International Journal of Jewish Education Research, IJJER 2013 (4), 29-67.

“From ‘Asur, Asur, Asur’ to ‘the Big Mutar1’”: Religious-Zionist Women’s Views on Sex Education in Israel

Galit Kahane Uli | [email protected] Bar Ilan University, Israel

Deborah Court | [email protected]; [email protected] Bar Ilan University, Israel

Abstract This study presents the experiences, feelings, and opinions regarding sex education, of 12 young religious-Zionist women who studied in the Israeli religious-Zionist school system and participated in bride-counseling lessons in the months and days prior to marriage. Each has been married two to ten years and each was participating in a bride- counseling course during the present study. The aim of the in-depth interviews was to understand how each of these women experienced the transition from complete celibacy before marriage to full sexuality in the first days and months after marriage, and to hear about their experiences of formal sex education as high school students and as brides undergoing bride counseling lessons, as well as their new impressions on sexuality education as students in a bride-counseling course. In addition, they were asked to articulate their thoughts on sex education for religious high school girls and for brides they may wish to counsel in the future. Caught between their perceived commitment to teaching the

1 This means “From ‘forbidden, forbidden, forbidden’ to ‘the big permitted.’” The authors decided to use the Hebrew transliteration in this quotation. 29 Religious-Zionist Women’s Views on Sex Education in Israel

halachic lifestyle and values, and their sense of obligation to promote the well-being of their students and brides when dealing with sexuality both before and after marriage, these women often voiced ambivalent and even contradictory opinions regarding what to talk about with students and brides, as well as when and how. But they also gave a clear message on the importance of promoting healthy femininity and sexuality within a halachic framework and the need for a formal sexuality program for religious girls in the high school classroom.

Key words: sex education, religious-Zionist, bride counseling, Israel

Introduction

The Jewish religious-Zionist world in Israel contains many laws, values and beliefs that can be considered ambivalent and even contradictory: traditionalism vs. modernity, rigid halachic laws vs. flexibility and democracy, sexual modesty vs. exposure to media and mixed (male-female) social youth groups, and more. The main challenge to the young religious-Zionist Israeli woman is to find the pathway where all of the seemingly conflicting values can converge, so that she can attempt to maintain her own thoughts, beliefs, and desires while striving to adhere to Torah laws and traditions and to remain a part of the Orthodox Jewish community. A review of the general literature on sex education, as well as traditional Jewish views and teachings, points to a serious lack of unified guidelines and effective sex-education programs for religious-Zionist Israeli girls that can lead to confusion and hardship in adolescence and through the first years of marriage. Female desire and satisfaction in sexual relationships is either ignored or often treated as a symptom of a low level of spirituality, which can lead to feelings of guilt and low self- esteem when building sexual relationships, even within marriage. The transition from celibacy to sexuality that many young Orthodox women experience needs to be studied, in order to create a new way of thinking about the sexuality of Orthodox women and to develop future sex education programs that can promote adolescent Orthodox girls’ positive definitions and beliefs about modesty, relationships and sexuality.

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Girls’ Sex Education in Religious Zionism

Orthodox Judaism, as a traditional religion, asserts authority over all areas of life, yet within the bounds of commitment to religious doctrine, many areas of struggle for individuality and change may be revealed, especially within the religious-Zionist community. Commitment to religion as well as to an inner voice may coexist at a very deep level of identity, along with a belief that such conflicts can be resolved within the religious system. In this way, non-religious aspects of one’s personal and social experience can become a significant aspect of religious life (Hartman, 2002; Sosis & Ruffle, 2003). Teachers in Israeli religious-Zionist high schools, where secular and religious subjects are taught, recognize a pressing need for education in sexuality, a need which is triggered by the realization that, contrary to Orthodox religious law, some students are sexually active, and most students are learning more about their emerging sexuality from the internet and other media sources (Hartman and Samet, 2007). While the general media and popular culture display a blatant caricature of sexual desire, this topic remains simultaneously ignored in the classroom, leaving adolescents confused about what is real and accurate and what may be relevant to them now or in the future (Fine and McClelland, 2006). Despite the fact that religious students are exposed to sexuality through the media, until recently, the general policy of most religious authorities in the Israeli religious school system was to discourage discussion of sexuality in the classroom, an approach that implies that “to ‘awaken’ one to the existence of sexuality through conversation is in itself to ‘arouse.’ Better to leave sexuality dormant, than to kindle it with speech” (Hartman and Samet, 2007, p. 79). Fine (1992) describes a similar attitude to sex education in the United States public school system, where resisters of sex education feel that any discussion of this topic in the classroom “raises questions of promoting promiscuity and immorality and of undermining family values” (p. 32). Opponents of sex education assume that by not teaching about sexuality, adolescent sexual behavior will not occur, despite the fact that empirical evidence disproves this theory (Fine, 1992). Another possible outcome of avoiding sex education in the classroom is the future inadequate sexual development of the school graduate, when sexual activity eventually becomes relevant. Opposing the attitude that discussion of sexuality should be

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avoided in the classroom, Fine and McClelland (2006) contend that “sexuality education is the only academic content area that is taught as if the knowledge gained in the classroom is meant to exclusively serve the young person’s present situation” (p. 328). They compare sex education to other school topics such as math education, wherein topics are learned within the school curriculum despite the fact that there is no need for these topics in the students’ daily lives. Gilligan (1990) supports the importance of open discussion with adolescent women about their budding sexuality when she defines the turning point in girls’ lives at the time of adolescence, where the tendency “for a resistance which is essentially political — an insistence on knowing what one knows and a willingness to be outspoken — [turns] into a psychological resistance: a reluctance to know what one knows and a fear that such knowledge, if spoken, will endanger relationships and threaten survival” (p. 256). Gilligan describes this period as “the time when girls’ desire for relationships and for knowledge comes up against the wall of Western culture and a resistance breaks out which is… potentially of great human value” (p. 257). In aiming to put this resistance in the Israeli religious-Zionist context, we would suggest that the time of girls’ desire for relationships and for knowledge is a period that extends from adolescence – when these young women are commanded by Jewish law and expected by their parents, teachers, and peers to remain celibate – until marriage, and even through the first years of marriage. During this extended turning point, the “wall” that Gilligan mentions becomes a double-barrier for these women. They must deal with the wall of Western culture as well as the restrictions on behavior, thoughts and feelings impressed upon them as members of the Jewish Orthodox world. Gilligan (1990) further describes girls’ knowledge of reality as itself politically dangerous, but at the same time determines that “it is both psychologically and politically dangerous for girls not to know what is going on — or to render themselves innocent by disconnecting themselves from their bodies, that repository of experience and desire, and thus, in essence, disassociating themselves from themselves, from relationships and from what they know about the world.... [G]irls’ knowledge and girls’ passion are bound to make trouble in the world girls are entering” (p. 284, 285). In comparison with the above mentioned avoidance of sexuality education in the American classroom, a notable problem surrounding sex-education discussion in the religious-Zionist education system in

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Israel is the expectation and definition of good, positive behavior in the Jewish Orthodox student. This problem is specifically relevant to the numerous restrictions of tzniut [modesty] with which the girls must comply pertaining to the clothes they wear, what they speak about, and their general behavior and activities, in and out of school. Moreover, the ideas of tzniut shape women’s personal body image and the way women feel about themselves, strongly impacting future marital relations and sexual satisfaction and enjoyment (Marmon Grumet, 2008). For some young female students the laws of modesty may be conceived of as a complete negation of women as sexual beings, a perception that can create great difficulty in their future marital and sexual lives, especially during the transition into marriage, when cultural expectations shift from encouraging a girl to be chaste and uninterested in sexuality to becoming an active marital partner who is alluring and available for her husband. Marmon Grumet (2008) suggests that the messages of tzniut and the methods by which this subject is transmitted must be seriously re-examined. Bordo (1993) states that “not chiefly through ideology, but through the organization and regulation of the time, space, and movements of our daily lives, our bodies are trained, shaped, and impressed with the stamp of prevailing historical forms of selfhood, desire, masculinity, [and] femininity” (p. 165, 166). The laws and dictates of both theTorah and the Jewish community play a strong role in shaping and training the body of the female adolescent. Rules of modesty in dress, behavior, and male-female relationships, along with the demands of fashion in Western culture, cause “female bodies [to] become docile bodies – bodies whose forces and energies are habituated to external regulation, subjection, transformation, [and] ‘improvement’” (p. 166). This may become even more accentuated at the time of transition into marriage, when Jewish Orthodox women are expected to adhere to a new set of laws pertaining to their bodies (laws of purity within sexual relationship) and laws of dress (head covering), beyond those to which they adhered before. Samet (2005) focuses on another problem of education for tzniut for young women in religious-Zionist sex-education: boys’ desire and sexual impulses are well-defined and discussed (whereby, boys are restricted in self-arousal as well as arousal by the opposite sex), while female desire is “erased.” We suggest (and the results of our interviews will show) that the reason for this is the educator’s commitment to teaching the strict criteria for tzniut in women, whereby a woman who is truly modest will not be at all focused on or have thoughts about sexuality.

