Forum
FORUM Scholars Clash over Ancient Separation by Gender When Was Gender Segregation Introduced in the Synagogue? In an interesting pair of articles in December 1989, Bernadette Brooten ("Were...
...None of these religions were "fertility or sexually oriented cults...
...It is as incorrect to assume that the first record is the first instance as it is to assume that whatever existed later existed earlier...
...2 Babylonian Talmud (BT), Yoma29b...
...He should be candid about it...
...Weak: Arab fertility patterns will persist unchanged...
...Consequently, they issued blatant statements that the partition between men and women is a biblical injunction, based directly on the Torah (d'oraitha...
...Schiffman's statement concerning female religious leadership illustrates some of what is at stake in the separation question...
...just as it never changed in the past, so it should never be changed in the future...
...They took this action based on their belief in the equality of the sexes, their aspirations for a mixed society and, evi-dendy, also from their desire to make the synagogue more similar to the religious institutions they knew and admired—churches...
...Tulips are the national flower of Holland, a country which, along with Denmark, Sweden and Bulgaria was one of the few countries that saved Jews during the Holocaust, Goiinkin argued...
...One of the few such compositions to survive from this dark age is the midrash Ma 'aseRashbi which dates from the eighth-tenth centuries...
...Brooten is "professor of scripture and interpretation at Harvard Divinity School" (p...
...How long soulless, could the body survive...
...But if it were to come down to that, I would very much hope that some people would bear in mind that demography is not the only criterion for determining whether a state is fewish...
...A prime example is Chanukah where aspects are mentioned briefly by the Mishnah While there is no reference to the requirement to light a lamp or to the accompanying benedictions...
...45), since sectarian groups joften "patterned their worship on that jof the Temple" (p...
...In my opinion, this passage concerns not modesty (prohibition of prayer in front of a woman), but rather an attempt to prevent proud and ostentatious behavior during prayer...
...Schiffman states that "the early church separated the sexes in worship" (p...
...John Chrysostom (fourth century), preaching in Antioch, Syria, documents the diversity in practice...
...I am not saying that Brooten is without bias...
...431-438...
...The three items mentioned by Schiffman as not being mentioned in the literature because they were so well known—mechitza, prayer for mezuzah affixing and order of prayer—were, in fact, not practiced until recent times...
...You will notice no mixed seating, just mixed standing and praying...
...In sneering at those on the Right who refuse to face the implications for tomorrow of today's demographic statistics, Fein has finally found common ground with Kahane...
...The half truths, assumptions and other unsubstantiated material by Lawrence Schiffman are an insult to our intelligence...
...Transfer," the euphemism for expulsion, is not merely "unpalatable," as Mr...
...No demographer denies that continuation of present trends will result in an Arab majority—within even the partitioned Israel that Fein advocates—sometime-in the next century...
...Other, perhaps more problematic, evidence appears in Tanna d'beiEUahu: "And from him the sages learned...a man should not stand in public and pray because of the awareness of people, nor should a man stand among women and pray because of the awareness of women...
...1 Early Christians who did separate the sexes sometimes separated only the laity...
...If then, the synagogue in the mishnaic and talmudic period had no women's section, when was it founded...
...Such sayings as these could have created a congenial environment for the demand for separation of sexes...
...Is this a coincidence or is this considered the proper way for ladies to cross their legs in synagogue...
...Much of Schiffman's article is journalistic, but scholarly tone and credentials are assumed in the section where he responds to Brooten's thesis (and in which he inexplicably calls her a "New Testament scholar," a seemingly unlikely label for a person whose primary work, entitled Women Leaders in the Ancient Synagogue, was published as part of the Brown Judaic Studies series...
...420436...
...This is the pattern which existed in the ferusalem Temple for the most part, as noted by Ze'ev Safrai, and this is the condition that the separation in synagogues was designed to guarantee...
...So much for the empirical question...
...In the ancient Christian church in the East there was no uniform practice...
...Nonetheless, examination of the Lamentations Rabbah male-rial in comparison with the version of this midrash published by S. Buber (p...
...In regard to theJerusalem Temple, in which women were forbidden to enter the men's worship areas except for certain specific and limited rituals (as noted in the response of Z. Safrai), all evidence points to its having been the basis not only for the worship of the Qumran sectarians and the Therapeutae, but also for the earliest continued on page 62 FORU M continued from page 11 "rabbinic" synagogues...
...The laws of kashrut, family purity and many other daily laws were well known yet mentioned specifically and repeatedly in the literature and clarifications and interpretations without end...
...Goitein argued that this pattern of worship must have developed in antiquity...
...Acts 1:13-14...
...He must perceive some, for he is unwilling to transfer them out...
...The accusations of "immoral behavior'' at synagogues in John Chrysostom's anti-Semitic tract (cited by Ze'ev Safrai) cannot be taken as reliable evidence...
