Rosner's Guest: Hara Person

Rabbi Hara Person is Editor-in-Chief of URJ Press (a division of Union for Reform Judaism) and managing editor of The Torah: A Women's Commentary, the first comprehensive commentary authored only by women on the Five Books of Moses, set for release soon.

She is a graduate of Amherst College, holds an MA in Fine Arts from NYU/ICP, and was ordained by the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion. She is co-editor That You May Live Long: Caring for Aging Parents, Caring for Ourselves, editor of the anthology The Mitzvah of Healing and co-author of Stories of Heaven and Earth: Bible Heroes in Contemporary Children's Literature (Continuum, 2005). Rabbi Person lives in Brooklyn, New York, with her husband and two children.

Readers can send questions to rosnersdomain@haaretz.co.il.



Dear Hara,

I will start with a simple question, to clarify for readers our topic for discussion this week.

Why does the (Jewish) world need a specific, distinctive book of women's commentary on the Torah?

Best

Rosner


The easy answer to that question is that there can never be too much Torah commentary. The more Torah commentary, the better, the more doorways in to the text and the more possible ways we have to connect to the text, the better. The Torah: A Women's Commentary is meant to be an addition to the resources already available, another voice.

Today we have a critical mass of women scholars in the field of bible in a way that has never been the case up to now. We have senior scholars like Dr. Tamara Eskenazi, the editor of the book, and now we have their students, like Rabbi Andrea Weiss, Ph.D., the associate editor, who are becoming major scholars in their own right. They all write and publish, but their work has never been brought together before in one place, accessible to any Jew studying Torah rather than only to the scholarly community. At the same time, gender as a topic of study has become accepted. It's no longer controversial to talk about gender as one of the ways in which a text or a society or language can be studied.

Every commentary has its own perspective, its own angle. We wanted to add something else into the ongoing engagement with our primary Jewish text. Historically, women's voices were never included in the conversation. Women weren't Torah scholars or meforshim. Thus there are gaps in the existing commentaries. Cantor Sarah Sager, who provided the original impetus for this project, talks about writing a D'var Torah on Parashat Vayera and struggling with the lack of commentary on Sarah's experience.

This commentary highlights the work of Jewish women scholars around the world. Our contributors draw from many academic fields and approaches, such as archeology, literary criticism, feminist scholarship, rabbinics, theology, anthropology, sociology, and philology. The contributors were asked to pay special attention to the women in the text, issues related to women in the text, and in some cases, the absence of women in the text, as well as the classical rabbinic perspectives on women. It doesn't try to present the women's perspective but rather multiple women's perspectives.

One of the unique aspects of this book is that there are four different kinds of commentary on each parashah, plus a poetry section accompanying each parashah as well. The result is a multiplicity of voices that make the study of Torah that much richer. One of the things that's so special about this book is not just that it's a commentary written by Jewish women, but that it's a commentary written by 100 Jewish women scholars, accompanied by poetry by over 100 Jewish women poets.

It's also relevant that although this book was inspired by a cantor and written by scholars, it would have gone nowhere if the members of Women of Reform Judaism, the sisterhood women in the congregations, hadn't been hungry for this book. This is a grassroots effort, a response to a need expressed by the women filling the pews in congregations. They want to study Torah, they want to be educated and inspired, and they want the realities of their lives to be included in the conversation.

The Torah: A Women's Commentary provides new perspectives on the women characters in the Torah, and also issues related to women like laws of inheritance, childbirth and menstruation, and rape. These are things that might have been given short shrift or been glossed over in other commentaries. Here the spotlight shines directly on these issues. We ask questions like how do recent findings in archeology provide a new perspective on family roles and relationships in biblical times? And how does that shed new light on, for the example, the story of Tamar and Judah?

At the same time, this book isn't intended to be used only by women. That would be missing the point. Our goal was to create a commentary that adds women's voices to the mix, so that the experience of everyone studying Torah can be enriched. We all need to learn from each other.

Dear Hara,

You mention the cases related to "absence of women in the text". But isn't this what makes the Torah so difficult when it comes to women's voice?

