Association for SPRING 2013 Center for The Issue 15 West 16th Street The Latest: New York, NY 10011 William Kentridge: An Implicated Subject Cynthia Ozick’s Fiction Smolders, but not with The Questionnaire: If you were to organize a graduate seminar around a single text, what would it be?

Perspectives THE MAGAZINE OF THE ASSOCIATION FOR JEWISH STUDIES

Table of Contents From the Editors 3 From the President 3 From the Executive Director 4 The Marriage Issue Jewish Marriage 6 Bluma Goldstein

Between the Living and the Dead: Making Levirate Marriage Work 10 Dvora Weisberg

Married Men 14 Judith Baskin

‘According to the and ’: Marriage from Social Institution to Legal Fact 16 Michael Satlow

Reading : What’s Marriage Got to Do with It? 18 Susan Shapiro

One Jewish Woman, Two , Three Laws: The Making of and in a Revolutionary Age 24 Lois Dubin

Jewish and Marriage in 1920s Vienna 26 Marsha Rozenblit

Marriage Equality: An American Jewish View 32 Joyce Antler

The Playwright, the Starlight, and the : A Triangle 35 Lila Corwin Berman

The Hand that Rocks the Cradle: How the Gender of the Jewish Influences Intermarriage 42 Keren McGinity

Critiquing and Rethinking 44 Adler

Kiddushin, Marriage, and Egalitarian Relationships: Making New Legal Meanings 46 Gail Labovitz

Beyond the Sanctification of Subordination: Tradition and Equality in Jewish Marriage 50 Melanie Landau

The Multifarious Models for Jewish Marriage 52 Ira Bedzow and

What’s Different (or not) about Same-Sex Marriage 54 Jay Michaelson The Latest William Kentridge: An Implicated Subject 56 Michael Rothberg

Cynthia Ozick’s Fiction Smolders, but not with Romance 58 Dean Franco The Questionnaire If you were to organize a graduate seminar around a single text, what would it be? 60 AJS Perspectives: The Magazine of the President Please direct correspondence to: Association for Jewish Studies Jeffrey Shandler Association for Jewish Studies From the Editors Rutgers University Center for Jewish History Editors 15 West 16th Street Dear Colleagues, Matti Bunzl Vice President/Publications New York, NY 10011 University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Leslie Morris Marriage is always in the news, from the latest tabloid spread to knew what was actually uttered in at their , they Rachel Havrelock University of Minnesota Voice: (917) 606-8249 the urgent debate on gay marriage. (Too) much of the policy debate would never . Others provide ways of transforming marriage Fax: (917) 606-8222 University of Illinois at Chicago centers around the nature and fate of the seemingly self-evident and weddings into events that are more inclusive, egalitarian, and true Vice President/Program E-Mail: [email protected] Reuven Firestone Web Site: www.ajsnet.org “Judeo-Christian tradition.” As Jewish Studies scholars, we tend to be to contemporary values. There are several suggestions about how to Editorial Board skeptical when politicians invoke the tradition we study for a living. contract a halakically legitimate bond while dispensing with some of Allan Arkush HUC-JIR, Los Angeles Binghamton University University of Southern California AJS Perspectives is published bi-annually High time, then, to collect a representative sample of the latest its objectionable premises. Some articles show that marriage is a con- by the Association for Jewish Studies. research on marriage. tingent in which no single bond ever demonstrates the model. Carol Bakhos Vice President/Membership The defense of marriage as a biblical institution brings with it Even as scholars agonize over what to do about matrimony in University of California, Los Angeles and Outreach The Association for Jewish Studies is an no small amount of irony. The Hebrew speaks of men “taking” the age of women and state laws protecting gay marriage, Orit Bashkin Anita Norich affiliate of the Center for Jewish History. women; it outlaws with groups deemed too far from Israel planners and officiants look to Jewish tradition for the tell- University of Chicago University of Michigan © Copyright 2013 Association for and with relatives considered too close; and it stipulates procedures for tale huppahs, , and smashing of glass. For many couples, the Benor divorce, , and verifying adultery. But there are no descrip- wedding functions as a key moment of connecting to a Jewish past HUC-JIR, Los Angeles Secretary/Treasurer Jewish Studies ISSN 1529-6423 Jonathan Sarna tions of marriage as a convention or representations of wedding rituals. through these signifiers. Should tradition be put aside in the name Michael Brenner Brandeis University The famous verse in which a man leaves his and of progressive values? Without dictating any answers to our current University of Munich in order to cling to a woman might well refer to coitus more than predicament, we recall Naomi Seidman’s article from The Secular Nathaniel Deutsch AJS Staff matrimony. The Tanakh describes parties where men drink together Issue that demonstrated how ideas of romantic love entered Jewish University of California, Santa Cruz Rona Sheramy AJS Perspectives reserves the right prior to whatever transaction affects marriage, yet these feasts lead thought as a bourgeois nineteenth-century import. Seidman refers to Todd Hasak-Lowy Executive Director to reject advertisements or other items not consonant with the goals to confusion and violence. Jacob’s revels end with his marriage Foucault when she writes of how “the traditional world multiplied School of the Art Institute of Chicago Karen Terry and purposes of the organization. to the wrong woman and Samson’s more philosophical sympo- rather than constraining sexual relations, embedding its marriages Program and Membership Ari Kelman Copy may be condensed or rejected sium leads only to the consummation of war between Judah and within a dense web of religious, social, and networks.” The Coordinator Stanford University because of length or style. AJS the Philistines. For outpourings of love, we must turn to Ruth the bourgeois model, in contrast, separated the couple from these net- Heidi Lerner Natasha Perlis Perspectives disclaims responsibility Moabite who pledges to her mother-in-law Naomi that “only death works eventually turning them into a market that could be expanded Conference and Distinguished Stanford University for statements made by advertisers will separate me and you” (Ruth 1:17) or to , who mourns through divorce: the greater the number of separate households, the Lectureship Program Manager and contributors. Laura Levitt Jonathan in verse, “You were most dear to me. Your love was won- greater consumption of goods and services. If the market replaces Temple University Ethan Zadoff derful to me, more than the love of women” (2 Samuel 26). God as the driving force of a marriage, then is agency increased? How Grants and Communications Meira Polliack The offers an even bleaker view. explicitly can one mediate the role of the state when thinking about marriage? Coordinator University brings God into the equation and prevents the termination of marriage: How does the case of Israel, where the Rabbinate presides over all Riv-Ellen Prell “What God has joined together, let no one separate.” Remarriage consti- state marriages, complicate the issue? Does the institution of mar- University of Minnesota tutes “adultery” and the most elevated state is that of the “eunuchs for riage afford autonomy? Should it? Can it be transformed and why, to Jonathan Schorsch the sake of the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 19:6–12). Paul’s famous come back to our original question, are we so married to the issue? Columbia University resolution was “better to marry then to burn” (1 Corinthians 7:9), thus David Shneer imagining union as a joint policing of desire. Marriage, as articulated Matti Bunzl University of Colorado here, goes beyond controlling women to assume a mode of Foucaul- University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign dian self-surveillance in which the individual modulates his desires Dina Stein Rachel Havrelock University of Haifa as part of a larger program of social discipline. Such a program is like- University of Illinois Chicago Nadia Valman wise evident when marriage becomes a metaphor for the relationship Queen Mary University of London between a community and God. Here the actual business of satiation, Yael Zerubavel , and reproduction becomes displaced and concealed by Rutgers University yearning, ritual, and expansion of the group of devoted believers. The Bible has much more to say about the marriage between Managing Editor the faithful and God in which the human figures as femi- Karin Kugel nine. Jeremiah speaks of Israel’s tender pursuit of God’s love during the wandering in the wilderness (2:2). But the difficulties inherent Graphic Designer in the marriage between God and Israel appear in the of Eze- Ellen Nygaard kiel where God charges His with “harlotry,” a “weak heart,” and “filthiness.” After such berating, one almost wishes that God would issue a rather than “an everlasting covenant” (16). There is debate—much within this issue—over whether the rab- binic marriage contract provides safeguards for women’s basic rights or commodifies brides as objects of transaction. It is certain that rab- binic law establishes marriage as a legal procedure within a public Front, Back, Inside Covers, and images ritual. The implications of the legal procedure and its impacts on throughout issue unless credited otherwise: from different periods of time lie at the heart of The Marriage Issue. Artwork by Nelly Agassi. Courtesy of the artist and Dvir Gallery. The questions, whether textual or historical, lead us to wonder what to do about marriage today. Some authors suggest that if most women

2 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 3 From the President From the Executive Director Dear Colleagues, Dear Colleagues,

In 1989, when AJS was twenty years old and had been growing in Jewish Studies department, something few institutions of American Membership dues play a critical role in supporting the work of the the academy (Regular Members) from those without such training size and scope, its leadership decided that the time had come to higher education had at the time. Indeed, the brochure describes this Association for Jewish Studies, accounting for roughly a third of the (Associate Members). Over the years, the of Jewish Studies institute a new means of planning the annual conference. Instead as a new program, “on the cutting edge of history.” organization’s annual budget. These dues help pay for core programs, as an academic discipline and of its practitioners as trained scholars has of having all paper and panel submissions come to a single address, That spring, CCNY offered twenty-one lecture courses in Jewish such as Perspectives, AJS Review, the Distinguished Lectureship Pro- become widely accepted; as a consequence, this distinction in member- AJS would divide the field into sections. The head of each division Studies, some of them cross-listed with other departments, as well as gram, the extensive resources on the AJS website, and all the staff ship categories has become irrelevant. Therefore, the Board of Directors would collect submissions for its respective subfield and submit language courses in Arabic, Hebrew, and . The roster includes time associated with these projects. And, of course, the dues help has amended the by-laws by eliminating separate Regular and Asso- recommendations to the central program committee—in effect, the a survey of Jewish history, courses on Jewish thought, Bible, , keep the lights on. Despite rising annual costs for these programs ciate categories and creating a new category, the Professional Member, procedure AJS currently uses. Legend has it that the first draft of con- medieval and literature, Yiddish literature, Holocaust and overall operations, AJS has maintained the same dues levels for which encompasses “anyone with a professional or scholarly interest in ference divisions was made by the heads of AJS one evening while literature, Hasidism, Israeli society, American Jewish immigration, the past half decade, carefully managing its income and expenses to Jewish Studies.” “‘Professional interest,’” the by-laws now read, “refers to sitting at the bar of the Copley Hotel in (where AJS then con- and the sociology of ; among topics announced for eke out as many enhanced services within its current structure. someone whose part- or full-time vocation is devoted either to teaching, vened every year), jotting down their rubric on a cocktail napkin. the next semester are courses on Jewish women, mysticism, and Looking ahead to the next several years, however, the AJS Board research, or related academic endeavors in Jewish Studies. ‘Scholarly Like most legends, the facticity of this one is less important Holocaust history. of Directors felt it appropriate and necessary to change the dues struc- interest’ refers to someone who shares the intellectual interests of the than the understandings that inhere within it. This bit of AJS lore This list looked very familiar to me; it is strikingly similar to a ture—both to simplify a complicated, multitiered, income-based system Organization, but whose major vocation is not in Jewish Studies.” infers that the task of dividing up Jewish Studies into subfields was typical semester of Jewish Studies courses at Rutgers and seems to and to create a sustainable model that can support AJS’s services while AJS is grateful for the extraordinary support its members have straightforward; the divisions were readily apparent and did not resemble the offerings of many other Jewish Studies programs in North remaining sensitive to members’ financial situations. This change, shown the organization over the past several years, especially during require extensive reflection or debate. These divisions are not all of a American schools of higher education. There are, of course, some note- recommended by Vice-President for Membership Anita Norich and the trying financial times at most colleges and universities. We constantly kind; they are variously defined by discipline, language, geography, worthy differences: Other than sociology, CCNY offered no courses Executive Committee and then approved by the AJS Board of Direc- seek to provide new services and benefits to our members, and support canonical text, or historical period. Though the divisions AJS uses to in the social sciences; there were no courses on Sephardi or Mizrahi tors at its June and December 2012 meetings, came out of a careful, them in their work as scholars and teachers. As you renew your mem- organize its conference have been tweaked over the years, the original Jewry or on Jewish art, music, theater, film, or other media—all topics year-long study of other learned societies’ dues structures. Particular bership and review these changes, please do not hesitate to me rubric drafted in 1990 remains at the foundation of this system. addressed in courses Rutgers and other schools often offer. On the attention was paid to different membership models (flat fee vs. income- ([email protected]) or Vice-President for Membership Anita Norich The changes made in these divisions over time have come about whole, however, the rubric of Jewish Studies seems more unchanged based), ranges of services offered, current and projected salary levels ([email protected]) with any comments, questions, or concerns. largely in response to what members propose to present at the annual than not over the course of nearly forty years. of members, and organizational infrastructure (i.e., volunteer vs. pro- conference. For example, this past December, the Program Committee What does one make of this comparison? Is it a sign of the field’s fessional staff). Full details of the new structure to be implemented Rona Sheramy agreed to dissolve the division on Gender, following the recommenda- stability or of its stagnation? Does undergraduate teaching reflect the for the 2013–14 membership year can be found at www.ajsnet.org/ Association for Jewish Studies tion of this division’s chair, who argued that proposals of papers and intellectual dynamics of Jewish Studies scholarship? Should it do so— membership.htm. Here are the highlights: (1) The board retained an sessions dealing with issues of gender and sexuality now are regularly and for that matter, can it, given the extent to which courses must fit income-based dues structure but reduced the number of income tiers sent to so many other divisions of the conference that relatively few into the requirements of schools and the rubrics of other departments? from twelve to eight. (2) Where previously the highest income level was submissions on the topic come to the Gender division. The study The larger trend of Jewish Studies, as reflected in AJS conferences of “above $125,000,” there is now a new level of “above $150,000.” (3) AJS of gender and sexuality in Jewish Studies has, in effect, been main- recent years, has been to expand the field’s sense of the possible, inte- continues to subsidize memberships at the lower range of the income streamed. Hence, the need for a separate division, which had been cre- grating new methods and areas of inquiry into more established topics scale, as an investment in the future of these scholars; thus, student ated in the early 1990s to bring much-needed attention to this work in and approaches. As a consequence, the question of what Jewish Studies rates will remain the same, and others earning less than $30,000 annu- Jewish Studies, now seems a less effective way of addressing the field’s constitutes and how it is constituted figures with growing frequency ally will see only a $5 dues increase. (4) For more than 75 percent of expansive with gender and sexuality. (Note that the confer- in both individual scholars’ work and in discussions among scholars. non-student members, the average dues increase will be less than $8. ence still welcomes submissions of interdisciplinary presentations on I believe firmly that this ongoing self-reflection is a strength of the The board also approved a second, important change: revising the this topic; for details, see the Call for Papers on the AJS website.) This field and should be encouraged both in AJS endeavors and beyond. The membership categories that have been in place since AJS’s incorpora- issue, as well as other questions of how to modify the conference struc- nimbleness of Jewish Studies is an advantage for established scholars tion in 1970. This may seem simply like a bureaucratic adjustment, ture, received much debate at the December meeting of the Program and new students alike. How, then, can we extend this thoughtful intel- but it reflects important developments in the field. For decades, the Committee, and its members continue to consider how the conference lectual agility to our teaching, especially at a time when the means and Association had three main types of memberships: Regular Members, can better reflect the shape of the field. As Jewish Studies continues ends of higher education are being rethought? “for individuals whose full time vocation is devoted to either teaching, to change, the notion that its structure is self-evident has given way research or related academic endeavors in Jewish studies”; Associate to more complex, ongoing probing of how the field is developing. Jeffrey Shandler Members, “for individuals who share the intellectual concerns related This issue warrants attention in other venues as well. Delineating Rutgers University to the purposes of the Corporation, but whose major vocation is not the scope and organization of Jewish Studies is likely realized most in academic Jewish studies”; and Student Members, i.e., graduate stu- extensively, if implicitly, in the rosters of courses offered by the under- dents concentrating in an area of Jewish Studies. A bit of institutional graduate Jewish Studies programs in which many of us teach. I recently history helps to explain this change in membership categories. While thought about how the dynamics of the field are reflected in this setting the number of Regular and Student Members grew in popularity over when I came across an intriguing artifact while doing research at the the years, the number of Associate Members dwindled. When AJS was Magnes Collection of Jewish Art and Life in Berkeley: a brochure listing founded, there was a constituency of people who, though not profes- courses offered by the Department of Jewish Studies of the City College sors or otherwise professionally engaged in academic Jewish Studies, of New York in Spring 1974. Though by then CCNY no longer taught a had a deep scholarly interest in the field and saw AJS as an intellectual preponderance of Jewish students (they had numbered some 80 percent home. At a time when Jewish Studies was seeking credibility on col- of enrollees during the interwar years), it had established a substantial lege and university campuses as an academic discipline, the Associa- tion’s leadership felt it necessary to distinguish scholars trained in

4 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 5

cohesive Jewish communities, generally Jewish Studies—be they different legal private spheres. It is, however, ironic and bound together by familial ties, isolated from systems; structures and operations of more than a little disconcerting that, The Marriage Issue the surrounding society by external power among various groups; social and while these approaches to the study of anti-Semitism and internal religious strength” political effects of gender, class, and status Jewish marriage and divorce laws expose needed an inviolable marital bond. Rabbi inequities; or the nexus between larger the operative gender asymmetries of Jewish Marriage Gershom’s liberalizing impulse was probably institutional constructs like community power, they also reveal the impossibility Bluma Goldstein a reaction to the same social circumstances: or and individual predicaments. of altering or undoing them, given the he, too, was concerned with communal But that route proved problematic because fundamentally inflexible patriarchal maintenance, but may have feared that a decidedly inflexible aspect of Jewish Jewish legal system and culture. here are of course numerous ways and divorce legislation. In addition, the even more exacerbated should the wife, who women who could not obtain a get would was under consideration. The to approach a generic topic such as exclusion of women from the most valued cannot legally initiate a divorce, desire one. seek conditions more amenable to them methodological concerns and theoretical Bluma Goldstein is professor emerita in T“Jewish marriage.” One could focus practice of Talmud study solidified a social The biblical source for Jewish divorce (get) outside . Of course, it is also likely that versatility of cultural studies usually the German Department and member and on its history of myths and reality, as Paula system in which a group of men, the is Deuteronomy 24:1-2: “A man takes a wife Rabbenu Tam might have dreaded a weakened focus on challenging and exposing the former chair of the Jewish Studies Program Hyman has; on the extensive legal history rabbis, determined the status and actual and possesses her. She fails to please him undermined by . authority behind structures of domination, at the University of California, Berkeley. Her of marriage arrangements and practices, practices of women in the community. because he finds something indecent about Some responses to the inflexibility of with the expectation of abolishing or at publications include Enforced Marginality: as does Louis M. Epstein; or on the ways in Jewish law is generally contract- her, and he writes her a bill of divorcement, Jewish law acknowledge the difficulties least reducing the power inequities that Jewish Narratives on Abandoned Women which marriages among Jews have functioned oriented, and Jewish marriage, which is hands it to her, and sends her away from confronting the rabbis who might want— often lie concealed in both public and (University of California Press, 2007). in different eras or different geographical not considered a sacrament, is a contract his house; she leaves his household and yet cannot—implement innovations in and social milieux. This essay, however, determined by halakah. According to the law becomes the wife of another man.” The marriage and divorce laws. Unfortunately concentrates on the ways in which Jewish of the and elsewhere, contracts woman has to rely on her for a commiseration does not rectify the injustice. marriage participates in the socially and may be executed bilaterally, but that is not divorce because only he has the prerogative Reuven Yaron, a professor of ancient law, culturally constructed relations of power. the case in Jewish law. All halakic contracts of executing and delivering a divorce, or get. who speaks of encountering “again and These relations shape the hierarchies are unilaterally executed, even though they There are, however, four reasons why a again the same tendency to strictness, the especially of gender but also of class that may require the consent of both parties. woman might not be able to obtain a divorce: same horror at going beyond the principles are more generally operative in traditional Moshe Meiselman explains that the marriage (1) the husband is mentally incompetent laid down by the Talmud,” also empathizes Jewish law (halakah). It is significant that contract is unilateral simply because there are and cannot grant a divorce; (2) he has died with the “anguish and regret of the authors, since Talmudic times Jewish law has created “no bilaterally executed contracts in Jewish without legal evidence of his demise; (3) a the conflict between their humane desire to a fundamentally unalterable corpus of law, law”; and the man, that is, the husband, is recalcitrant husband refuses to divorce; or help and the overriding obedience to what at whose core is an unequal gender and the executor. Although there are no explicit (4) he abandons his wife and disappears. they consider their duty.” Furthermore he power differential in which men control the legislative prescriptions about marriage in The difficulty in releasing a woman from realizes that “this is poor consolation indeed privileged hegemonic center while women are the Bible, which often uses the term “to take” an undesired marriage derives essentially for the woman whom the decision might marginalized, relegated to a different arena, to designate marriage, all the halakic laws from the unalterable system of Jewish law condemn to a life of celibacy,” not to mention namely, the domestic sphere, and denied the about marriage and divorce are based on rooted in gender and power inequality. of course the shame, ostracism, and the loss rights and privileges that men enjoy. Talmudic interpretations of biblical texts. In Over the centuries there have been a of self-esteem and status she would suffer. Founded on biblical law, Jewish Jewish , the woman is acquired number of rabbis and scholars who have Not a word of criticism, however, about the patriarchy has a long history, with a legal by the man, a form of acquisition not unlike tried to modify the marriage and divorce patriarchal system whose laws permit such foundation codified in the Talmud by the acquisitions in other contracts. Indeed, Boaz legislation in order to alleviate the onerous violence against women. From another rabbis, and its locus of power established Cohen notes that the rabbis borrowed modes burden on , but their efforts were perspective, , a conservative firmly in the androcentric social system of betrothal from the “manner of acquiring judged by other rabbinical figures to be feminist, acknowledges that the rabbis who of traditional Judaism. The exilic turmoil a slave or real estate.” Although the acquired halakically unsound or inadequate. There was “did not go the final step in equalizing divorce of the Talmudic period might indeed woman becomes the property of the man, a liberalizing period of about five hundred law” were not guided by a concern for gender have necessitated stringent standards and she is not, according to Rachel Biale, the years (from about the seventh to the eleventh inequality but by “principles of paternalism practices that added to the existing burden kind of property that can be sold like other century) when Rabbi Gershom effected “for and hierarchy.” Yet, according to Greenberg’s on women’s lives. Salo Baron notes that in acquisitions. Nonetheless, each man is the the first and unfortunately last time in Jewish apologetics, the rabbis “cannot be faulted, order to implement communal cohesiveness owner of his property, and only he—not the jurisprudence” almost complete equality given the almost universal nature of sexual in a threatening diasporic situation, leaders courts or the woman—can dispose of his between men and women regarding the hierarchy.” Sexual and gender hierarchy is, opted for rigorous rabbinic control of family possessions or nullify the marriage contract by get: the husband’s right to divorce his wife however, not a natural phenomenon but life that included strict implementation of divorce. It might seem as though the marriage remained intact and only he could prepare and a socially and politically constructed one marriage and divorce laws, which affected contract only affects the status of the woman deliver the get at will, but she was granted the and, as such, can be constructed differently. family life and the legal status of women in personally—which it does—but the loss of right to demand a get and, should he refuse, In fact, it was possible for Rabbi Gershom a fundamentally patriarchal society. After control has broader implications. After all, as to petition the court to compel him. But in in the Geonic period to make significant the end of the Talmudic period, no beit din Biale notes, marriage serves as “the instrument the twelfth century, Rabbenu Jacob Tam, a gains in parity and protection for women (rabbinic court) was universally accepted by of control over economic fortunes, social French authority, ruled against any coercion that lasted for half a millennium. Moreover, all Jews—a sine qua non for legislation—so status, sexual activity, and self-perpetuation.” of recalcitrant husbands and against the right explanations by a number of scholars that there was no possibility of altering the basic The serious consequences of the of women to initiate divorce proceedings. the actions of the rabbis solely concern the laws. The fact that there was no legislative unalterable gender and power differential , among others, regarded well-being, protection, and status of women prerogative to change the laws accounts for operative at the very foundation of the Jewish Rabbenu Tam’s position as broadly acceptable seeking a get seem hollow, even disingenuous. the fundamentally unalterable corpus of legal system do not end with the execution because of the problematic social and political In closing, let me say that I have been Marriage contract, manuscript, ink and paint on paper, dated 3rd of Kislev 5649 (1888) at Jewish law and the inflexibility of marriage of the marriage contract. They are perhaps situation of Jews in the Diaspora where “small, drawn to multicultural concerns within Yerushalem. General Collection, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University.

