Elana Maryles Sztokman

Elana Maryles Sztokman (born December 20, 1969) is an award-winning author, sociologist, educator, activist and thinker in the field of Orthodox Jewish feminism.

Sztokman was trained in education, sociology and Judaism. Her first two books, which cover different aspects of Orthodox Jewish feminism from sociological and educational perspectives, each won the National Jewish Book Council Award. She has lectured on gender in several institutes for higher education, including Bar Ilan University, the Schechter Institute for Jewish Studies, Young Judea and the Efrata Teacher Training College. She also worked as Executive Director of JOFA, The Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance, from 2012-2014. She a frequent columnist at The Forward Sisterhood, The Jerusalem Post, Ha'aretz, Lilith Magazine, The Jewish Week and other publications and has also written for The Atlantic and Slate. She has also been instrumental in founding several Jewish feminist organizations.

Sztokman is married to Jacob Sztokman, the founder of Gabrial Project Mumbai,^[1] a Jewish initiative combating poverty and illiteracy among children in Mumbai. They have four children and live in Modi'in, Israel.

Early life

Sztokman was born in the Flatbush neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York, the third of four daughters born to Matthew Maryles, a former Managing Partner of CIBC Oppenheimer Investment Bank and an active Jewish communal leader, and Gladys Schmeltz Maryles, a homemaker and volunteer. Sztokman attended the modern Orthodox Yeshiva of Flatbush elementary and high schools (ES '83, HS '87). She attended Barnard College where she was active at Hillel and with Columbia Students for Israel. She also spent one semester in Israel at Midreshet Moriah seminary. She graduated from Barnard in 1991 Magna Cum Laude and with thesis honors with a degree in political science and education, as well as New York State High School Social Studies Teaching Certificate.^[2]

Early career

Sztokman started her career as a high school social studies teacher. She taught 7th and 11th grade social studies and international relations at Hunter College High School, as a student teacher with Mrs. Anna Morello,and later taught social studies at Shevach High School under the auspices of Dr. Rivkah Blau. She also studied part-time at the Drisha Institute while she was teaching.^[3] In 1993, Sztokman moved to Jerusalem, Israel, where she received a Master's degree in Jewish Education at the Melton Center at Hebrew University. While she studied, she worked part-time as a teaching assistant for Dr. Asher Shkedi, as well as an instructor in adult education at MediaWorks, and as a freelance translator, specializing in translating children's books from Hebrew to English. During that time, she became interested in the issue of agunot, and in 1996 helped found Mavoi Satum, (lit. "the Dead End"), one of the first organizations in Israel dedicated to the issue of chained women. She was co-chair of Mavoi Satum from 1997-2002.^[4][5]

Sztokman's master's thesis, completed under the direction of Prof. Asher Shkedi is a qualitative study examining bible instruction and Jewish identity in state schools in Israel.^[6] In 1999, Sztokman began working on her doctorate in the discipline crossing the departments of education and sociology/anthropology. Her doctoral advisers were Prof. Tamar Elor and Prof. Tamar Rapoport. Her dissertation, "Gender, ethnicity and class in state religious education for girls the story of the Levy Junior High School, 1999-2002", examines the identity formation of adolescent religious schools in the state religious school system. The dissertation, which rests on the sociological theories of Michel Foucault and others to advance a thesis about social constructivism and agency among religious girls, received a prize from the Lafer Center for Gender Studies at Hebrew University. Sztokman completed the dissertation in 2005^[7]

