Women of the Wall: Claiming Sacred Ground at Judaism's Holy Site (review)

Abstract

Women of the Wall (WoW), a group formed to hold women-only public prayer services at the Western Wall in Jerusalem, is one of the more controversial outgrowths of the twentieth-century collision of Jewish traditions with the women's movement. The collection of essays and reminiscences under review, edited by two of the group's American members, presents a continuum of insider viewpoints on the decades-long gender conflict sparked by WoW's activities at the Wall. In a concise, helpful introduction, the editors explain that WoW had its genesis in December 1988, when approximately seventy women attending the first International Congress for the Empowerment of Jewish Women went together to worship and read aloud from the Torah in the women's section of the Western Wall plaza. According to Bonna Haberman, who was among those who went to the Wall that day, their action was partly a response to a proposal she had put forward at the conference for a regular Rosh Hodesh (New Moon) women's prayer group meeting at the Wall. The tremendous impact that service had on those who participated in it sparked off a local initiative to follow through on Haberman's proposal. Women of the Wall came into being. After considerable deliberation, WoW embraced the practices of women donning tallitot (prayer shawls), praying aloud in public, and reading from the Torah scroll, all prohibited to women according to conventional Orthodox interpretations of Jewish law. In keeping with the Orthodox religious commitments of several founders, the group refrained from reciting devarim shebikedushah, prayers that traditionally may be recited only in the presence