I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the concept of credentials. In any realm of life, if someone wants to be taken seriously for an opinion, it seems they must have proven expertise. In some cases, requiring credentials is obviously prudent. I wouldn’t go to a plumber to have my tonsils removed. Likewise, I wouldn’t contact my physician to clear a clog in my pipes. When it comes to religious matters, likewise, I wouldn’t stop by my local falafel shop to ask the owner a shailah, just as I wouldn’t go to my rabbi to buy a shwarma. Obviously, guiding the religious community on matters of halacha requires certification. This certification comes in the form of smicha from a recognized yeshiva or individual rabbi.
However, sometimes credential requirements can be a bit ambiguous. For example, I have my credentials listed on my “About” page, but do I really need any of the degrees listed to be qualified to write this blog? Even if I were a high school dropout, I would still be entitled to the opinions and experiences I share here.
Similarly, when it comes to the layman’s voice of 21st century orthodox Jewry, there seems to be a division between the credence of “kol isha” and “kol ish.” It is a rare (but slowly growing) experience to find an orthodox woman writer who is openly critical of frum society or the rabbinate. Yes, there are those who critique within the realm of feminine experiences (e.g. mikvah, niddah, tzniut, mothering). However, women simply don’t have the credentials (smicha or an extensive yeshiva education), or the possibility of obtaining the credentials, to have their voice be taken seriously on a grander scale.
Sometimes, from my vantage point, it seems that anyone with a bris is heard and debated with more respect, simply due to a happy accident of birth. At the very least, the male voice of dissent inspires some sort of reaction beyond plain vitriol and name calling. To use a Sons of Anarchy reference, men are the actual club members and we women are just their “old ladies.”
For example, how would you feel about my blog if I told you I had a confession to make? Maybe this is the perfect time for me to come clean about something. Some of you have already guessed, but to others this will be a surprise. It may even seem like a betrayal, but I assure you, it isn’t. My deception was done without malice.
My confession is that while I have been blogging as a Jewish orthodox woman, in reality, I am actually a Jewish orthodox man.
My name is Chananya Pollak.
That’s right. Let it sink in. There, there, it will be ok! It’s still me, just with an XY chromosome pair.
Why did I do it, you ask? Why would I waste my time posting fake photos, creating a fake profile, or generally assuming a female persona? At best, it’s psychologically abnormal. At worst, I could be accused of “simlat isha” (virtual cross dressing).
I did it to put myself in the precarious stilettos of my wife and daughters. You see, while I do have my own gripes about the state of affairs in the Jewish orthodox world, I view those concerns through the lens of one who can take an active role in making changes.
I have the credentials to voice my opinion on both halachic and hashkafic matters. Well, I don’t have the ultimate credential, which would be smicha. However, spending many years in yeshiva does entitle me to a certain level of credential. So does the knowledge that I could obtain smicha if I chose to pursue that course of study. My wife and daughters will never be able to obtain smicha. Without that credential, or the possibility obtaining it, their voices will never have direct influence in shaping the future direction of our community.
I never realized how true this was until I created Kol B’Isha Erva on a dare from my wife. I have had my own blog since 2003, called Chazak Chazak V’nitchazek. Over the years, I have critiqued our modern interpretations of halacha and mesorah, but I’ve never experienced the personal attacks that I have on Kol B’Isha Erva. Granted, I present myself as a talmid of Rav Yosef Ber Soloveitchik and a fervent proponent of Torah Umadda. As an educator, my credentials seem to have garnered me some measure of respect among my readers and opponents alike.
However, I refused to believe that my gender played any role in the level of acceptance with which my views were received. My wife and oldest daughter told me, after one particularly controversial theory that I published, that had a woman written those same words, she would be skewered. I felt that they were overstating the case, and thus, the concept of Kol B’Isha Erva began.
Gitel and Shayna, I know you thought you would never hear these words, but you were both right. It’s not only the reactions from readers that has been eye opening (if one more random guy named Yossi emails to ask me if I am sure that I’m “happily married” I might have to go NSA on his ass! Why are they always named, “Yossi?”). The main revelation for me has been seeing the world through the eyes of a woman. I actually felt as if I were looking at my community through Sharon’s eyes; Sharon, a fictional character, a mere figment of my imagination.
I have grown so attached to Sharon that I’m actually thinking of making her the protagonist in a full length novel. She’s given me some great material and I hate to let her go, so to speak. Sure, Sharon can be self-absorbed, irreverent in her humor, overly sarcastic, and pretty neurotic when it comes to gay rights and women’s issues. However, I knew I only had a short time for Sharon to serve her purpose, and so I had to make her rather extreme in her modern orthodox liberal feminist viewpoints in order to garner as much feedback as possible. I think I can safely say that my strategy worked.
Or has it?
Did I have you believing, even if for only a moment, that I am really a man? If you had even a shred of doubt, did it cast a temporary cloud of change over the landscape of opinions you’ve read here? If the same words come from a man versus a woman (both equally observant, both lay people, both in a similar age bracket), how likely are you to give credence to one or the other based solely on their sex?