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Moreover, in order to encourage young girls to behave modestly – especially near boys and men – boys are presented as intensely desirous and sexual, and unable to control their impulses (Cherka-Yodkovitch, 2005; Samet, 2005). Fine (1992) discusses this approach in the general public school sex-education program. “The naming of desire, pleasure, or sexual entitlement, particularly for females, barely exists in the formal agenda of public schooling on sexuality . … In the typical sex education classroom, silence, and therefore distortion, surrounds female desire” (p. 35, 37, 38). Whatley (1994) describes the situation of female desire in sexuality education, noting that “women are often presented as having little (if any) sex drive; if they initiate sex, it is not sexual desire but a need for closeness or intimacy that motivates them” (p. 196). We would suggest that with the additional demands for women’s modesty, young Jewish Orthodox women are left with very little space for examining and expressing their sexual desires. Tolman’s (1994) research on sexuality education for girls in public school classrooms highlights a conflict between two features of girls’ experiences of sexuality: desire and vulnerability. The participants made explicit connections between sexual desire and danger, while social contexts caused most of the girls to make a conscious choice of sacrificing pleasure in an attempt to obtain protection from danger. A major question we raise here is whether some women sacrifice pleasure for other reasons – such as in an attempt to protect their modesty – even if the context of sexuality is definitely not a dangerous one.

Sex Education in the Israeli Religious School System: Policy and Programs

The Branch of Psychology and Counseling Services (Agaf Sheff”i) in the Department of Education is the official authority that is responsible for sex education policy and programs in the Israeli public school system. Enquiries made through Agaf Sheff”i on the internet, as well as e-mail and telephone conversations with representatives of the Branch of Health Education (in the non-religious public school system) and the Branch of Family Life Education (in the religious public school system) have revealed that there are no official rules or supervision in the secular or religious public school systems in Israel pertaining to how sex education should be taught in the classrooms, who is expected to teach the existing programs, and how to evaluate the effectiveness of sex

34 Galit Kahane Uli & Deborah Court education classes on students’ knowledge, feelings, values and behavior. The two major programs existing in the formal religious high school system are “Marital and Family Relations” (Ishut) (Eisenberg, 1997) as part of the bagrut [Israeli matriculation exam] in toshba [Oral Law studies], often taught by rabbis, and the most recent program for Family Life Education (Cherka-Yodkovitch, 2005) which is supposed to be taught by home-room teachers (usually female for girls), as part of the class program on values and social topics. The former program, Ishut, does not attempt to deal with issues of female sexuality, but rather to teach halacha. The Israeli Rabbinate obligates every Jewish bride to learn the laws of family purity, which define times when a married couple may have sexual relations and times when there must be complete separation, including not touching each other or even passing objects from one’s hands to the other’s (Baskin, 2002; Knohl, 2005). Any Jewish bride – secular or religious – interested in an Orthodox wedding service must take part in a lesson consisting of a minimum of two hours with a bride-counselor trained by the Rabbinate. The lesson teaches the basic laws of family purity – vaginal checks at the end of the monthly period and ritual immersion. From informal discussions with several secular brides who took this lesson, I have understood that they are also taught the possible punishments connected with transgression of family purity laws mentioned in Jewish religious sources, such as karet (untimely death or eternal excommunication), sick or paralyzed babies, and more. The universitymidrasha in which students who participated in the current research were enrolled, along with other well-known associations, has created bride-counseling courses that offer an alternative learning program for preparing both religious and secular brides for marriage and future practice of family purity laws. Bride counseling classes for religious girls through one of the above associations usually consists of 8 to 10 two-hour lessons, preferably beginning one to two months before the wedding date. The bride counseling program from which these participants were drawn during the 2010 academic year encourages focusing on three major areas when preparing brides for marriage: family purity laws, male-female communication in marriage, and sexuality. The complexities related to teaching religious high school girls about sexuality both within the rigid halachic framework and the modern world in which they are raised, have led to formulation of the following research questions:

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1. How do a group of Israeli religious-Zionist women, married 2-10 years and participating in a “bride counseling” course, describe their past transition from celibacy (as single women) to sexuality (as married women)? 2. How does their participation in the course affect their outlook on their personal transition from celibacy to sexuality in their own life, as well as their outlook on existing sexuality education programs for religious girls and women? 3. What changes and additions do they recommend for sexuality education programs for girls in orthodox schools in Israel?

Methodology

The current research was conducted through a qualitative approach that strives to discover “the meaning people have constructed about their world and their experiences” (Merriam, 2002, p. 5). Patton (in Merriam, 2002) explains that the goal of qualitative research is not to attempt to predict what may or may not happen in the future, but rather to understand the nature of a phenomenon: what the participants’ lives are like, what meanings they give to the phenomenon being researched, and what the world looks like to them in the particular setting in which they live. The current research aims to explore the meaning these women give to the transition they went through as young Jewish Orthodox Israeli women and what they now feel they should have learned as adolescents, after having gone through that transition. Data was collected through in-depth, semi-structured interviews. The central purpose of the interviews, as in the model discussed by Jones and McEwen (2002), was to engage in dialogue with the participants in order to elicit their descriptions and perceptions of themselves, and to provide them with a structure for communicating their own understandings of and perspectives on their personal experiences through attribution of meaning to those experiences. The participants were encouraged to use “their own words in describing the internal and interpersonal processes by which they [define] their identities and [make] sense of differences” (Jones and McEwen, 2002, p. 166).

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Research Population

In-depth interviews were conducted with 12 religious-Zionist Jewish women during the course of the summer of 2010. All names mentioned in the article are pseudonyms so as to protect the privacy of the participants and their spouses and families. The interviews centered on the women’s experiences of the transition from pre-marital celibacy to sexuality after marriage, including what this transition means to them and how it affected their relationships with self, spouse, community, and G-d. The women were also asked to express their opinions on the materials taught within the two existing sex-education programs (mentioned above) and were then requested to share their insight on topics and issues they feel should be taught to Orthodox Jewish female students during high-school and throughout the years preceding marriage. The participants were chosen from the students enrolled in a course on “Bride Counseling” conducted within the framework of a university Midrasha. The women range in age from 23-30 and have been married between 2 and 10 years. After having studied with these women as a peer for half a year, the researcher began approaching them about being interviewed. These women are interested in teaching future brides about relationships and sexuality and most of them expressed their enthusiasm about being interviewed on what they considered to be an important topic, with one or two expressing a more hesitant attitude, unsure that they wanted to discuss such an intimate topic. Interview sessions were conducted in the homes of the participants, at a time that was deemed comfortable and private. The aim of this setting for conducting the meetings was to enable the meaningful placement of the phenomena being researched within a specific social environment. The participants’ homes are the natural setting for their experiences in sexuality and family life and as such, created an environment that is closely connected to the research questions (Holliday, 2007). The twelve women who participated in the research were all religious-Zionist, yet they each belonged to different subsets of this diverse group. The differences could be seen in their different attitudes about education, modesty, and how to speak about sexuality, their style of clothing, the different type of communities within which they dwelled and more. They also differed in levels of flexibility regarding observance of halacha – some of them spoke and behaved in a way that showed they may be more flexible about certain laws, while others gave the impression

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that they would not be flexible in any way regardinghalacha . The travel involved in order to reach the different homes of the participants also played a role in building an understanding of the cultural setting for the interviews and strongly contributed to the research process. Some of the interviews were conducted in central Israel, while others were conducted in more distant or remote places. One interview was conducted in a yishuv that received residents evicted from Gush Katif in 2005. The interviewee is married to a student of one of the big yeshivot that was moved from Gush Katif to within the Green Line. She is personally not flexible in any area of halacha. Three of the interviews were conducted in the Shomron area. Two of these women live in a new settlement, which consisted at the time of five families and a few bachelors living on a hill beyond a bigger, more established settlement. There was no established access road to their homes, but rather an unpaved path along a cliff, with no safety fence. These two women seemed to be very flexible about how to discuss sexuality even though they were not flexible about practicing halacha. Another interview was conducted in a building of 20 Jewish inhabitants located in an otherwise solely Arab neighborhood in Eastern Jerusalem. This interview demanded an official armed escort for the travel there and back. Before the interview, the participant showed us the view from the roof of her building, which included a very close view of the Dome of the Rock on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount. This interviewee was similar to the participants who were inflexible in halacha practice while promoting open discussion of sexuality with adolescents. The experience of traveling to their homes helped highlight the women’s different ideologies and cultural expressions for the researchers. Even though they all identify with the religious-Zionist community, they each belong to a different subset of this group, and some of these cultural differences are revealed by their words and in the themes that arose in each of the interviews. Two of the interviews were not conducted in the participants’ homes, by request of the participants themselves. One asked to meet in the school where she works, in the teachers’ room, and at certain points in the interview the participant had to speak quietly or discreetly because of the intimate topics being discussed while others were nearby. The second participant asked to meet at the university where she studies and there was definitely a less warm, “homey” atmosphere during this interview.