6 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 7

Between the Living and the Dead: Making Levirate Marriage Work Dvora Weisberg

n contrast to “normal” marriage, levirate marriage. This construct of marriage creates commentators to apply even if the woman marriage is marked by irregularities and anomalies within the broader construct of in question becomes a divorcée or a . Icomplexities. Speaking broadly, a levirate Jewish marriage. Levirate marriage by definition, however, union involves a widow and a male from the The first and most troubling anomaly requires a man to marry his brother’s widow family of her deceased husband; in Jewish created by the institution of levirate marriage and, if the goal of levirate—the birth of a child tradition, the only man required or permitted lies in the relationship between the levir and who will carry on the name of the deceased— to enter into a levirate marriage is the brother the widow before their marriage. Jewish law is to be fulfilled, he must have sexual of the deceased. The offspring of a levirate has myriad rules restricting an individual’s relations with her. Thus levirate becomes union are usually recognized as the legal choice of a marriage partner; many of these a permitted (or even mandated) . offspring of the woman’s late husband, rather rules prohibit marriage between close This problem is noted by early rabbinic than the offspring of their biological father, relatives. Among the incestuous unions sources. Noting the apparent contradiction who is known as the levir. Although in many forbidden in Leviticus 18 and 20 is the between Leviticus 18:16 and Deuteronomy cultures, levirate unions are not regarded as prohibition against a sexual relationship 25:5, midrashim claim the two verses were marriages, postbiblical Judaism treats the between a man and his brother’s wife. “spoken at the same moment,” that is, God union of a man and his brother’s widow as a This prohibition is understood by ancient knowingly gave two laws that seem to be

in opposition but that can in fact co-exist. non-levirate marriage is the assignment of the levir. Beyond a rather tortured exegesis The law of levirate serves as an exception the offspring of the union to the mother’s on Deuteronomy 25:6, to the incest prohibition or overrides it. deceased husband rather than the levir. offers no explanation for this innovation. At the same time, the begins its Genesis 38, the story of Judah and Tamar, Another difference between levirate discussion of levirate marriage by prohibiting offers evidence that this aspect of levirate may marriage and other marriages lies in the way it marriage between a levir and his widowed have been disturbing to potential levirs. Onan is contracted. Rabbinic law requires that a man sister-in-law if the latter would be forbidden is reluctant to impregnate Tamar knowing betroth his future wife and that she consent to him under any incest prohibition other that any child born to her “would not be his,” to the betrothal. A levirate widow, in contrast, than that of a brother’s wife. Moreover, the but that of his late brother, Er. According to is bound to her husband’s brother from the Mishnah extends the prohibition to all of the Deuteronomy, the birth of a child who can moment of her husband’s death; betrothal wives of the deceased brother if even one of “be accounted” to the deceased, “that his is not, strictly speaking, required. Moreover, them is forbidden to the levir for reasons of name may not be blotted out in Israel” is the since the bond between them is generated by . These texts suggest that the aim of levirate marriage. Rabbinic tradition the husband’s death, the widow’s consent is rabbis, realizing that any levirate marriage supports the notion that this is the primary not necessary. A levirate marriage is brought may be perceived as “permitted incest,” if not the sole aim of levirate by declaring into being through an act of intercourse, even, simultaneously reassured themselves that that levirate marriage is not performed if the according to the Mishnah, if the act is casual levirate is not incest while prohibiting levirate deceased left any child or grandchild. At the or nonconsensual. We do have sources that unions in which there had been multiple same time, rabbinic law upends the aim of mandate a speech act (ma’amar) on the part family ties between the levir and the widow. levirate marriage, declaring that the children of the levir and the widow’s consent as part of The other significant anomaly of such a marriage are treated under the law the process of formalizing a levirate union, that distinguishes levirate unions from as the offspring of their biological father, suggesting the desire on the part of at least

10 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 11 some rabbis to “regularize” levirate unions close family relationship in which they are living over those of the dead. The levir is not AJS INSTITUTIONAL MEMBERS 2012–2013 by making them more like other marriages. forbidden to think of each other as potential his brother’s surrogate; he is a husband. The The Association for Jewish Studies is pleased to recognize the following Institutional Members: Faced with a biblical law that promotes mates to one in which they are expected to widow ceases to be a widow and becomes a distinctly irregular form of marriage, become husband and wife. Additionally, the the wife of a second husband. The children the rabbis of the first five centuries of the opportunity for levirate marriage arises from born of this union are the legal offspring of REGULAR INSTITUTIONAL MEMBERS Common Era sought to smooth out many a family crisis, the death of a husband and their biological father. From the ruins of one Brandeis University of the anomalies present in levirate unions. brother. The death “disorders” the family, nuclear family, levirate marriage creates a new Brown University, Program in Judaic Studies The rabbis’ efforts to “normalize” levirate leaving the childless widow with no tangible one. It does so by “renaming” individuals or Columbia University, Institute for Israel and Jewish Studies marriage offer us insights into the way connection to her late husband’s family. reassigning roles, transforming brother-in- Cornell University, Jewish Studies Program they understood the family and familial Levirate offers a path to reordering the family, law and sister-in-law into husband and wife. Harvard University, Center for Jewish Studies Hebrew Union College – Jewish Institute of Religion relationships. Every marriage creates a reintegrating the widow into her husband’s This legal transformation is not Indiana University, Robert A. and Sandra S. Borns Jewish Studies Program new family and reorganizes several others. family through marriage to his brother. magical. Literature from many cultures Jewish Theological Seminary, The Graduate School Men and women become husbands and At the same time, a family unit that indicates that levirate unions could be McGill University, Department of Jewish Studies Monash University, Australian Centre for the Study of Jewish Civilisation wives, entering into new relationships with is disrupted by death cannot be wholly emotionally and socially problematic for New York University, Skirball Department of Hebrew and Judaic Studies individuals who were previously “.” repaired, nor can it be restored to its previous the individuals involved. Nevertheless, Ohio State University, Melton Center for Jewish Studies and become in-laws. state. In many cultures, levirate is an rabbinic understandings of levirate Rutgers University, Department of Jewish Studies that were previously distinct and separate attempt to provide a widow with a socially marriage mark an attempt to regularize University of Arizona, Arizona Center for Judaic Studies acceptable sexual outlet while discouraging the irregular and to place individual men University of California, Los Angeles, Center for Jewish Studies entities become intertwined. In some University of Maryland, Joseph and Meyerhoff Center for Jewish Studies cases, families experience the marriage of or prohibiting remarriage and at the same and women into relationships that reflect University of Michigan, Jean and Samuel Frankel Center for Judaic Studies a family member as a “loss” to the family; time providing the deceased with children rabbinic visions of “normal” marriage. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Carolina Center for Jewish Studies in others, marriage is seen as a way in after his death. On some level, the deceased University of Texas at Austin, Schusterman Center for Jewish Studies University of Toronto, Centre for Jewish Studies remains a strong presence in his family; his Dvora Weisberg is associate professor of Rabbinics which the family “gains” new members. Washington University in St. Louis, Department of Jewish, Islamic, and Near Eastern Levirate marriage offers a fascinating wife, while permitted a sexual relationship and director of the Rabbinical School at HUC- Languages and Cultures glimpse into constructs of family because it with one of her husband’s relatives, remains JIR, Los Angeles. She is the author of Levirate Yale University, Program in Judaic Studies involves two individuals who were already “faithful” to her husband by not remarrying; Marriage and the Family in Ancient Judaism University, Bernard Revel Graduate School of Jewish Studies York University, Israel and Golda Koschitzky Centre for Jewish Studies related but who are now entering a very the children born to her are legally his (UPNE, 2009). different type of relationship; the levir and children. chose a different the widow make the transition from a path; it chose to privilege the claims of the ASSOCIATE INSTITUTIONAL MEMBERS American Jewish University American University, Center for Israel Studies and Jewish Studies Program Barnard College, Jewish Studies Program Blavatnik Archive Foundation Foundation for Hebrew College Johns Hopkins University, Leonard and Helen R. Stulman Jewish Studies Program Loyola Marymount University, Jewish Studies Program National Yiddish Book Center Northwestern University, Crown Family Center for Jewish and Israel Studies Old Dominion University, Institute for Jewish Studies and Interfaith Understanding Posen Foundation, US Purdue University, Jewish Studies Program Reconstructionist Rabbinical College Towson University, Baltimore Hebrew Institute University at Albany, SUNY, Center for Jewish Studies University of Colorado, Boulder University of Connecticut, Center for Judaic Studies and Contemporary Jewish Life University of Denver, Center for Judaic Studies University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Program in Jewish Culture and Society University of Massachusetts Amherst, Judaic and Near Eastern Studies Department University of Minnesota, Center for Jewish Studies University of North Carolina at Asheville, Center for Jewish Studies University of North Texas, Jewish Studies Program University of Oregon, Harold Schnitzer Family Program in Jewish Studies University of Pittsburgh, Jewish Studies Program University of Scranton, Weinberg Judaic Studies Institute University of Tennessee – Knoxville, The Fern and Manfred Steinfeld Program in Judaic Studies University of Virginia, Jewish Studies Program University of Washington, The Samuel and Althea Stroum Jewish Studies Program University of Wisconsin – Madison, Mosse/Weinstein Center for Jewish Studies University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee, Sam and Helen Stahl Center for Jewish Studies Vanderbilt University, Jewish Studies Program Wexner Foundation

Center for Jewish History If your program, department, foundation, or institution is interested in becoming an AJS institutional member, please contact Rona Sheramy, AJS Executive Director, at [email protected] or 917.606.8249.

12 AJS Perspectives for the sake of her beauty; and mainly for concerns, including economic activities and then mates. And how does he coax his Married Men the sake of children” (BT Ketubbot 59b). that would benefit the household. That mate? Rab Judah citing Rab replied, He tells Judith Baskin Elsewhere, he stated, “It is sufficient for us men would characterize the consequences her this [when he spreads his wings prior that they rear up our children and deliver for women as “confinement in a prison” is to mating]. ‘I will buy you a cloak that will us from sin” (BT Yebamot 63a). Good wives, reminiscent of other rabbinic statements that reach to your feet.’ After the event he tells About marriage they were never wrong, exemplified in rabbinic tradition by R. women’s common sense and understanding her, ‘May the cat tear off my crest if when I The Rabbis; how well, they understood Akiba’s self-sacrificing spouse (BT atrophy because they are isolated from the have any money I do not buy you one.’” Its human position. 50a), earn merit “[b]y sending their sons to rest of the world ( 18:1). The sugya, which begins with the learn in the , and their husbands As if ten were not enough, BT ’Erubin statement, “A man is forbidden to compel ith apologies to W. H. Auden’s to study in the schools of the Rabbis, and 100b also provides three alternative female his wife to the [marital] obligation,” ends “Musée des Beaux Arts,” it’s true: by waiting for their husbands until they handicaps, noting that, “In a baraita it was appropriately with a commendation of Wthe rabbis had no illusions about return from the schools of the Rabbis” (BT taught: She grows long hair like Lilith, seduction. But this erotic and derisive the infinite contingencies of marriage, the 17a and 21a). A bad wife who sits when making water like a beast, and depiction of women as sexually credulous quotidian realities of an arrangement they dishonors her husband risks divorce and serves as a bolster for her husband.” But and easily persuaded can only reinforce male considered both foreordained and an essential impoverishment, or perhaps the punishment are these detriments or benefits? R. Dimi is satisfaction at not being created female. channel for men’s and women’s sexual of an abusive second marriage (see Genesis cited as saying that these three qualities are The passage’s deeper purport: to respect and energies. The rabbis fully acknowledged Rabbah 17:3, which begins, “If he is fortunate, compliments to women. Perhaps from a male appreciate the wife who serves as a physical, the role of fortune in the success of any she is a help; if not, she is against him”). point of view they are: women’s long hair can emotional, and economic bolster to her individual instance of this most intimate Something amazing, to invoke Auden be attractive; that she serves as a support for husband and children, often at significant of human positions, just as they accepted once more, is the preservation of traditions her husband is certainly desirable for him. cost to herself, is diminished and undermined. that marriage was an indispensable insisting that marriage is also problematic Although it is difficult to see how “making Pace Auden, the Rabbis may have known institutionalization of the familial divisions for women; indeed, the downsides of being water like a beast” is a positive quality, it may all about marriage and its advantages and of labor on which rabbinic society and its a wife are candidly delineated. BT ’Erubin be an endorsement of feminine reserve. This costs, but this is an important failure. future depended. Perhaps most painfully, the 100b, for example, offers a countdown of statement allows a segue into an apparently Sages also grappled with the conflicts that “Eve’s curses” in a discussion of inappropriate unrelated that concludes the larger Judith Baskin is Philip H. Knight Professor of marriage engendered between devotion to and appropriate modes of marital sexuality Talmudic passage and offers a final word Humanities and associate dean for Humanities, divine service and responsibility for human generated from Genesis 3:16. Some of these on the relative roles and capacities of wives College of Arts and Sciences at the University dependents. are physical, including the discomforts of and husbands: “R. Johanan observed: If the of Oregon. Her publications include Midrashic Needless to say, androcentric perspec- menstruation, loss of virginity, pregnancy, had not been given we could have Women: Formations of the Feminine in tives dominate. Reflecting on “It is not good for and childbirth. Others include the challenges learned modesty from the cat, honesty from Rabbinic Literature (UPNE/Brandeis man to be alone” (Genesis 2:18), Genesis Rabbah of child rearing, a woman’s yearning for her the ant, chastity from the dove, and good University Press, 2002). 17:2 teaches: absent spouse, and the need to ingratiate manners from the cock who first coaxes Hamburg Miscellany, Hamburg, Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Hamburg, Cod. Hebr. 37, fol. 79v. German, 1427-28. oneself silently with one’s husband. The He who has no wife dwells without final three disadvantages apply to a woman’s good, without help, without joy, without marital constraints: “She is wrapped up like blessing, and without atonement. . . . R. and respect. According to BT Yebamot 62b husband shapes the personality of his wife a mourner, banished from the company Hiyya b. Gomdi said: He is also incomplete, (also BT 76b), “Concerning a man just as God formed the character of the of all men, and confined within a prison.” for it is written, And God blessed them and who his wife as himself, who honors her people of Israel, “For He who made you will The first of these, even if understood as called them humanity (Genesis 5:2) [for more than himself, who guides his sons and espouse you, His name is the Lord of Hosts (Isaiah a straightforward reference to married only joined together are male and female daughters in the right path and arranges for 54:5).” Nor is the divine metaphor unusual; women’s veiling themselves in public, evokes fully human]. Some say: He [who does not them to be married near the period of their throughout , the relationship connections between women and death in Committed to an interdisciplinary, comparative, and theoretical approach to Jewish Studies marry] even impairs the divine likeness: puberty, Scripture says, You will know that all between a man and a woman is understood parallel texts such as Genesis Rabbah 17:8 For God made humanity in the divine image is well in your tent (Job 5:24).” BT Baba Metzia metaphorically as signifying the intimate • 35 Faculty Members • and BT Berakhot 51a. “Banished from the (Genesis 9:6) and this is followed by, Be 59a cites Rab’s saying: “One should always bonds between God and human beings. company of all men” is said to refer to the • Over 60 Courses •

fertile, then, and increase (Genesis 9:7). be heedful of wronging his wife, for since Nevertheless, certain rabbinic voices fact that a married woman, unlike a man, • Ph.D. Certificates in Jewish Culture and Society & Holocaust, her tears are frequent she is quickly hurt.” articulate an ambivalence about marriage, cannot have two sexual partners at the Genocide, and Memory Studies •

These final words suggest that procreation, The advantages of marriage for women particularly for scholars who might prefer to same time, implying that and/or • Jewish Studies Major through Department of Religion • a male legal obligation, is the overwhelming are assumed, if not detailed. As BT Yebamot devote their energies to study (BT Ketubbot frequent resort to women outside of marriage • Jewish Studies Minor • marital value, since what makes man like God 113a puts it, “More than the man desires to 62b), and these strands contribute to a wider were accepted and appreciated features of • Visiting Israeli Writers Program • is his ability to generate new life in the body marry does the woman desire to be taken in discourse on the uncertain nature of marital men’s lives in rabbinic times. “Confined • Initiative in Holocaust, Genocide, and Memory Studies • of his wife. Moreover, many of the biblical marriage,” while BT Ketubbot 75a declares happiness and the potential treacheries of to a prison,” the tenth disability imposed verses cited in this extended text refer to a in the voice of Resh Lakish that a woman is bad wives. As BT Baba Batra 145b relates, by marriage in this enumeration, refers • Jewish Studies Workshop • man and his “house” or “household” (bayit). satisfied with any sort [of husband] since “It “R. Hanina said: All the days of a poor man are to women’s enforced absence from most For the rabbis, a meritorious wife is a man’s is preferable to live in grief, that is, with a wretched (Proverbs 15:15) refers [to him] who activities in the public domain. Rabbinic

“house,” a body built from his body to house bad husband, than to dwell in widowhood.” has a wicked wife; But contentment is a feast social policy apportioned separate spheres www.jewishculture.illinois.edu and bear his children and fulfill his sexual Samuel b. Unya is quoted in BT Sanhedrin without end (ibid) refers [to him] who has a and responsibilities to women and men, and domestic needs. Such a partner, when she 22b that, “Before marriage a woman is a good wife.” R. Hiyya, an apparent skeptic on making every effort to confine married “brings light to his eyes and puts him on his shapeless lump. It is her husband who the possibility of companionate marriage, women and their activities to the private feet” (BT Yebamot 62b), deserves consideration transforms her into a useful vessel.” The taught that, “A wife should be taken mainly realms of the family and its particular

14 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 15 betrothed to me with this ring according the bride’s virginity. They hardly needed to could take precedence over the praxis of ‘According to the Law of Moses and Israel’: to the law of Moses and Israel”). Assuming pin down the precise moment of marriage. marriage would have seemed absurd. that there are no legal disabilities, that’s Why, then, did the rabbis insist on a The contemporary debates about Marriage from Social Institution to Legal Fact all it took (and takes): at the end of this ten legal act to constitute a marriage? Because marriage strike me as obscured; it is often Michael Satlow second transaction the couple is “married” that is the kind of thing that the rabbis did, not clear whether they are about legal rights, in the eyes of the law and would require a and because the stakes were so high. Can this public recognition, or private . formal divorce in order to remarry. Without answer be reformulated in a more specific The rabbis do not provide a normative magine a powerful married man, a This second scenario takes a bit more Marriage, first and foremost, defines a legal this transaction, there is no marriage. way? Scholars who are familiar with Talmudic answer to this issue, but they can help us politician or religious leader, exposed for imagination. To most of us this justification relationship that creates new rights and One of the more controversial claims literature recognize that the rabbis created to disentangle what’s truly at stake. Ihaving an affair. The media cover the story would sound ridiculous. Whatever the law responsibilities, particularly in the areas of that I made in my book is that this very legal conditions, such as defining “work” on and the man’s reputation is, if not ruined, at says, it is clear that two decades of living sexual relationships and property transfer. notion—the formation of marriage—depends the Sabbath or when one should recite the Michael Satlow is professor of Religious Studies least tarnished. Although an extramarital together as a couple, raising a family, sharing (Interestingly, in rabbinic law the marital on a legally objective and verifiable act, Shema in the evening. In the case of marriage, and Judaic Studies at Brown University and is the affair is not illegal, many see his betrayal of his a life and income make a “marriage.” Our status of parents—except in the case of like the term kiddushin itself, was a rabbinic there is another concern: adultery. Since the author of Creating Judaism: History, Tradition, spouse as distasteful, perhaps even a reflection hypothetical philanderer would be mocked adultery—has no bearing on the personal innovation. There are very few references, defines adultery (like violation Practice (Columbia University Press, 2006). of other character flaws. To anyone who if he were to suggest such an argument. status of their progeny.) And as a legal most notably in the Hebrew Bible and of the Sabbath) as a capital crime, even the He maintains a blog at www.mlsatlow.com. watches television, such a scenario requires This hypothetical situation occurred to relationship, it must be carefully defined. the Gospel of Matthew to the notion of a rabbis could not implement a penalty, they very little imagination. me as I was writing Jewish Marriage in Antiquity Nowhere is this clearer than in the binding betrothal. The available evidence needed to define it. How do we know when Imagine, now, in the aftermath of such (Princeton, 2001). One of the leitmotifs of that rabbinic discussions of how a marriage suggests that most Jews in antiquity had a woman is married? Can we pinpoint the a revelation, this powerful man asserted that book is the classical rabbinic understanding takes place. According to the rabbis, it no need for such a formal procedure. They exact moment when her status changes? he had recently checked his , of marriage as a legal institution. While the begins at the moment of kiddushin, a binding prepared prenuptial contracts (the ) Most Jews, however, did not need to issued some twenty years ago, and had found rabbis certainly recognize that there might be betrothal. The rabbis allowed for different that governed economic relationships rather be bothered with such legal formalities. a legal flaw. While he has, of course, loved love and attraction accompanying marriage mechanisms of kiddushin, but they preferred than legally constituting a marriage. Like They knew adultery when they saw it. In his wife for these past two decades, he has and that the union is a social relationship what is practiced to this day: the transfer the Greeks and Romans, most Jews knew the cases where they didn’t, the families found that he is not technically “married” to that can lead to individual fulfillment of an object of value (e.g., the ring) from a when they and their neighbors married. They negotiated with each other and the “elders” her. His indiscretion, then, should be excused, for both partners, these ideas are largely man to a woman with a statement of intent participated in a celebration that could last to resolve the situation. To them, as to us, for he was in fact and in law a single man. secondary to their thinking about marriage. in front of witnesses (e.g., “Behold, you are for days, perhaps witnessed the evidence of the idea that a defective legal formality