...others did not...
...These norms may have influenced the Jewish practice, especially among the important Jewish communities living in Moslem lands...
...In sum, I stand with my original view that direct historical or unequivocal archaeological evidence on this topic is indeed lacking and that in the absence of any firm evidence, it seems more likely that the practice of separation (exclusion of women from the men's worship area) was early, as shown by the ritual of the Temple in ferusalem and the parallels from the Therapeutae and early Christians...
...BT Sola 41b...
...In response to Ze'ev Safrai, I want first to note with gratitude the seriousness of his response to our set of articles...
...this partially contradicts the testimony of Josephus {Antiquities 9,11:5 and the parallel passages...
...1 Corinthians 16:19...
...The Brooten-Schiffman debate well illustrates the very different conclusions that scholars who read exacdy the same data may reach...
...Actually, there is no evidence at all in the New Testament for mixed worship...
...Ma'aseh Rashbi and a variety of Cairo Genizah documents indicate that by the early Middle Ages the separation of the sexes was definitely a given in Jewish worship...
...Both Aber and Blank could learn much from the tone of the responses of Brooten, Safrai and myself in this issue...
...An outside staircase is also in use as a separate entrance and we believe that this was done so that in time of trouble in the main sanctuary, the women and children could sneak out quietly...
...What really gets to me is that every time Jewish women make some headway back to their place in society that they relinquished several centuries ago for the survival of the community, there are always Jewish men who come along with their ignorance, and backlash, who pick and choose, as they step carefully through the maze of history, to support their particular patriarchal system in the hopes of perpetuating it, as they feel threatened by change...
...However, they prove that at the time they were said this demand was not yet widespread, and certainly was not normative ha-lachah (religious law...
...I am not qualified to judge the scholarship on this matter, but Schiffman's prejudices come through clearly...
...The capsule biography plainly slates that Dr...
...Brooten raises the issue of "women leaders," the subject of her Harvard dissertation...
...There, the synagogue is mentioned as a place where a woman might meet a strange man, while her husband was powerless to prevent it, even though ordinarily he has the right to forbid such a meeting...
...Goitein specifically discounted the possibility that it was an innovation, as Safrai argues here...
...Safrai's assumption that this separation is a medieval development is without foundation...
...There is, in fact, a very high correlation between education and decline in fertility...
...The passage fromTanna deve Eliyahu again proves the same point: Since prayer was forbidden to men whenever they could see women, there was separation in permanent houses of prayer...
...The Orthodox community responded by waging a war...
...Moment is to be commended for its attempts to bring Jewish scholarship to the masses...
...Perhaps I ought to be flattered to be in such distinguished company...
...The arguments are theirs, not mine...
...In his endnote 5, he says "The reason there is no explicit law in the traditional literature may well be that the laws relating to the mechitza were so well known that knowledge of them was simply taken for granted...
...That women could meet men at the synagogue in no way implies mixed worship...
...His deduction is based on an inadequate textual base, since he overlooks the parallels in Lamentations Rabbah 1:45 and 4:22, in which the terms are reversed and the women are referred to as "those below...
...As a matter of factual information, the picture of the Wailing Wall in 1903 shows men and women reciting psalms at the holy site...
...The fact is that demographic predictions are notoriously unstable...
...Compared to adjacent periods, few Jewish sources have survived from this dark age...
...Yet, as more than one scholar has observed, English translations can only approximate the richness of chesed in Hebrew...
...On the other hand, I agree strongly that "academic scholars, like myself [and I mean to include myself—L.H.S.], see no contradiction between the results of their research into the development of halachah and their religious point of view...
...One can, from her article, deduce that she probably has a feminist agenda...
...697-706...
...They are not the leaders of the community...
...men and women could meet there...
...At any rate, public ceremonies—such as the Torah reading by the high priest and the king, a festive public event—took place in the Court of Women.2 It is clear that men also participated in these ceremonies...
...Even the most elementary student of talmudic literature knows that numerous laws are assumed but not mentioned directly...
...It can also be conducted with venom and hostility, a pattern which can only destroy interchange of ideas and, I might add, the Jewish community...
...Obviously, Fein finds the prospect of expelling the Arab so unappetizing that he would rather lose the Jewish state...
...42a) shows that the reading in the Jerusalem Talmud is correct and that the text in the popular printed editions q/Tamentations Rabbah is corrupt...
...And this is over and above the doubts as to whether there was a separation between women and men in the Temple itself...
...We have virtually no information about this temple or its cult...
...Steven Fine The Hebrew University Jerusalem, Israel Which Way Should Women Cross Their Legs in Shul...
...Thus, Schiffman must attack Brooten's conclusions: If women did indeed sit with men in the ancient synagogue, then the statements cited by Schiffman of Rabbis Soloveitchik, Kotler et al are laughable...