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Data Analysis

When analyzing the interviews, the process of grounded theory development (Bryant and Charmaz, 2007; Merriam, 2002) was used, as well as elements of Gilligan’s (1992) voice-centered analysis, which allowed sensitization “to thematic patterns and the significance of linguistic cues” (Hartman and Samet, 2007, p. 77). The strengths of the grounded theory method are particularly appropriate for the goals of this study. This methodology, designed to encourage persistent interaction with data, while remaining constantly involved with emerging analyses, enabled a firm and concrete ground for analytical investigation within both cultural context and real-life situations. Thus, grounded theory was not utilized to prove or disprove hypotheses but rather to generate categories for theorizing the informants’ experiences (Bryant and Charmaz, 2007). While these observations can only be said to apply to the specific group of women interviewed, we have attempted, through their voices to illuminate the feelings of the larger population of religious-Zionist Israeli women who have gone through similar experiences. As a religious-Zionist Israeli woman belonging to the participants’ world, the main researcher tried to identify and monitor her personal biases and observations rather than attempt to eliminate them, and to understand how they may shape the collection and interpretation of data (Merriam, 2002).

Results

Repeated reading of the interviews revealed several recurring words, phrases, and metaphors which helped the researchers build categories that shed light on the research topic and questions. The different categories were then grouped into the following major themes that capture the participants’ past sex education and how they presently feel about teaching this topic to religious teenage girls and brides.

Living and Teaching Halacha

Religious-Zionism tries to respond to the needs of modern times, yet this is considered acceptable only within the boundaries of halacha (Sosis and Ruffle, 2003).

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The participants seemed to support this attitude, mentioning the need for the provision of clear and indisputable halachic boundaries for students and brides. They also discussed the feelings of failure that can arise when women do not succeed in adhering to halacha. Yehudit, who was raised in a big city slightly north of central Israel, experienced a great deal of freedom as a teenager and often rebelled against the rules and demands of her high school for tzniut (modesty). Yet when she discusses education for tzniut she states unequivocally, “It is necessary to remind the girl… that halacha is halacha… you explain it like that, the way it is.” Sarah, who was raised in a non-religious, traditional home, and went to a liberal religious high school, discusses the issue of adherence to halacha when talking about her future plans as a bride counselor. In the beginning of the interview she mentioned that her bride counselor did not teach her some of the more stringent halachot (laws) before marriage and that this possibly made her transition into marriage easier. Yet, she is sure that she will teach these same difficulthalachot to her future brides, hoping that if she teaches them in a sensitive, encouraging way the brides will not have a difficult time with them. “Things can be very simple. And one can leave her the option that if she doesn’t feel good about something, if it causes her frustration, she should talk about it. I don’t think the halacha is interested in us being frustrated. Definitely not.” Sarah’s debate about sharing with future brides laws that she herself was spared by her bride counselor, seems parallel to Gilligan’s (1990) observance of the turning point for political resistance in adolescent girls’ lives. Gilligan discusses the “reluctance to know what one knows” (p. 256) and the fear of speaking that knowledge. Sarah deals with the same resistance, but rather than the fear of speech, Sarah expresses the fear of withholding information – in her case, halacha. However, a deeper reading may indicate that providing that information is the woman’s way of hiding behind the wall of conformity (to halacha) rather than acknowledging the “adolescent” bride’s need for a less halachically and, therefore, more innocent introduction to sexuality. Like Yehudit, Sarah is also clear on the fact that halacha must be adhered to and that this must be made clear to students and, in Sarah’s case, brides. “This is the halacha and we adhere to halacha – just like we don’t understand many halachot that we perform. We simply perform them. This is also part of our life.” Rina, a very practical, direct woman, is a teacher in a public religious girls’ high school in central Israel, in the city where she resides. She is

40 Galit Kahane Uli & Deborah Court obviously careful about halacha on a personal level but feels differently than Sarah and Yehudit about how to teach young brides halacha: I really appreciated the speech by Rabbi ______.... His speech suddenly gave me a new turn of thought; when he spoke about how important it is the way you say things, and how sometimes what you don’t say is more important than what you do say. Rina’s words suggest that with certain brides, certain halachot should not be mentioned. Possible reasons that were not explored, yet may have been underlying in Rina’s suggestions are that certain halachot may be too difficult, even traumatizing for some brides and that non-religious brides should not necessarily hear about every halacha, since they won’t automatically follow them. Moreover, the Rabbi whom Rina mentioned stated clearly that if there is a halacha the bride most probably will not abide by, it is better not to teach her the halacha so that she transgresses the halacha unintentionally (shogeg) rather than knowingly (mezid). Elisheva, raised in a religious home and the graduate of a relatively strict religious high school, is also confused about how to teach halacha without compromising on any rules and boundaries, while still allowing enough space for choice and comfort. “You are taking upon yourself the responsibility of the lives and the adherence to mitzvot (commandments) of the couple. On the one hand, you should present a feeling of comfort; on the other hand, you should not give a feeling of too much freedom. It is truly about finding the balance.” It seems that Elisheva is very interested in finding the balance but doesn’t know how, when she states,“Wow, I will have difficulties with this.” Ahuva, who immigrated to Israel from Ethiopia at age 12 and works as a counselor and mentor of religious and non-religious Ethiopian teenagers in central Israel, sheds light on the problem of teaching students solely according to halacha: “As educators, we need to portray the realities that are raging outside and what it is correct to do, according to halacha, but not only according to halacha. It’s a little difficult because what can you do about those [students] who don’t care about halacha?” Ahuva is realistic about the fact that even if parents and educators are interested in teaching according to halacha, not all the students are interested in living by halacha and educators must be responsible for teaching these students what they need to know as well. Rebecca, who describes herself as more religious than her liberal parents and siblings, teaches in a girls’ public religious high school in central Israel. She introduces the difficulty of discussing different topics

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of sexuality with her students because of halachic boundaries: I don’t know how much I would discuss with girls what happens to adolescent boys, mainly because of the halachic problem of tzniut. I don’t know how much we are allowed or forbidden to talk about these things. I also don’t know if they really need to know everything [about the changes boys go through in puberty]. What is unclear in Rebecca’s dilemma is why she doesn’t check what is halachically permissible to discuss with unmarried female students about male puberty rather than remaining with the above question. It is also interesting to note that Rebecca frames this issue only as a halachic question, and not as an educational and psychological one. Some of the participants mentioned the feelings of failure that can be involved when they do not succeed in adhering to halacha, especially when discussing the trials young religious men have with sperm ejaculation. Elisheva described the difficulty she thinks her husband probably had before marriage: “I can say that for my husband, I believe that the years of guarding and waiting are much harder than what we go through.” Karen, who was raised in a religious home but went to a liberal religious high school where the students were much less religiously observant than she was, shared a fairly intimate story from the time of her engagement when her fiancée requested to not meet with her the next day. She was very hurt by this until he spoke to her bridal counselor, who explained to her that their meetings cause him to have feelings of arousal and he was afraid of experiencing ejaculation as a result of these meetings. “It’s a very, very long time, and it continues day after day. She needed to explain to me that it isn’t good for him, that it’s difficult for him.” Yehudit also described the difficulty the man has waiting until marriage and assumes that most men experience forbidden ejaculation before marriage: “The man restrained himself for a long time. He had his downfalls, he ate his heart every time he fell.” Yehudit uses the terms “downfall” and “to fall” when describing other acts of transgressing halacha. For example, she shared with me the fact that she and her husband had full sexual relations with each other prior to their marriage, singling her out from the other participants who clearly did not experience physical relations of any kind before marriage. Yehudit describes their feelings on their wedding night, when they began “to regret the whole period of time that we touched, that whole downfall.” Later she repeats, “It’s a pity that we fell. We could have done it in a way of holiness.”

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Fine (1992) discusses the four prevalent discourses on sexuality in the American high-school classroom: sexuality as violence, sexuality as victimization, sexuality as individual morality, and lastly, a discourse of desire. Yehudit’s attitude towards her pre-marital sexual relations suggests the third discourse, sexuality as individual morality, which led to the outlook that pre-marital sexual behavior is immoral. According to Fine, “this discourse values women’s sexual decision making as long as the decisions are made for premarital abstinence” (p. 35). All of the above descriptions combine to give a general picture of the precedence of halacha in the participants’ lives, while illuminating the inherent difficulties in teaching students the strict boundaries ofhalacha without leaving them ignorant of important information on sexuality, or causing them unnecessary discomfort in future sexual relations.