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16 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 17 marriage contract as an agreement with a core understanding about the importance the context of the Jewish philosophical Reading Jewish Philosophy: the claims of the woman in this case. of marriage in stabilizing the sexual imaginary and its androcentric focus on the Mendelssohn concludes: impulses, especially—although perhaps not stabilizing function of marriage for male What’s Marriage Got to Do with It? only—of the male. Mendelssohn notes: sexuality. There are serious gender problems Susan Shapiro The husband has changed his principles introduced and sustained by the focus on and adopted another religion. If the wife It is by agreements of this kind that man male sexuality, some of which include the is now forced to enter into a household leaves the state of nature and enters relegation of women to mere figures of the he field of Jewish philosophy may that this agreement is mutual and noncoercive marriage and with his very understanding of which is contrary to her conscience and into the state of social relations. His “feminine” and to other projections within seem an unlikely place to look for of either party’s conscience and that no third the social contract. Further, this understanding to educate her children according to own nature impels him to enter into philosophical discourse with real world Tmatters related to marriage, its party—including the state—can interfere. underpins his overall argument in principles which are not her own; in a associations of various kinds in order legal, ethical, and other consequences. ideological and cultural formation, and its In this section of Jerusalem we find for the separation of religion and state. word, if she is compelled to accept and to transform his fluctuating rights This “gender trouble” remains an consequences. When one reads their texts a very long footnote about a particular Religious conviction cannot be coerced by the have forced upon her conditions of a and duties into something definite. unresolved challenge for the field of Jewish closely and critically, however, one finds that divorce case then pending in Vienna. state or by any religious authority. One can marriage contract to which she never . . . Civilized man lives for the future philosophy, one which must be addressed if not only do Jewish philosophers employ Mendelssohn argues against the position at most persuade, not coerce. The violation agreed, she would obviously suffer an as well, and wants to be able to count we are not, however unwittingly, to reproduce the trope of marriage but also sometimes requiring the Jewish wife to remain married of the wife’s conscience, the original terms injustice and, by a pretense of liberty of on something certain also in the next its systemic faults but, instead, live up to the directly engage questions of marriage law, to her formerly Jewish, now Christian, of the marriage contract, and her religious conscience, one would obviously allow moment. Even the urge to procreate, if potential of its ethical claims and ideals. Jewish and otherwise. Further, one finds in husband. For Mendelssohn, this constitutes beliefs are all of a piece for Mendelssohn. oneself to be misled into the most absurd it is not to be merely a brute instinct, Jewish philosophical texts contemporary an instance of religious coercion and not Defending one entails defending the others. coercion of conscience. The conditions of compels man, as we have seen above, Susan Shapiro is associate professor of assumptions about marriage, gender, love, and toleration. He interprets Joseph II The footnote continues: contract can now no longer be fulfilled. to enter into a social contract, to Judaic and Near Eastern Studies and director sexuality registered in its very basic terms and his Edict of Toleration as protecting the The husband, who has changed his which we find something analogous of the Religious Studies Program at the and philosophical imaginary. interests of the Christian majority rather Now, since both partners still professed principles is, if not in dolo, at least in culpa, even among many animals. (57) University of Massachusetts Amherst. She is The work of offers than preserving and “tolerating” Jewish the Jewish religion, at least outwardly, [responsible for the fact] that this is the the author of Recovering the Sacred: Ethics, a view of marriage that is consistent over difference. Mendelssohn’s plea that “An when they entered into the contract, it is case. Must the wife submit to coercion of While Mendelssohn’s argument here Hermeneutics and Theology After the matters of philosophy and law in a manner emperor as just and wise as Joseph will surely obvious that they had no other intention conscience because the husband wants to may seem straightforward and innocuous, its Holocaust (forthcoming). that affirms respect for the importance of a not permit such violent of the power but to conduct their household according have liberty of conscience? When did she significance shifts when considered within woman’s consent and partnership in marriage. of the church in his states,” is actually an to Jewish rules of life and to educate their agree to that? Should not her conscience Mendelssohn treats marriage in his major indictment of the emperor’s position in which children according to Jewish principles. also be free, and should not the party that work, Jerusalem, as a sort of social contract that the religion of the Christian husband would It is at least certain that the partner who caused the change answer also for its is mutually binding and based on consent, be determinative, regardless of the wife’s took her religion seriously could have consequences, indemnify the other party, UnIversIty Of WIscOnsIn–MaDIsOn not on the violation of the conscience of one desires, conscience, or religion. In opposition assumed nothing else; and had she been, and reinstate her, as far as possible, in her MOsse/WeInsteIn center fOr JeWIsH stUDIes or the other party. Mendelssohn understands to this coercion, Mendelssohn writes: at that time, apprehensive of a change of former status? Nothing, it seems to me, conscience to be comprised of one’s basic this kind, and had such a condition come could be simpler, and the matter speaks The Mosse/Weinstein Center for principles or convictions, neither of which If marriage is merely a civil contract up for discussion, she certainly would not for itself. No one ought to be compelled Jewish Studies offers students and have expressed herself in any other way. to accept conditions of a contract to may ever be coerced by either religion or state. (and it cannot be anything else between scholars a vibrant, interdisciplinary “Principles are free. Convictions, by their very a and a Jewess, even according to She knew and expected nothing other which he could not have agreed without approach to the study of Jewish nature, permit no coercion or bribery. They Catholic principles), the wording and than to take her place in a household violating his own principles. (51–52) civilization and a thriving intellectual belong in the realm of man’s cognitive faculty the conditions of the contract must be governed by ancestral rules of life and to and cultural community at one of the and must be decided by the criterion of truth interpreted and explained in accordance bear children whom she would be able While it might seem that in defending the best public universities in the world. or untruth. . . . Only the judgment reached with the intentions of the contracting to educate according to the principles of wife, Mendelssohn merely defends Jews and by his powers of intellect can be accepted as parties, and not those of the legislator her . If the difference is important Judaism, he does so in a way that is fully • 25 exceptional faculty specializing in valid” (70). Marriage is his primary exemplar or judge. If, according to the principles to this person, if it is a matter of record consistent with his overall argument in Jewish history, languages, literature, of the social contract, which (according to of the contracting parties, it can be that the difference of religion must have Jerusalem. His experience of being a Jew may social sciences, and the arts social contract theory) makes possible civil maintained with certainty that they been important to her, at the time the have informed his argument, but only because • BA and undergraduate certificate society. His work stands out among social must have understood certain words in contract was entered into, the contract he was able to understand the stakes for programs in Jewish Studies contract theorists, with the exception, this and no other way, and that, had they must be interpreted according to her minorities and for others rendered vulnerable • Over $30,000 in graduate and perhaps, of Thomas Hobbes, by including been asked, they would have explained notions and convictions. Even if the in the emerging nation states. Recognition 108 Ingraham Hall undergraduate scholarships offered women and marriage in the social contract. them in this and in no other way, then entire state were to have different views of the stakes of consent in contract and 1155 Observatory Drive annually Marriage, for Mendelssohn (following this morally certain explanation, which is on this matter, it would have no influence noncoercion of conscience may well have Madison, WI 53706 • Home to the Mayrent Institute for Yiddish Culture, Conney Project Christian Wolffe), is not defined in romantic taken to be a tacit and implied condition on the meaning of the contract. (51) shaped his views that a contract should be 608-265-4763 on Jewish Arts, and Greenfield terms but through the mutual responsibility of a contract, must be as valid in law as if based on the consent and noncoercion of [email protected] Summer Institute of a child’s parents to raise him or her in an it had been explicitly agreed upon. (51) That Jewish marriage should be centered the historically weaker party. Mendelssohn’s agreed upon way. “The parents, through the on the raising and educating of children, as position in this case is not an instance of Learn more at very act of cohabitation, have entered into a It is notable that Mendelssohn considers well as what Mendelssohn terms, “Jewish special pleading, but rather exemplifies his jewishstudies.wisc.edu state of matrimony. They have made a tacit marriage between Jews to be “merely a civil rules of life,” is a familiar portrait of Jewish overall philosophical position and argument. contract to render capable of felicity, that is, contract” and that in this dispute he sides family life. More remarkable is Mendelssohn’s Stopping here might provide a happier to educate, the being, destined for felicity, for with the wife against both the husband and unequivocal defense of the Jewish woman. ending to the genealogy of the Jewish whose coming into the world they are jointly the state. Mendelssohn’s argument here is He even stands up to the “entire state” (and philosophical imaginary as regards marriage. responsible for” (50). The crucial point here is consistent with his earlier definitions of the Emperor) in interpreting the original Mendelssohn’s writings, however, still hold

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22 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 23 the couple’s Enlightenment arguments, family without benefit of clergy or state. In When modern states brought civil law into One Jewish Woman, Two Husbands, Three Laws: especially Montesquieu’s distinction between 1813, when the Napoleonic Empire brought the bedroom of the Jewish nation, they repudiation and divorce: they claimed that the purely civil French marriage regime created tensions between civil and religious The Making of Civil Marriage and Divorce in a Morschene was not a repudiated woman, but to Trieste, they finally wed. Three decades authorities and unwittingly raised issues rather a divorced woman who had initiated later, they died three days apart in 1844. of individuals’ civil rights and of women’s Revolutionary Age her own civil divorce! Their novel arguments Morschene’s story offers a comparative rights and agency. Jews, both in Israel and Lois Dubin reinterpreted the impediment to marriage view of state-building by means of civil law in the Diaspora, confront these issues today, between and divorcée and presented and public health policy, and the making albeit in different ways. An Israeli scholar her natural and moral right to marriage. of civil marriage and divorce as part of the once commented ironically after hearing n late 1793, when the Habsburg Monarchy solutions to pressing personal problems? lives of women: venereal disease was long- According to the couple, the “true substance secularization of marriage and divorce. Her Morschene’s story, “If only the French had led the coalition against Revolutionary How did the civil equality of Emancipation lasting and incurable, and states should of marriage . . . [was] always and forever story illustrates marriage and divorce in come to Israel!” IFrance and all of Europe was at war, work as state intervention in domestic life, take proactive measures to halt its spread. dependent upon the sacred bond of Nature, transition, conditioned by new laws and My understanding of the making of civil one Jewish woman waged her own private and how did the creation of civil marriage and As one physician argued, “to force Rachele and the free will of the contracting parties.” practices, by enhanced roles for sentiment and marriage and divorce in the late eighteenth struggle in Trieste, the thriving Habsburg free divorce affect Jewish women in particular? to stay in such a marriage . . . would be to Morschene’s petitions for civil divorce and individual choice, and not least, by shifting and early nineteenth centuries is further port on the Adriatic. The desperate twenty- Going to a civil court to resolve marital ignore basic principles and to tyrannize the civil marriage articulated a natural law power relations within the family. While deepened as I follow the debates that roil the three-year-old Rachele Morschene Luzzatto misery was a new option for a European human race . . . and to dishonor Religion and view of marriage as a civil contract for the Morschene’s first marriage was an alliance of contemporary American body politic: debates sought to extricate herself from her failing Jewish woman. Prior to this, Rachele would Nature at one and the same time.” Rachele purpose of procreation and for the partners’ families arranged for economic self-interest, about civil unions and same-sex marriage, marriage to Lucio Luzzatto, a thirty-eight- have had but one option: to go to Jewish lamented that this cohabitation, which was benefit through companionship, “conjugal her second was a love-match forged by women’s roles in heterosexual marriage, and year-old broker, her husband of five years, and authorities for halakic adjudication. Jewish destroying her, body and soul, would lead to affection” between “souls who honestly individuals. Developed through personal women’s sexuality and health. The state, father of their two-year-old daughter. With law allows divorce and remarriage, but the her “complete extinction.” To Chief Rabbi love each other,” and “mutual aid”—all of relationships and struggles, Morschene’s religious authorities, families, and, not least, her father’s help, she brought her case for essential act of divorce is the husband’s giving Tedesco of Trieste, she appealed clearly but which served society overall. Given the war new horizons were ultimately framed by the individuals themselves—all have a stake economic support and civil separation to the a get (writ of divorce) to his wife (based on deferentially: “I too know, though I am a between the Habsburg Monarchy and , Habsburg and French states—which redrew in deciding who has the civil right to enter Civic and Provincial Court of Trieste. Finally, Deuteronomy 24:1); a woman cannot give a woman, that a marriage is a serious matter, as Frizzi and Morschene left unsaid that purely the boundaries between civil and religious, and leave marriages, and on what terms. in December 1795, seeking relief from the get to her husband. At times, Jewish courts is its dissolution, but I know even more that civil marriage procedures already existed in between public and private, between the body “bitterness and . . . anxiety brought on by an tried to ameliorate the situations of individual the first duty of nature is to preserve life.” France from 1792. The couple signed a civil politic and the Jewish community—and by Lois Dubin is professor of Religion at Smith ambiguous situation,” she petitioned for a civil Jewish women, but they never altered this Lucio saw the question of duty differently. marriage contract of their own invention in the Enlightenment—which spurred new College and currently visiting professor and divorce on three grounds: (1) her husband had fundamental inequality of Jewish divorce law. He argued that a wife’s conjugal duties November 1799. Vienna was convinced, but scientific understandings of disease, health, fellow at the Frankel Institute for Advanced brought the family to economic ruin; (2) he Since Rabbenu Tam’s ruling in the twelfth always come first: “If illness were sufficient Triestine Jewish authorities resisted their and the role of medicine in public policy. Her Judaic Studies at the University of Michigan, had deserted and dishonored her; (3) and most century, Jewish courts have been reluctant to to allow wives to remain distant from their instructions, upheld traditional halakah, strategic self-fashioning also reflected the Ann Arbor. She recently published “Medicine as importantly, his venereal disease, syphilis, compel a husband to divorce his wife even own husbands, then it is certain that there and refused to marry the couple. In 1800, the “eighteenth-century rights revolution” that Enlightenment Cure: Benedetto Frizzi, Physician put her in mortal danger. Lucio castigated when she had legitimate . would hardly be found marriage in its true pregnant Morschene sought from defined individuals as bearers of natural rights. to Eighteenth-Century Italian Jewish Society,” her for selfishness and impropriety, yet he In the late eighteenth century, both and legitimate connubial state.” Further, he Frizzi, but the lovers soon resolved their European Jews had always regulated in Jewish History 26: 1–2 (2012), special issue: claimed that his disease was cured and that the Habsburg Monarchy and Revolutionary maintained that “if a judge were to sanction quarrel and formed a long-term liaison and marriage and divorce according to halakah. Festschrift for Kenneth Stow, 201–21. the marriage should continue. France instituted novel laws that defined wives’ disobedience and absolve them from Rachele Morschene of Trieste was, in fact, marriage as a civil contract and regulated marital dependence and submission, it would one of the first European Jewish women—if all marriages and by civil law, cause a total revolution in marriage.” not the first—to obtain a civil divorce. For including those of Jews. In 1783, Habsburg In 1794–95, civil judgments awarded more than twenty years, in Habsburg and then legislation created a dual, interlocking Rachele separation and . These Napoleonic-occupied Trieste, she negotiated system. It defined marriage as civil but were upheld on appeal. After Rachele and new civil laws of marriage and divorce created no civil marriage ceremonies and Lucio finally agreed on terms for divorce in as well as Jewish religious law (halakah) left religious ceremonies intact. Civil divorce November 1795, Rabbi Tedesco affirmed the in her pursuit of separation, divorce, and was introduced for those communities possibility of a Jewish divorce. Sometime remarriage. As I reconstruct her efforts, I that permitted religious divorce—Jews, in April 1796, they were divorced civilly treat marriage and divorce as legal norms, Protestants, and Orthodox Christians—but and religiously. In my view, the civil action social institutions, lived experiences, and it was not imposed upon Catholics; still, facilitated Morschene’s subsequent religious cultural values, and I have come to see her civil courts were required to obtain religious divorce. In this case, and others, the civil law efforts as revealing of the intersection of sanction for each divorce. By contrast, in 1792 of a modern state provided moral standing religion, law, and gender at a key moment France instituted purely civil ceremonies and a new venue for Jewish women seeking in European Jewish history. My book of marriage and divorce for all and defined remedies for intolerable marital situations. Rachele and Her Loves: Marriage and Divorce them as the only legally binding acts. At some point, Morschene and Frizzi’s in a Revolutionary Age (Brandeis University How did Rachele and Lucio plead their blossomed into romance. In 1798, Press, forthcoming) takes a microhistorical causes? A key element in her case was the they sought permission from Vienna for a and gendered approach to the cultural graphic testimony about Lucio’s condition “purely civil marriage.” Their predicament: and political processes of Enlightenment provided by medical experts. They were led the kohen Frizzi could not marry her in a and Emancipation. It straddles public and by Dr. Benedetto Frizzi, family physician religious ceremony because Jewish law forbids private spheres to view Enlightenment and and Enlightenment intellectual who had priestly descendants to marry repudiated Emancipation “on the ground” and through studied with Dr. Johann Peter Frank, a women (Leviticus 21:7), and Habsburg law the lenses of marriage and family. How did pioneering crusader for public health who had not created civil marriage ceremonies. Lithograph, 1884. Reprinted from Trieste nelle sue stampe sviluppo urbanistico dalla nascita dell’emporio alla fine dell’Ottocento: storia, cronaca, folclore, arte, Enlightenment ideology offer practical spread a new gospel that would alter the Habsburg authorities were moved by vita quotidiana nei secoli XVIII e XIX, 2a ed. Riv. [di] Alfieri Seri; con la consulenza iconografica di Fiorello de Farolfi. (Trieste: Italo Svevo, 1980), 119.

24 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 25 from Trembowla, Galicia, she had arrived in family, she adamantly refused to marry any Hilsenrad, Brown Was the Danube [Thomas Jewish Courtship and Marriage in 1920s Vienna Vienna with her family in 1914. Although she of the men her family tried to arrange for Yoseloff, 1966], 129–31.) Marriage ads in the Marsha Rozenblit was sympathetic with the left-wing Zionist her. She wanted “to go out and seek work liberal, Zionist, and Orthodox press reveal that group Hashomer Hatzair, she refused to marry someplace as a free human being,” so she many men still wanted to “marry a business” a comrade from that organization when he moved to Vienna in 1924. In Vienna she had and many woman offered money, apartments, orld War I played a crucial role A close examination of Jewish memoirs her to be a moral, intelligent, respectable, asked her to accompany him to Palestine in a non-Jewish Communist but she and businesses to attract men to marry them. in changing Jewish courtship and diaries from World War I through the responsible woman who would make him a 1930. By that time she had moved away from did not want to marry him; she did not want Religious Jews were determined to find Wand marriage patterns in Central 1930s reveals that young Jews now wanted nice Jewish home. Thus, he decided to marry her earlier Zionist commitments and had to offend her family, and the couple did not appropriate religious mates for their relatives. Europe. Before the war, both bourgeois and the freedom to choose their own marriage Pepi Kamil, a friend of his sister in Vienna. no desire to live in Palestine, especially not have enough money to marry. She married The persistence of traditional patterns, religious Jews routinely arranged marriages partners. What is most interesting, however, is She was neither pretty nor rich, but she was a on a kibbutz. Now an ardent socialist, she twice: once in 1931, merely to obtain legal however, should not obscure the major for their children. Such marriages often united that most Jews who chose wives or husbands “good girl,” a good daughter, and a seamstress decided to marry a fellow socialist, a Jewish status in Austria, and then again in 1936, to change that had taken place. Jewish men families already engaged in or brought new for themselves did not do so on the basis of who could earn her living if necessary. It is attorney from Graz who worked for Vienna’s Jenö Fried, a Hungarian Jewish communist, and women might have been as pragmatic people into family businesses. Arranged love or even . What they wanted was clear from his diary that they did not love socialist city administration. He had won while both were exiles in the Soviet as their parents or traditional Jewish marriage, which was also the norm in non- autonomy and the right to chose. Like their each other when he decided to marry her her heart when he had argued with those Union. Theirs was a marriage of political marriage brokers had been, or they could Jewish bourgeois circles, was primarily parents, they often chose husbands and wives in 1917. He had chosen her after careful, who expressed hostility to eastern European convenience. They shared ideology, exile have married for love; nevertheless they practical. Jewish families tried to find matches for practical reasons, expanding the orbit of practical consideration, although they became Jews. She told her parents that he was “the status, and the same crowded apartment, so increasingly felt they had the right to for their children that were class and status practical concern from business connections emotionally close to each other after their man most worthy of love that I have ever marriage simplified the living arrangements. chose. The sufferings they had endured appropriate, matches that also worked to to the person who would make a proper engagement. His parents concurred with his met.” She had decided to marry him because (Prive Friedjung, “Wir wollen nur das Paradies during World War I emboldened them perpetuate Jewish social networks. Although spouse and create a good home. Moreover, decision. The couple married in February 1918 they shared the same ideological convictions auf Erden”: Die Erinnerungen einer jüdischen to assert their right to decide with whom marriage for love—common in literature ideological compatibility was especially in Vienna, but Reiss was only happy when and she admired him greatly. (Minna Lachs, Kommunistin aus der Bukowina, ed. Albert they should be for the rest of their lives. and the new medium of film—existed as an important for Jews on the Left or active in he and Pepi could settle down and create a Warum schaust du züruck: Erninnerungen Lichtblau and Sabine John [Bohlau, 1995].) ideal, in practice few people married for love, the Zionist movement. Arranged marriages home together. (Teofil Reiss, “Kriegstagebuch” 1907–1941 [Europaverlag, 1986], 170.) Traditional certainly Marsha L. Rozenblit is Harvey M. Meyerhoff although many couples came to love each continued in bourgeois and religious circles, in Kriegsarchiv, Austria, B/1576:12.) Similarly, Prive Schächter Friedjung, a persisted in 1920s Vienna. Helen Hilsen’s Professor of Jewish History at the University of other during their engagement or after their but increasingly men and women chose For Reiss, neither love nor sex played a Jewish communist from Zadowa, Bukovina, younger sister Olga wanted a rich husband, Maryland, College Park. Her most recent book is marriage. their own partners, sometimes, but not prominent role in his choice of a wife. The who spent most of her life in Vienna, so in 1923 she allowed her parents to make Reconstructing a National Identity: The Jews World War I changed everything. The war usually, for love. Although they wanted to opposite was the case for Esti Drucker and also married for the sake of ideological her a match, even though her sister, who of Habsburg Austria in World War I (Oxford and its attendant suffering made parents less choose their own , they continued Martin Freud, who also insisted on choosing compatibility. The daughter of a poor, Hasidic had married for love, disapproved. (Helen University Press, 2001). willing to force their children into marriages to adhere to conventional expectations of their own life partners, but who did so because that they arranged, and it made young men gender roles within marriage and the family. they were passionately in love with each other. and women feel that they should arrange The diary of Teofil Reiss is a very Esti (Ernestine) Drucker was the daughter their own marriages. How could parents interesting example of how Jewish men who of a wealthy Jewish family, and her parents force a son who had experienced the carnage had fought in the war felt they had the right always assumed they would arrange for a CONNECTING YOU and horrors of the front to marry some girl to choose their own wives. Reiss was an army wealthy Jewish businessman to marry their with whose family they sought a business medic from Vienna, probably lower middle daughter. She had other ideas. She met Martin, WITH LEADING SCHOLARS connection? How could they make a daughter, class, moderately religiously observant, and Sigmund Freud’s eldest son, at a party in early who suffered hunger at home or who had fled not well educated. His unpublished World 1918, and fell passionately in love with him. DLP OF JEWISH STUDIES with them in terror from Galicia to escape the War I diary reveals a man in his mid-twenties They determined to marry, but her parents invading Russian army, marry a man they had who thought he was terribly attractive to the disapproved. After all, Martin was a young chosen for practical considerations? The war ladies and who spent all his spare time going lawyer and would not be able to support her emboldened young people to make marriage out with Jewish girls, both in Galicia, where accustomed style of life. Moreover, his father decisions for themselves, and it created a he was stationed in 1915 and 1916, and back was a psychiatrist, “and a pornographic one THE AJS DISTINGUISHED LECTURERSHIP PROGRAM connects you with dynamic speakers in situation in which parents felt they could home in Vienna when he was home on leave. at that” in her father’s words. They tried the field of Jewish Studies. We will help you identify and arrange a talk by a leading Jewish Studies scholar, no longer tell their children what to do. His main goal was to find someone who would throughout 1918 and 1919 to arrange an enriching your next program with one of over 300 lecture topics. Talks cover the breadth of Jewish history, Vienna provides a wonderful focus make him a good wife. He rejected Sabine appropriate marriage for their daughter, but for an examination of Jewish courtship Sauer from Lancut, Galicia, in whose home she refused. The Freuds also opposed the religion, politics, and culture. and marriage. Its large Jewish community he spent many weeks on leave, because she marriage. Sigmund Freud even wrote to his included many highly acculturated bourgeois seemed too bold to make a good wife. He had son that Esti was “too pretty” for them, by The lecture fee through the AJS Distinguished Lectureship Program is $1000. Most speakers are only Jews who had lived in the city for at least loved staying at her house—mostly because of which he meant she was too rich and spoiled. available through the program once per year, so contact us soon! two generations, but it was also composed the good food and the interesting conversation Esti and Martin persevered, and their parents of poor Jews, as well as Jewish immigrants with Sabine’s father as well as with the allowed them to marry in the fall of 1919, from elsewhere in the former Habsburg Hasidic of Zolynia, another guest—but when he returned from an Italian prisoner- Look at lecture topics, speaker bios, and other information at www.ajsnet.org. Questions? Contact Natasha Perlis, Monarchy. There were refugees who had he found her inappropriate, especially after of-war camp. Unfortunately, their marriage Program Manager, at [email protected] or 917.606.8249. fled Galicia during the war with no homes she turned up in his barracks one day. Such was unhappy. (Sophie Freud, Living in the to which they could return. There were also behavior was not proper for a respectable Shadow of the Freud Family [Praeger, 2007].) religious Jews, both rich and poor, immigrants girl, and he sent her away. Similarly he More common than marriage for love Association for Jewish Studies 15 West 16th Street or long residents in the city. For all these rejected many girls who, he claimed, threw was marriage for the sake of ideological New York, NY 10011-6301 Jews, World War I provided an opportunity themselves at him, proposing marriage. He compatibility. Such was the case for Minna to end long-standing Jewish practices. wanted to choose his own wife, and he wanted Schiffmann Lachs. A seven-year-old refugee