And even more so - by looking to write more about the experience of women throughout the Torah, you might be in danger of enhancing the less important stories (for the sake of writing about women) and neglecting the more significance (which does not always include women).

How do you balance all these considerations?

Best

Rosner

There is no lack of material directly related to women in the Torah text. There are all the well-known personalities, like Sarah, Rebekah, Rachel, Leah, Dina, Miriam, Tamar, and on and on. There are the laws related to women's lives, like childbirth, menstruation, or adultery. And there are unnamed women, like Noah's wife or Lot's wife.

But yes, it is also true that there are absences in the texts. For example, we know what the priests' responsibilities were and therefore some of the details of their lives. We don't, however, know much about the lives of their wives or daughters. There are also other kinds of absences. Even if women are present on the stage, so to speak, the narrative is told from the male's point of view. Take the story of the binding of Isaac. The text begs the question of what Sarah was doing, thinking and feeling. Did Sarah know what was happening? Why or why not? If she knew, how did she respond? And if not, what happened when she found out later? The text is silent - she is completely absent from the narrative.

The rabbis themselves asked these very questions about Sarah's reactions, and created a midrash that connects the akedah to what comes immediately afterward, Sarah's death. In several midrashim, her death is a result of Abraham taking Isaac to be offered up. She dies of grief, one midrash explains, upon hearing what Abraham was doing (Breishit Rabbah 58:5). This explanation is absent from the Torah text itself, but the rabbis saw the need to imagine this event from Sarah's perspective. They recognized that this story couldn't be only about Abraham and Isaac, but that it also had to be about Sarah.

You ask about significance, but who's to say what's significant? Jewish tradition teaches that all of Torah is significant. And of course we have a long Jewish tradition of finding holes in the text, or seeming contradictions, and coming up with ways to explain them. These are not only contemporary concerns. It was the classical rabbis who gave a name to Noah's wife, and to Pharaoh's daughter. It was the rabbis who made the connection between Asher's daughter Serach in Genesis and the subsequent mention of her in Numbers, and then wove a complex story about her role in the history of the Israelite people.

Moreover, the question of significance is a value-based question. For centuries we have been taught that women's concerns and women's lives were not as significant as men's. Look at any traditional history book and it's about men's actions, not women's. Men were the ones on the battlefields and in the halls of government and that's what got recorded. However, today there are fields of study that teach us to also value the work that went on behind the scenes, the ways in women lived their lives, raised families, contributed to the economy, and educated future generations. That is part of the same impulse going on here with this book. We can no longer truly believe that women's lives and women's experiences were not as significant as those of the men. Both the midwife and the general take center stage; they both work to ensure the survival of the people.

What is important is deemed such only because Jewish tradition has decided that one story or one event is more important than another. With this book we're saying that texts related to women are important too. If we are to honor our fathers and our mothers, then we have to study about the women in the Torah and the texts related to them rather than just privileging what is related to men.

It is true though that this commentary is not meant to be the only commentary you'd ever need. It's made to be used side-by-side with other commentaries. Certain things will be emphasized in this commentary that will be missing in other commentaries, and vice versa. That's the point, to add to the conversation, not replace it.

Where do you feel that Judaism and feminism intersect, and where they separate, both on a practical and theoretical level?

Many books have been written on this subject! It is certainly something we had to think about all the time as we worked on the commentary. On a very basic level, there are similarities in the way in which Judaism and feminism both value the individual while seeing the individual as part of a bigger community. In both systems, the individual person counts and is valuable. At the same time, there is a responsibility to the bigger community, be it of Jews or of women.

Both Judaism and feminism are systems that value wrestling. Israel means wrestling with God - we have a tradition of wrestling with the big ideas of God, faith, holiness and justice. None of these are clearcut, and we spend our lives trying to understand these concepts and how to respond to them. Feminism is also a tradition of wrestling, wrestling with the accepted norms and challenging conventional ways of seeing the world. Both are traditions that wrestle with the status quo in order to avoid favoring complacency over justice. Both are traditions of speaking truth to power.