Tzniut and Exposure: When, Where and How?

A second major theme that came up throughout the interviews was the possible ways of teaching tzniut, with the participants focusing on the importance of educating for creative expressions of femininity such as song, dance, art, etc. rather than only teaching tzniut through external expressions such as restrictions on clothing. They discussed the fact that just as there is a time and place for modesty, there is also a time and place for exposure. The participants highlighted a significant issue, the possible suppression of femininity that can be caused by the religious school system when it focuses strictly on the dress code, discussing centimeters (of sleeve or skirt length) and repeating certain words or phrases such as: “Tzniut, tzniut, tzniut! [modesty]” and “Asur, asur, asur! [forbidden].” Penina and Ziva, two of the youngest participants, live with six other families in an unofficial settlement on a hill in the Shomron. Being far away from the faster pace of central Israel, their life-style is obviously different than the other participants, yet they were accepted open-heartedly in the bridal-counseling course and their insights were always treated respectfully and with interest. Penina discusses her high school’s attitude to tzniut: I remember when the Rabbi would rebuke us about three-quarter [length] sleeves..... It disturbed me and made me feel that they are focused on external issues. I mean, what is modest about that? I was really against that.... First of all, it isn’t modest – why are you [a man] even looking at me? .... No one talked about the beautiful things that

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are beyond – that the body is a good, beautiful thing and that one must guard it. They spoke in a very superficial way that caused me to rebel and I am not a rebellious person. Ziva spoke even more strongly about her disgust with how educators teach girls about tzniut, relative to the boys around them who are not allowed to see them dressed immodestly: Something really bothers me about that way of teaching… trying to convince the girls to dress modestly.... For me, that way of teaching creates the image of a rapist, in how we relate to men.... And I say to myself, what kind of male image have we created? I mean, what kind of perverted, messed up rapist is walking the streets trying to look at our legs all the time?! Really, a woman needs to guard her modesty because it’s special; it’s beautiful; it’s good. Ziva is very critical of what Fine (1992) calls the discourse of sexuality as violence. The students hear a discourse of sexual violence rather than discussing the more positive aspects of sexuality, whereby it is to be hoped that students will be less sexually active or in the case of the educators of Ziva’s youth, the girls will dress less provocatively. Tami, the least halachically flexible participant, living in a community of former Gush-Katif residents, had a very hard time discussing intimate topics. She mainly focused on her high school’s way of teaching halacha and tzniut, which she was uncomfortable with and even angry about, stating quite clearly, “Tzniut was a most hated topic.... The administration was so limiting, to the extreme of placing a person at the school gate, looking for victims.” Tami longs for a teaching of modesty that she feels is summed up by her husband’s comment to her toddler daughter, “Cover your sweet, holy body.” Yehudit was adamant about the exclusive focus on the external signs of modesty – rules of dress code – in her high school. I know about that pressure in the Ulpana (religious girls’ high school). You wear something inappropriate and they make the biggest mistake: “Go change! That isn’t modest!”… They need to come from a softer standpoint… Not – “You’re not modest!” How many times did they do that to me in the Ulpana? “Your shirt isn’t modest. Go change!” Do you think I changed? No! They had to deal with it. The way Yehudit’s school dealt with the external issues of modesty did not cause her to wish to be more modest, but rather to rebel. A few moments later, she uses a quite difficult metaphor of a light

44 Galit Kahane Uli & Deborah Court being turned off within her, the moment she was willing to conform to the standards of modest dress and behavior demanded by religious society. I repressed [my desire to dance] because I was told, “Asur! Asur! Asur!” and it was as if the light went out within me in this area…. I chose to listen to the halacha and stop dancing but something within me turned off. Revital, a very introverted, sensitive woman, teaches Ishut in an evening program for religious high school dropouts trying to finish their matriculation exams and remain within a normative routine for youth of their age. Most of these students are not religious and many of them are or have been involved in sexual activity. Revital, therefore, obviously needs to use her own material on tzniut and sexuality, items that are not referred to in Eisenberg’s (1997) curriculum on Ishut. Revital’s opinion on teaching tzniut is that educators should come “from a place that is more embracing, more respectful.” She thinks the girls should be told that “when you respect yourself, you dress in a way that respects yourself.” She advises the students to “invest in yourselves, dress beautifully but in a way that others can discover your secret – it shouldn’t be open and for sale. The moment you cover something, it can be discovered and there is a treasure inside.” Karen addresses the issue of pressuring teenage girls to be externally modest, and the negative effect this can have on their future exposure to their husbands when it becomes permissible: Many girls talk about the fact that it was “ground” into their minds: “Be modest, modest, modest, modest, modest!” And now they ask us for something else. So was it good [that we were modest], was it bad?… I say, if we define in advance that it isn’t good and bad, but rather we say, “This has a place and that has a place and each thing that is in its place is good and each thing that is not in its place is not good.” That needs to be the starting point. Karen mentions many times throughout the interview how important it is to remind students in an encouraging way that they will have opportunities for healthy, happy and holy sexual experiences in the future – “at the right place and the right time.” She gives an example of her encouragement to a male student who complained about the trials of forbidden sperm ejaculation: Someone asked, “Why do I need this urge? It is uncontrollable; it just

45 Religious-Zionist Women’s Views on Sex Education in Israel

takes us to bad places. What do I need it for, anyway? I would give it up – take it away from me!” …. I said to him, this [sexual arousal] has a place; it has importance and value…. The only problem is that this isn’t the right time. The only problem is that you need to have patience. And it’s difficult.... One shouldn’t say it’s bad, it’s not bad. Yehudit also mentioned a similar way of explaining to boys the need to delay physical relations with girls: “Say to him, “Listen, this is a good thing and a positive thing, and this is how G-d created us. He didn’t create us this way for nothing. There is a purpose. We do need fun, good things for us. But [G-d] gave us the time and the framework for each thing.” The theme of tzniut and how it should be taught, that generally arose from the different interviews can be summed up by Elisheva’s following words: In ulpanot, a place should be given for exposure of the body: dance and drama, all sorts of things that can encourage a woman to feel her femininity in a more positive way. To explain the beauty of tzniut, its unique purpose, the uniqueness of saving yourself for your husband…. Even if I would explain that the woman arouses urges [of other men] I would go for the positive side of this arousal – ‘You will go and arouse your husband later on…’ Go for the positive side of the issue and the beauty of tzniut and its uniqueness.”

Femininity and the Kedusha (holiness) of Sexuality

Tami describes what is, for her, a very disturbing part of the religious education she received, whereby “the academic side was very strong and at the same time you are constantly being hinted, ‘bat yisrael, bat yisrael, bat yisrael, bat yisrael’ and go to college and build a family…. Decide! On the one hand you prepare me for being a speaker on bio- technology and on the other hand you constantly hint to me ‘bat yisrael, bat yisrael, modesty, modesty, modesty, modesty, modesty.’” Tami feels that her high school geared girls to male pursuits in life – academics, male roles in the working world, etc. – rather than “giving a place for expressing your body… among women, in a world of women.” Tami even mentions that her admiration for her older brother, who was a Torah scholar, caused her to swing back and forth while learning and praying, and even, at times, to rub an imaginary beard. “I remember the first time I discovered what women are, how strong it is, what a strength there is, I wasn’t aware, I couldn’t believe it…. I preferred learning in batei

46 Galit Kahane Uli & Deborah Court midrash that were of a male style such as ______which is more scholarly.” Tami is essentially referring to Gilligan’s (1990) “deeply knotted dilemma which lies at the center of women’s development… how can girls both enter and stay outside of, be educated in and then change, what has been for centuries a man’s world” (p. 266)? She remembers the turning point when she suddenly recognized “what strength the woman has.... What is the dance of a woman? It’s something totally different. It’s not the dance of men. Stop imitating them! We have something of our own.” Penina also mentioned the issue of girls being raised in “a very male world”: Everything is classified by male parameters of success. For example, test scores and professional success. Femininity is something different – something slower, more religious, deep, more connected with spiritual realms. In [the school I went to] there is a lot of running after grades, the girls really want to succeed and get good grades. And the way of teaching is very formal; frontal classes. Feminine learning is through discussion, togetherness, sharing experiences. Penina shares her insight on modesty and femininity: The woman’s body is a good thing, a beautiful thing. We shouldn’t be ashamed of it and it is something we want to guard…. You should feel good about yourself, that you are good, that you feel good and that the feelings you have are good feelings. You just need to know how to guide those feelings to the right place and the right time…. With your husband – you are really allowed to make yourself beautiful for him, and to dress immodestly for him and to show him things. And also with women, you can dance with your whole body and not be ashamed. And it’s good to be aware of your body and connect with it. Revital described her desire to teach girls about their bodies and about femininity from preschool age and through high school: At preschool age, I think that, first of all we need biological knowledge of our bodies. Not to be embarrassed, and to feel connected [to our bodies], lovingly and happily; to instill very strongly the place of the beauty and love of the body. At a slightly older age, the idea that “I am covering up because there is a treasure here, there is a very great treasure so we cover it, we don’t show it outside and that is good for me.” Bat mitzvah – 7th grade – the biological knowledge of what is happening to the body, the cycle of the beginning of life – a thing of happiness. And after that, the awareness of the qualities and the good