26 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 27

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30 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 31 business with the money Jake has given her Marriage Equality: An American Jewish View for the divorce. No longer constrained by the Joyce Antler marriage traditions of the past, which placed the husband as the unchallenged family patriarch, Gitl equates her opportunity to select her romantic partner with her freedom to choose her own work. As opposed to the arranged marriage she shared with Yekl, consent and choice are paramount. Equally important is the fact that Gitl’s status in the private sphere is bound up with her public role. In The Imported Bridegroom, too, the couples that work together (or in which the woman is employed) have the greatest possibilities for mutual happiness. In “A Sweatshop Romance,” Beile chooses David, who finds her a job in his shop and treats her “with respect, like a modern woman.” We expect that their romance will endure. Marriage and intimacy served as a tableau on which Cahan sketched the folly of unequal relationships of power, work, and longing. In subsequent generations, prayers, even as a child,” Friedan recalled, herself speaking—and revising—the prayer American Jewish writers as varied as Clifford “after the ‘Now I lay me down to sleep’ and the that Orthodox Jewish men recited every Odets, Arthur Miller, Philip Roth, and Grace Sh’ma Yisrael—I would pray for a ‘boy to like morning. “Down through the generations Paley continued to depict fractured romances me best’ and a ‘work of my own to do’ when I in history,” Friedan declared, “my ancestors and marriages torn asunder by barriers of grew up. I did not want to be discontent like prayed, ‘I thank Thee, Lord, I was not created role, status, and gender. The public critique a woman.’ From this day forward I trust Stills and photos from The Imported Bridegroom, directed by Pamela Berger (USA, 1989). Courtesy of the National Center for Jewish Film. my mother was.” The solution was for women of marriage was most boldly resurrected, to pursue active careers outside the home. that women all over the world will be able however, by the feminist activists of the How “Jewish” was Friedan’s insight? to say, ‘I thank Thee, Lord, I was created a long with the generational conflicts a protofeminist sensibility regarding power wife, Gitl, eventually modernizes, too. By the 1960s and 1970s who demanded equal rights A telling incident occurred in 1970, when woman.’” Friedan claimed that she could that arose as a consequence of differentials in marriage and the ways in end of Cahan’s story, after she has received in the private as well as public sphere. A on the fiftieth anniversary of the passage not recall where she had heard the prayer. Amigration from the Old World to which rigid Old World customs oppressed a get from the rabbi paid for by Jake, she is noteworthy proportion of these leaders and of the suffrage amendment, Friedan led a The Feminine Mystique changed ideas the New in the late nineteenth and early both men and women. Cahan recognized ready to begin a new life with the sympathetic thinkers were Jewish, most of them secular march of 50,000 women down Fifth Avenue about marriage and domestic life and helped twentieth centuries, the spheres of love that structural changes had to be made boarder Bernstein. While Jake goes off, but some with religious backgrounds. The to demand equal rights. At the defining to launch the liberal of and marriage were also transformed. As the before either sex could realize autonomy and bewildered, to confront a future that is “dark Jewish traditions that they eventually rejected moment of the march, Friedan found the early 1960s. But the younger group of popular Bintel Brief column of the Jewish mutuality in marriage. Later in the century, and impenetrable,” a confident Gitl uses her had significant bearing on their perspectives. Daily Forward filled with stories of traumatic Jewish feminists from both the liberal and status as a new, modern American woman Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique conflicts between Jewish couples, desertion radical wings of the women’s liberation to her advantage. She and Bernstein start a (1963) shaped the landscape of feminist and divorce no longer seemed alien to Jewish movement echoed Cahan’s condemnation of marriage criticism by exposing the supposedly family life. unequal marriage and framed revolutionary “happy housewife” as a sham, a false Although the Bintel Brief letters duly ideas about the circumstances in which consciousness cemented by the collaboration represented the dark side of immigration, a more equitable marriages could thrive. From of media, corporations, social scientists, more positive view of the opportunities of Betty Friedan to Shulamith Firestone and educators, political leaders, husbands, and New World marriage emerged as well. No Alix Kates Shulman, feminists envisioned women themselves. Marriage infantilized better example of these dual perspectives and implemented ideas and structures women, Friedan claimed, burying them can be found than the stories of Abraham that Cahan had only begun to imagine. alive in their suburban homes as if in a Cahan, the Forward ’s editor. Cahan expressed In the 1896 novella, Yekl, and his “concentration camp.” Like the victims of the collection of short stories, The Imported Holocaust, women remained passive because Bridegroom and Other Stories of the New York of the “progressive dehumanization” they Ghetto (1898), Cahan depicts couples split experienced in their status as wives. Friedan’s apart by the exigencies of Americanization, use of Holocaust imagery did not attract an inevitable process that he saw as bringing much attention at the time, and she never about loneliness, estrangement, and broken explicitly spoke about Jews in her book. But romances. Often wives are left behind because her own background growing up Jewish in their husbands modernize faster. Yet, like Peoria, Illinois, as an outsider, and the psychic Yekl (who renames himself Jake), they cast burden left by her mother’s bitterness at her off “greenhorn” wives only to find themselves own stunted life as a housewife, influenced unmoored by their new circumstances. Jake’s Friedan greatly. “When I still used to say

32 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 33 women who launched the women’s liberation from religion. In later years she insisted that the dynamic founder of the Jewish Orthodox movement a few years later provided an friends address her as “Shulamith,” not Shulie. Feminist Alliance (JOFA), were initially wary The Playwright, the Starlight, and the Rabbi: even more radical critique. In The Dialectic of Firestone’s critique of marriage resembles of ’s biting critique of marriage Sex (1970), Shulamith Firestone called for a that of another Jewish radical—anarchist because of its consequences for Jewish family A Love Triangle feminist revolution to replace marriage and Emma Goldman, who similarly railed against life. Today Greenberg has another point of Lila Corwin Berman the nuclear family by means of engineered the “sex-class” caste system of marriage as view. “How much we owe them,” she said reproduction and nontraditional households. absolutely irreconcilable with love and of these secular feminists, “how much they Marriage, she felt, was “functionally defunct”: therefore unworkable. Other radical feminists have changed the world. And here we are, met Arthur Miller when I was seventeen. it was its “political, i.e., unequal power context” saw glimmers of hope. Alix Kates Shulman’s still fighting for the , with so little He was a recipient of the Four Freedoms that made it “such a holocaust.” Firestone 1969 article, “A Marriage Agreement,” with progress made after 40 years.” Greenberg IAward (for the freedom of speech), and I came from an Orthodox, and according to its proposition that men and women sign believes that for Jewish marriage to thrive had been selected among local high school her sister, Rabbi Tirzah Firestone, a deeply contracts establishing shared child care and and fulfill Judaism’s sacred ethical principles, students to attend the ceremony, which was patriarchal, Jewish family and had studied housework, created considerable public its participants must be free and equal. She held near the Roosevelt mansion in Hyde at a Cleveland Yeshiva before attending debate. A prominent figure in Redstockings, acknowledges that the universalist vision Park, New York. I remember almost nothing Washington University and the School of the women’s liberation group established espoused by these Jewish radical feminists and about the ceremony, except for three things. the Art Institute of Chicago. Her father’s by Firestone and Ellen Willis, Shulman was their multi-sided struggle against patriarchy First, while Arthur Miller was accepting his rejection of her book—which he called “the motivated in part by the negative example of laid the groundwork for what remains a award, a friend or possibly a teacher leaned joke book of the century”—and other deep her mother, Dorothy Kates, who despite her continuing struggle for the Jewish religious into me and said, “Do you know he used to be criticisms, even from feminists, cut deeply. “worldly accomplishments,” including three community. There is still work to be done. a communist?” Second, I shook Arthur Miller’s After starting the first women’s liberationist terms as president of the Federation of Jewish hand. He had a firm, pleasant handshake, groups in the country and playing a pivotal Women of Cleveland, had been reduced to the Joyce Antler is Samuel Lane Professor of and he struck me as being the perfect height. role in promulgating the radical wing of the role of “dependent housewife.” For Shulman as American Jewish History and Culture and And third, perhaps noticing my starry-eyed movement, Firestone spent several decades well as Friedan and Firestone, a marriage with professor of Women’s and at look, that same friend or teacher told me that isolated from former colleagues and family. a subordinate partner could not be sustained. Brandeis University. Her publications include Arthur Miller and Marilyn Monroe had been Diagnosed with schizophrenia, she was in These secular Jewish feminists were You Never Call, You Never Write: A History married briefly. and out of mental hospitals until her sudden, widely influential in the United States and of the Jewish Mother (Oxford University A decade later, I opened a file stamped tragic death in the summer of 2012. Those who abroad, including among the Jewish religious Press, 2007) and The Journey Home: How “Restricted Correspondence” and found a knew her well felt that her Jewish identity community. But even passionate advocates Jewish Women Shaped Modern America series of letters written by the man who had remained strong, though she separated herself for equal religious rights like Blu Greenberg, (Pantheon Books, 1997). performed the marriage ceremony of Arthur Miller and Marilyn Monroe. New Haven rabbi, Robert Goldburg, had presided over Monroe’s conversion and officiated at a Jewish ceremony, in the wake of a civil one, for the couple. Two of the things I had learned about Release! Miller the day I met him—the allegation New that he was a communist, and the fact that he had once been married to the iconic Marilyn Monroe, Arthur Miller, Rabbi Robert E. Goldburg photo. SC-8326. Courtesy of The Jacob Rader Marcus Center of the American Jewish Archives, American beauty—rushed into my mind. Cincinnati, Ohio, americanjewisharchives.org. I stared at a photograph of Miller, Goldburg, and Monroe taken at a benefit dinner in 1959. The men in tuxedos flanked Monroe, who wore a tank dress with a lace the “great American mind” and the “great of connection to a tradition and a community, bodice. She leaned into Miller, and smiled American body”—the cerebral was the something that lasted beyond the present, at Goldburg. I could not trace Miller’s Jewish man; the corporal and sensual was the with long threads of meaning extending into line of vision. Was he gazing lovingly at Protestant-raised woman. But the presence of the past and toward a future. In epistolary his wife, or were his eyes trained on the the rabbi, one point in what surely appeared recollections after Monroe’s death, Goldburg rabbi? Was Miller grimacing or smiling? I as a triangle, interrupted the dichotomies. described her joy while studying Jewish texts thought, then, about that firm handshake. Rabbi Goldburg signed Marilyn Monroe’s with him and participating in rituals. He When writer’s block hit, I returned to conversion certificate hours before he believed he gave her something that neither the photograph. I was writing a book about performed her wedding. Though he had fame nor her husband could give her. about the Jewish perception of the lines that known Miller’s family for a number of years, Goldburg’s letters, which he wrote Thirteen luminaries of Contributorsseparated inClude: and connected Jews to non-Jews. his relationship to the new couple pivoted periodically to Jacob Rader Marcus at the the academic world explore ethics, David Berger • JoshuaYet everything Berman • about that photograph seemed around the intimacy he felt with the convert, American Jewish Archives, suggest the love Moshe Halbertal •to Ronald obscure Heifetz those • lines. Most obvious, the Monroe, and not the Jewish playwright. In he felt for Monroe. In his desire to defend his justice, religion, leadership and more. Daniel Rynhold • Jacobphotograph J. Schacter • & captured more romance across ethno- fact, Miller had not encouraged Monroe’s motives for the historical record and explain religious-racial boundaries. Those boundaries conversion, and I imagine that he, ever the that the conversion he performed was proper A Division of Koren Publishers Jerusalem certainly were not erased. Commentators secularist, must have looked upon it with and appropriate, Goldburg’s affection for and critics (such as sharp-tongued Norman some bemusement. Still, he understood that Monroe lingers. His love for Monroe may MAGGID www.korenpub.com Mailer) made much of the union between Monroe craved what the rabbi offered: a sense have indeed been requited in the way that was

34 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 35 acceptable to him—through her high regard rabbi must have been mortified when he had face to the world. For this, which has taken for him as a rebbe, a teacher, a guide. Perhaps to call the couple and let them know what his courage, we owe him a great debt.” The two this accounts for Miller’s expression in the people, their people, had decided. Proud of his men, a playwright and a rabbi, were fellow photograph of the benefit dinner, with the own FBI “red file,” Goldburg seethed at the travelers resisting a world that insisted on suggestion of a grimace cast in the direction timidity of these establishment Jews. Later, boundaries—religious, ethnic, sexual, racial. CONNECTING YOU of the rabbi, who ironically injected the he would protest the Vietnam War, invite In the United States, Jewish leaders had AJS intermarriage with a brand of Judaism that Stokely Carmichael to speak at his synagogue, fixated on Jewish marriage as the means of WITH LEADING SCHOLARS comforted Monroe more than it pleased Miller. and dismiss the kind of Jews who allowed eternal peoplehood. Time and again, they Miller would not have attended the their anxiety about were confronted with the shortcomings of DLP OF JEWISH STUDIES dinner, a fundraising event for the American into the mainstream to overshadow this formulation because marriage is not a Friends of Hebrew University, but Goldburg their concern for societal inequality. conservative institution. Rather, marriage urged him to do so. Two years earlier, In 1991, near the end of Golburg’s tends to be creative and revolutionary— Goldburg had prevailed upon the couple life, Miller explained how he had come to melding two people together, creating a to make an appearance at a United Jewish admire this rabbi—despite the coolness new unit different from what existed before, Appeal gala at the Fountainebleu in Miami that I perceived between the two in that and existing in multiple layers of identity “This is an excellent The AJS Distinguished Lectureship program and of Beach. Exercising his influence over the triangulated photograph. Miller praised the and community created by a new “we.” Program, sponsored by the Association couple, Goldburg even persuaded the reticent rabbi for stepping outside of the “narrow, Even when Miller and Monroe divorced, great benefit to Monroe to talk for three minutes about why unilinear” Jewish life that frustrated the Monroe remained close to Goldburg and , for Jewish Studies, connects you with she converted to Judaism. (“I wrote the speech playwright and that, it seems, Monroe to Miller’s family. (Miller’s father escorted universities, and dynamic speakers in the field of Jewish for her,” Goldburg recalled.) The day of the craved. According to Miller, ethnicity and Monroe to Madison Square Garden and federations.” event arrived and with it a subpoena for Miller religion left a “trail of blood, of injustices watched from the wings when Monroe –Maxine Schwartz, Studies. We will help you identify and to appear before the House Un-American and hatred” in their wake, but not so the sang happy birthday to John F. Kennedy.) Director of Development arrange a talk by a leading Jewish Activities Committee. Goldburg received word form of Judaism Goldburg endorsed. As Marriage may not transcend boundaries, and Outreach, from the United Jewish Appeal’s organizers Miller wrote, “For holding onto universal but it always crosses them. Who among us has Sue and Leonard Miller Studies scholar, enriching your next Center for Contemporary that Miller’s invitation was rescinded. The values, [Goldburg] has turned Judaism’s best maintained a deep friendship or a marriage Judaic Studies, program with one of over 300 lecture without experiencing moments of division, a University of Miami gap, even a chasm? In individual relationships, topics. Talks cover the breadth of “The AJS whether or not formed across lines of Jewish history, religion, politics, and ethnicity, religion, class, or race, we confront Distinguished places where the cry of universalism cannot Lectureship Program culture. be heard: an argument over a childrearing was an amazing find. s2013 Get 20% off decision, a difference of opinion about how to It enabled us to bring subscriptions* spend money, a conflict about responsibility. a world-renowned The lecture fee through the AJS Whatever identity markers we share, we also use promo code: AJ scholar to our Distinguished Lectureship Program is find ones that separate us—this is what is so community, which creative and revolutionary about marriage, we otherwise would $1,000. Most speakers are only available an assertion that even in our differences we not have been able through the program once per year, can function together. This is neither rigid to do. The entire so contact us soon! universalism nor narrow particularism. process was handled If we imagine in each marriage a creative with excellence, care, revolution, then we may embrace the and professionalism, Questions? Contact Natasha Perlis, Program changes and transformations—not eternal Manager, at [email protected] or 917.606.8249. sameness—that marriage in this country and we are planning in the last half of a century have brought. on making this an For more information about AJS and the The photograph, that still captivates me annual event.” lectureship program, visit www.ajsnet.org. Talmud isn’t just black & white each time I look at it, captures a moment —Aliza Orent, in that ongoing revolution, when a rabbi, Director, Jewish Life and Learning, a playwright, and a starlight stood unified § Side-by-side English-Aramaic translation Jewish Community by a Jewish tradition, at its best capacious Center of Austin § Color illustrations enough to make room for all of them. § Historical, scientific precision Lila Corwin Berman is Murray Friedman Chair § Explanations of terminology of American Jewish History and director of the Feinstein Center for American Jewish History at Founded in 1969, the Association for Jewish Studies (AJS) Temple University. Her article “Jewish Urban is the largest learned society and professional organization representing * Expires June 1, 2013 Politics in the City and Beyond” appeared recently Jewish Studies scholars worldwide. Koren Publishers Jerusalem in the Journal of American History. AJS | 15 W. 16th Street | NY, NY 10011 | www.ajsnet.org | [email protected] | 917.606.8249 www.korenpub.com

36 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 37 NEW from the Brandeis Library of Modern Jewish Thought

Jews & Diaspora Nationalism Professor of Modern Jewish History Writings on in Europe and the United States Judaic Studies Program Edited by Simon Rabinovitch Yale University's Program in Judaic Studies seeks to fill a tenured position in “This well-chosen collection of essays introduces readers to the modern Jewish history. Primary academic affiliation will be in the Program birth of this ideal in Eastern Europe, its fraught encounter with the in Judaic Studies, with anticipated appointment in the Departments of History other new ideological power in twentieth-century Jewish life— and Religious Studies, as befits the successful candidate's fields of Jewish socialism—and its adaptation to the challenges of Western specialization and methodologies within Jewish history. Candidates are democracies. It is an essential addition to the American Jewish library.” expected to have broad familiarity with the critical study of Jewish history, —Kenneth B. Moss, Felix Posen Associate Professor whether social, cultural, political, religious, or intellectual, while specializing of Modern Jewish History, Johns Hopkins University in modern Jewish history in the Americas, Western or Eastern Europe, North Africa, or the Middle East. Candidates should be thoroughly fluent in Modern Middle Eastern Jewish Thought Hebrew as a language of both primary sources and contemporary scholarship, as well as at least one other modern Jewish language (e.g., Yiddish, Ladino) Writings on Identity, Politics, and Culture, 1893 – 1958 Edited by Moshe Behar and Zvi Ben-Dor Benite or host cultural language. They should be well-grounded in modern critical approaches to the study of history, including the ability to situate Jewish “Moshe Behar and Zvi Ben-Dor Benite have done a great service to society and its history within broader cultural and comparative contexts. scholarship by bringing together sources that reflect the robust Candidates should have an outstanding record of excellence in publication discourse among Jewish intellectuals of Middle Eastern origin. They and teaching, the latter at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. The are to be heartily commended for this important act of historical successful candidate will be expected to provide academic support to existing reclamation.” resources for the study of modern Jewish history, working closely with —David N. Myers, UCLA colleagues in the Program in Judaic Studies as well as in relevant departments and programs. Yale University is an equal opportunity/affirmative action employer. Yale values diversity among its students, staff and faculty and strongly encourages applications from women and underrepresented minority scholars. Moses Mendelssohn Jews & Race Writings on Juaism, Writings on Identity and Applications, with current vitae, should be submitted online Christianity, and the Bible Difference, 1880 – 1940 https://academicjobsonline.org/ajo/jobs/2629. Inquiries and nominations can Edited by Michah Gottlieb Edited by Mitchell B. Hart be sent by e-mail to the chair of the search committee, at [email protected]. Applications will be reviewed beginning September 1, 2013.

