Woman Arrested for Praying at Western Wall

One of the most difficult things to reckon with as a female of the 21st century is the sexism that still exist (Especially when it is in civilized religious circles).

On January 5, 2010 Anat Hoffman, leader of the group WOW (Women of the Wall) was taken into custody, finger-printed and interrogated for wearing a prayer shawl while praying at the Western Wall in Jerusalem, according to Ariela Pelaia in her news letter judaism.guide@about.com.

We remember women in Afghanistan wearing burkas and being beaten for what seems like minor infractions of some civil misconduct. We pretend that this only happens in near third world countries under barbaric rule.

When Neda Agha Soltan was assassinated in Tehran, the first thought that comes to our Westernized minds is, "What do you expect, it's Iran." We turn a blind eye to the blatant sexism in our own cultures. Sexism crosses ethnic boundaries, it crosses religious boundaries, and it crosses financial boundaries. It exists in the Muslim communities, the Christian communities, and the Orthodox communities. It is in the African American community, the European American community, and in the Asian American community.

Women praying at the wall have been pelted with stones, books, and even chairs for wearing their prayer shawls while they pray at the wall since the re-capture of Jerusalem in 1967.

The irony is that there wouldn't even be a Western Wall, there wouldn't even be a Jewish State, there wouldn't even be a Jewish religion, or even a Jewish people had it not been for the bold actions of Jewish women through-out history. The irony is that we have already had a female Prime Minister in Israel, Golda Meir.

When we think of the beginnings of the Jewish people, we remember Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Yet, it wasn't Abraham who gave birth to the Jewish people, it was Sarah. Abraham had two sons, Isaac with Sarah and Ishmael with Hagar the Egyptian woman. It was Sarah's son, Isaac that carried the line of Judaism to the next generation.

It was Rebbecca who concocted the plan to fool Isaac into giving Jacob the blessing. Had she not done this, who knows who would be calling themselves Jews today, if anyone at all.

Yocheved was Moses' mother, Miriam was Moses' sister, and it was the Pharaoh's daughter, not his son who saved the life of Moses. No where in the Torah does it list a man having saved Moses' life. Where would Judaism be without Moses? Where would Moses be without these three women?

Were it not for Deborah, the Prophetess (Judges 4-5), Barak would have refused to lead the battle against Jabin of Hazor in the quest for Canaan, and again in the same story, it was the Kenite woman, Yael who killed Sisera, Jabin's general, not Barak. Where would Israel be without the conquest of Canaan?

When Joshua took the city of Jericho, it was a woman who gave the signal to the spies and helped them to enter the city.

Do we not celebrate Purim in memory of Esther, the woman who saved the Jews in exile from genocide and extinction?

And even from the Christian perspective, it was Mary, wife of Joseph who risked her life to give birth to Jesus out of wedlock, it was Mary of Magdalen who was the first to approach Jesus at the tomb, and it was a woman who was the first Christian martyr of Rome.

Today, contrary to popular belief, the most powerful political personality in the world is not the American president, but the English monarch, Queen Elizabeth. The most influential person in African American society is not Barak Obama, but Oprah Winfrey, a woman. In the Catholic faith, who is more widely known, Pope Benedict, or Mother Theresa?

Not-with-standing that every man who persecutes a woman is himself born of a woman-- in modern Israel, women are drafted into the army at age 18 as equally as their brethren males.

Yet, the very wall that likely would not be standing today had it not been for women who fought for it every bit (And perhaps more-so) than men, the very women who served their country in the military as equally as men, are harassed, beaten and arrested for praying at that wall.

The Western Wall is thought to be the outer court-yard, not the inner sanctuary of the ancient Temple. Even if it were the inner Holy of Holies, then the men too should be forbidden to pray there, unless their name is Kohene (Cohen or any derivative there-of), as only the high priests were permitted to worship in the Holy of Holies.

When Anat Hoffman was taken into custody, she was not wearing a white prayer shawl with the black stripes that men wear, she was wearing an inconspicuous colorful prayer-shawl. She was praying, not protesting, not passing out literature, not playing paint-ball-- but praying.

Personally, I'm kind of wondering, if the men who throw things at women for praying at the wall, or the men who had this woman arrested were actually focused on praying themselves, why did they even notice her there? Wouldn't they have been focused on their own prayers and oblivious to others around them?...

While an Orthodox observance is the ideal that we should all strive for, the spirit of the law should not go unnoticed. One without the other seems rather empty and obstructive to the purpose of such a ritualized form of worship in the first place. When the law becomes the law for the sake of the law, without the love and compassion that was written into the mitzvahs, then G-d becomes a tyrant to be bitterly feared like the slave masters of Egypt, not the Holy Wonder that David so loved and adored. It was through love and compassion that G-d delivered us from slavery in Egypt.

It was Moses who killed the Egyptian for beating on a Hebrew slave, not because it was an Egyptian beating on a Hebrew, but because it was an armed man beating on an unarmed man. Moses intervened when the Midianite was beating on the woman at the well.

There have been cases in Orthodox shuls where the women were found to be chatting it up right in the middle of the service because their seating was so secluded that they had no idea what was going on in the proceedings.

I once heard a parable:

"Woman was not made from man's head so that she could rule over him, nor was she made from his foot so that he could trample upon her, but she was taken from his rib so that she could walk beside him and be his partner" (Source un-known).

The mitzvah doesn't say to honor your father and throw your mother to the dogs. It says to honor your father and your mother alike.

Please feel free to post any tasteful comments whether they agree or disagree. Open discussion is the only way we learn and progress to change.

This is Heather Ann Angel Orthodox in my Liberal convictions.