Activism and communal work

While working on her doctorate, Sztokman relocated to Melbourne, Australia, for three years (2002-2005), where she worked as Educational Director of JNF Victoria, and as an educator at the Florence Melton Adult Mini-school. At the Melton school, in addition to teaching the "Rhythms" course, she also taught a series of graduate classes on gender-related topics, including Gender in Jewish Law, Biblical Women, Gender Issues in Jewish Life, and others. She was also marginally involved with NCJW Australia, and wrote for the Australian Jewish News.^[8] From 2005-2012, Sztokman worked as a writer, lecturer and organizational consultant. She lectured in gender as an adjunct professor at Bar Ilan University, the Efrata Teacher Training college, while regularly writing for publications including The Forward, The Jerusalem Post, Lilith Magazine, The Jerusalem Report, Jewish Educational Leadership, Ha'aretz, and Slate. As an organizational consultant under the business name "Spirit Consulting", Sztokman worked with organizations on "crafting the message" and creating educational and cause-marketing materials. She worked with Beit Hatfutsot (The Museum of the Jewish People), Eshel Avraham Masorti Synagogue, The Hartman Institute, Eretz Acheret Magazine, Israeli Flying Aid, The Israel Association for Adult Education, Jewish Congregation of Maui, The Center for Women's Justice, and others.^[9] While working with these organizations, Sztokman continued to write regularly on gender for The Forward and other publications. During this period, she also produced two books on gender.

JOFA

In 2012, Sztokman became the Executive Director of JOFA, the Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance. While at JOFA, she helped launch The Torch^[10] blog on Orthodox feminism at My Jewish Learning. She also played a key role in launching JOFA UK^[11] under the leadership of JOFA UK Ambassador Dina Brawer, and in June 2013, JOFA UK held the first ever JOFA conference on Orthodox feminism in the UK, and then launched two partnership minyan.^[12] Other new initiatives launched under Sztokman's leadership include a video webinar series on social change in Orthodoxy, and the Joan S. Meyers Torah Lending Project, which provides a Torah scroll for bat mitzvah girls who want to read from the Torah as part of their celebration. During Sztokman's tenure, JOFA co-sponsored a historic Agunah Summit^[13] to resolve the issue of agunot, or "chained women".^[14][15] Blu Greenberg announced later on that year that as a result of the summit, a new beit din would be established to free agunot from unwanted marriages.^[16] Sztokman is also credited with significantly raising the JOFA public profile, and under her leadership, JOFA was covered in the media no less than 75 times.^[17] In January 2014, the organization announced that Sztokman was leaving her position as Executive Director.^[18]

Writing

Sztokman is a prolific writer, and has been regularly writing articles and op-eds on gender issues in Jewish life since the late 1990s. Her first articles appeared in The Jerusalem Report and The Jerusalem Post. She has also written for Slate, Haaretz, The Forward, Tablet, Lilith Magazine, Jewish Educational Leadership, The Australian Jewish News, and Times of Israel, among others. Her first blog, which opened in 2009, was called "For serious Jewish women." Sztokman closed the blog in 2011 and created a new blog, "A Jewish Feminist" in early 2012.

Sztokman's first book, The Men's Section: Orthodox Jewish Men in an Egalitarian World, which was published by the Hadassah Brandeis Institute (series on Jewish women) in 2011, is the first English book to examine gender identities of Orthodox Jewish men. A qualitative ethnography based on interviews with 55 men who attend partnership minyan, The Men's Section was met with acclaim and won the 2012 National Jewish Book Council Award for women's studies. Barbara Sofer wrote in The Jerusalem Post that it is "refreshing to read a scholarly woman’s analysis of Orthodox men. The author describes the little-discussed subject of life on the men’s side of the divider."^[19] Amanda Borschel-Dan at Times of Israel wrote that the book is "a story about tension, identity and dialogue. About living on the borders of a culture, yet still navigating within them. About negotiating, pushing back, and yes, acceptance. Its tale is particular, yet so universal that scholars and laymen all over the world are picking up Elana Sztokman’s new work, The Men's Section."^[20] Rabbi Mishael Zion wrote at The Forward that the book makes “a vital contribution well beyond the scene of liberal Orthodoxy," and that it "provides the intellectual tools through which we can reconstruct traditional gender identity in novel ways.”^[21] Rabbi Jack Reimer wrote in The Jewish Jewish Journal that "I can only hope that when we have more women like Dr. Sztokman, who are learned, articulate and committed to both equality and halachah, that things will eventually change.”^[22] The book currently has a 5.0 star rating on Amazon (5 ratings) and a 3.5 star rating on Goodreads (10 ratings).