...That is precisely what Rabbi Meir Kahane has been saying all these years...
...In the case of mixed seating, as in so many areas, the scholar must attempt a historical reconstruction based upon the few sources at his or her disposal...
...Associate Professor of Scripture and Interpretation Harvard Divinity School Currently: Fellow, Bunting Institute of Radcliffe College Cambridge, Massachusetts 1 Bernadette J. Brooten, Women Leaders in the Ancient Synagogue: Inscriptional Evidence and Background Issues, Brown Judaic Studies 36 (Scholars, Press 1982), p. 261, n. 171...
...Fein's way out of the dilemma—handing Judea and Samaria over to the Arabs—is no solution...
...they did everything they could to defend their position...
...Bernadette J. Brooten, Ph.D...
...Some date it as late as the seventh-eighth centuries...
...Aber claims to be concerned about the survival of Judaism, yet she refuses to allow for the survival ofJudaism in any other form than that which she approves...
...Lawrence Schiffman replies to Bernadette Brooten and Ze'ev Safrai: Bernadette Brooten's response to my view that the earliest Christians worshiped separately simply restates her interpretation of the data which I, in fact, interpret differently...
...I take the view that the "synagogue" in the Hellenistic world, as reflected in the inscriptions she studies, is the Jewish community, not the place of worship (usually known osprosuche in Greek, not synagogos...
...2 See Brooten, Women Leaders, p. 261, n. 170...
...The implication seems to be that it is at least customary for men to pray among women—and even sometimes to do it to show off...
...As in many areas of Jewish history during the Greco-Roman period, our knowledge in respect to this issue is fragmentary...
...But not enough common ground...
...There is obvious merit, for Jews, in the continued existence of ajewish state...
...Gaibel is a bit correct...
...The architectural solution of a women's gallery, however, could not have been copied from the Moslem mosque—since there was no provision for women there and certainly no balcony...
...According to this system, the women's section existed from time immemorial...
...Orthodox academic scholars, like myself, see no contradiction between the results of their research into the development of halachah and their religious point of view...
...on pp...
...It contains a description of the heavenly Bel Midrash (house of learning), in which a partition of reeds separates men and women.4 This description indicates a temporary partition and therefore one may regard this story as evidence of a transitional stage in which the sexes were separate during the sermon and prayer, as well as during study...
...Ze'ev Safrai Kvuzat Yavneh, Israel The writer received his Ph.D...
...This text, I might add, also convinced the famed archaeologist Professor E. L. Sukenik (of the Hebrew University) and the dean of American and Israeli talmudists, Professor Saul Lieberman (of the Jewish Theological Seminary), that there was separate seating in amoraic Palestine [third to sixth centuries...
...But Brooten, at least, is able to acknowledge the possibility of error, whereas Schiffman and his authorities cannot...
...June 1989...
...Ross S. Kraemer, "A New Inscription from Malta and the Question of Women Elders in the Diaspora Jewish Communities," Harvard Theological Review78 (1985), pp...
...1 Flavius Josephus,/e»sA War7.10.2-4, ss...
...The fall planting and subsequent tending of the tulips, he continued, should involve children so they will learn to remember and commemorate the lessons of the Holocaust...
...The same demographics that today give us nightmares over retaining Judea and Samaria offer no more comfort to a truncated Israel...
...As Schiffman has noted in his moment article, the partition (mechitza) that separates men and women in Orthodox synagogues also separates Orthodox synagogues from Conservative and Reform ones...
...Then we find women and children in a balcony, sometimes behind a wall, later with a lattice partition and more recendy behind a curtain...
...There never was a formal prayer service (for which men and women must be separated according to fewish law) held at the Hotel untilferusalem was reunified under Israeli sovereignly in 1967...
...46), does not follow logically...
...The practice of the Syrian church described in the Testamentum Domini (fifth century) which allowed female clergy to sit with male clergy while worshipers sat separated by sex again proves my point...
...The two articles come down on opposite sides of an emotionally charged issue...
...It is in this spirit that one should continue to clarify the history of the separation of the sexes in synagogue worship...
...The designation "d'oraitha"indicates a halachah derived direcdy from the Torah and direcdy supported by its language...
...Schiffman Insults Our Intelligence Re: the articles by Lawrence Schiffman "When Women and Men Sat Together in American Orthodox Synagogues," and Bernadette Brooten, "Were Women and Men Segregated in Ancient Synagogues...
...Indeed, not only is he horrified by hypothetical plans to expel them should another war come, he makes plain his disapproval even of any carrot-and-stick approach that would encourage them to improve their position through voluntary emigration...
...Gaibel argues I do, that their presence "confers great benefit" on Israel...
...I, therefore, stand with my original view that the earliest Christians worshiped separately and that this pattern was gradually changed over lime as Christianity distanced itself further and further from Judaism...