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38 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 39 TheFrankel Frankel Institute for Institute Advanced Judaic for Studies Advanced - University of Michigan Judaic Studies UniversityFellowship of Opportunity Michigan

HERBERT D. KATZ CENTER FOR ADVANCED JUDAIC STUDIES University of Pennsylvania Fellowship Opportunity Post-Doctoral Fellowship 2014–2015 Application Deadline: November 10, 2013

NEW PERSPECTIVES ON THE ORIGINS, CONTEXT, AND DIFFUSION OF THE ACADEMIC STUDY OF JUDAISM Theme 2014-2015 From its inception, Jewish studies was a transnational endeavor characterized by a network of scholars emerging from different seedbeds. In time, modern rabbinical seminaries in central Europe and universities in France, England, the US and Israel would provide new and necessary forms of institutionalization. The needs and strategies of the discipline and its political and cultural functions varied in different countries and political Jews & Empires contexts. What the present state of the field requires is a collaborative effort to deepen our understanding of the intellectual revolution at the heart of modern Jewish history. The turn to history in the 19th century fundamentally recast the nature of Jewish thinking in Europe and beyond, influencing even those who Since the earliest age of Jewish history, Jews have maintained highly intense, complex, and challenged or rejected the dominance and mandate of historical-critical scholarship. The predominant narrative ambivalent relationships with the imperial powers of the day. While providing an exact defini- in this history of the academic study of Jews and Judaism is that of the Wissenschaft des Judentums (WdJ), tion would be difficult, empires were large political entities that sought world domination and which fulfilled crucial cultural, political, and religious functions in its day, and which, despite recent scholarship, remains to be fully contextualized. How have academic categories and methodologies framed how controlled diverse ethnic groups and territories. Although the Roman Empire gave the name to Jews and Judaism are understood—be they in parallel with Christian theology, political science, history, the concept and served as a model for future Western empires, relationships between Jews and classical philology, or in relation to traditional teaching contexts and methodologies? How might modern Jewish empires, both mythological and real, extend into the distant past, reaching into , studies be seen in comparison to other emergent ethnic and religious area studies? What can we learn from a Assyria and Babylonia, as well as the Hellenistic empire of Alexander the Great. more systematic comparative study of different religious or national currents within WdJ and other parallel academic developments in Jewish studies? Proposals might address the following questions:

• How did and does WdJ function in the struggle for emancipation and against anti-Semitism in varying The theme of “Jews and Empires” presents a good vantage point for comparative and interdisci- national contexts? plinary examination of aspects of political, economic, social, and cultural history, as well as • How was Jewish scholarship influenced by its institutional home or lack thereof? comparative study of religions, arts and literatures, languages, historical geography and anthro- • What role did Jewish scholars play in the establishment and conceptualization of Oriental and Islamic pology. It invites scholars of social sciences and humanities, as well as creative artists, to engage studies? And vice versa. • To what extent did the WdJ engage with, build on, and depart from, the scholarly legacy of Christian in productive dialogues across time and space. Questions to be considered include the possi- Hebraism and Renaissance humanism, and the historical-critical approach to the Bible in the late 18th and bilities of developing theoretical paradigms to describe the nature of Jewish-imperial relation- early 19th century? ships. In addition, the theme encourages scholars to explore specific issues related to the inter- • What extra-scholarly motives drove the development or neglect of some fields? To what extent were those actions of Jews and empires in particular geographic and historical contexts, from ancient aims achieved, and what do its failures reveal about European-Jewish history in the 19th and 20th Egypt to contemporary America. The “imperial turn” in Jewish Studies can offer new illuminating centuries? • Which disciplines other than history have shaped the development of the WdJ? perspectives on such diverse range of issues as anti-Semitism and the Holocaust, Zionism and • What impact has the rise of Jewish nationalism and Zionism had on the direction of Jewish scholarship, such Jewish statehood, relationships among Judaism, Christianity and Islam, international trade and as the politics of archaeology, the place of messianism in Jewish history, or the history of communal commerce. institutions, even the funding of academic chairs? • By what channels did the results of critical scholarship reach a broader public, and which audiences exactly? The theme's significance extends beyond traditional limits of Jewish studies. “Jews and Empires”

The Katz Center invites applications from scholars in the humanities and social sciences at all levels, as well as invites applications touching upon the broader questions of minority status, ethnicity and outstanding graduate students in the final stage of writing their dissertations. Stipend amounts are based on a identity, migration and mobility, diaspora, and power. fellow’s academic standing and financial need with a maximum of $50,000 for the academic year. Fellowship recipients will be notified by February 1, 2014. The deadline for applications is October 9, 2013. Applications are available on our website: katz.sas.upenn.edu Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies 420 Walnut Street Philadelphia, PA 19106 Tel: 215-238-1290, ext. 505; fax: 215-238-1540 For more information and application materials, contact For questions contact Carrie Love email: [email protected] The Frankel Institute for Advanced Judaic Studies at 734.763.9047 or [email protected]. www.lsa.umich.edu/judaic

40 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 41 The Hand that Rocks the Cradle: How the Gender of the Jewish Parent Influences Intermarriage Keren McGinity

ntermarriage, like all marriage, is a they had intermarried or not, the extent of the children’s Jewish upbringing became a relationship of power. How the power is their change over time suggests that being significant component of Jewish identity for Idivided depends on two things: gender Jewish while married to a non-Jew usually some intermarried fathers. The shift over the and who negotiated for what, either before heightened women’s consciousness about course of one’s life could be striking. During or after saying “I do.” If intermarriage has the being Jewish. When Bonnie Aaronson his college years Allan Benjamin preferred to potential to strengthen the Jewish people planned her 1981 wedding, she had a very “pass” as a member of the (Christian) majority (along with institutions of education, such as strong cultural and social identity as a Jew, rather than joining a Jewish fraternity, but summer camp or trips to Israel), it is critically but she was not a religious person. However, after intermarrying and becoming a father, he important to understand the influence of in the late 1980s after Bonnie had two accompanied his children to Tot and the gender of the Jewish member in the children, she became actively involved in listened to Jewish CDs. Allan reflected, “As marital union. Analyzing gender—the roles her temple and co-chaired a committee that the kids grow, I’m becoming more open, more of both men and women combined with the created an alternative High Holiday service. Jewish. I’m now somehow a board member relationship between the two sexes—is key Interviewed nearly twenty years after she of the Jewish Community Center. Seven to a full understanding of the meaning of wed, Bonnie remarked, “I have changed years ago, I’d be looking at you like ‘where is Jewish intermarriage because gender informs pretty dramatically in terms of my Jewish the JCC?’” Although reawakening of Jewish how men and women raise children. My practice and observance . . . in the course of identity in a father is similar to the experience research focuses on heterosexual marriages, our marriage.” Among the intermarried Jewish of the Jewish mother, the men’s parenting is therefore much remains to be understood women I have interviewed, having children often secondary to his professional pursuits. about the gender dynamics within same-sex made them decidedly proactive about making Although the men who participated in intermarriage regarding parenting Jewish Jewish connections, about observance, and my research are invested in trying to balance offspring. about Jewish education. The experience or integrate their careers with fatherhood, the How intermarried women and men of having children also forced women to social reality of finding time for involvement experience parenthood is essential to come to terms with the inadequacies of with their children is an uphill battle. increasing the likelihood that they will their own Jewish upbringing and to look The non-Jewish wife of a Jewish man who raise children to identify as Jews. When a for creative ways to teach their children intermarried in 1997 said that she was glad to Jewish woman intermarries and becomes a (and themselves) about Jewish heritage. have a Jewish family, but the extent to which parent and when a Jewish man intermarries Men may also experience an awakening they were Jewish would be his responsibility. “Mending Old Cradle Family Home Cat Kitten Stocks” by A. Stocks from Illustrated London, 1873. and becomes a parent, their experiences of their Jewish identity when they marry Her reasons were not an outgrowth of feminist are different. The influence of becoming a and become parents, regardless of whether thinking, but rather stemmed from the reality parent on their respective Jewish identities, they intermarry or in-marry, due to greater that she is not Jewish and would not know however, is surprisingly similar. Jewish communal opportunities. Historically and how to go about it. He pointed out, “The only men continue to be the main breadwinners respond to intermarriage and interact can become Jewish role models in their identity is maintained, transformed, and at present, the organized Jewish community problem with that theory is that I’m at work for their families while women continue with the individual people involved. The families even if their own fathers were not. reinvented in ways that are authentically directs much of its programming toward 60 or 70 hours every week. ” There was not to be the information gatherers and social acceptance of patrilineal descent by the For example, intermarried Jewish men can meaningful to people who self-identify as family units rather than to single Jewish men much time to ensure his children’s Jewish organizers, maintaining greater influence Reform and Reconstructionist movements light Shabbat candles, read Jewish bedtime Jewish and intermarry. It also demonstrates or women. Still it appears that intermarriage cultural or religious education. Consequently, than their husbands over children’s ethnic allows children of intermarried parents to stories, and transmit their love of Jewish why intermarried Jewish men are believed to influenced a deepening of men’s Jewish the children attended a Conservative Jewish and religious upbringing. Women’s hands be counted as Members of the Tribe. It now culture to their offspring. For children of raise less Jewish children than intermarried identities in relation to their Gentile-born day school from kindergarten through rock the cradle, so to speak. As a result, remains for the Conservative movement Jewish fathers to become as strongly identified Jewish women (Sylvia Fishman and Daniel spouses and through becoming fathers. For second grade where they were exposed to men’s presence where Jewish identity to validate the status of the children of Jews as the children of Jewish Parmer, Matrilineal Ascent/Patrilineal Charles Revkin, being Jewish meant being part more practices of Judaism than their father. is nurtured (at home, the community intermarriage and to acknowledge the requires that intermarried Jewish men step Descent [Brandeis University, 2008]). of a community and he acknowledged that The family transitioned the children to a center, the school, the synagogue) is more influence of the roles of Jewish husbands up to the parenting plate. Perhaps then the My qualitative research indicates that it became more important as he got older. “It public school in 2010, and their home life limited. Gender will persist in influencing and fathers, allowing them to retain their Conservative movement will include their when people who are intermarried become was a combination of circumstances,” Charles does not include Jewish ritual or observance. the disproportionately low transmission affiliation with the movement of their choice. children as full members of klal yisrael rather parents, they also become more conscious of explained, “where I married someone non- It remains to be seen to what extent this rate of Jewish identity to children of Intermarried Jewish men can raise Jewish than labeling them as “patrilineal Jews.” Jewish identity and of Judaism. Women who Jewish and then . . . I knew I wanted to raise father will be able to foster his children’s intermarried men compared to intermarried children as effectively as intermarried Jewish participated in my study described intensified my kids Jewish. I know mothers tend to play developing Jewish identities without the Jewish women so long as “men’s work” women as long as they understand that it Keren R. McGinity is research associate Jewish identities, increased religious practices, an important role in that. Here we were not built-in support of a day school environment. outside the home continues to be more is their responsibility to do so, ideally in at the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute. or both. Although they may have become gonna have a Jewish mother, so it’s almost The challenge for intermarried men valued than “women’s work” inside it. partnership with their spouses. The Jewish She is author of Unexpected Partners: “more Jewish” once they became mothers, a like an overreaction to make sure it gets raising Jewish children is the tenacity of Jewish continuity depends on how community must reinforce their effort by Intermarriage and Jewish Fatherhood typical American Jewish pattern, whether done.” Assuming a proactive role regarding traditional gender roles. For the most part, the respective movements within Judaism validating their familial contributions. Men (Indiana University Press, forthcoming).

42 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 43 roots that has been in the news lately. The long-term monogamous relationships that which is a post-kiddushin set of limitations and Critiquing and Rethinking Kiddushin Chief Judge of the Jerusalem Rabbinical Court are neither promiscuous nor kiddushin. obligations. Instead it is a written account of Rachel Adler and the Sephardic Chief Rabbi ruled (July I propose such a relationship in the stipulations that shape the partnership. 17, 2012) that when a man is prevented from Engendering Judaism, the B’rit Ahuvim. The B’rit Ahuvim is both a business having children by his wife’s infertility or The B’rit Ahuvim draws on the research of relationship and a covenant. Like a business he word is out in both the Diaspora Tweaked Kiddushin B’Nissuin u’v’Get (Conditions on Marriage refusal, he may, in some cases, be permitted Mordecai Akiva Friedman (Jewish Marriage relationship, it acknowledges fundamental to take a concubine. A concubine, according in Palestine: A Cairo Geniza Study, 2 vols. [Tel and Israel: the classic form of Jewish Two of the most popular ways of remedying and Divorce [Mosad ha- K. uk. , 1966]). economic and social concerns. As in a Tmarriage known as kiddushin has these problems among non-Orthodox Jews Precisely formulated conditions upon the act to b.Sanhedrin 21a, has no ketubah and does Aviv University, 1980–1981]). Many of the covenant, the partners are committed problems. Critiques and remedies are are double-ring ceremonies and creative of kiddushin itself ensure that if the husband not require a get. Historically, a small but eighty Palestinian Friedman found in ultimately to one another rather than to the presented from Orthodox and non-Orthodox ketubot. Whether it is valid for a couple to is not able or willing to give a divorce within significant minority of legal decisors have the Geniza contained a stipulation enabling stipulations they promise to fulfill, and sources. An entire issue of Sh’ma (June 2010) exchange rings is a matter of controversy. a specified time, the marriage is retroactively permitted concubines. is an the wife to initiate divorce proceedings and therefore the covenant may survive covenant has been devoted to rethinking Jewish Both the Orthodox decisor, Rabbi Moshe annulled. Children resulting from a marriage untidy and ahistorical category containing requiring the husband to divorce her upon transgression. Like a business partnership, weddings. Feinstein and the Conservative Rabbi Isaac that was later retroactively annulled are the secondary wives of the patriarchs, the her request. Some of the ketubot refer to the the B’rit Ahuvim can be dissolved by the Klein believe that the marriage is valid once legitimate, and sexual intercourse prior to concubines of kings, Greco-Roman hetairas, marriage as a shutafut, a partnership. One withdrawal of either one of the partners. The Trouble With Kiddushin the husband has given a ring even if the bride retroactive is not considered amicae, and concubinae, and the mistresses quotes the prophet Malachi (2:14) referring This withdrawal should be confirmed by a Critics allege that the legal structure of reciprocates with a ring and a statement. promiscuity because the spouses had the of medieval Spanish-Jewish aristocrats. to the wife as chaverati v’eshet b’riti,“my bet din. kiddushin is a format for inequality in the Rabbi Feinstein forbids the practice, and intention of sex within marriage. Melanie In “Partnerships According to Halakah companion and my covenanted wife.” The Conservative movement has adopted marital relationship. Wives are biblically Rabbi Klein permits it. Landau, an Australian scholar, has published but without and Kiddushin,” [in Drawing on the language of both the theoretical structure of B’rit Ahuvim for required to be monogamous; husbands Creative ketubot, written by the couple, a searching critique of kiddushin and its Hebrew] Academot 17, 2006, Zvi Zohar business relations and covenant, I have gay marriage, although not the ritual structure are not. Kiddushin is rooted in property have no legal force either in Jewish or civil alternatives. Her book, Tradition and Equality attempts to establish concubinage as a designed a ceremony to remove marriage from I offer. Ironically, the New York Post reported law. In the first chapter of the Talmudic law. They would be superseded by the in Jewish Marriage (Continuum, 2012), has justification for premarital relations. Others property law and resituate it in partnership dissatisfaction among Conservative women tractate Kiddushin, valid methods of classical ketubah. Some Orthodox couples an informative chapter on conditional have proposed it as an alternative to kiddushin law. Instead of the husband acquiring the that although a more egalitarian structure acquiring a wife are analogous to ways of write addenda to the ketubah in a separate marriage and the Berkovits t’nai. for secular Israeli couples. Concubinage is wife or of mutual acquisition, the partners now existed, they were left with kiddushin. acquiring slaves, land, animals, and other document and, in some cases, make a neder, a hard sell to feminists, however. If being acquire the partnership itself. This central Warning: the natives are still restless. chattel. As Gail Labovitz demonstrates in a vow, about the contents of the document. Kiddushin Alternatives purchased is unappealing, being leased act replaces the , the espousal portion her interdisciplinary study, Marriage and Rob and Lamelle Ryman published material Because kiddushin involves many risks and long term is hardly more attractive. The of the marriage ceremony. The partners Rachel Adler is professor of Modern Jewish Metaphor (Lexington Books, 2009), the Talmud from their kiddushin on the Internet (www. requires so much tweaking, alternatives fact is that the tradition has no model of draw up a shtar b’rit with agreed-upon Thought and Feminist Studies at Hebrew Union frequently uses objectifying metaphors of journeymama.net), including a document have been suggested. Rabbi Meir Simcha an egalitarian relationship. I have argued stipulations, similar to the tailor-made College-Jewish Institute of Religion, Los Angeles owning and buying in regard to marriage. where the husband pledges sexual fidelity, a Feldblum, an Israeli rabbi, proposes Derekh in Engendering Judaism (Jewish Publication Palestinian ketubot that delineate the couple’s campus. She is the author of Engendering Women complain that the bride in a “living” ketubah, and documents facilitating Kiddushin, or quasi-marriage (“Ba’ayot Agunot Society, 1998) that concubinage is not a single major obligations to one another. This Judaism: An Inclusive Theology and Ethics classical kiddushin must be passive and silent, delivery of a get. The Orthodox rabbi Steven U’Mamzerim” Dinei Yisrael XIX). Derekh category, but a placeholder for varieties of partnership deed, however, is not a ketubah, (Jewish Publication Society, 1998). her silence signifying consent. Furthermore, Greenberg, who is gay, describes officiating at a Kiddushin has its origins in a Talmudic case kiddushin requires the man to acquire the gay marriage effected entirely by mutual vows. in which the couple wished to be married woman unilaterally. Mutual acts of espousal Some Orthodox couples are giving but was technically ineligible to contract a are specifically ruled out. The preferred the bride a voice in the ceremony. In their valid marriage. The relationship the rabbis method of acquisition is kinyan kesef, buying ceremony (JOFA Journal 1998–99), Drs. Beverly permitted them to contract was not judged the woman from herself with a token of easily Gribbetz and Ed Greenstein used an ancient to constitute promiscuity but did not meet specifiable but slight value. A gold ring, with variant formula for acquisition: The groom all the requirements for a rabbinic marriage 18K engraved inside is is now commonly said, “Behold you are my wife and I am your and therefore did not require a get. used. Because only a man can acquire, only man (ishekh)” and the bride responded, “I am Rabbi Feldblum argues that no woman the husband can renounce his acquisition. your wife and you are my man.” Her statement today would consent to kiddushin if she Halakically, women cannot effect their own does not effectuate acquisition but simply understood that she was allowing herself , divorces. Hence, if a husband becomes acknowledges his acquisition; however it is to be acquired. Since there can be no mentally incapable of giving a get (divorce participatory. The use of “your man” rather kiddushin with an adult woman without contract), has disappeared, or simply refuses to than the usual term for husband, ba’al, her consent, it follows that most marriages divorce, his wife is trapped. She cannot get out master or owner, recalls Hosea’s prophecy are actually invalid. This unwillingness of of the marriage becoming an agunah, a chained (2:16) in which the covenant-marriage modern women to consent to acquisition woman. If she remarries counter to halakah, is reconciled: “You shall call Me Ishi, (my constitutes, then, an ineligibility to contract her subsequent children will be stigmatized man)/ No longer shall you call me my ba’al.” valid kiddushin. Instead of kiddushin, Rabbi as mamzerim, ineligible to marry other Jews. In other ceremonies, after the groom has Feldblum suggests a kiddushin-like ceremony Some couples complain that the pronounced the acquisition formula, the that would not include a get, and not result Babylonian boilerplate ketubah, signed by woman recites a verse from . in agunot and mamzerim when no get is the husband, witnessed, and given to the given. There is a divorce procedure if the wife, does not reflect the conditions or issues The Berkovits T’nai marriage is unsuccessful, but it is not a of a modern marriage. Finally, although Some couples, to protect the wife from unilateral de-acquisitioning by the man. gay, lesbian, and transgender couples seek becoming an agunah, are contracting This divorce procedure, in Feldblum’s authentic Jewish ways to marry, most consider kiddushin al t’nai, conditional marriages, opinion, differentiates Derekh Kiddushin from kiddushin inappropriate to their needs. based on Dr. Eliezer Berkovits’s book, T’nai concubinage, another solution with Talmudic

