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Related: About this forumReligious feminists take the Torah scrolls into their own hands
A feminist group on Facebook has helped more women take part in religious services and contributed to the creation of partnership synagogues.
By Tsafi Saa | Oct. 1, 2013 | 4:26 PM
Sharon Mayevsky is a religiously observant playwright, screenwriter and blogger. Her Hebrew-language blog is called “Dosa Feminista” - dosa being a riff on dos - a derogatory Hebrew term for an ultra-Orthodox Jew.
On the recent holiday of Simhat Torah, Mayevsky celebrated a milestone — her bat mitzvah — granted, a few years late. In Orthodox Judaism, girls become bat mitzvah — fully obligated in Jewish law and observance — at 12.
Mayevsky, who is married and the mother of two daughters, was called up to read the Torah for the first time in her life, and she delivered the festival-day portion from beginning to end. With some emotion she notes that her parents, who belong to a more conservative community, came to see her perform, and her father even made a blessing during the reading.
For many traditional Jewish women Simhat Torah - celebrating the end of the annual cycle of Torah readings - is a men’s festival. While the men dance with the Torah and are called up one by one to make a blessing over the reading, the women basically watch and talk among themselves.
http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/jewish-world-features/.premium-1.549959
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dipsydoodle
(42,239 posts)to there being a derogatory Hebrew term for an Ultra ?
cbayer
(146,218 posts)particularly feminists.
rug
(82,333 posts)The issues date to the late nineteenth-early twentieth century, with the rise of Zionism. The vast majority of Haredi Jews rejected Zionism for a number of reasons. Chief among these was the belief that Jewish political independence could only be achieved with the coming of the Messiah. In addition was the disdain in which they viewed political and cultural Zionism which lacked any religious manifestation. Influenced by socialism, secular Zionists looked on religion as an outdated relic which should disappear in favor of Jewish nationalism. As with the nineteenth century Reform Judaism movement in Germany, the result was mutual recriminations, rejection, and harsh verbal attacks. To Zionists, Haredi Jews were either "primitives" or "parasites"; to Haredi Jews, Zionists were tyrannizing heretics. This kulturkampf still plagues Israeli society today, where animosity between the two groups has even pervaded both their educational systems.
Despite the animosity, it was necessary for the two groups to work out some modus vivendi in the face Nazi persecuation. This was achieved by a division of powers and authority, based on the division that existed during the British Mandate in the country. Known as the "status quo", it granted political authority (such as control over public institutions, the army, etc.) to the Zionists and religious authority (such as control over marriage, divorce, conversions, etc.) to the Orthodox. A compromise worked out by Labor Zionist leader Berl Katznelson even before statehood ensured that public institutions accommodate the Orthodox by observing the Sabbath and providing kosher food.
Notwithstanding these compromises, many Haredi groups maintained their previous apolitical stance. The community had split into two parts: Agudat Israel, which cooperated with the state, and the Edah HaChareidis, which fiercely opposed it. Both groups still exist today, with the same attitudes. The Edah HaChareidis includes numerous Hasidic groups, such as Satmar, Dushinsky and Toldos Aharon, as well as several non-Hasidic groups of Lithuanian and Hungarian background.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haredi_Judaism
dipsydoodle
(42,239 posts)that despite Hebrew being a written language that they would fabricate relatively new words.