...Historical inquiry into the adoption of the women's section is not the same as contemporary planning...
...the much larger Court of Women was a mixed meeting place in which men and women were present together...
...Whether separation of the sexes is an example of this phenomenon or a later development is precisely the matter under debate, but the phenomenon, observed by Maimo-nides, cannot be disputed...
...In an interesting pair of articles in December 1989, Bernadette Brooten ("Were Women and Men Segregated in Ancient Synagogues...
...Some early Christians of later centuries separated the sexes in worship, while others did not...
...It is because I perceive intolerable costs to their expulsion...
...Once a year moment will recognize and honor these people if you will tell us about them, These are not the people whose faces regularly appear in the Jewish newspapers...
...English translation, George Prevost [Cambridge, 1939] p. 443...
...II, p. 75...
...The dating of Tanna d 'bet Eliyahu is the subject of scholarly dispute...
...That women were accordingly designated by various titles of honor in the HellenisticJewish communities has nothing to do with the separation of the sexes in Palestinian Jewish synagogues (i.e., places of worship...
...337338 there is a list of countries which may reveal the time of the composition...
...The answer is: "a hand- * breadth of a woman is promiscuous...
...Until then, both the Turks and the British had forbidden actual services, but, as can be seen in the picture, they did not interfere with private prayer...
...point of the article...
...This notion has been disproven lime and again as archaeological evidence or the discovery of new manuscripts has shown many things to have been earlier than previously thought by historians...
...8 (9), p. 46...
...from Hebrew University...
...Among all the laws of modesty derived from the Torah, not a single one refers to a prohibition of the presence of men and women in the same hall...
...see Chrysostom, Homilia in Matlhaeum 73 (p...
...The philosophical/moral question persists, however—if not as an urgent policy question, at least as a test of what the Jewish people is about...
...26, etc...
...Jewish inscriptions from all over the Roman empire show that women held titles of leadership ("head of the synagogue," "elder," "leader" and "mother of the synagogue...
...It is useful to remember the caution often voiced by the late Professor Menahem Stern that less than ten percent of all literature from the Greco-Roman period has come down to us...
...For these Orthodox rabbis, the claim that the women's section—the separation of men and women in the synagogue—stems from the Torah is important because it is part of the creation of a harmonious system handed down at Sinai...
...58.677...
...Regarding A. f. Blank's letter, I fail to see why the expression of two different scholarly opinions in moment should do a disservice to both the masses and to the scholars...
...He has turned my disagreement with Bemadette Brooten on scholarly matters into the main Yellow Tulips to Commemorate Shoah Should Be Ordered Now for Fall Planting Rabbi Noah Goiinkin suggests that we plant yellow tulips in front of every Jewish home, synagogue and organization to commemorate the Shoah (see "How Should We Commemorate the Shoah in Our Homes...
...Safrai seems to assume that the earliest attestation of a phenomenon in our sources must be its earliest date of existence...
...I did not argue that separation was proven for ancient times, only that it was most likely...
...He also studied in a yeshiva...
...More important is the issue of method...
...He viewed it as impossible to explain separation as based on Islamic influence...
...Tanna d'bei Etiyahu, Ch...
...It is precisely because it was prohibited for men to pray while women were in view that separation came to exist in the synagogue...
...Ita Aber Yonkers, New York Are Schiffman and Brooten Both Biased...
...Discussion of the prohibition of prayer by men in the presence of women, or when able to see women, shows exactly the opposite of what Safrai asserts...
...Others place women at worship, in no way indicating whether they sat together with men or separately...
...Since Jewish communities existed throughout the ancient Mediterranean, why would the historian restrict himself or herself only to the East...
...I subscribe to the earlier date...
...The high priest Onias IV founded the ijewish Temple in Leontopolis, Egypt, at the time of the Maccabean revolt, and it lasted until around 73 C.E., when the Romans closed it;4 there is no evidence that it had a women's court (just as the First Temple in Jerusalem is not said to j have had a women's court...
...Consequendy, the Orthodox deny any legitimacy to the Reform and Conservative movements as successors to halachic tradition...
...We may never know for sure...
...Schiffman argues that a description of Trajan's destruction of an Alexandrian synagogue, in which the women are referred to as "those above" and the men as "those below" (Jerusalem Talmud, Sukkah 55b...
...The very antiquity of these laws is proof that they are right...
...Why did the ancients decide to separate the sexes in the synagogue...
...Brooten paid special tribute (p...
...p. 86, line 13...
...Another passage, this time from the Babylonian Talmud (Berakhot 24a), also helps to clarify the matter...
...Some of t he texts cited here by Brooten from John Chrysostom simply mention women as important in the church...
...In order to justify their claim, the Orthodox rabbis "invented" halachic midrashim that cannot be found in the sources and, in other cases, expanded authentic halachic midrashim...