44 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 45 I’d like to suggest that there are three (2) Use a formula that does not create kiddushin makes a statement of his/her own change of Kiddushin, Marriage, and Egalitarian Relationships: approaches currently being pursued, while legally, but which preserves something of the status: “Behold, I betroth myself to you.” also noting that the categories are likely language and/or appearance of kiddushin. Making New Legal Meanings to change, develop, and grow over time. These two proposals come from very (3) Replace kiddushin entirely with another Gail Labovitz different ideological perspectives and have legal model. (1) Make kiddushin mutually binding different intent, yet use similar means. Both Rachel Adler, in Engendering Judaism, and/or legally neutralize the harmful attempt to mimic the appearance and even states that kiddushin and the metaphor of he feminist critique of traditional wife from remarrying or even having another “Some authorities object . . . especially if the effects of its unilateral nature. some of the assumptions of marriage through ownership cannot be redeemed. While she Jewish marriage through the legal relationship under Jewish law. formula used by the bride is the same as the What these proposals have in common kiddushin, while also deliberately seeking to holds that two “reciprocal” acts of kiddushin Tmechanism of kiddushin has been amply For some, the response has been to seek one used by the groom. Legally, however, is recourse to the legal mechanisms of avoid creating actual legal bonds of kiddushin. ought to legally cancel each other out, articulated in a wide selection of writings. ways in which to give the bride a more active there can be no objection. Once the traditional conditional kiddushin; each embeds conditions Meir Simha Feldblum (Dine Yisrael XIX) nonetheless “it commodifies human beings. In its classic form, kiddushin is something role, such as suggesting responses she can formula has been recited the betrothal is into the kiddushin declarations that are writes from an Orthodox Israeli perspective, The groom’s commodification and acquisition that a man does to change the legal status make to actively indicate her acceptance of binding, and whatever is added is of no legal meant to make the statements of the two to address the social problems of agunot of the bride is not rectified by the bride’s of a woman, centering on the statement, the kiddushin. Many Orthodox decisors, and significance” (Isaac Klein, A Guide to Jewish parties provisional upon each other. The (women whose husbands withhold divorces) retaliation in kind” (191). Rather, a new “Behold, you (feminine) are betrothed to for even some Conservative ones, discourage the Religious Practice [Jewish Theological Seminary topic is complex, but it should be stated and mamzerim (children born to “adulterous” ceremony with a new legal basis is needed. me (masculine)”; the bride need only silently bride from presenting a ring to the groom of America , 1979], 396; emphasis added). It is that most Orthodox authorities do not unions, as when the mother’s prior marriage Adler turns to rabbinic discussions of the accept the token of kiddushin (typically a ring). during the ceremony, ruling that this turns still the case within both Conservative and accept the validity of such conditions, on was not severed by a proper get and is formation of business partnerships, known in Metaphorical associations with acquisition the transaction into an equal exchange and Orthodox practice that when a marriage ends the understanding that living together in therefore considered still in force under Jewish mishnaic and Talmudic passages as “placing and purchase (as in mKiddushin 1:1, “a nullifies the groom’s acquisition of her, but the man will be required to give the woman a marriage cancels out conditions of betrothal. law). Those in these situations have limited [money] in a pouch,” to create a ceremony she woman is acquired in three ways . . .”) further some permit it if a sufficient separation is get, regardless of whether “mutual” kiddushin Conditional kiddushin is accepted in the (mamzerim) or no (agunot) marriage options names “B’rit Ahuvim,” “Lover’s Covenant.” serve to emphasize the inequality of roles made between the two acts or if the bride took place; she is not required or able to give Conservative Movement. In Jill Jacobs under Jewish law. He further notes that many In this ceremony each of the two partners (of and statuses. A key legal effect of kiddushin makes no reciprocal statement “acquiring” him a get instead or in return. and Guy Austrian’s proposal (Conservative modern, non-Orthodox women would reject any gender combination) places an item of is to enact exclusive, nonreciprocal sexual the groom. Indeed, while such mutualized The question for those who wish Judaism 63:3), each party makes the kiddushin the premises of kiddushin were such premises value—a ring or something else chosen for its access for the man to the woman (she does statements—i.e., each participant declares to proceed in an egalitarian direction contingent on the other’s willingness to be fully understood. Thus, while he continues significance to the participant—into a bag and not, legally, have exclusive sexual rights the other “set aside”—may reflect the actual (whether between different-sex or same- obligated by the terms of the egalitarian to privilege kiddushin as the optimal form of lift the bag together, thereby each acquiring over him). Thus, kiddushin also assumes expectations of the couple for a union of sex couples) while also taking into ketubah, marriage contract, which they marriage, he proposes that marriage done “in rights and responsibilities in the partnership. heteronormativity; the participants must be sexual and emotional exclusivity on both consideration the Jewish legal framework draft; each also invites the other to “be my the manner of kiddushin” be allowed into the of differing genders in order to assign roles. sides, it does not typically follow that they of marriage, is this: Can there be Jewish life partner” rather than using language of legal system as a new form of valid connection. The concerns that remain are several. Allow Moreover, the unilateral nature of the creation will have control over the legal meaning given marriage without unilateral kiddushin? kiddushin. Whether this is mutual kiddushin In such a ceremony the groom would use me to highlight two, which are interrelated. of marriage means that its dissolution is also to the mutual kiddushin. Even some of the Is a marriage still recognized as Jewish or a form of kiddushin that makes explicit the words “harei at m’yuhedet li” (behold, you Both hinge on the impulse among decisors enacted by the husband alone; he must undo decisors who permit mutual statements limit if kiddushin is reconfigured to be mutual the need for female consent is not entirely are singled out for me), a formula which is of Jewish law (and other legal systems) to his acquisition of her. A divorce document, their legal scope. Consider, for example, the and the harmful effects of its unilateral clear, nor is it clear that a new format would mentioned in bKiddushin 6a and later codes assimilate new cases and unfamiliar acts the get, can be withheld by the (ex)husband as view expressed by Rabbi Isaac Klein, a legal nature are legally neutralized, or enacted be necessary for dissolving this kiddushin as only doubtfully creating kiddushin and into already established categories. First, a matter of spite or extortion, preventing the authority of the Conservative Movement: through a different method altogether? or whether the woman could dissolve the hence not, he argues, demanding a get to be the closer an alternative ceremony looks kiddushin herself by subsequent removal of severed. Although the couple foregoes the to traditional kiddushin, the more likely her consent to the conditions. The authors acquisitional nature of kiddushin and the that it will be assimilated by traditionalist also note, “our ceremony seeks to solve unilateral divorce process, the ceremony as authorities under the rubric of kiddushin, problems of patriarchy and sexism in Feldblum imagines it is still hardly egalitarian. such that a get will be required to sever it. . . . kiddushin between a man and a woman, and David Greenstein (G’vanim 5) argues for The author of the Mah Rabu blog , therefore does not necessarily address the a more thorough-going rejection of kiddushin however, questions whether one ought to particular needs of same-sex couples” (40). in its traditional form, as it relies on a “theory be concerned about legal meanings imposed A proposal on the blog “Mah Rabu” of marriage” very different from that held from outside, at the expense of creating one’s (mahrabu.blogspot.com/2010/06/wedding by most modern couples. His rejection of own egalitarian legal meanings. A second -industrial-complex-and-kant-as.html), on mutualizing traditional kiddushin rests question follows: If not deemed kiddushin, the other hand, explicitly aims to create also on legal grounds, in keeping with the such connections may still be absorbed into mutual kiddushin, with conditions built view of Issac Klein, cited earlier. He does, the traditional system under other definitions, into the statements each party makes to the however, embrace the concept of exclusivity such as licentiousness, or even concubinage. other such that one kiddushin should not that kiddushin represents, “the sense of If no get is demanded, then is this sufficient? go into effect (or stay in effect) unless the exclusive ‘ownership’ that is inherent in Are negative, undesirable definitions imposed other does also, and vice versa. In regards feeling love for another should be preserved from outside relevant? To what extent do to divorce, if one of the parties chooses to and acknowledged—as a feeling and claim the authors of these proposals, and others terminate his/her act of kiddushin, then the that each is entitled to have regarding the that might follow in their wake, hope to condition on which the other person’s act other.” Like Feldman, he also turns to a create new legal meanings, and for whom? of kiddushin rests is no longer valid. This form of marital declaration mentioned, format would also appear to be applicable but explicitly rejected as nonbinding, in Gail Labovitz is associate professor of Rabbinic to a marriage of same-sex partners, since rabbinic and later halakic writings. On this Literature at American Jewish University. Her unlike in classical halakah, it presumes that basis he proposes a ceremony in which each book, Marriage and Metaphor: Constructions kiddushin is a process that may be performed partner (of any gender combination) does of Gender in Rabbinic Literature (Lexington B’rit Ahuvim ceremony. Courtesy of Rabbis Amitai and Julie Pelc Adler. by and binding on persons of either gender. not attempt to “acquire” the other, but rather Books, 2009), recently came out in paperback.

46 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 47 SAMI ROHR PRIZE The Unwritten Diary of Israel Unger Carolyn Gammon and Israel Unger FOR JEWISH LITERATURE $24.99 Paper • 234 pp., 91 b/w illus. • 978-1-55458-831-2 • Life Writing series Israel Unger and his family hid for two years during WW II in an attic crawl space in Tarnow, Poland. Against all odds, they emerged alive and eventually emigrated to Canada in 1951. Unger had a stellar academic career, married, and raised a family in Fredericton, New Bruns- wick. His “unwritten diary” is as much a story of a young immigrant making a life in Canada as it is a Holocaust story.

“[The Unwritten Diary of Israel Unger] is a powerful story of courage, survival, humility, and To recognize emerging writers who love—love of family, love of community, and love of peace, justice, and truth.... Unger and his demonstrate a fresh vision and evidence collaborator, Carolyn Gammon, wrote this book clearly intending to tell the story of an extraor- dinary life.… Like so many works motivated by passion and discovery and framed within the of future contribution to the Jewish lexicon. borders of historical and family narratives, this book became a journey of self-discovery and narrative renewal.... This book of memory is as finely written an account of a life as I have read.” The $100,000 fiction and non-fiction prizes – Richard Blaquiere, Bugle-Observer (Woodstock, NB) are awarded in alternate years. Out of Time: The Vexed Life of Georg Tintner Tanya Buchdahl Tintner Congratulations to the $39.99 Paper • 430 pp., 40 b/w illus. • 978-1-55458-938-8 2013 Fiction Winners & Finalists: “An important book ... an invaluable book that can be recommended to music lovers just as highly as the conductor’s Bruckner recordings on Naxos, which received outstanding reviews Francesca Segal, Winner all over the world.” – Rémy Franck,Pizzicato (Luxembourg) Ben Lerner, Choice Award “This book ... has been immaculately put together,fully illustrated, footnoted, indexed and deftly Shani Boianjiu, Finalist written with a candour that usually eludes family members who tackle biographies. Tanya Stuart Nadler, Finalist Tintner’s long experience as a writer and deep understanding of her fascinating subject is evi- dent on every absorbing page.” – Peter Shaw, New Zealand Listener Asaf Schurr, Finalist

Mapping Canada’s Music: Selected Writings of Helmut Kallmann In conjunction with this Prize, the Rohr family has John Beckwith and Robin Elliott, editors established the Sami Rohr Jewish Literary Institute, $59.99 Hardcover • 292 pp., 19 b/w illus., 1 colour photo • 978-1-55458-891-6 • Life Writing series a community devoted to the continuity of Jewish literature. Mapping Canada’s Music is a selection of writings by the late Canadian music librarian and histo- rian Helmut Kallmann (1922–2012). Most of the writing deals with aspects of Canadian music, but some is autobiographical. Of the seventeen selected writings by Kallmann, five have never Read about the awardees at before been published; many of the others are from difficult-to-locate sources. They include www.jewishbookcouncil.org critical and research essays, reports, reflections, and memoirs. In one essay, Kallmann recalls growing up in a middle-class Jewish family in 1930s Berlin under the spectre of Nazism. Each since inception in 2007 chapter is prefaced with an introduction by the editors. Twoinitial chapters offer a biography of Winners: Gal Beckerman, Sana Krasikov, Lucette Lagnado, Kenneth B. Kallmann and an assessment of his contributions to Canadian music. Moss, Austin Ratner, Francesca Segal, Sarah Abrevaya Stein, Tamar Yellin Choice Award: Ilana M. Blumberg, Eric L. Goldstein, Abigail Green, Discipline, Devotion, and Dissent: Jewish, Catholic, and Amir Gutfreund, Michael Lavigne, Ben Lerner, Joseph Skibell, Dalia Islamic Schooling in Canada Finalists: Elisa Albert, Naomi Alderman, Allison Amend, Graham P. McDonough, Nadeem A. Memon, and Avi I. Mintz, editors Lila Corwin Berman, Shani Boianjiu, Ruth Franklin, Yael Hedaya, $39.99 Paper • 282 pp. • 978-1-55458-841-1 Nadia Kalman, Ari Kelman, Jonathan B. Krasner, Anne Landsman, As Canada’s population becomes more religiously diverse, the continued establishment and James Loeffler, Michael Makovsky, Stuart Nadler, Julie Orringer, support of faith-based schools has reignited debates about whether they should be funded Danya Ruttenberg, Asaf Schurr, Anya Ulinich, Haim Watzman publicly and to what extent they threaten social cohesion. Discipline, Devotion, and Dissent exam- ines Jewish, Catholic, and Islamic schooling in Canada to address the aims and practices that characterize these schools, how they prepare their students to become citizens of a multicul- tural Canada, and how they respond to dissent in the classroom

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48 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 49 European rabbis, which culminated in 1930 from Judaism, especially among . on unequal power dynamics that needs to be Beyond the Sanctification of Subordination: in the publication of a collection of these His article is another wonderful example transformed if it is to serve as the basis for rabbinic protests, Ein Tenai be Nissuin. In of halakic creativity that is motivated by Jewish families. Reclaiming Tradition and Equality in Jewish Marriage response to this collection, Rabbi Eliezer ethical concerns. Appropriating dormant Others have advocated for equal Melanie Landau Berkovits defended conditional marriage in legal traditions, such as those mentioned ceremonies, without acquisition, that are Tenai be Nissuin u’v’Get, published in 1966. above, in order to align praxis with current still called kiddushin. This approach—of As well as the interesting and relevant moral concerns is an important feminist keeping the concept of kiddushin but shifting The status of a human as an acquisition, content, the dialogue that these publications methodology. its meanings—pays tribute to the canon that is surely not acceptable to me, and contain is a stunning example of divergent In grappling with the non-reciprocity but radically transforms it at the same time. the fact that it’s not mutual, that the man understandings of the role of halaka and the of marriage and the acquisition of the wife Such a model maintains the rabbinic concept acquires the woman . . . and of course all relevance of moral agency of the legal decider. by the man, some have opted for a totally of kiddushin while equalizing its power the problems that come after— that a Conditional marriage partially renewed model, like Rachel Adler’s Brit differential. Mutuality explicitly defies the woman can’t divorce, and that if she is avoids the nonreciprocity of the kiddushin. Ahuvim. Although I honor her project, I rabbinic definition of kiddushin. This may unfaithful her children are “mamzerim.” Although the woman is still “acquired,” wanted to use an alternative to kiddushin that be possible and desirable in the long run. This is terroristic rule of women’s sexuality the marriage is retroactively nullified if the has its basis in the tradition and transform But for the moment, I think that a process that is not applied to men. I don’t think it is husband exercises his nonreciprocal powers it in that way. needs to begin in which both women and healthy at all for a couple to live with the and refuses to give the wife a divorce. Many others have continued with the men become aware of traditional kiddushin, awareness of power relations such as these. Derekh Kiddushin is the other model acquisition model but departed from tradition its implications, and possible ramifications. I address. It also has Talmudic precedent by making the acquisition “egalitarian,” for Orthodox women who value equality also —Tehila (although applied in a different situation example, through double ring ceremonies need to take the risk and refuse to participate in the Talmud) and refers to an exclusive in which the woman expresses a reciprocal in traditional kiddushin. At a time of potential relationship that is mutually contracted. statement of betrothal similar to the man. union with a beloved, and connection I find kiddushin humiliating. The kiddushin Rabbi Meir Simcha Feldblum reintroduced My reading of kiddushin as unreconcilably with the Divine, no woman should have to itself humiliates me. It humiliates me in a deep this model of partnership in his article nonreciprocal and in need of utter participate in something that is at odds with way and represents everything I oppose in my (in Hebrew): “The Problem of Agunot and transformation suggests a radical break from her deepest values and commitments. whole being. And what was so hard for me—I Mamzerim: A Suggested Overall and General the status quo. Instead of emphasizing the can cry just thinking about it—that here I am, Solution.” The article was his response to holiness of marriage and its centrality to Melanie Malka Landau is researcher at Monash at the moment that would be so important ethical concerns about the plight of agunot Jewish family and Jewish community, it University and director of the Or HaLev Center to me going to stand in a public way in front and mamzerim, as well as the alienation interprets kiddushin as a relationship based for Jewish Spirituality and Meditation. of everyone who I love and who is important to me, and I am going to allow halakah to relate to me in a way that I think is forbidden for anyone to relate to a woman ever! The Robert A. and Sandra S. Borns

—Shlomit Jewish Studies Program at Indiana University Master’s Degree in Jewish Studies few months ago in my hometown Doctoral Minor of Melbourne, Australia, I told an Author facilitating a conditional marriage. Photo courtesy of Rachel Sacks-Davis. Yiddish Minor AOrthodox rabbi and community day Extensive Graduate Fellowships school principal that I write about Jewish PENN STATE’S marriage. He asked me, tongue in cheek, “Are JEWISH STUDIES PROGRAM you ‘for’ or ‘against’?” my translations) enter into such agreements Kiddushin. First, I discuss conditional “Proceed with caution!” I responded. for a range of complex and difficult reasons marriage where the marriage is conditional CHAIKEN FAMILY CHAIR And I wasn’t joking. Kiddushin, and the not within the scope of this essay. on the husband not to withhold a get. In IN JEWISH STUDIES acquisition of the woman by the man that In addition to the inequality of the the event that he does withhold a get, after it entails, is a dangerous enterprise. structure and formation of the relationship, a specified period then the marriage is The current nonreciprocal model of the possibility of a woman being stranded in considered retroactively nullified. After civil Seeking a distinguished scholar kiddushin is not an appropriate contract for a marriage because of a recalcitrant husband divorce was introduced in French courts in of Modern European Jewish History a relationship between equals. Many, if not, is a risk that no Jewish woman should be 1884, French Jews were concerned about most women would not agree to such a forced to take in the twenty-first century. Jewish women getting divorced civilly and and/or Holocaust Studies. relationship if they knew what it entailed. My recently published book Tradition then remarrying without a Jewish divorce. Other women who know what it entails, (such and Equality in Jewish Marriage: Beyond the They received permission from Rabbi Eliyahu as those quoted above from Koren, You Are Sanctification of Subordination (Continuum, Hazan, the Chief Rabbi of Alexandria, to For more information visit Goodbody Hall 326 • 1011 E. Third Street Hereby Renewed Unto Me: Gender, Religion and 2012) explores two particular alternative introduce conditional marriage, in order to jewishstudies.la.psu.edu Bloomington, IN 47405-7005 Power Relations in the Ritual forms of “marriage” in the Jewish tradition, overcome the dangers they foresaw. This Tel: (812) 855-0453 • Fax: (812) 855-4314 [Magnes Press, 2011], 110 and 111 respectively; namely conditional marriage and Derekh prompted great consternation from many [email protected] • www.indiana.edu/~jsp

50 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 51 secular law does not address the problem of the community does not want its Jewish of Jewish marriage as conveyed by Jewish The Multifarious Models for Jewish Marriage a recalcitrant husband not issuing a religious marriages to be invisible to secular law). To law tells a different story. Jewish marriage Ira Bedzow and Michael Broyde divorce or granting a secular divorce. The 1992 defer or to ignore either system is simply not is sometimes considered as a metaphysical Get Law, on the other hand, allows secular law a feasible choice. Circumventing the issue, on union, yet it is also a private contractual to impose itself on Jewish law by financially the other hand, calls for juridical creativity arrangement. In the past it has been here is a Jewish expression, “When case of fault, if either party breaks the original in the thirteenth century (and found in the penalizing a husband who refuses to give his but it also increases the role of Jewish courts polygamous, though today it is monogamous. you have one Jew, you’ll have two terms or assumptions of the marriage, the Or Zaruah), many others have adopted it since. wife a religious divorce. Though the intent in adjudicating matters of marriage. Like many other areas in Jewish law, what is Tsynagogues; two Jews, you will have rabbinical court can impose an obligation to Jewish marriage in America is further of the law is to maintain harmony between Jewish law can maintain its own considered permissible falls within a given three opinions, but when it comes to marriage, divorce, either without financial obligation complicated by its relationship with secular secular and Jewish law by forcing the two conception of marriage and prevent coercion range, and what is considered normative the rabbis say that two Jews can have five for the husband if the wife is at fault or with marriage (and divorce) law. This is a uniquely divorces to occur at the same time, it imposes by secular law if potential husbands and wives is historically and socially influenced by different models of matrimony . . . and some financial obligation if fault is the husband’s. modern issue. At no other time in history a secular marriage principle—namely that of sign a . Each party would the ebb and flow of rabbinic history. say six.” The third model for Jewish marriage did the state impose its marriage laws on the the right for a unilateral no-fault divorce—on be bound to meet certain obligations if either In Jewish law there are five different arises in the Geonic period (589–1038). Jewish community. The influence of secular current conceptions of Jewish marriage. This party later disregards the agreement. Jewish Ira Bedzow is a PhD candidate at Emory models for what constitutes a Jewish marriage, Alhough marriages could still be polygamous, law on Jewish marriage creates a possible right is absent in all but the Geonic model and courts would then arbitrate end-of-marriage University. He is the author of Halakhic Man, and each model is based on a contractual if a woman wanted to leave her marriage she sixth model in which Jewish couples marry in the rulings of , and is nowhere disputes so that the result is in accordance Authentic Jew: Modern Expressions of view. This differs from Christian views, which had the right to sue for divorce and still retain according to secular laws and customs, and normative in contemporary Jewish law. with the prenuptial agreement, as well as Orthodox Thought (Lambda Publishers, 2009), consider marriage as either sacramental, as in her ketubah. Some rabbinic courts went even Jewish law accommodates secular law, while When confronted with irreconcilable the halakic norms and values of the Jewish and a book of poetry, Things Overheard in the Catholicism, or covenantal, as among many farther and annulled marriages when the imposing Jewish ritual on it. The difficulty contradictions, such as this one, there are community to which the couple belongs Synagogue (Urim Publications, 2012). Protestant denominations. It also differs from woman requested it through a special decree with this model is that while the other three different ways to respond. Jewish (for an example by the leading Orthodox the view of marriage in European civil law, called “the decree of the academy.” This meant five models, regardless of their differences, law can defer to secular law, it can ignore Jewish law court in America, the Michael J. Broyde is a law professor at Emory as well as the Anglo-American conception that both the start and the continuation maintain that marriage is a private affair, this secular law, and it can avoid the conflict by of America, see www.theprenup.org). University and is a rabbinical court judge (dayan) of common law marriage, as being a matter of marriage had to be voluntary by both model of Jewish marriage imposes public circumventing it. The first two options are Though Biblical and philosophic texts in the Beth Din of America. He is the author of of public law, where the state defines the parties. A similar model was advocated by law, and therefore secular social mores, onto generally impractical, since most American often portray Jewish marriage as a bond by many books and nearly one hundred articles. nature of what constitutes marriage. (This Maimonides (without the decree of the a conception of Jewish marriage. Public law Jewish communities wish to live according which man and woman become one flesh, is not to be confused with common law academy and with a court-ordered divorce), conceives of marriage as a creation of the to both Jewish and secular law (for example, or a single soul, the historical conception marriages, which are, in fact, also a matter and was normative among the Yemenite state; therefore, agents of the state define its of public law.) Marriage in Jewish law, on communities. This view of marriage is most terms rather than solely adjudicate potential the other hand, is solely a contract between similar to a pure contractual partnership. disputes, as they would in any other private private parties, who agree to wed based on The fourth model was established by dispute. In practice, many perceive this personal preferences and agreed-upon terms. the decree of Rabbenu Gershom, leader of hybrid simply as an isomorphic arrangement, Did you know? Determining the nature of Jewish European Jewry at the end of the tenth and where husband and wife are actually married marriage is as much a matter of understanding beginning of the eleventh century. Both twice, and potentially divorced twice. The how it commences as it is of knowing how husband and wife have the equal right to fact that marriage is seen through the lens of The AJS website is a central location for resources on Jewish Studies research, teaching, and program it can end, as the Yiddish expression goes, divorce, but the pure contract model restricts two different conceptual systems, however, development, including: “Before you marry, make sure you know the rights of the husband. Whereas the Geonic can cause difficulties when the underlying whom you are going to divorce.” When we model allows either partner to initiate divorce, principles of the different conceptions diverge. Syllabi Directory: A listing of more than 150 syllabi, organized and cross-listed by topic. Designed to delineate the different models of Jewish Rabbenu Gershom established that both When this occurs, the dominant legal system assist AJS members in developing new courses and identifying new readings for current classes. New marriage, we must also delineate the role parties voluntarily agree to end the marriage will cause the weaker legal system to adapt. submissions are welcome. that divorce plays in ending them. as well. Moreover, Rabbenu Gershom greatly When it is impossible for the weaker legal The first model of Jewish marriage is limited the types of divorce considered to system to do so, it creates a dilemma for the Public Programming Best Practices Resource Guide: A guide for scholars launching public programs the one provided in the Torah. Marriage is arise from fault and also abolished . weaker system that causes more harm to its in conjunction with a Jewish Studies department, including information on audience targeting, market- typically monogamous, could be polygamous, This created a model in which marriage was adherents than concomitantly being under ing and outreach, program evaluation, and more. but is never polyandrous. Divorce can be seen more significantly as a bonding of two the dominant system is meant to help them. A unilaterally initiated by the husband, and, people into a union rather than a contractual dilemma occurs when adaption to a situation The Profession: A collection of articles, links, and webinars pertaining to professional matters in Jewish according to the majority opinion, there is agreement between partners. There was no is impossible: Does the weaker system rebel Studies, including the job search, fundraising for Jewish Studies, and non-academic careers for Jewish no obligation to provide a (ketubah) divorce absent mutual consent or hard fault. and take a position that conflicts with the Studies scholars. according to Biblical law, although to The fifth model for Jewish marriage superior legal system? Or does it acquiesce do so was a firm and ancient custom. is a modified version of the fourth model, to the superior system and accept a legal Perspectives on Technology: An archive of columns by Heidi Lerner, Hebraica/Judaica cataloguer at The second model, which emerges in the for it accepts the equalization of partners situation which contradicts its own ideals Stanford University Libraries, on technology-based resources for Jewish Studies teaching and research, rabbinic period, differs in that it provides for established by Rabbenu Gershom. The to its detriment and possible legitimacy? including links to all electronic resources. greater security for the man’s wife or wives. difference is that the fifth model provides an An example of this dilemma can be seen are obligatory and are a precondition exit when the marriage has in fact deteriorated by the controversy initiated by two get laws And more, including Positions in Jewish Studies, Data on the Field, Directory of Jewish Studies Pro- of marriage. Even though divorce remains past the point of recovery, whereas Rabbenu in the state of New York. The 1984 Get Law grams, Events and Announcements in Jewish Studies, Directory of Fellowships and Awards, The Art of the unilateral prerogative of the husband, it Gershom’s model does not. When the prevented a person from initiating a civil Conferencing, Registry of Dissertations-in-Progress. is limited by the financial obligation to pay marriage is working, neither party can end it divorce before completing a religious divorce, the ketubah. Some Talmudic opinions even unilaterally. When the marriage is over in all avoiding a divergence between secular and To access all these resources and more, visit www.ajsnet.org/resources.htm. posit that a husband cannot divorce his wife but name, however, either party could initiate Jewish law since the state cannot impose itself if he cannot pay her the agreed upon sum divorce, and neither party may refuse. First on its religious counterpart. It harmonized Please e-mail syllabi and any suggestions for the Resources section of the website to [email protected]. established in the ketubah. Moreover, in the advocated by German Jewish law authorities New York law with Jewish law. Yet the

