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

PERSONAL VIGNETTES

PERSONAL VIGNETTES The personal vignettes that follow represent a wide range ofperspectives on women's place in normative Judaism. We begin with two women discussing very different communities, whofind value andsatisfaction in the traditional roles theyfill. Shoshana Gelerenter-Liebowitz tells ofthe value placed on women's prayer and candlelighting in the Lubavitch I:Jasidic community in which she was raised. In that community, both men and women place a high value on the spiritual efficacy of women's religious functions. She also introduces a motifthat recurs in a number ofother vignettes: that ofayoung girl whose budding maturity means that she is no longer permitted to sit with herfather in the men's section. Gelerenter did not resent this experience and accepted it as part ofa natural process. Beverly Lebeau, a rebbetzin for many years in Conservative synagogues , also writes ofthe satisfaction shefeels in that traditional role. For generations, the rebbetzin was seen as an adjunct to the rabbi: listening, advising, becoming involved with the community's concerns. In the last two decades, expectations ofthe spouse of a rabbi (which now includes 238 Contemporary Realities husbands as well as wives) have been changing, as spouses are no longer as readily available to devote their time to the congre9ation. Lebeau~ vignette reflects this sense ofchange. We chose to include these two articles because we wish to present a variety ofvoices. These two vignettes show that there are si9nificant numbers of women who are happy with their traditional role as Jewish women. Shoshana Gelerenter-Liebowitz GROWING UP LUBAVITCH When I was very young I loved to go to shul with my father. One of the many privileges I enjoyed as the oldest child was having my father to myself on our long walks to and from 770 (the headquarters and main synagogue of the Lubavitch Movement). My parents came from Poland and became Lubavitch when they arrived in the United States. I am therefore a first generation American and Lubavitcher. On our walks to and from shu/ my father spoke to me quite freely of his parents who had died in the Holocaust. In Hrubishov, Poland, his mother was the fore/einer in shul. She was the woman who was able to read the prayers. She would say the prayers, word for word, and the other women would recite right after her. This meant my grandmother was a literate woman, which was atypical, as most women could not read or understand Hebrew. My father would talk about his mother with great pride. (See Taitz for more information on foreleiners, also called firzogenn, pp.66ft'.) When I was little, I was allowed to enter the men's section with my father. Some other fathers brought in girls older than myself. When a little girl looked a little too old to be in the men's section, around ten years old, the men would become very agitated. Sometimes someone would say something to admonish her, and the big little girl would understand that she was too old to be with the men. Nobody had to explain why girls can not sit with their fathers in shul past age ten or why boys and girls don't pray together. Boys and girls don't do anything together. Nobody ques- 239 Personal Vignettes tions this. The separation of the sexes is accepted throughout the society. Boys and girls are never together. During my childhood, if a girl played with boys outside of shu! she was called a l;lamor eizel, a donkey. It was very frowned upon. I don't remember ever feeling upset that I couldn't pray with the men anymore. The men's section was not a pleasant place in which to pray. It didn't feel peaceful because it was always crowded and hot and there was no room to sit. Lubavitch women don't ever feel secondary or deprived. Their lives are as busy as the men's. There is always so much activity. An equal responsibility for performing mitzvot rests with with the males and females. All children are soldiers in HaShem's army. The boys encourage nonobservant men to wear tejillin; the girls ask women to light candles: equal roles. When girls start lighting candles on Friday nights, at three years old, their womanhood really begins. They light and their brothers don't. Candlelighting is stressed very much. Although little boys at age three get their first haircut...