Judaism and feminism are complex ideas with many interpretations. That reality goes to the heart of the endeavor of creating this commentary, which provides multiple perspectives and ways in to Torah. There are ways in which this is a very Jewish book and a very Jewish way of creating a book. And there are ways in which it is feminist and reflects lessons gleaned from feminist inquiry. As noted by Rabbi Andrea Weiss, the associate editor of the commentary, the blending of these specific aspects of both Judaism and feminism that have informed our undertaking help make this book unique. As a Jewish book, it is modeled on classical Jewish texts like Mikra'ot G'dolot, in which the reader is presented with a multitude of authors and perspectives on one text, in addition to editorial notes. At the same time, this multivocal nature is also connected to feminism, in that one voice or one perspective is not valued above another.

Feminism teaches a kind of democracy of process and of ideas, which encourages a multiplicity of voices. There are many ways in which this book echoes that impulse, from the fact that the scholars span the Jewish spectrum from Orthodox to secular, as well as hailing from around the globe. Our editorial process was also the most extensively collective process I've ever been involved with as an editor, in which many voices weighed in with opinions and ideas, and which continued to involve the authors until almost the last minute.

Judaism historically has emphasized authority, especially vis-à-vis halachah, so this is one area where the two systems differ. While Judaism allows for many voices to be heard on one text, see for example the commentaries of Rashbam, Rambam, Ramban, Ibn Ezra, and Rashi, there is also an emphasis on which is the correct reading. Different rabbis and communities will grant authority to different interpretations. Our attempt was to honor those voices from Jewish tradition, while sometimes also arguing against them, and also to add new voices in order to enlarge the conversation. One of the struggles of this book is not simply to just reject much of Jewish tradition, especially regarding women, but to find a way to understand it, re-interpret it, wrestle with it, question it, even disagree with it, and still own it as Jewish women. The challenge was to try to find a way to engage with the text and the history of commentary as Jewish women, not as just one or the other.

Dr. Tamara Eskenazi, the editor of the commentary, writes that one way to think about the relationship between Judaism and feminism is to realize that both seek the well-being of a community and its members. Both explore the ways in which the individual and the larger community shape one another to the benefit of all members. A major difference, however, concerns the tools of exploration: whereas feminism examines issues by focusing on questions related to gender, Judaism explores them in reference to Jewish texts and history, often in connection to some specific understanding of God.

As we created this commentary, we looked carefully at the methodologies and values of both Judaism and feminism, trying to integrate the two in the best way possible. We paid attention to issues of gender, power, sexuality, inclusion and exclusion as we also focused on Jewish texts, Jewish interpretations of the texts, and Jewish ways of finding meaning in the texts. The commentary is both Jewish and feminist in that it strives for a multiplicity of voices and interpretations. As Dr. Eskenazi writes, "This book is both Jewish and feminist in its concern to draw out meanings that allow reader to assess critically the inherited tradition and have new tools and insights with which to help shape our lives as persons and communities in a fair and constructive fashion."

A question from a reader:

Do you think the same method can be useful for other Jewish texts. For
example: a women's commentary on the Talmud?

What we've done in this book is to provide five kinds of responses to each parashah. First there is the Central Commentary, which is the main commentary. It is scholarly in nature, taking into account research from a variety of fields such as archeology, philology, and anthropology, as well as literary criticism, feminist criticism, and gender studies. The second kind of commentary is Another Voice, which provides a "counter-voice" to the Central Commentary, sometimes challenging one of its concepts, or elaborating on a point. The third kind of commentary is Post-Biblical, which looks at the classical rabbinic interpretations of the text in particular as they relate to women. The fourth kind of commentary, Contemporary Reflections, is generally written by a rabbi, a cantor, an educator, or a leader in the Jewish community. This is the more homiletical commentary that brings in contemporary concerns and connects the text to the lives of women today. The fifth and final kind of commentary is the Voices section, which connects poetry, much of it previously published, to the Torah text.