52 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 53 of a diverse society. In a mosaic, the tiles ba’al (owner) and who the owned, has shed were to get Jewishly married, they wanted What’s Different (or not) are different from one another, and the light on the tensions of such dichotomies in it to be “kosher,” with all the trimmings. celebration of that difference is what heterosexual contexts as well, where they are I predict the experience here will be about Same-Sex Marriage makes the overall mosaic beautiful. no more valid. This is not unlike the similar. I don’t think the new “alternative Jay Michaelson Or, to choose the most proximate of the term “coming out,” which originated rite” with its chuppah-free forms will example, consider the effects on religious in gay experience, for all manner of self- catch on at all. People who want a Jewish institutions once women’s voices are revelations. In both cases, LGBT experience wedding want a Jewish wedding. Ketubah- “ arriage equality” is an uninterest- The rabbis on the law committee were caught foreseeable, development. They see it as a empowered. Liturgy changes, theology matters to everyone, not just gay people. free weddings will likely be adopted by the ing issue. Marriage inequality in the middle. Is “different from” always “less back-door sabotaging of kiddushin, and, though changes, leadership changes—and At the same time, it’s obvious that this small minority of Conservative Jews who Mis interesting. than”? Is separate inherently unequal? I have yet to read anyone saying so in print, presumably, all for the better since these tempest in a liturgical teapot won’t matter are Jewishly literate enough to notice and Consider the Conservative movement’s And then there was the issue of kiddushin. conservatives might well point to this turn changes better reflect the diversity of to the most Jews. Most Jewish weddings are care, while most others coast on tradition. recent tribulations over a gay marriage liturgy. For at least thirty years now, feminists of events as evidence that same-sex marriage the population at large. These new, Jewish because there’s a chuppah, there’s a In other words, what’s important By all accounts, this particular debate has have critiqued this legal form—in which actually is changing marriage for everyone. or newly heard, voices enrich the glass, and there’s a rabbi even though none for most people is precisely what isn’t been quite civil, l’shem shamayim, and the sort the groom effectively buys the bride—as In some ways, this is a nightmare come true conversation by engaging in dialogue of those elements is required by halakah. interesting to the scholar. Ultimately, the of applied scholarship that makes academic outrageous. Kiddushin seemed particularly for those who disparage gay marriage. and often in critique of existing ones. Halakically speaking, the words which are contemporary marriage is a sacralization of life interesting. The I have a different We are only beginning to have the recited under the wedding canopy determine love. Once upon a time, marriage was seen as question presented: view, naturally. To conversation when it comes to LGBT people. the nature of the relationship. But popularly primarily an economic relationship, so the should gay marriages develop it, I want to Only in the last ten years have we begun to speaking, they are less important than the terms of that relationship were of primary be solemnized with a go back to my brash ask more probing questions than “Is it okay pomp and circumstance. Weddings are importance. These days, however, marriage replica of a traditional introductory sentences to be gay.” In Christian communities, queer Maimonidean in nature: there’s one level is seen as primarily romantic, and the old Conservative Jewish about marriage equality theologians have been thinking and writing of meaning for those who understand legal provisions are secondary in nature. wedding, or should and inequality. From for several decades. In Jewish communities, them, and another for those who do not. Changing them will be important for the there be a different the outset, there with a few exceptions, we are playing In this light, the gradual transition of literate minority, and it’s the right thing to do. liturgy that takes the have been multiple catch-up. And, of course, we are still at square Conservative marriages to a non-kiddushin But what matters more is the simpler stuff: unique circumstances strands to the LGBT one in many communities, often fighting for rite makes sense, and once again, LGBT this is love, and it is holy, and it is good. of a same-sex couple movement, just as there basic legitimacy in the context of marriage. experience might help point the way. into account? are in feminism and in The question of kiddushin is an instance It’s interesting to note that in the United Jay Michaelson will receive his PhD in Jewish The answer, as of anti-racism and anti- in which the distinctive modalities of a Kingdom, when the Liberal movement Thought from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem a few months ago, was oppression work of all same-sex relationship, in particular, the proposed a radically different wedding in June, 2013. He is the author of God vs. Gay? exactly what one has kinds. There are those impossibility of assigning who is to be the rite, gay people refused to adopt it. If they The Religious Case for Equality (Beacon, 2011). come to expect (for in my community who better and for worse) espouse a basically from the Conservative assimilationist movement: both. message: let us in (to The Committee rabbinical school, to on Jewish Law and the rite of marriage, Standards offered a etc.) because we are Photo courtesy of the author. traditional liturgy, basically the same as but without kiddushin, you. We are not here as well as an alternative liturgy with out of place in a same-sex wedding. Who buys to transform institutions, but to join them. different language and different ritual whom? And if a new ritual is being created, We want only what you already have. This is forms (no chuppah, no rings, etc.). isn’t this the perfect time to dispense with the dominant argument, and the argument This result is not particularly interesting, this old, offensive, and outmoded form? that is politically the most effective. as it is but the latest in the movement’s (take The law committee, following the But then there are the more radical The Association for Jewish Studies wishes to thank the your pick) pluralism/vibrancy, or paralysis/ pioneering work of Rachel Adler, tended voices with a different message. Let us in, Center for Jewish History and its constituent organizations discord. But the debate surrounding the to agree. But then the law of unintended they say, not because we are the same as question, and its unintended consequences, consequences kicked in. With kiddushin no you, but because we are relevantly equal American Jewish Historical Society, are fascinating. longer mandatory for gay couples, some and importantly different as well. And know American Sephardi Federation, Leo Baeck Institute, First, there were multiple—and straight couples have already begun adapting that when you do let us in, we will probably Yeshiva University Museum, and YIVO Institute for Jewish Research diametrically opposed— rationales for the gay liturgy for their own egalitarian change your—now our—institutions. alternatives to the traditional model. On the nuptials. After all, the reasoning goes, if This, of course, is not an LGBT-specific for providing the AJS with office space one hand, some LGBT advocates—myself the kiddushin-free rite is equally valid as the message. Few people advocate for the at the Center for Jewish History. included—favored a ritual that didn’t mimic traditional one, why shouldn’t it apply to “melting pot” model, the idea that all genders, a straight wedding but recognized that a gay heterosexual couples as well? Do straight races, ethnicities, and sexualities will blur wedding is importantly and productively people now have fewer options than gay together into one majority. Multiculturalism different. On the other hand, some small-c people? more closely resembles the metaphor of conservatives favored a different ritual so that There are those who have complained the “gorgeous mosaic” (apparently first it wouldn’t be confused with a “real” wedding. about this unexpected, but perhaps used by New York’s mayor David Dinkins)

54 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 55

in the shower, which can now be seen as irony that, despite its racism and anti- an oblique reference to the gas chambers. Semitism, South Africa was a refuge for Jews The Latest The film contains no clear narrative line during World War II is noted by the South or voiceover to guide interpretation of what I African-British writer Dan Jacobson, who would call the film’s “multidirectional” visual writes of his grandmother and her children: William Kentridge: An Implicated Subject associations. If these are memories that are “In leaving Lithuania for South Africa, Michael Rothberg excavated from the formations of the mine, it they had exchanged an anonymous death is not clear whose memories they are. Out of at the hands of murderers for life itself.” this uncertainty emerge two ways to read this If were distant from prominently involved in the anti-apartheid gold mining region adjacent to Johannesburg. sequence, which correspond, in turn, to the the Holocaust—and yet still implicated in it struggle, Kentridge makes art that is weighted This mining landscape is one site where two ways that the historical references arise by virtue of the loss of families and ancestral with political implication while critiquing Kentridge develops an understanding of South in it: the unmistakable allusion to the slave communities destroyed in the genocide— William Kentridge. Video still from Mine, 1991. politics, for the most part, indirectly. Although African Jews as “implicated subjects,” who 16mm film transferred to video. 5 minutes, ship is emblematic of a collective memory those same Jews were now uneasily integrated Kentridge’s work spans multiple media, are ethically and politically intertwined with 49 seconds. Courtesy of the artist and Marian (and forgetting) of the larger historical into a new, also violent context. Kentridge including drawing, sculpture, theater, and, the contemporary and historical injustices Goodman Gallery, New York/Paris. transfers and correspondences between captures this new form of implication in most recently, opera, I focus primarily on that mark both South Africa and more global different forms of violence connecting Europe the doubled figures of Felix and Soho. On one work from the open-ended series of short histories of racism, , and genocide. and Africa (and theorized by the likes of the one hand, Felix seems more aware of animated films that he calls Drawings for The themes of the Drawings for Projection and Monument (1990). Johannesburg documents Aimé Césaire and Hannah Arendt, among the racist violence around him, although he Projection. Kentridge began that series in 1989, powerfully suggest these local and global the creation of Soho’s empire, including the others); meanwhile, the unconscious and remains separate from the political struggles a year in which apartheid entered its final histories, but Kentridge’s unusual technique mining town we associate with the later film, that surround him. In the figure of Soho, death throes in the face of massive political provides our best access to the questions while Monument shows Soho as supposed William Kentridge. Video still from Felix in Exile, on the other hand, we are reminded of the

1994. 35mm film; video and laser disc transfer. 8 mobilization. The series registers this history they raise.Unlike traditional animation, “civic benefactor,” hypocritically erecting Jewish financiers who, in the late nineteenth minutes, 43 seconds. Courtesy of the artist and obliquely, primarily by employing the lens of in which the filming of a large series of a statue in honor of the workers. Mine, in century, fostered the growth of the mining Marian Goodman Gallery, New York/Paris. a private life that opens onto adjacent social images creates the illusion of movement, contrast, reveals the underside of Soho’s industry. In the words of critic Claudia Braude, questions. In fragmentary form, the films tell Kentridge works with a small number of empire in no uncertain terms. This revelation “The history of the Johannesburg Jewish the tale of the industrialist Soho Eckstein and drawings (typically between twenty and takes place most dramatically in a sequence community . . . is intimately intertwined with “ ews have an interesting position in South the artistic Felix Teitlebaum, two men who forty for an eight-minute-long film). His that begins with Soho’s coffee pot—a cafétière, the history of the early mining town.” Soho’s Africa,” the artist William Kentridge physically resemble the artist and serve as his process of “drawing for projection” is based as Kentridge calls it, or what we call in the mine becomes a historical allegory for one Jonce told a New York journalist from alter egos in a simultaneously comical and on marking, smudging, and erasure. He United States, a French press. While enjoying strand of Jewish South African history, but in The Jewish Week. Jews have indeed led an serious reflection on contemporary South draws an initial image on a white sheet breakfast in bed, Soho presses down on the the artist’s hands this allegory is many-sided. awkward, ambiguous existence in South Africa. The films, which include occasional with charcoal—occasionally supplemented plunger of his coffee. However, it does not Kentridge’s palimpsestic art—along Africa over the last century, as scholars such with blue and red chalk—and then walks stop at the bottom of the pot, but continues with the multidirectional legacies it evokes— as Claudia Braude and Shirli Gilbert have across his studio to his film camera, where its downward movement through the floor William Kentridge. Video still from Mine, 1991. registers several things simultaneously. It demonstrated. They have been haunted by the he shoots two frames of the image. He and into the mines below. The coffee plunger 16mm film transferred to video. 5 minutes, uncovers the specific dynamics of South 49 seconds. Courtesy of the artist and Marian European violence they were lucky to escape creates a miniature mineshaft that cuts into then returns to the drawing and amends it Goodman Gallery, New York/Paris. Africa’s political interregnum but also and fearful of Afrikaner anti-Semitism. Yet, through additional drawing, smudging, and the living and workspaces of the miners, demonstrates how the larger forces of while a significant minority of South African erasure, before shooting two more frames. passing through their barracks and showers capitalism, colonialism, and genocide have Jews opposed the apartheid regime after The process of creation continues likes this and into the cavernous mines themselves. ghostly presence of the Nazi camp suggests framed South African history over the longue 1948, a majority accommodated themselves for a period of months and results in a film As the scene proceeds, Kentridge reveals the peculiar psychology of domination and durée. It draws attention to the specific, to their country’s racist social architecture. that preserves layers of residual charcoal that his drawing technique partakes of the complicity of white and—perhaps more ambivalent position of the country’s Jewish Kentridge, a Johannesburg-based visual artist dust and concatenates palimpsestic images violence it depicts, an implicit commentary pointedly—white Jewish South Africans. minority, yet also anticipates a more general and a leading figure in the global art world where traces of previous drawings remain on the complicity of the artist in a world of If we interpret Soho’s name, Eckstein, return of suppressed memories that would during the last decade—does not depict that on celluloid and in the final film even as structural oppression: the plunger becomes as an indirect indication that he is of Jewish accompany the end of apartheid. What the “interesting position” in a direct way. Very the drawings themselves that make up each a kind of drill and is associated both with descent—a new message emerges. Given the movement of the coffee plunger in Mine few—if any—overtly Jewish motifs manifest William Kentridge. Video still from Mine, 1991. frame disappear forever (except for the final the drilling performed by the miners and associations created by Mine, Soho’s iconic reveals is not simply a historical analogy 16mm film transferred to video. 5 minutes, themselves in his work; furthermore, the image in each sequence, which is sometimes with the artist’s own pencil. As the drill cuts pinstriped suit becomes a displaced reminder between different sites of violence or Soho’s 49 seconds. Courtesy of the artist and Marian content almost never pertains to Jewish Goodman Gallery, New York/Paris. displayed in exhibitions alongside the films). into the rock, an image emerges that is soon of the concentration camp uniforms that (or Kentridge’s) individual unconscious. It history, culture, or religion. Nevertheless, I Time is made concrete by a technique that recognizable as the cross section of a slave Soho never had to wear. The shadow of the also evokes a complex history of trauma, argue, Kentridge has developed an aesthetic simultaneously ensures disappearance and ship. A second association joins this reference Holocaust references the partial similarity implication, complicity, and forgetting that project that speaks both to a generalized intertitles and bits of text but no dialogue, preservation. In this manner Kentridge turns to slavery: the iconography of the mine also between German and South Africa racist defines a social group—South African Jews— diasporic condition common to Jews (and recount a love triangle between the two animation into a medium for reflecting on resembles a Nazi camp. Indeed, the image regimes as well as the presence of virulent caught in that “interesting position” between others) and to the intensely local position of men and Mrs. Eckstein. They also track the memory and forgetting. When Kentridge of the compound seems to be modeled on anti-Semitism that accompanied Afrikaner accommodation and marginalization. South African Jews at the interstices of an rise and fall of Soho’s business empire while uses this technique to explore South Africa’s a famous photograph from the liberation nationalism, especially during the Nazi period infamously racialized society. alluding to South Africa’s history of racialized mining landscape, a traumatic Jewish of Dachau (one which apparently features in Europe. It might also draw attention to Michael Rothberg is director of the Initiative Kentridge’s approach to Jewishness is violence and the political struggles marking history also emerges, but it emerges in a young Elie Wiesel), although Kentridge the vast distance of South African Jews from in Holocaust, Genocide, and Memory Studies similar to—and, in fact, overlaps with—his its transition from apartheid to representative contact with other histories of violence. claims not to have had the Holocaust in mind the Holocaust: the fact that immigration to at the University of Illinois. He is the author of approach to social and political questions democracy. A significant dimension of Soho’s Mine (1991) was created as the third at all. Regardless of the artist’s intentions, South Africa represented asylum for many, Multidirectional Memory: Remembering in general. Coming from a Lithuanian- empire includes a mining concern established of the Drawings for Projection, following however, recognition of this modeling also if not simply a bit of historical good fortune the Holocaust in the Age of Decolonization and German-Jewish Johannesburg family in an area recognizable as the East Rand, the Johannesburg, 2nd Greatest City after Paris (1989) casts a dark shadow over the images of miners (the case for Kentridge’s own family). The (Stanford University Press, 2009).

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treatise on Renaissance art. For both Malamud affirmation of love’s transformative powers. clarity: the young lovers, now married, Cynthia Ozick’s Fiction Smolders, and Ozick, Jews have more serious things In this retelling of The Ambassadors a callow disappear from the novel, while the other to attend to than the glorification of false American boy falls unaccountably in love characters are pitted against each other but not with Romance religions. Perhaps her most audacious act with a Jewish Holocaust refugee when they in spite, anger, and envy. It is a victory of Dean Franco of searing honesty, is the essay “Who Owns meet in mid-1950s Paris. The boy’s father love, but everyone else burns with rage. Anne Frank?” Ozick shocks even herself by sends his aunt to retrieve him, but the aunt imagining Frank’s diary going up in smoke, ends up protecting the fragile relationship Dean Franco is associate professor of English at ynthia Ozick does not write love Ironically, the equanimity Ozick incinerated along with its author rather than through a series of deceptions and inventions. Wake Forest University. He is the author of Race, stories. Her stories take an alternate seeks between the familiar and the strange be traduced by readers who fool themselves The father finally attempts to lure his son Rights, and Recognition: Jewish American Croute, skirting romance and avoiding only matters when the is near, into thinking they can identify with Anne. home with an enormous sum of money, Literature Since 1969 (Cornell University plot lines launched by separation and through circumstances of travel, exile, or Foreign Bodies also ends with burning, but the aunt receives the check and secretly Press, 2012). heartbreak. Since the characters in an Ozick displacement. When a stranger appears in but the novel offers something new: an burns it. The conflagration yields no scalding story are not lovable, there are few weddings. our ambit, the strangeness in the encounter If Isaac Bashevis Singer coined a paradoxical pertains to ourselves and the other. concept, in his eponymous novel, Enemies, We are very often strangers to ourselves, a Love Story, Ozick’s fiction anticipates the projecting our own demons onto the other. contemporary neologism, “frenemies”: A How else can we account for the everyday bitter character contemplates marrying his spites, , and petty acrimony old friend’s widow not for love but for her accruing not only between ourselves and fearsome astringency; a group of Yiddish our distant enemies or even some nameless poets keep each other close for decades in foreigner, but within our own families? order to revel in one another’s failures and Who does not have (at least) one law for to nurture their common contempt for their themselves and a different one for the other? The Association one successful friend; a refugee orphan meets Ozick is a master cartographer of the CAROLINE BLOCK, The Johns Hopkins University a woman who claims to be his sister, but he foreignness of the familiar and a canny clerk rejects her and shoves her down the stairs. The in the court of the inconstant mind. Ozick’s for Jewish Studies Rabbis, Rabbas and : Aspiration, exception to Ozick’s frenemies is the more story “Bloodshed,” for example, explores Innovation and Orthodoxy in American Women’s recent novel, Foreign Bodies. In this rewriting Portrait of Cynthia Ozick by Gerard Murrell. the mixture of condescension and despair congratulates Talmud Programs of Henry James’s novel The Ambassadors, the Courtesy of The Jacob Rader Marcus Center of involved when the protagonist Bleilip comes characters are possessed and transformed the American Jewish Archives, Cincinnati, Ohio, to visit his once secular, now haredi, from James’s post-romantic Europe to Ozick’s americanjewisharchives.org, and Gerard Murrell. Toby. Toby’s joy in her new life, including the recipients of the BRITT TEVIS, University of Wisconsin-Madison post-Holocaustal refugee transit zone where her rabbinical husband and yeshiva bocher May It Displease the Court: Jewish Lawyers and love grows like a weed from the fissures in her children inspire neither pride nor envy in the Democratization of American Law characters’ cracked psyches. of the strange. We love what we know, or Bleilip, but only resentment. How dare she 2013–2014 Berman Ozick writes about nightmare families: at least what we can assimilate and love find love in this atavistic community! At the husbands and wives, children and siblings— propels us toward ethics with a facility that end the reader learns that Bleilip has been The AJS also recognizes the following project, which the loved ones who, in dreams, transmogrify strangeness and suspicion do not. For this carrying a gun in his pocket and harbors an Foundation Dissertation received honorable mention: into inexact and awful copies of themselves. reason, Ozick dismisses as unchallenging undisclosed fear and dread. He, all along, is The Pagan Rabbi’s wife discovers her pious the commandment from Leviticus that the stranger to both his cousin and himself. Fellowships in Support WENDY FERGUSSON SOLTZ, The Ohio State University husband is, well, a pagan. An obscure we must love our neighbor as ourselves. Maybe this is why Ozick quickly dismisses Stockholm book reviewer is duped by a cabal The neighbor is too familiar, claims Ozick the familiar—nothing really is familiar, and Separate but Not Equal: The Jewish Fight for Racially of forgers who appear like a marionette and the difficulty of comparison is merely everyone is strange, even to themselves. of Research in the Social Integrated Education, 1930-1965 family out of a Bruno Schulz fiction. Ozick’s psychological. Instead, Ozick is interested in Romance may not be ignited in Ozick’s celebrated metafiction, Usurpation: Other what we do when we do not love the other, stories, but her flinty characters move closer People’s Stories, is a series of nested stories that represented by the insistence on having to some sort of truth about themselves and Scientific Study of the begins when an erstwhile writer hears another one law for the citizen and the stranger, for each other. Their vanity is exposed and Please visit the AJS website for more author read a story the first one wished she “you were strangers in the .” shredded, their shortcomings laid bare, Contemporary American information about these projects and the had written. The experience engenders envy For Ozick, this imperative to compare makes their mundanity made plain. When the dissertation fellowship program. among a cast of lesser writers and hollow a metaphor of the grammatical juncture Stockholm book reviewer is offered a forged attempts to copy the original. The story that of the strange and the familiar, elevated by copy of a lost Bruno Schulz masterpiece, he Jewish Community: sets this self-imploding fiction is Bernard the Hebrew Bible as the corner on which has every reason to accept it for a moment Malamud’s “The Silver Crown,” in which we may all stand to engage ethically with of borrowed fame, but he discerns that the a son’s hatred for his father is revealed. the other. The comparison of what we do manuscript cannot be real and burns it. A Love isn’t very interesting to Cynthia not know, the foreigner, to what we do— character in “Usurpation” fearful of his own Ozick. In her 1989 essay “Metaphor and our own experiences, cultural memory, or vanity, burns his story, perhaps another, Memory,” she explains that, at the root of historical understanding of deprivation and unacknowledged “usurpation” of Malamud. the ethical imagination, the theme of love exclusion—that is the difficult ethical work In Malamud’s “Last of the Mohicans,” a is secondary to the more compelling theme explored in so much of Ozick’s fiction. Holocaust survivor burns a Jewish scholar’s

