtyard. This compound may have included an inn for travelers, an orphanage, a primitive hospital, and certainly, a mikveh (ritual bath) and a school. Based on Geniza materials, Goilein divides the Jews of the Islamic world into different social classes: the upper classes, businessmen and Women and the Synagogue in Medieval Cairo professionals, urban craftsmen and laborers, and peasants.6 The social class of a woman's father often determined the quality of the education she received. The level oftheir education would be important in respect to determining women's participation in the synagogue, in helping to decide whether they could pray on their own, and in ascertaining whether they could follow the services in the synagogue. The Geniza contains a letter about hiring a private instructor to teach orphan girls to pray "so that they should not grow up like wild animals and not even know 'Hear Israel:"7 If...