It is this blend of voices that is so unique in this book. There is both the combination of different kinds of commentary written by different people for each parashah. And there is the blend of the scholarly, the homiletical, and the poetic. The result is a rich blend of perspectives and ideas, not unlike Talmud itself.

I definitely think that this methodology would be useful for other Jewish texts. It would be fascinating to do a women?s commentary on the Talmud. But even before that, I would love to see a women's commentary on the Nach sections of the Bible, the Prophets and the Writings. That would be an incredible project!

As a student of Jewish texts, I love the idea of being able to study any text through multiple perspectives at one time. Part of what is so challenging and fascinating about studying Talmud is that the text itself presents multiple perspectives. So you would potentially have multiple voices commenting on multiple voices. But that's why this commentary is such an authentic Jewish endeavor - as Jews we've always had a tradition full of different opinions and perspectives.

A women's commentary on the Talmud could provide a fascinating look into the lives of the women of that time, and interesting background to many of the existing discussions. However, let's take that idea one step further. The Talmud is in part a record of men's responses to sacred text and to the realities of their lives. What would be really incredible would be a women?s commentary on the Mishnah that reflected women's responses to sacred text and the reality of their lives, leading to the creation of a women?s Gemara and thus a women's Talmud. If women scholars, rabbis, cantors, educators and thinkers were commenting on the core text, what would their questions be, and then their answers? What kind of a Talmud would be generated from that? How would women respond to issues like Shabbat, kashrut, and niddah? What laws, rituals, and midrash might result from that endeavor?

Dear rabbi

"How would women respond to issues like Shabbat"?

Why would they respond differently from men? Can you please give an example?

Thank you,

Yaacov Gal
Currently in Illinois

I really don't know how women would respond to this or any other topic that is covered in the Talmud. I suggested it as a hypothetical scenario based on the way in which the Talmud was created. In other words, how would the Talmud we have today be different if the sages had been women? Or even if there had women among the sages? It's simply possible that women would bring something else to the table. This is especially likely in areas where male sages were discussing issues related intimately to women's lives, like niddah, but it's even possible that the discussions around topics like parapets or the gorings of oxen would have been different.

I can't provide a concrete answer to your question since there can't be one "woman's response." Part of the strength of our commentary is that there are multiple responses and multiple perspectives. Can you imagine such a thing as one "Jewish response" to anything? (See the comments below if you need proof of the spectrum of Jewish beliefs!). I don't believe that there would have been one specific woman's response to any of the issues in the Talmud, but there certainly would have been some views that reflected the realities of women's lives and experiences.
Perhaps, for example, if women had been involved in the creation of Jewish ritual from the beginning, there might have been a formal covenantal ceremony for baby girls that parallels brit milah. Or perhaps a weaning ceremony, or a ritual for a girl's first menstrual period. All of these have been created in modern times, but maybe they would have existed all along. If it was the case that women were the primary family and community members responsible for things like kashrut, childraising, and certain aspects of Shabbat practice, particularly around issues like the preparation of food, then it is simply conceivable that they would have brought different insights into the discussion.

Look at an example from the Torah - take the story of Judah and Tamar from Genesis 38. In many readings of this text, it is primarily a story of Judah, part of the ongoing Joseph cycle. Through the events of this chapter, Judah comes to understand the wrongness of his ways, so much so that rabbis read his actions there as a form of repentance. And of course the result of the story is that Judah's line continues and another link in the chain to the messianic line is created. But what about Tamar? Is she merely a plot device, a way to get from here to there? In most commentaries, the spotlight is primarily on Judah. It is true that Tamar is praised by the rabbis, who see the ends as justifying the means and therefore her actions. But when women study this story Tamar takes center stage. It is not that there is one way that women read the story, but rather that when women study this chapter, Tamar and her role are given more attention and scrutiny. Beyond what the story teaches us about Judah, what does it teach us about sexuality in the ancient world? About relationships? About what is hidden and what is revealed? About subterfuge? About desperation and the lengths that a childless widow will go to in order to secure her future? It is less a matter of what conclusions are reached and more a matter of what questions are asked.