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Jonathan M. Hess performances of Deborah in the nineteenth- Nadler, and Willi Goetschel that considers The Questionnaire Moses M. and Hannah L. Malkin Distinguished century press. I would introduce all this Spinoza’s Jewish background as the basis Professor of Jewish History and Culture and material with a survey of key precursors, for a philosophical system that becomes Director, Carolina Center for Jewish Studies, from Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice, one of the pillars of secular if not atheistic University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Lessing’s Nathan the Wise, and Richard thought. Finally, I would turn to the minor If you were to organize a graduate seminar Cumberland’s The Jew to selections from strain of criticism that takes seriously the fact Two decades ago, while I was finishing my Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe and scenes from that Spinoza favors apostles over prophets around a single text, what would it be? PhD in comparative literature, I fantasized Fromental Halévy and Eugène ’s in the TTP and holds the example of Christ about prospective employers asking me grand opera La juive. Recent work in theater considerably higher than those of the Hebrew Nathan Abrams Robert Alter Jeremy Dauber this question. Trained in the heyday of history and performance studies would give prophets. In this context, Graeme Hunter’s Senior Lecturer in Film Studies, Professor of Hebrew and Comparative Atran Associate Professor of Yiddish high theory and schooled in the virtues of the course its theoretical interlocutors— Radical Protestantism in Spinoza’s Thought Bangor University Literature, University of California at Berkeley Language, Literature and Culture and close reading, I was prepared to suggest any and its rationale for supplementing the is exemplary. Having taught a graduate Director, Institute for Israel and Jewish Studies, number of texts whose rhetorical, formal, sacrosanct model of close reading that was seminar on “apostate Jews” in which the The text I would choose would be Joel and My first choice for a text to which to devote Columbia University and philosophical complexity made them so crucial to the way an entire generation TTP was one of the featured texts, I see the Ethan Coen’s film, The Big Lebowksi (1998). a graduate seminar would be Agnon’s Tmol prime candidates for intensive study in of literary scholars was trained. merit of devoting a whole seminar to it. While many of the Coens’ films—Miller’s Shilshom [Only Yesterday]. I actually made it Maybe it’s the fact I just finished a book on a graduate seminar. Given the directions Crossing (1990), Barton Fink (1991), and, of the topic of a Berkeley seminar in Hebrew its author. Or maybe it’s the fact my wife that the field and my own work have gone course, A Serious Man (2009)—are essential to literature that I taught in the early 1990s just gave birth to our first child earlier this in over the last twenty years, structuring a Eleanor Kaufman Ari Y. Kelman understanding contemporary Jewish cinema, and regret that I haven’t repeated it. Tmol week, so I’m particularly attuned to works seminar around a single text holds somewhat Professor of Comparative Literature, Jim Joseph Chair in Education and Jewish The Big Lebowski is the epitome of many new Shilshom is arguably the greatest novel in featuring fathers and children. But I don’t less appeal for me today. Indeed, my recent University of California, Los Angeles Studies, Stanford University Jewish cinematic trends, particularly those in Hebrew, and it is certainly the one modernist think those are the only reasons I’d pick work has moved away from the model of evidence since 1990. Its key Jewish character masterpiece in Hebrew. It needs to be read Sholem Aleichem’s Tevye the Dairyman (Tevye close reading, whether exploring the vast My choice of a single text around which to The Jewish Catalog. It is a brilliant, vexing, Walter Sobchak (John Goodman) is not only in the original because of its extraordinary der milkhiger) as my graduate seminar’s body of popular fiction produced by Jews situate a Jewish Studies course would be peculiar, uneven document of American a slightly deranged Vietnam veteran, he is stylistic subtlety and the rich play of irony central text. Our theoretically minded for Jews in nineteenth-century Germany or Spinoza’s Theologico-Political Treatise (TTP, Jewish life in the late twentieth century. also—atypically—a convert to Judaism. and allusion detectable in the Hebrew. (The comparative literature students wouldn’t studying how performances of Jewishness published 1670). Admittedly, this is a fraught It emerged at the intersection of so many Unusually for a cinematic Jew, Walter is not English translation is problematic, and know where to begin: would they write on the nineteenth-century stage helped give choice in this context, given that Spinoza complementary and contradictory forces that identified by any decontextualized markers when I once taught it in an undergraduate papers incorporating narratological theory rise to cultures of liberal universalism. was famously excommunicated from the it offers a way into any number of conversa- (indeed Walter is not even ethnically Jewish), course, I don’t think it went over very well.) to try to pin down Tevye’s talking strategies? Rather than dedicating a seminar to Portuguese Synagogue in Amsterdam in tions about the parameters and problematics but by his beliefs, values, and behavior. Tmol Shilshom represents a strenuous Would they employ discourses of gender close analysis of one text, I would organize 1656. Moreover, his writings are often taken of American Jewish education. An intention- Thus Judaism rather than Jewish ethnicity reversal of the European Bildungsroman that and power to work on the representation of a seminar on the transnational performance to equate God and nature and thus espouse ally educational document, The Jewish Catalog defines Walter. Walter is doubly unusual in ends in tragedy, or perhaps one should say, in his daughters, and Tevye himself, constantly history of the most popular German play of a pantheistic impetus above and beyond can provide a window into Jewish communal cinematic terms in that he is a convert and, a violent catastrophe for the protagonist that claiming he’s no woman? Or would the the late nineteenth century, and a text that, a monotheistic one; and his at times quite politics of the late 1960s and early 1970s, for a non-haredi Jew, maintains a level of is an absurdist Akedah. Yitzhak Kummer is deconstructionists come to the fore, citing tellingly, no one ever suggested I read while comical assessment of the Hebrew prophets trends in American religion, the spiritual Jewish Orthodox practice. Walter appreciates, one of those young men from the provinces Tevye’s triumphant references to binary I was in graduate school: Salomon Hermann in the TTP is generally far from flattering. life of the counterculture, longer histories of understands, and takes his adopted faith populating ninteenth-century fiction who divisions—divisions the stories then work Mosenthal’s Deborah (1849). When it first My course would examine such theological guides to Jewish life, the dynamics of institu- very seriously, certainly more so than many makes the journey to fulfill himself not to busily to undermine? They’d be challenged took German stages by storm in the 1850s, reflections directly and through close textual tional and counter-institutional Jewish life, other Jews on film, haredi or otherwise. At the big city but to Palestine of the Second by our history students, who’d insist that to Mosenthal’s melodrama was dismissed and analysis; with this, I would devote the first part and the relationship between technology and the same time, I would argue that the Coens . In the language of the old Zionist read the Tevye stories, written over more than despised by both the literary elite and official of the term simply to a careful reading of the education. And most of that does not begin to use Walter to mock the de-Semitizing and song invoked in the opening paragraph, he two decades, is to read the story of modern organs of Jewish community life. But Deborah text, without relying on outside sources. Then, touch on the book’s content, or what might be de-Judainizing strategies of the past. One comes “to build and to be rebuilt,” but his Eastern European Jewry writ small. Some became for Jews and non-Jews in nineteenth- for the remaining weeks, I would introduce learned from conducting oral histories with cannot help reading him as nothing less naïve aspirations turn into a shambles. Agnon might try to tease out the particular ideologies century Europe and America the most popular the students to the rather extraordinary range the book’s editors and contributors. than a deliberate parody of those Jewish offers a penetrating and unblinking portrait represented by Tevye’s daughters and their drama on a Jewish theme and a favorite of commentary on Spinoza and on this text One of the challenges of graduate directors (particularly the moguls of the of the dilemmas of Jewish modernity, in suitably unsuitable mates; and others might vehicle for celebrity actresses and aspiring specifically. We would look at the tendency seminars is balancing the students’ centripetal studio system) who denuded their films of part figured through Kummer’s oscillation try to locate clues to their author’s beliefs stars alike. Deborah was translated into to read the TTP in light of Spinoza’s most interests and the gravitational center of the Jews and Judaism and/or produced crass, between bohemian Jaffa, where he has an in the stories’ complex publication history. thirteen languages, including English, where celebrated work, The Ethics (1677), thereby class’s discussion. The seminar should provide sentimentalized caricatures for didactic effect erotic entanglement he can’t really handle, And our Yiddish students, of course, would it was known primarily as Leah, The Forsaken, downplaying the theological dimension of a space for ongoing, shared discussion that and Gentile consumption. Furthermore, and fanatically Orthodox Jerusalem, where remind everyone of the language—Tevye but also as Miriam, Naomi, Ruth, Hager, and his oeuvre, something notable especially in allows the students to continue developing Walter’s passionate, even fanatical, he finds a pious bride and death. The inner only exists in language, after all, both as Lysiah, The Abandoned. The seminar would studies of his work by eminent Continental their own ideas and interests that will adherence to the rules of bowling can be contradictions of the Zionist enterprise a fictional character and as a monologist. certainly involve close reading, depending on philosophers (Gilles Deleuze, Antonio Negri, eventually inform their dissertations. As read as a critique of the increasing stringency and the lethal ferocity of Orthodoxy are And they’d say that the robust history of students’ linguistic skills, of German, English, Étienne Balibar, and the excellent collection a primary document, The Jewish Catalog amongst Orthodox and haredi Jews who, it equally exposed, and probing historical literary criticism on Tevye can be a key to the American, and other adaptations of Deborah. by Warren Montag and Ted Stolze, The New could provide an opportunity for engaging has been argued, prioritize obedience over realism is interwoven with fantasy and history of Yiddish itself in the modern era, But students would read these texts against Spinoza). I would then turn to an increasing in mixed-method or interdisciplinary spirituality. Walter thus becomes a satiric macabre comedy in the chapters devoted to both in its Eastern European and American the backdrop of the Czech opera Debora, the body of work on Spinoza that regards him research while still anchoring the seminar representation of a particularly dogmatic and the reflections of Balak, the philosophical incarnations, both during Sholem Aleichem’s American burlesque Leah, The Forsook, the as a Jewish thinker despite his clear distance in a shared investment in a common text. buffoonish rabbi. Overall, The Big Lebowski dog, one of Agnon’s great inventions. The life and the strange transformations and British novel Leah, The Jewish Maiden, and at from and tension with Judaism, in the fashion It is accessible enough to be engaging provides a wonderful text for considering novel is densely textured with symbolic transmogrifications of his text’s afterlife. least one of the three silent films based on of Daniel Boyarin’s A Radical Jew: Paul and and not open enough to be self-evidently contemporary Jewish cinema and how it motifs, as the critics have shown, and Deborah. Focusing on the cultural mobility of the Politics of Identity (e.g. Rebecca Goldstein’s meaningful. It is frustrating, fascinating, and has metamorphosed over the decades. endlessly inventive—perfect material for this material, I would accompany readings Betraying Spinoza). Related to this is the funny, and it invites students to explore it enjoyable and instructive investigation. of texts with close readings of responses to important work of Jonathan Israel, Steven through a variety of modes and methods.

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Julian Levinson Shaul Magid crisis of human existence (mashber be-hayyim). Paul Reitter how the best German-Jewish artists drew on of gender. Another important aim of this Associate Professor, Department of Jay and Jeanie Schottenstein Chair in More than Maimonides, more than Kook, Associate Professor of German and Jewish tradition, whether they were aware of it course would be to situate Goldberg as a English, University of Michigan Jewish Studies, Indiana University more than anyone.” Trying to be clever, Director of the Humanities Institute, or not. Thus the diaries invite reflection on all key figure of European intellectual and I responded, “Do you mean the personal The Ohio State University these aspects of German-Jewish culture, as well modernist literary history. To that end, the My choice would be Henry Roth’s 1934 This is an interesting exercise for a variety crisis (mashber perati) or the collective crisis as on the continuities between the primary course would connect her to important Jewish novel, Call It Sleep, which is quite possibly of reasons. First, it allows us to ponder what (mashber klali)?” He stopped and stared at If I had been asked this question a few years material of German-Jewish culture and the émigré intellectuals, including Hannah the most subtle and comprehensive literary might be the goals of a graduate seminar more me and asked, “Are you married?” to which ago, I might have proposed a throwback more important secondary accounts of it. Arendt and Erich Auerbach, and to the field work addressing the American Jewish generally. Second, it enables us to explore I responded “yes.” “Then,” he said, “you course, where the goal is to arrive at a better The diaries also contain quite a bit of of comparative literature more broadly. immigration experience. As with any truly the singularity of a text, removing it from its know that they are both the same thing.” understanding of a single key work through useful information about the daily lives “classic” work, Call It Sleep can be read (and embedded and contextual place as part of a sustained analysis, where, that is, the key of Jewish university students, but that may has been) in sharply contrasting ways. It can book or compilation in order to see whether work is itself the topic of the course. But I be a topic for another seminar. Because of Moulie Vidas be seen as a celebration of multilingualism and how one text can carry the weight of an Barbara Mann recently taught a course like this—on Robert my space constraints, it is definitely a topic Assistant Professor of Religious Studies, and ethnic pluralism, as a Bildungsroman, entire semester. Simon H. Fabian Chair in , Musil’s The Man without Qualities—and while for another day. University of California at Davis as a masterpiece of urban modernism, as I have chosen Nahman of Bratslav’s Likku- The Jewish Theological Seminary the experience was rewarding, I’d like to a meditation on the Oedipal dynamics of tei MoHaRan I:64 as my text. Many of the col- try something different before repeating it. The graduate curriculum in my field is so the immigrant family, as an expression of lected homilies of Nahman (this one included) I’ve taught A. B. Yehoshua’s epic novel, So then the question becomes: Which text Allison Schachter text-centered that I’ll probably have many Jewish longing for the gentile world, and are fairly detailed examples of hermeneutic Mr. Mani (Mar Mani, 1989) as part of a would provide a particularly fruitful way Assistant Professor of English and opportunities to teach seminars focused on as a cautionary tale about the effects of virtuosity focused around a narrow theme, graduate seminar called Critical Theory into a topic that I’d like to teach. And the text Jewish Studies, Vanderbilt University a Talmudic chapter or the interpretive career jettisoning Jewish tradition in an all-out often veering far afield to include many other and Jewish Studies. In the course we read that comes most readily to mind is Gershom of a Biblical passage. The question, however, embrace of American freedom. Whereas subjects that are then swept back, through the “primary” theoretical texts from Saussure Scholem’s diaries. I’m interested in offering I would organize a course on gender and invites a fantasy; it also invites us to think countless modern Jewish works express warp and woof of midrashic/kabbalistic read- to Butler, “secondary” texts by Jewish a course on German-Jewish culture at the fin transnational Jewish modernisms centered on of a seminar organized around a text but not some measure of ambivalence about ing, to the central question. Written in a loose, Studies practitioners of these approaches, of the fin de siècle, and the notebooks that Leah Goldberg’s 1946 modernist novel Ve-hu necessarily a seminar about a text. Taking this categories such as tradition and modernity, proemic style whose focus is often a personal and a single canonical text, which serves Scholem, who was born in 1897, kept between ha-or (And That Is the Light). Set in 1932, on opportunity to indulge in a playful counter- Roth’s novel could be more properly called rather than textual subject, Nahman’s work both to anchor the course and acts as a 1913 and 1919, seem to me to take us into the eve of the Nazi rise to power in Germany, factual, I choose Johannes Eisenmenger’s “multivalent”: it expresses a number of offers students exposure to a variety of textual kind of laboratory in which students may that topic in all kinds of productive ways. Goldberg’s novel interrogates the place of Entdecktes Judenthum, the notoriously distinct viewpoints, each one seemingly and theological issues. It exposes students to perform their own symptomatic readings. In the first place, of course, the diaries are Jews in European culture and the place of hostile compilation and interpretation of with great conviction. For instance, the the world of rabbinic/kabbalistic texuality Mar Mani’s compositional style makes revealing with respect to Scholem himself, a women in both Jewish and European literary rabbinic texts (or, alternatively, its medieval traditional rabbi is depicted as a cruel and while simultaneously offering them a window it both a pleasure and a challenge to teach. cultural phenomenon of no small importance. and artistic culture. This metaliterary novel predecessor, Paris Ms. BNF Lat. 16558). In a ignorant brute, but the Jewish textual into the personalistic and devotional focus of The novel opens in the present and unfolds They show that he was still in his teens when negotiates the social and political backdrop real seminar, this text might be taught by tradition (in this case the Parsha to Jethro) Hasidic and pietistic Jewish spirituality. as a counternarrative. As readers move he began to formulate the ideas on which his of Jewish life in prewar Europe and engages an expert on anti-Semitism and it might is valorized insofar as it offers the young The themes of lesson #64 are doubt and forward in the book, the narrative itself moves later success would be based, and also that he with a range of literary traditions, including be studied as an instance of scholarship hero a solution to his deepest anxieties—as heresy framed around Moses’ confrontation back in time, through Palestine and eastern began to formulate those ideas as rebellious Scandinavian, Anglo-American, German, in the service of hate or oppression. In my well as a paradigm for approaching God. with Pharaoh and Pharaoh’s “hardened Europe at the turn of the twentieth-century intuitions. More even than his precocious Yiddish, and Hebrew modernism. The course counter-factual seminar, fantasized from A seminar devoted to Call It Sleep heart” (Exodus 10:1–4). What is so intriguing to early nineteenth-century Greece. The learning, what guided him was the sense would investigate these different strands the privileged situation of what Israel Yuval could identify its range of perspectives on about this homily is the personal notion novel is constructed as a series of one-sided that the great German-Jewish historians of of Goldberg’s novel, locating them in the called “the postpolemical” age, this text Jewish modernity and American urban of self-doubt, the existential anxiety where conversations: each long chapter presents the nineteenth century must be, in basic context of her corpus as a whole, including will not be studied for itself. It will, rather, experience, while also raising fundamental belief and un-belief each occupy space in what is essentially a monologue, spoken in ways, utterly wrong, for they had written in her fascination with Christian imagery, her supply a canon of Talmudic passages to hermeneutical questions about whether and the psyche of the adept. Nahman’s ability a particular character’s voice and providing a spirit of compromise and accommodation. engagement with European Orientalism, her organize a seminar in which the Talmud is how a definitive “reading” of the text might to locate human doubt in the metaphysical in often elliptical fashion crucial details Scholem is anything but a representative portrayals of female sexuality and eroticism, encountered as a provocative, even scandalous be possible at all. Various methodological “empty space” (halal ha-panui) God creates to about the Mani family and their fortunes. figure; yet the dynamic of rebellion and her depictions of mental breakdown, and text. While the “bizarreness” of the Talmud approaches could also be introduced. A set the conditions for creation reifies human Finally, each chapter’s linguistic style is innovation I just described is hardly unique. her blend of impressionist and expressionist in Eisenemenger’s book is often achieved unit on intertextuality could focus on its anxiety as a condition for, and endemic to, distinctive to the period in which it is set; And for all his extraordinariness, young style. In addition to Goldberg we would through distortion or selective quotation, dialogue with James Joyce and T. S. Eliot creation itself. The questions that are raised in thus what begins as broadly vernacular Scholem could be used as a case study in the read a selection of modernist writers with on a disturbing number of occasions we and with Christian and Jewish readings this homily extend from the hermeneutical Israeli Hebrew devolves into a pastiche of mechanisms of productivity among German whom she is in dialogue, both in her prose may find ourselves scandalized along with of the Book of Isaiah. A unit on language to the existential, from the kabbalistic to nineteenth-century nusakh, maskilic fanciful Jews of the expressionist generation. and her criticism, including Henrik Ibsen, Eisenmenger, experiencing the gap between could consider Roth’s depiction of Yiddish the psychological. For those interested in phrasing, and liturgical references. But it wasn’t only Scholem’s mature Virginia Woolf, James Joyce, Dovid Bergelson, the late ancient document and the modern as crystal-clear English, while also exploring Jewish heresiology from a psychotheological Mar Mani is absorbing and dizzying in ideas about historical Judaism that the diaries Yosef Chaim Brenner, and Uri Nissan scholar (an encyclopedia of anti-Semitism the contrast between the broken English perspective, this text produces seemingly its own right and demands close attention to begin to articulate. What he wrote in them as Gnessin. Placing Goldberg in dialogue with faults Entdecktes Judenthum for “accurate” of the characters and the often exquisitely endless fodder for reflection. detail on the level of the individual sentence, a teenager often comes close to many of his various writers and critical traditions, the but opportunistically “literal” readings). lyrical English of the third-person narrator. A Addendum: When I was a graduate as well as the novel’s superstructure. At the influential later claims about German-Jewish course aims to rethink the boundaries of It will be a lesson in the Otherness of the unit on reception history could consider the student at the Hebrew University in the same time, when systematically examined culture. The diaries abound with arresting Hebrew modernism, looking at its vexed Talmud and its causes (is it something in the dramatic resurgence of interest in the novel 1980s I had the honor of studying with David under the microscope of theory, the novel commentary about such things as the relationship to Anglo-American and European document itself? in our modern assumptions? among second-generation American Jewish Flusser. We had an evening seminar and a repeatedly yields new connective fibers. condition of the acculturated bourgeois Jewish modernist movements. Moreover, we would in our Christianized assumptions?) and intellectuals in the early 1960s and, indeed, few of us would walk Professor Flusser to Students finish the course with knowledge circles in which Scholem grew up, the Zionist interrogate how her relationship to all of in ways to overcome that Otherness. its position as a cornerstone in the emerging the underground garage where a taxi would of the nuts-and-bolts of theory, but also with circles in which he eventually moved, and these traditions is inflected by questions canon of Jewish American literature. take him home. During one of these walks a more critical sense of what kind of readers he asked me what I was studying, and I told they are, and how this sensibility may be him Nahman of Bratslav. He said, “Nahman translated into their own scholarship. was the only one who truly understood the

62 AJS Perspectives SPRING 2013 63 ASSOCIATION FOR JEWISH STUDIES 45TH ANNUAL CONFERENCE

December 15-17, 2013 Sheraton Boston, Boston, MA Join the AJS for more than 170 sessions devoted to the latest research in Jewish Studies.

• Major exhibit of leading publishers of Jewish Studies scholarship • Evening film screenings and performances free and open to the public • AJS Gala Banquet and Plenary Lecture, Sunday, December 15 (stay tuned for information on subsidized banquet tickets) • Evening receptions sponsored by Jewish Studies programs and research institutions • THATCamp Jewish Studies, an interactive forum on the digital humanities • Digital Media Workshop, featuring the latest born-digital research projects, teaching tools, and more!

Special reduced room rates at the Sheraton Boston ($129.00 single and double occupancy; $119.00 student rate) available through November 15, 2013. Contact 800-233-4100 for reservations. Be sure to ask for the Association for Jewish Studies rate.

Deadline for reduced advance conference registration rates ($130.00 professional members; $65 student members; $185 non-members) is November 15, 2013. See ajsnet.org for registration information.

64 AJS Perspectives