...As Safrai's views in the latter half of his comments are indeed a response not to my article but to what I describe in it, I shall not comment on them...
...His final statement is most strange: My article is not intended as a "scholarly response to Brooten's," but as an analysis of a contemporary historical development...
...Lawrence Metzger White Plains, New York...
...Further, it is impossible to believe that the accounts of synagogue building from the 11th century are describing a new practice...
...They are not the movers and shakers...
...Slightly later, in the eleventh century, a women's section is mentioned for the first time in the synagogues of Fustat and Damiette, both in Egypt.3 These are the oldest explicit and undeniable references to separation of the sexes in synagogue worship...
...2 Timothy 4:19) and Persis (Romans 16:12) to prove his point that the earliest Christians did not have a separation of the sexes...
...The sad part is that at a time in our history when we are the best educated and the most affluent, ignorance abounds and is perpetuated...
...Both of these approaches are devastating to the reconstruction of the history of Judaism...
...Only the most optimistic, noted Stern, would suggest that this is necessarily the best (or most useful) ten percent...
...For example, the Testamentum Domini (a Syrian Church order, probably originally from the late fifth century) speaks of widows, who are part of the clergy, sitting with the male clergy at the front of the church with the veil, whereas the laywomen and the laymen sit in separate side aisles.2 Therefore, Schiffman's deduction that early Christian separation of the se xes reflects Jewish practice and shows "that separation of women and men was the norm in Judaism in late antiquity" (p...
...Wrong: We are now in the early stages of a massive aliyah, an aliyah that may very well shrink the Arab minority from its present 1718 percent down to 12 percent or so...
...S. Assaf, Megorot u-Mehqarim be-Toledot Israel (Jerusalem, 1946), pp...
...One who claims that her "primary concern is with the survival of Judaism" ought to understand how important it is for fews to exchange ideas and to disagree without lowering themselves to personal insults and outright nasliness...
...14-23), is evidence for women's galleries in Palestinian synagogues of the Byzantine period...
...Now is the time to order tulips for planting in the fall (see ad on page 8...
...See also a recendy published inscription from Aphrodis-ias in Asia Minor which honors a woman named Jael, who is called "president" or "patron...
...For the same reasons I see no significance to the patterns in place in the temple of Leontopolis, Egypt...
...According to the Tosefta (Arakhin 2:1), women entered the Court of Israelites when they brought sacrifices...
...There the question is whether there are limitations on prayer in the presence of women...
...64,76,108,111,120,127...
...priestess" could also indicate a function.3) Early Christian women held such titles of leadership as "apostle," "elder," "teacher" and "deacon...
...in the December 1989 moment: I've studied the archaeological evidence over 25 years, with people like Moshe Davidowitz Dror, Bezalel Narkiss, Eric Meyers, Rachel Wischnitzer et al...
...I therefore stand with my original statements regarding both the ancient and modem synagogue...
...We would like to hear about people in your community who have performed some little-noticed—or unnoticed—act of giving, sharing, loving devotion, not for gain, not for recognition, but for chesed, covenant faithfulness...
...Scholarly and even intra-Jewish argument can be carried out in a mode of respect and openness to understanding and evaluating the views of others...
...In sum, historical research yields a diverse picture of ancient Jewish worship practices and very meager evidence for a strict separation of the sexes...
...Rather, they indicate the continuation of a long-established requirement in Jewish worship...
...Some early Christian churches had galleries (for women or for other purposes...
...Arnold J. Blank Brooklyn, New York Lawrence Schiffman replies to Ita Aber and Arnold Blank: The tone of the letter by Ita Aber simply renders it beneath response...
...Already, in 19th-century Germany, the founders of the Reform Movement sought to eliminate separation of men and women in the synagogue...
...5 S.D...
...The Orthodox rabbis, however, used it as a halachic ruling...
...Chesed appears in the Bible 246 times...
...If Mr...
...these arguments were previously considered in a now-classic Hebrew article by Shmuel Safrai,1 to which Dr...
...For example, the Babylonian Talmud refers to the synagogue as a "miniature temple," and this was expanded in later sources...
...As is customary in wars, Orthodox rabbis were not particular about the ammunition they used...
...In short, the women's section in the synagogue evidently developed in the early Middle Ages in the East (Eretz Israel and Egypt), from which it spread to all other Jewish communities as a FORUM requisite norm...
...It is clear that by the Middle Ages the women's section was already an integral part of the synagogue...
...FORUM Enclosed is a copy of a stereoscopic view of the Wailing Wall dated 1903...
...In a continuation of this discussion, another Amora says "a woman's calf is promiscuous" and "a woman's hair is promiscuous...
...Women in Asia Minor frequently functioned as high priestesses in the emperor cult...
...152-162 (in Hebrew...
...329-338 (in Hebrew...
...Here again we have a fundamental difference of opinion...
