We've Got So Far To Go

By Abby Seeskin
Macalester College

Growing up in a Conservative Jewish community, I rarely (if ever) felt that I, as a woman, did not have the same opportunities as my brothers. I sat with my brothers at Shabbat services, I went to the same Jewish camps, I became a Bat Mitzvah just like they became B’nai Mitzvah, I read from the same Torah, and I got the same Jewish education that they did.

So why talk about gender equality in the Conservative movement? Isn’t this enough? The Conservative movement has made important steps in gender equality: the 1973 vote to count women in a minyan, the 1983 decision to permit women to become Cantors and Rabbis, and the 2002 responsum that formally acknowledged that women can perform the same mitzvot that men can, but are not required to. Yet, men dominate the Conservative Movement. At the Jewish Theological Seminary, only about a fourth of the faculty are women. The heroes of the Torah include not only our three fathers but also Joseph, Moses, Aaron and more. Sure, we include the matriarchs in the Amidah and other prayers now, but rarely are we taught the triumphs of women in the Tanach. The scholars of Judaism that we study—Maimonides, Heschel, Mendelssohn—are almost exclusively male. We preach egalitarianism, and yet we partake in a movement of a religion almost entirely dominated by men.

It’s hard from here to determine what exactly we, as college students, can do to make Conservative Judaism a more gender equal religion. We can’t rewrite the Torah or rabbinic teachings, nor can we magically produce female scholars from the past who never existed. In fact, it’s pretty hard for me to conceive ways of undoing centuries of gender inequality. But we can take steps, albeit baby steps, in the progressive direction. We should question the disparity of representation of men and women in our religion. We can look to other branches of religions — specifically Reform and Reconstructionist Judaism — and study their feminist movements. From this, we can learn how to apply feminism to Conservative Judaism. And best yet, we can stop being complicit in gender inequality and start having conversations about gender equality within our universities, our synagogues, and our communities. Conversation is always the first step toward change.

Reading Torah and becoming a Bat Mitzvah is simply not enough for a woman in this day and age. In order for women to be treated as true equals to men in Conservative Judaism, young girls need to have appropriate Jewish female role models. Someday, these girls can grow up to be scholars and Rabbis of Conservative Judaism, and these women can change Conservative Judaism as we know it.

Originally from St. Louis, Abby Seeskin is a sophomore at Macalester College, where she is studying English. She plays clarinet in the Wind Ensemble at Macalester and is active in the Macalester Jewish Organization. Additionally, she is involved with Jewish Community Action, a Jewish social action group based in the Twin Cities.

[Posted 12/10/07]