Rabbis and reality: Public activities of Jewish women in Italy during the renaissance and catholic restoration

Abstract

Reconstructing the history of Jewish women is like peering through a wooden fence. Lingering too long in one particular place in our case, exclusively concentrating on one kind of textual source can block our vision. Moving along quickly, however, to view diverse sources, allows multiple images to blend in our minds, ultimately creating a viable picture. This is especially applicable to the historical study of Jewish women in Renaissance Italy. Were we, as historians, to judge the behavior, both public and private, of these women solely on the basis of rabbinic prohibitions and the negative opinions of rabbis concerning women's participation in public matters, we should be distorting reality. The public behavior of women during the Renaissance did not conform to rabbinic expectations. It was not although it has been said otherwise a function of nebulous Renaissance values, which supposedly breathed a spirit of liberation into Jewish personal and communal life. Rather, as we shall now illustrate, the public behavior of Renaissance Jewish women was determined by a give-and-take that counterpoised such forces as halachic texts and traditions, their current rabbinic interpretations, the needs of the Jewish community, and the strivings of individual Jewish women themselves.