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within me and how I treat my body…. In 11th-12th grades preparation for a relationship with a partner, what kind of relationship we are expecting. The participants felt that the topic of the woman’s monthly period should be used as a way to explain the uniqueness of being a woman. Ziva discussed the fact that because the laws of family purity are directly related to the woman’s monthly cycle, her period is the central focus of the marital relationship. Ziva mentioned that during the course she was “constantly focusing on the connection to the inner values of the woman, what happens in her relationship, the exterior process the woman goes through before becoming pure, before her tevilah (ritual immersion). I saw this as parallel to what goes on in the womb, and with the ovum, and what happens to the woman regarding emotional-hormonal processes… A certain puzzle is created… what is family purity about, if not the monthly cycle?” Revital stated that she appreciated how the bridal counseling course enhanced her understanding “about the woman’s period, and the general, constant state of renewal the woman is in. Our renewal in Judaism, our renewal in relationships… All the life that is involved in it, the renewal and that newfound discovery, every time.” Rebecca uses the term “strength” many times and describes the way she instills the ideas of femininity and feminine strength in her students’ minds: We spoke about the strength, how much strength G-d gives us.... I think they received a positive statement on femininity, a positive statement on the place of guarding oneself and holiness and purity that may one day give them a positive connotation when they meet with that “No!” that we meet with everywhere. “This is forbidden, that is forbidden, this is forbidden, that is forbidden.” Maybe they will have something positive in their minds that will help them when they grow older. Nechama, one of the obviously less halachically flexible participants, raised in an Orthodox moshav (cooperative settlement) and a strict religious high school, also uses the word “strength,” repeating it eight times throughout the interview. The contexts of the woman’s strength mentioned by Nechama are that the woman has physical strength, “strength of life” derived from her monthly period, and that she has the strength to attract men through her beauty. Nechama thinks that it is important to speak positively with girls about these strengths and to help them understand that “just as we guard a good and beautiful thing, we should also guard ourselves.” She is interested in teaching girls to “guard”

48 Galit Kahane Uli & Deborah Court their strength for their future relationships with their husbands. Ziva shares her dream of teaching girls about femininity and sexual tension, stating that sexual tension should be given “due respect,” and “that we tell girls, ‘This whole story of your having sexual tension – that’s amazing! It’s because you are women and you want a man and that’s terrific! You just need to hold on to it.’” Ziva seems to be referring to what Gilligan (1990) describes as “the time when girls’ desire for relationships and for knowledge comes up against the wall of Western culture” (p. 257), and, we suggest, the wall of halachic culture as well. Ziva wants girls to feel that it is natural, as women, to “want a man” and to encourage them to look forward to a future legitimate relationship that can go hand in hand with halacha. The participants mentioned certain shocks and traumas that religious brides may go through during the transition from being single and celibate, as young religious women, to marriage and sexuality. The main issues that came up were the difficulties that may be experienced on the wedding night, “Leil Klulot” and the new halachot performed in marriage, such as going to the mikvah [ritual immersion bath] or doing bedikot [internal checks for menstrual purity]. Sarah used the words “difficult” and “not easy” many times regarding the new halachot, the wedding night, and the difficulties she may have teaching these topics to her future brides. Ahuva describes the transition on the wedding night as “a shock” and explains that “we are talking about a class of people who educate for complete separation [between men and women] and that this is forbidden and that is forbidden. There are many fences and restrictions and suddenly the topic becomes the most permissible thing in the world. It is a drastic transition and therefore I think that bride counseling is very important. It has a very significant role in trying to soften the transition and make it a healthy, correct, step-by-step process. The bride counseling can slightly remove that pressure and shock.” Elisheva discusses the difficulty of the exposure on the wedding night: “Every religious bride – from that tzniut, and from the ‘Asur! Asur! Asur!’ To suddenly reach ‘the big mutar [permitted]’ – it seems a great shock to me.” As Marmon Grumet (2008) suggests, for some young female students, the laws of modesty may be conceived as a complete negation of women as sexual beings, a perception that can create great difficulty in their future marital and sexual lives. Grumet suggests that the messages of tzniut and the methods by which this subject is transmitted must be seriously re-examined, and it seems that Elisheva’s comments point in the same direction. Elisheva shares that she would like to tell her

49 Religious-Zionist Women’s Views on Sex Education in Israel

future brides, “I would let the first days just be for flowing together… So she will really feel good about herself… To give a feeling of comfort and not of massive pressure that that night she must [have sexual intercourse], even if it’s the worst thing in the world for her now.” Elisheva further states that “from what I hear and experience, the real difficulty exists in all those nitpicking bedikot, in being exposed naked before the balanit [the woman who presides over the ritual immersion] at the mikvah.” Elisheva’s references to the woman’s body are mentioned by Bordo (1993), who states that “our bodies are trained, shaped, and impressed with the stamp of prevailing historical forms of selfhood, desire, masculinity, femininity” (p. 165, 166). She touches on the element of physical intrusiveness of the bedikot that is mentioned by Hartman and Marmon (2004). Yehudit also mentions the Leil Klulot, remembering the fact that she had pre-marital sex with her husband and that “that gradual progression definitely made it easier for us. I’m trying to think about haredi [ultra- religious] girls who go into a physical relationship like that [immediately on the first night] and it’s very scary. It can also be very traumatic.” Karen also mentioned the words fear and trauma regarding the Leil Klulot, specifically regarding brides who never received correct instruction about sex and the wedding night. “There may be some girls that it’s really traumatic [for them]. I have friends that are really traumatized. One was really traumatized at the wedding itself. She told me two months later, that she had no idea what was going to happen when the wedding would end and she was afraid of it – the fear of death.” Rina, practical as always, suggests open discourse between the engaged couple before the wedding night so as to ease the transition from celibacy to sexual activity: We [Rina and her fiancée] had some very open discussions – even too open – before our wedding about all the halachic issues as well as about the wedding night. We simply came to that night knowing exactly what we wanted, knowing where we were going. I think that that made me very calm and things were different because of that…. I know someone whose husband didn’t study correctly before marriage …. They didn’t discuss anything in advance because they were too dosim [unwilling to be flexible in halacha observance], they reached the wedding night and everything exploded. I am against that…. But I don’t know, I never asked a Rabbi if that is really the correct thing to do. As certain as Rina is that it is better for the couple to plan the wedding night together she still voices the worry that maybe a Rabbi

50 Galit Kahane Uli & Deborah Court would not approve, meaning maybe halacha does not approve of such discussions before marriage. Rebecca raises a disturbing issue, admitting that she always thought “probably like every other person, that sex is completely permissible but the less the better.” She explains that the bridal counseling course taught her that marital sex is “the mitzvah of utmost importance.” She even mentions the change she personally underwent, recognizing how central sexuality is to her marriage and that when sex is “lacking, it causes many other emotional problems” in the relationship.

Opportunities for Discourse on Intimacy, Sex, and New Experiences

There seemed to be some ambivalence regarding how parents and educators should talk to children. It was clearly hard for the participants to find a balance between the desire to maintain children’s innocence and the necessity to discuss sexuality openly with children, since they are widely exposed to this topic through the media. The participants voiced the importance of speaking more openly with students, yet sometimes hinted or even stated openly that discussing sexuality may be dangerous and may possibly kindle promiscuity among teenagers. This ambivalence was most noticeable in Yehudit’s and Sarah’s interviews. When discussing the fact that many educators prefer keeping silent about sexuality in order to preserve modesty and innocence, Yehudit says quite clearly, “Terrible! Terrible! They will try to find out about it on their own…They think about it, you can’t prevent that. Total mistake.” A few moments later when asked about discussing physical relations between men and women she contradicts her former words, saying, “Look, you need to be careful not to give them an opening [for promiscuity]. You can’t come to a girl and say, ‘Physical relations are wonderful! But save it for after your marriage.’ She’ll want to find out what is wonderful now.” Further on in the interview, when asked about the possibility of discussing sexuality in 11th and 12th grade classrooms, Yehudit says, “You need to be careful not to give her an opening.” Suddenly an attitude that was defined as “terrible!” and a “total mistake” may be relevant to certain topics that Yehudit is unsure whether or not they can be discussed in the classroom. Sarah states at one point, “I wouldn’t just talk with them about sex and different kinds of sexual behavior… there needs to be a balance. And I’m trying to think, where is the higher price paid? If we don’t talk, then what?”