...81-97 (in Hebrew), esp...
...Some churches did include a women's gallery...
...The response of Ze'ev Safrai clearly shows how Blank's assumption that Orthodox fudaism must reach the conclusions it has is incorrect...
...But one of the assumptions on which that prediction is based is weak, and the other is wrong...
...Assuming no mass aliyah in the coming years, and extrapolating from present fertility patterns, the Arab minority within the Green Line will grow and might, in the future, become a majority...
...An additional and interesting argument for a mixed society in the synagogue may be found in the Jerusalem Talmud, Sota 1:16c...
...There's a Demographic Problem Even Within the Green Line Leonard Fein's article on population transfer, "Fantasies of Israeli 'Realists'" moment (December 1989), correcdy points out that retention of Judea and Samaria compels Israel to choose between ceasing to be ajewish state, ceasing to be a democracy and ceasing to have the Palestinian Arabs within its borders...
...1 Shmuel Safrai, "Was There a Women's Section in the Synagogue in Ancient Times?," Tarbiz 32 (1963), pp...
...Risches, of course, is the Yiddish word for wicked, evil, malicious...
...However, as one individual member of those masses, I feel that the juxtaposition of the articles by Ber-nadette J. Brooten and Lawrence H. Schiffman, in the December 1989 issue, is a disservice to both the masses and to the scholars...
...It is only fair to point out, however, that the distinction between those who believe in the development of halachah and its transformation, on the one hand, and those who do not, on the other, is not coincidental with the distinction between the non-Orthodox and the Orthodox...
...Periodicals like moment aim to provide a forum for such civil interchange of ideas...
...Women served as priestesses and leaders of the religious associations dedicated to the Egyptian deities Isis and Sarapis...
...Is he kidding...
...The laws of ritual slaughter in the Torah and the Mishnah assume knowledge of how to actually kill the animal...
...This is evidence not only of mixed synagogue worship in the fourth century, but also of external pressure on the Jews to change in this respect...
...believe in the development of halachah and its transformation " [emphasis mine— L.H.S.], a statement in which he apparently claims to speak for a large group of academics whom he has not consulted...
...I repeat here my view that such separation at worship did not necessarily require balconies or other such special structures...
...As I have stated elsewhere, "Chrysostom describes a wooden divider separating the sexes and then berates his congregation for making such a thing necessary, saying that the elders had told him that a divider did not exist in former times and referring to Galatians 3:28...
...Schiffman and his authorities must answer every challenge—historical, philosophical, scientific or moral— according to their predetermined belief system...
...The question of whether the time has come to change this norm is not a scientific question, but a religious-theological one...
...Further, the presence of women at synagogue services or in other worship contexts does not indicate mixed worship at all...
...John Chrysostom'spolemic against the separation of the sexes in church testifies, on the one hand, to its existence in his own day (fourth century) and, on the other, to his need to reinterpret passages in the New Testament to prove his point...
...perhaps she is a New Testament scholar, but in this context so classifying her seems gratuitously denigrating...
...The synagogue often abutted a large square and it was a natural meeting place in antiquity as it was throughout history...
...Balcony seating comes into use only many centuries later, when the Jews were in a threatened situation and survival of the species was paramount...
...A fewish home where Judaism is a stranger...
...Kahane's espousal of population transfer, however unpalatable some may find it, logically addresses the problem that both he and Fein perceive...
...Ford Was Risches Your article about Henry Ford, "When Henry Ford Apologized to the Jews" (February 1990) recalled a couplet by FPA (Franklin P. Adams), a well-regarded columnist for the Morning World in New York City, who wrote of Ford's "apology": Against my wishes I once was risches...
...See Even Shmuel's introductions to Midrashi Geual...
...From this passage, it is clear that the synagogue was mixed...
...Most ridiculous is his identification of me with the rabbis I quote...
...The beautiful cover on your December issue showing women and men praying together in an ancient synagogue shows all three women with their left leg gracefully crossed over their right leg...
...Nowhere does Fein tell us what similarly great benefit the presence of the Arabs confers on Israel...
...But the fact is that my article is a historical account of the role of these rabbis and their views in asserting the importance of the separation of the sexes in contemporary Orthodox worship...
...The separation during synagogue prayer may have been part of this development...
...If and as Israel's Arab citizens are more fully integrated into its economic 66 MOMENT > APRIL 1990 FORUM life, their fertility will decline...
...fewish people are entitled to a home where they are sovereign—but what a stupid and cruel irony it would be if the price of that home were the values, the ideas, the commitments that have sustained us through the millennia...
...Two additional arguments that S. Safrai touched upon, which Brooten and Schiffman did not mention, should be called to your readers' attention: While it was true that in the Temple there were a Court of Women and a separate, much smaller Court of Israelites and while it was true that women did not generally enter the Court of Israelites, this rule was not absolute...
...also 1.41,43...
