How has a legal tradition determined by men affected the lives of women? What are the traditional Jewish views of marriage, divorce, sexuality, contraception, abortion? Women and Jewish Law gives contemporary readers access to the central texts of the Jewish religious tradition on issues of special concern to women. Combining a historical overview with a thoughtful feminist critique, this pathbreaking study points the way for “informed change” in the status of women in Jewish life.

Rabbi Moshe Meiselman addresses the attitude of Jewish law to women and how the Jewish tradition views the contemporary challenge of feminism. He discusses in detail such current issues as creative ritual, women in a minyan, aliyot for women, talit and tefillin. The question of agunah is also given lengthy consideration. The author mixes current issues with scholarly ones and gives full treatment to other issues such as learning Torah by women, women position in court both as witnesses and as litigants, the marriage ceremony & marital life. — Amazon.com.

This book is dedicated to the study of the halakhic status of women in the synagogue and in public life. Rabbi Golinkin deals with the tension which exists between Jewish Law and modernity, striving to bridge the gap between tradition and change.

The term Niddah means separation. During her menstrual flow and for several days thereafter, a Jewish woman is considered Niddah -- separate from her husband and unable to practice the sacred rituals of Judaism. Purification in a miqveh (a ritual bath) following her period restores full status as a wife and member of the Jewish community. In the contemporary world, debates about Niddah focus less on the literal exclusion of menstruating women from the synagogue, instead emphasizing relations between husband and wife and the general role of Jewish women in Judaism. Although this has been the law since ancient times, the meaning and practice of Niddah has been widely contested. Women and Water explores how these purity rituals have affected Jewish women across time and place, and shows how their own interpretation of Niddah often conflicted with rabbinic views. These essays also speak to contemporary feminist issues such as shaping women's identity, power relations between women and men, and the role of women in the sacred.

For the past few decades, manu Orthodox leaders have reacted to the overall friction between some aspects of feminist ideology and halakhah (Jewish las and ethics) by treating suggestions for increased women's participation in religious activities with suspicion. They feared that these proposals, while benign in appearance, could legitimize feminism in the eyes of the halakhic community. It is now time, argues the author, to move past this fear of feminism. We are fast approaching a "post-feminist" era in which accepting certain initiatives originally promoted by feminists no longer carries with it the implications that we accept feminist ideology as a whole. We should not continue to fight yesterday's battles, confusing a genuine desire to grow in Torah with an attack on Torah values. It is obvious to people who have firsthand contact with women engaged in advanced Torah education in Israeli schools like Michlelet Lindenbaum, Matan, or Nishmat or in American schools like Drisha and Stern College that it is the unparalleled high levels of education attained by these women that now drives this concern, not by any particular feminist agenda. This book explores how this drive for increased women's expression in our homes, at life-cycle events, in our synagogues and in our schools can be realized with complete fidelity to halakhah.

This collection of revised and new essays explores Jewish women's history. Topics include portrayals of women in the Hebrew Bible, the image and status of women in the diaspora world of late antiquity, and Jewish women in the Middle Ages.