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She continues later on, “How much should one talk, how much can you expand on each topic?... One can always say, ‘The question you asked is a very good one and I really want to answer. Either we will discuss it privately or’ – I don’t know if it is correct to say, ‘This is not the time to answer you.’” Sarah thus deals with the dilemma by avoiding answering the student or by not answering her in a public setting, before the entire classroom. Elisheva consistently opposes these ambivalent attitudes: I don’t agree… They [the students] won’t deal with [sexuality] less. It is a topic that pops up, comes up all the time. That sexual tension between women and men can’t be ignored. It exists all the time, and is present. If we don’t talk about it, it will simply be [handled] unwisely, conclusions will be deduced independently and there won’t be any kind of mediation and understanding of the issue. Each one will just think about what he or she saw. This is really not correct in my eyes. It’s important to talk, it’s important to explain things. And even if it seems that they know, you still need to talk.... When asked which topics should be discussed in the classroom Elisheva answers unhesitatingly: “Tzniut, femininity, attraction between men and women…. To explain to girls about the male system, the sexual male system…. What is forbidden, why the prohibition exists; that boys are going in circles around this topic. They [the girls] should know this exists there.” Elisheva states that she thinks these topics are either not talked about in the classroom or they are talked about “but not in the right way…. They talk only about what is forbidden.” Elisheva thinks that the reason teachers don’t teach these topics is because they are embarrassed, and sympathizes with them, saying, “I know that it also won’t be easy for me.… Maybe this is the reason that it’s important to start talking with your child about these things at a young age. To open this channel at a young age already and slowly, slowly, release it… It’s important that programs should exist so that the teacher can come and have a little bit of direction what to say and how to say it… Because it really isn’t easy. There is embarrassment surrounding this issue… there really is a certain modesty that is good for this topic, but one needs to know how to talk about it in a modest way as well as in an open way.” Revital says that many adult educators avoid discussing sexuality because of fear.

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The avoidance of people who are embarrassed by it, and don’t know how to talk about it and to contain it. And fear exposing children, that the children will be exposed and then what? So they’ll be exposed anyway, the question is will they be exposed to it [sexuality] in a healthy, good way and will they be given the tools to know the right way so they won’t need to go look [for answers] in strange fields. Today there are so many means, on the internet you can get anything you want. They will have natural curiosity, it’s very strong, a person can’t wait until you tell him or her, before getting married…. You have the option of [telling them] from a healthy, lively, happy place, why not do it? Why let them go and look for it in a modest, hidden way, which isn’t really modest and is twisted. Gilligan (1990) treats the topic of the responsibility of women for girls’ education, mentioning two essential questions mothers and female teachers should ask themselves: “Where am I in relation to the tradition which I am practicing and teaching?” and, “Where am I in relation to girls, the next generation of women?” Rina shared the discussions she had with her students about their bodies and getting their period, and that she was surprised by reactions she received from other teachers: Teachers in the teachers room who heard that I taught my students about their period – they’re in seventh grade – looked at me [shocked], “What, are you a nurse?!” I said “No, but I’m like their mother so maybe they should hear it from somebody?!” It seems that the teachers in Rina’s school, unlike Rina herself, are not willing to face the questions Gilligan raises above. Rina is very critical in general about sex-education programs for religious girls in ulpanot: In ulpanot there is absolutely no preparation. They learn Ishut and Family Life and there is nothing mentioned or even partially mentioned about what goes on in their bodies…. I think that they get a lot from the internet – the fact that they don’t get the information causes them to get it through the back door…. When they are taught about Family Life, what are they told? Look at the book on Ishut! Ketubah (Jewish marriage contract), what he owes her, what she owes him… Really! Did anyone talk to her about healthy relationships? What goes on in her body? What does being married mean? Nothing! In my opinion the first source a religious girl hears from is her bridal counselor and that’s a big problem.

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Rebecca thinks one should be open with students about sexuality, except with regard to teaching high school girls about female arousal and satisfaction: I don’t think it [sexual arousal and satisfaction] interests a young woman at this stage. It interests women, it’s more of an interest to women who already experienced [sexual relations]. What is strange in Rebecca’s absolute confidence that teenage women are not interested in learning about sexual arousal is that she separates this topic from the general topic of sexuality, feeling that you need to be open about sexuality so that the students receive facts and truths, but you shouldn’t speak at all about female sexual arousal, because celibate women are not at all interested in this topic. Rebecca’s view leaves many unanswered questions, such as: What other topics which are relevant to sexuality should not be discussed in the classroom for the same reason – disinterest of the students? Is it possible that there are teenage students interested in learning about sexual arousal, and how will they get that information? When and how will the other students receive that information when they need it? This is discussed by Fine (1992), when she mentions the almost complete lack of discourse on female desire in the classroom, and by Fine and McClelland (2006), who argue that “sexuality education is the only academic content area that is taught as if the knowledge gained in the classroom is meant to exclusively serve the young person’s present situation” (p. 328). In Rebecca’s case, general sex education is important despite the fact that she expects her students not to be sexually active today. However, with reference to female arousal and satisfaction, Rebecca does not deal with Fine and McClelland’s participant, who voiced the worry: “But, when I am ready, where will I learn… about what might feel good for me? Where will I learn about sexuality after high school? Will it magically happen when I marry?” (p. 328). All of the participants clearly stated that bride counselors must be completely open with brides about sexuality and sexual intercourse. Most of them felt that discourse on these topics will be fairly limited with high-school students and unmarried women, but that before marriage they must be taught these topics in detail. Karen stated clearly that in her eyes “the most important thing is the counselling you receive” as a bride before marriage. Later in the interview I asked her if she thinks the bride counselor “can talk about everything,” and she corrected me, saying the bride counselor “must talk about everything.”

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When Nechama was asked if she thinks bride counselors should talk about sexual arousal and satisfaction for the woman, she said, “During bride counseling, definitely…yes, yes we should talk… The moment we succeed in talking from a beautiful place, from a holy place, then we can talk about [sexual arousal and satisfaction]… it is important.” Yehudit said that everyone wants knowledge – those who have previous knowledge and those who lack it. She mentioned that although she had already had sexual relations with her fiancée,“I was really yearning for instruction…. The fact that we were together doesn’t mean that I don’t want to hear the Torah instruction on this topic.... In the beginning of the year, in our bridal counseling courses, when they told us that many counselors don’t talk about this topic, and that it isn’t good, I immediately agreed.” Elisheva spoke very firmly about the need women have for a place to talk about their sexuality and new experiences after marriage. When discussing the transition a religious bride goes through when she gets married, she stated, “There is no one to talk to, there is no one you can tell… The bride counseling doesn’t always provide. No one talks about it.” Elisheva mentioned that she mainly joined the bride-counseling course to learn about “sexual relations – what is allowed, what is prohibited, all those things. It was very important to me to hear about it. To understand it better. To find a place to talk a little about it. This topic was very loaded for me and it really gave me a release when we talked about it in the course.” Later on she mentioned again, “I didn’t feel that I had a place to talk about [sexuality] with someone…. This year [in the bride counseling course] really gave me a lot. I feel much more complete with it.” The participants’ descriptions of the education they received for modesty, their experiences when transitioning from celibacy to sexuality, their first impressions of family purity laws and their future plans for teaching brides and students about modesty and sexuality, give a strong framework from which to understand the existing treatment of sexuality education in religious girls’ schools, and a foundation for considering a new and different approach to teaching girls about modesty, their bodies, femininity, and sexuality within the world of halacha.