...As in the scholarly debate, the Jewish communal debate on mixed seating should be carried out within a spirit of mutual respect and ahavat Yisrael—love for one's fellow Jew...
...Y. Even Shmuel, Midrashei Geula (Jerusalem-Tel Aviv, 1954), p. 341 (in Hebrew...
...It has been translated as 'loving-Kindness," "goodness," "mercy," "steadfast love" and "compassion...
...Therefore it is reasonable to conclude that the Court of Israelites was intended primarily for men, and women entered there only when they offered sacrifices...
...The partition of reeds is in no way transitional, in light of the persistence of such partitions throughout Jewish history...
...As I have indicated, that does not appear to be the choice that Israel faces...
...But this is a metaphorical expression, not a halachic ruling...
...Ignatius Ephraem II Rahmani (Mainz: F. Kirchheim, 1899) pp...
...Generally speaking, the laws of modesty prescribed in the later Babylonian Talmud are stricter than those in the earlier Jerusalem Talmud...
...The Evidence Is Inconclusive A mixed quorum of North American Jews seated within the late antique synagogue of Capernaum (shown on your December 1989 cover) is quite a graphic image with which to introduce a debate on mixed seating in ancient synagogues...
...There is likewise much to be said in behalf of democracy...
...For the greater part of the Orthodox world, there is no possibility of changing the halacha, all of which has been divinely ordained, and is thus eternally immutable...
...My primary concern is the survival of Judaism and if that were Schiffman's real concern he'd be writing something else...
...Blank sees the description "New Testament scholar," used alongside "Israeli historian," as "denigrating," then he is showing his prejudices, not mine...
...It is important to clarify that when we speak of separation of sexes, we are really speaking of the exclusion of women from the men's worship area...
...5 See Brooten, Women Leaders...
...The best we can do is suggest a number of possible hypotheses: Islamic practice may have been an important influence...
...Both points of view were given their fair share of space, and the educated "masses" may decide for themselves with which side of the issue they agree...
...the discussion concludes that one should not read the Shema'in the presence of a woman who reveals a handbreadth (about six centimeters) of her flesh...
...others move it up to the third century...
...See photo, p. 63...
...There is recorded evidence of this in 18th-century Poland...
...One thing is certain: its influence on the development of Jewish law and practice in talmudic Palestine or its Babylonian offshoot was nil...
...If I oppose the expulsion of Israeli Arabs, it is not because I perceive, as Mr...
...The Qumran (sectarians did model themselves on the 'Jerusalem Temple, but as historians we must be cautious of conflating diverse groups within ancient Judaism...
...and Lawrence Schiffman ("When Women and Men Sat Together in American Orthodox Synagogues") reconsider the arguments for and against the existence of separate synagogue seating in the period of the Mishnah and the Talmud...
...It includes the idea of devotion and covenant loyalty...
...If women were indeed integrated in the ancient synagogue, as Brooten maintains, then Schiffman and the authorities he quotes are in an impossible intellectual bind...
...2.4,8...
...Men and women, if they sat at all in ancient synagogues, did sit together...
...Similarly, there are no halachot in the Torah dealing with synagogue services, since not only had the synagogue not yet come into existence at the time of the Torah, but neither had the institution of public prayer...
...Such rendezvous are totally irrelevant to our issue...
...which men and women could meet...
...Her complete lack of competence in historical and archaeological matters is shown by her preposterous suggestion that balconies were originally intended to provide refuge and escape in limes of danger, certainly "an insult to our intelligence...
...Idem "The Synagogue and Its Furnishing According to Geniza Writings," Eretz Israel 7 (1964), pp...
...Moslem women did not participate in prayers in the mosques at all, and many severe strictures were placed on them...
...My disagreements with Bernadette Brooten and Ze'ev Safrai concern the interpretation of the meager evidence at hand, and that is the job of historical scholars, even if it means disagreeing as I hope readers will realize...
...English translation, James Cooper and Arthur Maclean (Edinburgh: T. & X Clark, 1902), pp...
...I continue to hold this view after authoring five A stereoscopic view of the Western Wall taken in 1903...
...Schiffman also argues from the general Near Eastern social convention of separating the sexes and states, "Only in fertility or sexually oriented cults did females take a leading role" (p...
...A home without the furniture of our faith...
...4 Bet ha-Midrash, Vol...
...Schiffman argues that the separation of the sexes among the Jewish Therapeutrides and Therapeutai (first FORUM century) must have "accurately reflected the practice in the Jerusalem Temple" (p...
...He writes from an Orthodox Jewish perspective...
...It only puts off the day of reckoning...
...Apparently, he also wants moment to censor out opinions with which he does not agree...
...Regarding the passage from theJerusalem Talmud, I was careful not to characterize it as definite evidence because of the textual problems Brooten raises...
