Just as there are strong efforts today to change the mesorah of strict gender roles in Orthodox society, so there are strong efforts to resist such changes. Some of the strongest opponents of opening up educational and leadership opportunities for women in Orthodoxy are women in Orthodoxy.
The question is why? Why would any intelligent, strong, and independent thinking woman fight for the right to live by a set of both opportunities and restrictions that are solely determined by her gender?
After all, other Jewish women have been defying such gender restrictions for more than 30 years. According to ejewishphilanthropy.com:
“To date, more than 350 women have become rabbis in the Reform, Reconstructionist, and Conservative branches of American Judaism.
Last month, the Conservative movement celebrated 30 years since the May ordination of the first Conservative woman rabbi, Rabbi Amy Eilberg. She was ordained in 1985 by the Jewish Theological Seminary. Since then, Conservative women leaders have revolutionized the field.
Rabbi Julie Schonfeld, executive vice president of the Rabbinical Assembly, says three main contributions of Conservative women rabbis on the Conservative movement are in the realms of ritual, scholarship and leadership.”
One might wonder why any woman wanting to rediscover her Jewish roots or convert to Judaism would ever consider joining the Orthodox denomination, when so many more opportunities for women exist within the other realms. However, according to RCA statistics, women make up 78% of Orthodox conversions. I was unable to find statistics on how many women vs. men become baal teshuvahs, but my guess is that women make up a larger number in that arena as well.
Tradition in a Rootless World by Lynn Davidman is an interesting portrayal of women who decide to eschew secular society to live a life adhering to traditional Orthodox female roles. While the RCA survey states that 80% of converts cite “spiritual-intellectual search” as their reason for converting, the women in Davidman’s book portray a slightly deeper picture of why women might wish to return to, or join, the Orthodox fold. The main reason – they come for the men. Or rather, they come for the promise of stable marriages and children; something that their relationships with secular men have not offered.
Yes, of course many women and men venture into Orthodoxy primarily to quench a spiritual thirst. However, it doesn’t surprise me that 80% of all converts tell their rabbinic sponsors that their reasoning for wanting to become an Orthodox Jew is to fulfill a spiritual and intellectual search. I’m betting that if a potential convert told their rabbi that their primary reason for wanting to become Jewish was because they heard that Jewish guys make the best husbands, they would be promptly dismissed as a candidate. Since baal teshuvahs don’t have to undergo a screening process to argue why they want to become frum, it’s assumed that their main reason is for spiritual meaning. However, the social aspect is quite often an equal enticement.
Again, though, if it’s marrying a Jewish man that women are after, why turn to Orthodoxy? Aren’t there plenty of available Jewish men to choose from in the liberal segments of Judaism? Apparently not. A 2011 Slate article asked, “Jewish men on the decline: is Judaism becoming too female-centric?” The article said that while laudatory advancements for women have been made in egalitarian sectors of Judaism, it has come at the expense of male retention:
“In 2008, Brandeis professor Sylvia Barack Fishman coauthored a monograph, Matrilineal Ascent/Patrilineal Descent, based on survey data and her own interviews. On a range of metrics, she found Jewish men to be less invested in their religious identity and less active in synagogue life than Jewish women. Women typically wish to marry within the tribe and raise Jewish children, while men often expressed hostility toward Jewish women and religion generally. Fishman declared this disparity a “crisis……
According to surveys and extensive anecdotal evidence, women do seem to be significantly more involved in the laity. Rabbis report that men are scarce in pews and adult education classes, and boys are known to flee after their bar mitzvahs. The North American Federation of Temple Youth consists of 59 percent girls and 41 percent boys…..
Since 2004, at the Reform seminary, Hebrew Union College, women have outnumbered men every year but one, usually by a substantial margin. (This year, for example, 25 women and 10 men graduated.) For cantors, the ratios have typically been even more skewed. Fishman and others worry that as boys see fewer role models, synagogue will increasingly be seen as a female space. This concern points to an unsavory reality: While women often clamor to participate in male-dominated institutions, female-dominated institutions are more likely to drive males away.”
The bottom line is that Orthodoxy manages to retain the involvement of men because it excludes women from public ritual life. The synagogue is a boy’s club, and that’s exactly why men like it. Even in the secular world men seek out male only spaces to socialize with other men sans wives and girlfriends. Whether it’s a bowling league, a softball team, a fraternity, a shriners club, or any number of other men’s societies – men like to have a place to group together in a pack without women.
For Orthodox guys, those places are the shul and the beis medrash. Yes, women are allowed in synagogue – but only behind a large screen where they can’t be seen or heard. For all practical purposes during services, the men can function as if women aren’t there. Also, let’s face it, most Orthodox women only go to shul on Shabbos and Yom Tov, so the majority of the time, the men have the synagogue to themselves.
This exclusive right over Jewish ritual and public places of worship and study give men a sense of ownership and entitlement over their own Judaism and the Jewish community. They are the voice of the Jewish people. If we take away that exclusivity and try and make it 50/50 between men and women, men lose interest in the entire enterprise. This dynamic seems to be playing out in other Jewish denominations where there are more young women invested in Jewish life, ritual, education, and leadership than there are young men.
Even though in the secular world it’s old school to want to settle down to marriage and babies in your twenties or even early thirties, many women still want those things. Maybe it’s a nostalgic longing for the throwback times of our grandparents or even parents, or possibly even just a longing for the security of a committed relationship that many men seem unwilling to agree to, but one thing liberal women looking for commitment can’t argue with is that Orthodox men are open to settling down in a way their secular counterparts aren’t.
When I was dating in college in the 1990’s (around the same time Tradition in a Rootless World was published) the concept of commitment in your early 20s was already dead in the secular world. If I went on a first date with a man and started talking about life goals, engagement timetables, weddings, marriage, or how many kids I hoped to have the man would label me a psycho and make an excuse to high tail it out of there. There is even a romantic comedy called “How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days” that exaggerates mistakes women make that scare men away, such as presenting a new beau with a photo album of merged baby pictures depicting how your future children will look:
Contrast this with the shidduch date, which assumes that both parties are there to assess whether the date will ultimately end in wedded bliss 3-4 months down the line. It would be unusual for the conversation on such a date not to veer into the territory of children, what schools you would send them to, where you see yourself living, how soon to get engaged, how soon to get married, etc..
When I started dating my husband, it was a refreshing change from the other secular Jewish men I had dated who made it clear they were not ready to settle down and were just having fun until some unknown time in the future after they finished school, were working for a few years, and had sufficiently dated enough women to be sure they were marrying the right one. My husband, like most of his friends, wasn’t looking for a girlfriend as much as he was looking for a wife. Contrary to being scared of commitment, Orthodox men are taught that the entire purpose of dating is to find a woman for commitment. This is an attractive prospect for women who seek such an attachment.
So attractive, that giving up the autonomy you have as a non-Orthodox person in exchange for the husband and children you desire is a fair exchange. If you never planned on being a rabbi, or a cantor, or if the main lure of Orthodox culture was family and stability and not praying with a minyan three times a day, what are you sacrificing? Not every woman (or man) chooses spirituality/religion as her number one priority in life. For women, it’s even easier than it is for men to put other things (like marriage, children, career, relationships) above religion as a priority. We don’t have the same restrictions on our time or interests in the name of bittul Torah.
Since two of the top priorities a woman is expected to have is being a wife and mother, a woman can still feel a sense of religious integrity if she joins the Orthodox movement with those goals playing a prominent role in her decision.
If staving off male defection in the Orthodox community means women continuing to ride in the passenger seat, while men take the wheel in religious leadership, it’s a sacrifice most women are ready to make.