Discussion

Family life is a central topic in the spiritual and practical way of life of traditional Jews. The importance of passing on the halacha and traditions from generation to generation, the major commandment of having children (pirya verivya), and the Jewish nation’s fight for survival 55 Religious-Zionist Women’s Views on Sex Education in Israel

throughout the ages, have strongly highlighted the centrality of marriage and raising a family within the Jewish life experience. It may be assumed that on a cultural level, the laws of family purity and the guarding of tzniut have been a means of protecting the family and of encouraging a strong marital relationship in order to have children and strengthen shlom bayit (peace within the home), which is considered, by many of those who follow these commandments, to be a kind of spiritual “glue” that strengthens the family and keeps it whole and complete (Neriah, 1989). This idea is manifest in the laws of tzniut that are relevant to both men and women, yet are stressed, in practice, mainly through numerous restrictions on women’s clothing as well as public behavior before men, such as singing and dancing, and even speeches and theatrical performances by women, in more haredi [ultra-religious] groups. It would seem that these halachot are meant to create a separation between non-married men and women, in order to delay sexual attraction and behaviors until marriage (Aviner, 2005). This situation leads many young men and women within the religious sector to marry at a relatively young age in comparison with the secular population, wherein one can experience and satisfy sexual needs at a very early age, with a number of partners, for many years. The laws of family purity may also exist, in part, to strengthen the marital bond by offering renewal and refreshment within the relationship. The feeling of longing for and missing each other during the period of separation, as well as the excitement at being brought together again may intensify the emotional stability and sexual satisfaction of the connection, thus strengthening the love between the husband and wife, who are allowed to have intimate relations exclusively within their marriage, and not with any other person (Knohl, 2005). It would seem that despite the fact that the laws of modesty and family purity are so central to religious life throughout the different stages in the lifecycle, formal sex-education for girls is a topic that arouses much conflict and ambivalence, both among religious educators and leaders and the young Israeli women who participated in the current research. Raised within the religious school system, they are planning on becoming agents of socialization as bridal counselors and teachers to adolescent religious-Zionist girls and women, who are commanded by Jewish law and expected by their parents, teachers and peers to remain celibate until marriage, and to adhere to strict laws of modesty in dress before and after marriage, as well as laws of sexual purity after marriage.

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These topics are taught very minimally within religious high schools. The teaching of tzniut focuses mainly on the girls’ dress code, rather than on the importance of following the laws of tzniut in order to enhance future marital relationships and to strengthen the image of the Jewish woman as a spiritual and feminine being, both within the family framework and within the Jewish community in general. A study of the Family Life matriculation program taught in 12th grade for Israeli religious girls, shows that the actual laws of family purity are barely discussed in the program, with no reference to the connection between the laws of family purity and their strengthening of marital relations. There is also no preparation given to the students regarding the new laws and experiences they will undergo when they marry, at a time that may be as close as a year or two (and for some girls, even less) after they graduate from high school. Religious girls from elementary through high school age may learn a wide variety of halachot on many different topics (some more relevant to them now or later, than others). Yet, an in-depth study of the laws of modesty, which are especially relevant to women, and the intricate laws of taharat hamishpacha, which will strongly affect their day-to-day lives after marriage, receive a very small place in the educational and moral learning program for girls, if they are discussed at all. The fact that there is no clear consensus on these laws, especially those pertaining to the dress code, in the religious-Zionist school system, may serve to confuse young religious women even more, both while in high school and when transitioning into marriage and sexuality.

Marriage as Dramatic Transition from Complete Celibacy to Full Sexuality

The turning point in girls’ lives at the time of adolescence, observed by Gilligan (1990) as “the time when girls’ desire for relationships and for knowledge comes up against the wall of Western culture” (p. 257), is strongly portrayed in the current research in the descriptions of the participants’ personal experiences in their past transition from celibacy to sexuality and in their views on the current methods of teaching modesty and sexuality in Orthodox schools. The participants discussed three major issues that strongly affect the transition religious brides experience on their wedding night and through the initial stages of marriage. The first major change brides undergo during the weeks prior to the wedding is their introduction to

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new laws of family purity, that they were either unaware of previously or were aware of, but had never dealt with on a practical level. The participants focused mainly on the inner vaginal checks required at the end of the monthly period, in order to ascertain whether or not the woman is completely pure, and on the laws of ritual immersion. The second change brides undergo is that of revealing their bodies before their husbands, which seems a contradiction to the need for modesty they were raised to revere. The participants voiced the worry that some Orthodox brides will have difficulty exposing themselves “immodestly” in front of their husbands, with some of the participants describing explicitly their personal hardships exposing themselves before their husbands or experiences they heard about from other women. The relatively long years of being told to cover their bodies, without any mention of opportunities where being uncovered can be considered positive, may cause young women to be locked in the outlook that any revelation whatsoever is negative and unholy. The last, and what may be considered biggest change the bride undergoes, is sexual intercourse. Participants spoke about the extreme transition from absolute avoidance of any intimate contact with a man to sudden and full sexual intercourse. They described the feelings of guilt and impurity, inseparable from the seeming contradiction between their own sexual desire and satisfaction and lifelong education for modesty and sexual restraint. One participant specifically mentioned discomfort with her husband’s frequent arousal, which was, in her mind, opposed to her image of him as a Torah scholar.

Learning about Sexuality from a Torah Perspective: New Impressions of Past Experiences

The participants expressed many qualms about the way the topic of tzniut is taught to girls in ulpanot and religious high schools today. They disagree – some of them very strongly – with the way educators treat the topic of tzniut, claiming that these institutions often depress the students’ femininity, leading them to a low self image of their bodies and to future hesitation and even fear of exposure and sexuality, which were presented to them in high school as immodest and wrong. A standard ulpana student may be sent home time and again to change out of a shirt or skirt that is “immodest,” yet will not receive any instruction as to the possibility that the laws of tzniut may positively affect her image as a woman, as well as her future relationship with her

58 Galit Kahane Uli & Deborah Court husband. That same student may ask “provocative” questions about sexuality, contraception and pregnancy, homosexuality, and more, and be reprimanded for expressing “immodest” remarks, thus remaining with no positive impression of the possibility that the laws of family purity may be effective in promoting a strong, healthy marital relationship and family unit, such as the one which she wishes to build in the future. At one and the same time, the participants seem to come up against the wall of their own personal interpretations of halacha, as well as the difficulties of teaching halacha within the complex framework of the differences of opinion among halachic commentators, whereby the participants felt that certain topics should not be discussed in the classroom because of the possible transgression of laws of modesty. Some of the major topics that came up that the participants were unsure about were how to speak (or whether to speak at all) with adolescent girls about the parallel development of adolescent boys; whether or not to encourage engaged couples to plan their future sexual encounters on the first night (or nights) after marriage; which of the halachot must be taught to young brides and which can be avoided, so as to lower levels of tension and discomfort for the bride and the couple. The participants did not seem to have clear answers about whether their interpretations of halacha are correct or not. Some of them are already teaching adolescent daughters and/or students, they are all planning on teaching brides in the future, and yet they still have not found relevant halachic materials or asked appropriate religious leaders in order to get answers to questions about: Which topics may or may not be discussed? At what age/stage in life (of the student) can the different topics be approached? How can we make sure to give students the information they need before marriage, pertaining specifically to the topics that halacha presumably permits us to discuss in the classroom? The participants describe current realities in the religious school system, whereby there is no formal discourse on sexuality and not even minimal instruction for girls about their bodies, the inherent differences between men and women (including within sexual relationships), the monthly period, and fertility. If there is any instruction, it is usually through exposure to the media, as is also noted in several studies (Aviner, 1991, 2004; Fine and McClelland, 2006; Hartman and Samet, 2007), which presents a view of sexuality that is far from the expectations and demands of the Torah and halachic world; or instruction is given informally by bnei akivah youth group counselors, who are themselves adolescents who received no formal instruction on sexuality

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Hartman and Samet (2007) discuss the general policy of most religious authorities in the Israeli religious school system, which is to discourage discussion of sexuality in the classroom. While none of the participants seemed to condone this policy, three of them hinted or even stated openly that discussing sexuality can be dangerous and possibly kindle promiscuity within teenagers. It almost seemed as if these participants were interested both in talking and not talking about sexuality in the classroom at one and the same time, suggesting either to avoid answering the students’ questions or to answer them in a private setting, and not before the entire classroom. The participants who consistently opposed the approach that prefers preserving adolescents’ innocence to speaking openly about sexuality seemed to base their opposition mainly on the fact that adolescents are already exposed to sexuality through media and popular culture, and that if they don’t hear about this topic from their parents and teachers, they will remain influenced only by the inadequate “instruction” they received informally and will be totally unprepared for future sexual relations with their husbands. One may ask if in a world essentially unexposed to popular media – such as small, extreme sectors of the haredi [ultra-orthodox] world, for example – there is no need for instruction and counseling on sexuality and the female body, which can significantly ease the transition from celibacy to sexuality and lead to a positive, healthy outlook on future sexuality and observance of family purity laws. It is possible that the participants’ expressed opinion that students should be formally taught about sexuality, since they are exposed to it anyway through the media, is an approach that gives educators more confidence about discussing sexuality. In this way, sexuality is taught not because it ideally should be, but because there is no choice. In any case, according to this study’s participants, it is a definite necessity. The participants may assume that most of the students inthe religious school system are not sexually active, yet they are all aware of the fact that if women do not receive information and instruction on sexuality in high school or from a good bridal counselor, they are bound to experience much difficulty on their wedding night and with sexuality and post-marital halachot later on, a worry parallel to Fine and McClelland’s (2006) findings, whereby students they interviewed were unsure where they would get information about contraception and sexual satisfaction when they become sexually active in the future. The participants’ experiences and opinions seem to be pointing

60 Galit Kahane Uli & Deborah Court at a destructive, never-ending circle of silence on sexuality. Sexuality is not discussed so as not to expose students to topics that are considered immodest, leading to negative ways of dealing with sexuality through alternative channels of information, which are definitely not accepted in the world of halacha. This circle intensifies when students marry (or engage in sexual intercourse before marriage), and judge their sexual behaviors to be immodest. Such an attitude may lead to feelings of guilt, lack of sexual satisfaction, and even sexual dysfunction, disrupting positive, healthy relations with their husbands. This phenomenon may begin at a very young age, if parents and educators give a negative, intimidating message regarding sexual organs. One of the participants described her experiences with her toddler son, whom she forbade to touch his penis in the bath. She further stated that with girls there is less of an issue because “girls don’t have anything.” Such an attitude – as well as general rebukes about modesty such as “That isn’t nice,” “That isn’t good,” “That is immodest,” or “That is forbidden!” – may lead girls to remain completely ignorant of and unconnected with their vaginal area. In later years, when entering marriage and beginning to have sexual experiences, brides are instructed to do internal vaginal checks and to allow penetration during intercourse with their husbands, which can subsequently be extremely intimidating and even traumatizing.