...All architectural evidence indicates that the two-story structure was designed for light and ventilation, separate from the idea of its being the tallest structure in the Jewish community...
...These two passages cited by Safrai argue for separation as the norm in the synagogues of talmudic limes, at least for talmudicjews, not against it...
...Testamentum Domini 1.19,23...
...It was still permitted to read the shema' or pray outside the synagogue, but not while the male worshiper could see FORUM women...
...Goitein, "A Women's Gallery in the Synagogue Building in the Gaonic Period", Tarbiz33 (1964), p. 314 (in Hebrew...
...Gaibel says that I must choose between expelling the Arabs and losing the Jewish state...
...Can it really be the case that in order to keep theJewish body safe we must murder the Jewish spirit...
...Romans 16:3...
...Therefore, I cannot consider that Schiffman's article is a scholarly response to Brooten's...
...Moreover, it is clear that not all the laws that applied to the Temple also applied to the synagogue...
...A. Buechler, "Fore-court of Women and Brass Gate in Temple,"/«yw/i Quarterly Re-viewlO (1898), pp...
...Further, because that would be such an unbearable choice—on a moral par with, say, Sophie's choice—/ believe Israeli policy must be directed towards avoiding it...
...The lay worshipers were segregated by sex, although the existence in the Christian community of female clergy required some adaptation of ancient Jewish practice...
...Islam is very strict in matters of modesty...
...The Arab who in 1949 was less than 10 percent of population behind the Green Line now numbers 19 percent, and that despite the mass immigration of the state's first years...
...Aristides G. Lazarus Bronxville, New York We have been unable to find any halachah—or even minhag—on this.—Ed...
...But the Torah is well-known and accessible to all...
...He teaches at Bar-Ilan University in the Department of Israel Studies...
...It is also quite possible that the practice of separate seating evolved from religious developments internal to the Jewish community...
...It is used chiefly of God, but it is also used of human beings, especially when they reflect this godly attribute...
...I should only suggest that I think he went a bit too far in staling that "academic scholars of Judaica...
...S.D...
...The advantage of this system is that the Orthodox disputants need not address themselves to the nature of the halachot...
...3 The use of the expression "And from him the sages learned...
...it is unacceptable...
...The Early Church Did Not Separate the Sexes Lawrence Schiffman's valuable description of a 1950s court case, "When Women and Men Sat Together in American Orthodox Synagogues" (December 1989), contains inaccuracies concerning the ancient synagogue...
...I, for one, expect to enjoy talking to these colleagues about these issues when we next meet...
...16:15 and to such women as Priscilla (Acts 18:2,26...
...indicates the quotation of another, older source that has not survived...
...Should we arrive at the conclusion that the women's section was established as a part of Jewish tradition "only" 1,000 years ago, that does not necessarily diminish the validity of the idea, the depth of the concept or the continuity of the tradition...
...The literary and archaeological evidence cited is inconclusive as to whether or not men and women "sat together" in ancient synagogues...
...books on the development of Jewish law and practice...
...agree that women played a major role in the communal structure of the ancient Jewish communities of the Diaspora...
...But none of these sayings even hint at a general prohibition of praying in the presence of a woman...
...Send tie information, together with any available photographs, to mo*?hi Chesed Honorees, 3000 Connecticut Ave., N.W., Suite 300, Washington, DC 20008...
...The New Testament and other very early Christian literature do not mention a separation of the sexes in worship...
...Moreover, it was the most notable place in Tell Us about the Chesed Honorees You Know Chesed Honorees are the unsung heroes of the Jewish community...
...Gaibel suggests...
...Tulips bloom in April when Yom haShoah is commemorated (the 27th of Nisan usually falls in April) and "yellow," Goiinkin wrote, "gives pride to the yellow star that the Nazis forced Jews to wear...
...Rather, the distinction in attitudes toward halachah is coincidental with the distinction between the academic scholars of Judaica and the world of the traditional yeshivol...
...Both of these readers seem to be unable to tell the difference between the description of the views of others and the views of an author, and as Blank slates, he is "not qualified to judge the scholarship on this matter...
...Yalgul Shim'oni, Deuteronomy, #934...
...They are the loyal, devoted, giving people who have performed unusual acts of chesed...
...There is an unfortunate gap, however, in Jewish literature between the talmudic period (which ends in the fourth-fifth centuries) and the medieval period (which begins in approximately the tenth century...
...When speaking of temple worship, we must also remember historically that the Jerusalem Temple was not the only temple at which Jews worshiped...
...Zalman Gaibel Chicago.lllinois Leonard Fein Replies: Mr...
...In fact, one important Christian writer, John Chrysostom (fourth century) disparages the Jews and includes among the crimes committed in synagogues the fact that it is a place where immoral behavior occurs because men and women gather there together (Adversus Judaeus 1,2...
Vol. 15 • April 1990 • No. 2
