Women in the synagogue

Abstract

Women took part in synagogue services in the ancient world, and sometimes received official titles like ‘ruler of the synagogue’ or ‘elder’. So much is clear, and the situation in antiquity evidently contrasts with the less prominent position of women in the synagogue at some later periods; but interpretation is hampered by lack of detailed information on the ancient synagogue. Did women worship apart from men, perhaps, as in mediaeval and later times, in a special section of the building? Did women with official titles carry out the functions of the offices concerned, and thereby take part in the government of the synagogues? Since the early nineteenth century these historical questions have been ardently debated against the background of women's emancipation and synagogue reform. Signs of the times were the opening of the partition between the men's hall and the women's hall of the mediaeval synagogue of Worms (1843), and the discontinuance of the use of a women's gallery by the Berlin ‘Genossenschaft fur Reform im Judenthum’ (1845); and in the USA ‘family pews’ and female office-holders gradually became familiar during the nineteenth century in reformed congregations. More recent writing again reflects the impetus of women's movements in Judaism and Christianity, but can also draw on intensified study of women in the ancient world. No more is attempted in what follows than to indicate and assess evidence bearing on the two linked questions of women's place in communal worship and women as office-holders. The broader issues implied but not explored below were ironically evoked in 1913 by an essayist who entitled her study ‘Woman's Place in the Synagogue’.