Ahuva: A Special Case, a Different Language

Ahuva’s interview very obviously represents a special case, completely different from the other participants’ experiences, in that Ahuva seems to be living the dual reality of a young religious Israeli woman and as an inherent part of the immigrant Ethiopian community at the same time. On a methodological level, it is hard to define Ahuva’s experience as within the same context as the other participants. The phenomenon she describes as an Ethiopian immigrant during adolescence, and joining the religious-Zionist Israeli sector in adulthood, distinguishes her from the other participants and reveals new and complicated aspects of femininity, sexuality, and the instruction of these topics in the Ethiopian- Israeli community. Her insights on the experiences she went through as an adolescent and as a newly married woman shed a special light on the topic of sex education in the new Ethiopian community, that needs to be treated simultaneously when building a general sex education program for

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religious girls. The first milestone in Ahuva’s life that clearly sets her apart from the other participants is the moment she first got her period. Jewish Ethiopian tradition considers all menstruating women impure. Therefore, they need to be separated from the rest of the community during menstruation (Weil, 2004). Ahuva describes a reality where menstruation is so taboo that when experiencing her period for the first time, the Ethiopian adolescent may be completely on her own: I can tell you that in our family, and in the [Ethiopian] community, in general, nobody talks about this topic… I think it’s very important not to let girls grow up in the same situation I did because it’s very important that the mother strengthen her daughter and explains that it is a healthy process, that it’s o.k., that she encourages them. When asked whether she shared with her mother that she got her period her succinct answer was: “No, nothing. You really hide it, you feel like there’s something forbidden. It’s forbidden to talk about it, and it’s not modest… I used [pads] in the most sterile way possible, not to leave any evidence, not to leave anything.” The next important stage in Ahuva’s life was when she hadto choose a husband and felt that she wanted to do things differently than what is accepted in her community and family: I want to be a different woman, I want to build myself and my life…. I had this kind of tick in my mind that there’s no chance I’m marrying an Ethiopian. The type of Ethiopian husband that I knew was engraved in my mind, and I said there’s no chance that I’ll find someone who will read me and understand me correctly. Ahuva describes her need to rebel against traditional Ethiopian family structures, as discussed by Fenster (1998), who researched “the loss of authority experienced by men relative to women” in the Ethiopian community in Israel. Ahuva did end up finding an Ethiopian man whose attitude was attuned to hers, yet she is consistent when she advises young Ethiopian women to “try and suit the mold of life here and to build family life that is suitable to here and not to copy the mold they were raised in.” Jewish tradition in Ethiopia demands that after giving birth, a woman must move away from her family to separate small huts until ritual purification (Friedman, 1989). Ahuva describes the traumatic experience she went through after giving birth to her first daughter: You aren’t allowed to leave the house and you have to say hello to

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everyone who comes and you are impure, impure! I will never forget on Friday evening, for me it was really traumatic… I got ready like everyone else and came to the Shabbat table and my father-in-law went crazy, “There is Kiddush here, holy Shabbat bread, go back to your room!” it was really terrible… so I went back to my room and my husband went to the kitchen, brought bread and wine, came into the room and we sat together and sang and made Kiddush… At the end of that Shabbat my father-in-law said, “I saw something beautiful here… your togetherness is beautiful.” Ahuva’s experiences, which were so eloquently related in her interview, helped to enhance the fact that beyond the questions and issues that arise from the general interviews about sex education for religious women in Israel, there are separate issues and educational dilemmas unique to the Ethiopian community that need to be dealt with in order to promote the well-being and happiness of the young men and women growing up with dual cultures and values.

Sexuality and Family Life Education: A New Approach

Despite the obvious difficulties in finding solutions to some of the major conflicts that arise within this topic, the women who participated in the current research are interested in portraying modesty, relationships, and sexuality in a more original and positive light than the methods that were used when they were students or that are currently being used in the religious school system. Regarding tzniut, they voiced expectations of teaching modesty first and foremost through the acknowledgement of places for exposure, treating tzniut as one side of a two sided coin – the second side being exposure. This means that there are places where modesty is appropriate, correct, positive and healthy, and in those places exposure is forbidden and destructive. Yet in other places, such as educating young women for healthy, positive exposure within their future marital relationships, an area that is most difficult to discuss in a classroom forum, exposure is correct and even demanded, healthy, and holy, and in these places modesty may be destructive and contradictory to the holiness of marital relations and healthy femininity. In order to promote a positive outlook on sexuality and exposure of the body after marriage, the participants unanimously voiced a need for teaching modesty through positive messages to students such as: expressing your femininity as much as you desire in acceptable contexts,

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discussing the fact that modesty is correct in certain settings while in other settings, exposure is the more correct expression of femininity. HaCohen (1993), who generally poses a very conservative approach to Orthodoxy and education, nevertheless voices the need to provide adolescent girls with tools that will enable them to learn and choose their own outlook on sexuality and modesty. Bordo’s (1993) description of female bodies’ subjection to external regulation was voiced by the participants in the current research regarding both the treatment of the dress code and tzniut within Orthodox high schools, as well as the difficulties arising at the transition into marriage, when Jewish Orthodox women are expected to adhere to a new set of laws pertaining to their bodies, specifically those of the bedikot that must be observed as part of the laws of purity within the sexual relationship. The participants expressed the importance of teaching the laws of tzniut and purity in a loving, sensitive way so as to help students and brides adhere to the laws through free choice, rather than docility and subjection. The participants all voiced the need for a sex education program that promotes adolescents’ awareness of the beauty and positivity of their femininity as well as the holiness and goodness of future sexual relations with their husbands, “at the right time and the right place.” They unanimously agreed that because not all topics can be discussed explicitly in high school, the bride counseling classes young women receive before marriage are critical to promoting their well-being and happiness in sexuality and in the new halachot they will adhere to after marriage. The obvious conclusions are that the Israeli Orthodox school system must work on providing a sex education program that is suitable to the demands and restrictions of Jewish Orthodox education, while also promoting the future well-being of students when they begin experiencing sexual relations. It may be assumed that each and every one of the participants would expect direct Rabbinic approval and accompaniment when building such a program, since they all voiced in different contexts the importance of adherence to halacha, both in teaching sexuality and in day-to-day issues that were discussed in the interviews. The women who participated in the research helped to shed light on a very intimate topic that is usually kept concealed in the religious world. That concealment, seemingly necessary to preserving modesty, can potentially cause ultimate damage to building healthy sexuality and family relations, so central to Jewish life and tradition. These women’s

64 Galit Kahane Uli & Deborah Court insights as to discussing sexuality more openly and promoting positive, healthy femininity within the halachic framework of tzniut and family purity, may possibly be the foundation for a new approach on sexuality and family life education for religious girls. An important factor that should be researched in this field is the male experience parallel to the female experience portrayed in this research. It is necessary to discover the views, feelings and experiences of young religious-Zionist married men, and how the existing sex- education programs for orthodox adolescent boys can be improved. The contributions of the current research are far-reaching, in that the topic discussed has received very little academic attention in the past. Despite the fact that the relatively new curriculum on Family Life Education (Cherka-Yodkovitchk, 2005) is comprehensive and far-reaching, formal sexuality education in the religious world has undergone very few changes over the years. Research such as the current study can shed light on women’s needs and views, and this can inform future curriculum work. As members of the Jewish religious-Zionist community in Israel, we cannot deny that our own personal questions disturbed us enough to begin pursuing this research, but the greatest motivation that led us through interviews, analysis, and conclusions was the desire to make a difference for our daughters, our students, and the next generation of young women embarking on a new and beautiful chapter in their lives: adult femininity and healthy sexuality and purity.

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