Sztokman's second book, Educating in the Divine Image: Gender Issues in Orthodox Jewish Day Schools, written in collaboration with Dr. Chaya Rosenfeld Gorsetman (also published by The Hadassah Brandeis Institute, series on Jewish women), is an exploration of Orthodox Jewish day schools and the ways in which schools construct gender identity. The book examines issues including: single-sex versus coed education; dress codes; sex education; gender in books; gender in pedagogy; gender in school ritual and gender in school leadership. Sztokman told Sara Ivry at Tablet that the book was based on ten years of work, and compiled several different sources of qualitative research, mostly in North America but also in Israel.^[23] This book won the 2013 National Jewish Book Council award in Education and Identity, making Sztokman one of only a small group of authors to win this award twice—and it is very rare to win two years in a row.^[24]

Sztokman's third book, The War on Women in Israel: How Religious Radicalism is Stifling the Voice of a Nation, published by Sourcebooks was released in September 2014 to very positive reviews.Publishers Weekly wrote, "With outrage and bewilderment, [Sztokman] chronicles how Israeli business leaders, lawmakers, politicians, and police have caved to the demands of an ultra-Orthodox minority to remove women’s faces, voices, and even their physical presence from public venues, creating 'female-free zones' in the name of modesty. She exposes the 'entrenched culture of sexism' in the Israeli army and legislature, and explores how the Orthodox rabbinical courts cause disproportionate harm to women in their governance of “personal status” issues (marriage, divorce, and conversion), among other concerns." Kirkus calls the book "A worthwhile and eye-opening study." Library Journal writes, "Sztokman's articulate call for attention toward and action on behalf of women's rights in Israel will be of interest to all readers with a passion for global feminism and Jewish women's lives."

In August 2014, Sztokman published a widely circulated piece in The Atlantic ^[25] about gender in the Gaza war.

In September 2014, Sztokman's account of gender segregation^[26] on El Al airplanes garnered tens of thousands of shares and was reported in the mainstream media around the world.

Jewish feminist thought

Sztokman is a leading Jewish feminist thinker. Influenced by thinkers including Blu Greenberg, Prof. Tova Hartman and Prof. Tamar Ross, Sztokman builds extensively on Ross' ideology that feminism in not a challenge to Torah but rather an inherent reflection of core Torah principles such as compassion and care for the other.^[27]

Sztokman, keenly aware that critics of Orthodox feminism view feminism as outside normative Judaism, argues that this a false dichotomy. As she writes (with Gorsetman) in Educating in the Divine Image:

Feminism and calls for gender equality can be very confronting and challenging to some basic norms of Jewish educational life. Judaism values communal needs, while feminism values individual rights. Traditional practice entails obedience, while feminism promotes criticism, questioning, and resistance. The Torah is replete with social hierarchies, while feminism advances the deconstruction of traditional hierarchies....That said calls for gender equity are vital for the health of the Jewish world, especially for young people growing into their identities. This is about feminism as a spiritual, educational idea. It is about learning to see every human being as equally owning the divine spark within his or her soul. And it is about educators acting in a way that celebrates all those souls, and seeks to enable each and every child to grow into a fully functioning, alive and awake, respected member of society.^[28]

Moreover, Sztokman argues that Orthodox feminists are the "most committed" religious Jews and that the Jewish community should look up to them and learn about what it means to embrace Torah.^[29][30]

On feminism as compassion

Sztokman frequently writes about feminism as an expression of compassionate spirituality, based on the teaching that all people—women and men—are created in the divine image. She wrote at the Wexner Foundation, for example:

The women – and men – who have dedicated their lives and spirits to protecting women’s places in religious life are the spiritual warriors of our generation. We continue to put forth an alternative vision for Orthodoxy, one that does not see 'stricter' or more 'radical' as more 'authentic' but actually views compassion and gender equity as foundational elements of Torah. We are not looking to proponents of radical Orthodoxy for approval...The fight for women’s rights in Orthodoxy is not just about women, and it’s not just about rights. It’s about constructing a vision for a Jewish society that values both adherence to Torah and the perpetuation of a spirit of humanity and compassion...The feminists are literally on the frontlines of the battle to create a community that can actually consider itself a light to the nations, a community that is not afraid of cooties but is afraid of what will happen to us when we stop appreciating that all humans were created in the Divine image.^[31]

Sztokman's positions on issues such as women's inclusion in partnership women, women rabbis, women wearing tefillin, and solutions for the problem of agunot, are all premised on this "spiritual feminism" that seeks to build a compassionate Jewish community.

On the female body and "modesty"

Sztokman's views on women's bodies and on the practices of "modesty" or "tzniut" are based on this blend of radical feminism and spiritual feminism. Sztokman views some rabbinic approaches to women's body as "oppressive" and calls for women to reject body restraints and rabbinic language of body cover and instead adhere to their bodies own needs and desires. As she writes in her doctoral dissertation, "language of comfort and language of desire are completely absent from discussions about women's dress in Orthodox Judaism". Sztokman said in an interview in Tablet that girls' religious identities are so bound up in their own body cover that religious girls and women often do not even know how to describe their own religious identities outside of descriptions of their clothing.

In a response to an essay by Rabbi Michael Broyde on the "sheitel", or practice of women covering their hair with wigs, Sztokman writes:

[Broyde] argues that “modesty” — i.e., rules of excessive cover of the female body — is an antidote to belly-button rings, which in turn are an indicator of promiscuity and recreational sex. Really? This line of thinking is full of more leaps than an equestrian track. At the risk of stating the obvious, let me say that there are more than two choices for female attire. There is a whole series of gradations between the sheitel and the music video outfit. There is a lot of variation in between. Women who choose to wear jeans and a t-shirt, who play with ways to put their hair up in a scrunchy or let it flow naturally over their shoulders, who wear leggings to go bikeriding in the park — these are women who, according to this reckoning, are immodest, likely to have sex as often as they eat, and dangerously on the edge of social norms.

This black-and-white view (no pun intended) is particularly disturbing because it leaves out an entire range of female experience. The possibility of women freely choosing the way they exist in their bodies is outside of this dichotomy. It leaves out the very possibility that our clothing decisions are not based on the male libido but simply on our personal preferences. And by the way, not all women who have belly-rings engage in recreational sex.

Both the fervently Orthodox worldview and the MTV worldview involve a sexual objectification of women’s bodies. Both expect women and girls to dress a certain way because we are objects of male desire. Both are dominated by men making determinations about what women should or should not wear based on their own inability to see us as more than a body. Orthodoxy, as opposed to MTV, says, okay, so cover up and then maybe we’ll respect be able to put aside our sexual desire and have a conversation with you. But you know, the Taliban makes a similar argument. It’s a no-win situation for women, and leaves us completely passive and helpless.^[32]

Sztokman's linking of Orthodox practice to radical Islam on the issue of women's body cover is met with criticism by some Orthodox Jews who claim that these cultures are different. As one commenter wrote: "[Sztokman] likens Orthodox Judaism to the Taliban, an ethos in which women are kept illiterate and routinely endure physical beatings.What do you say to the observation that such an incendiary comparison is over the top and borders on hate speech?"^[32] Sztokman argues that much of the rabbinic writing on the subject of women's bodies is based on misogynistic ideas about women's proper role in society. In one story about a rabbi allegedly recommending to a girl that she cut her legs rather than submit to her parents' requests that she wear pants, Sztokman writes, "Orthodox Judaism has issues with the female body, to put it mildly. In a culture defined by the degree to which women are kept silent and invisible, pressured to have as many babies and possible while maintaining the home and covering as much flesh as possible," it is not surprising that some rabbis make extreme recommendations regarding women's bodies.^[33]

On cultural relativism

In debates over Jewish reactions to women's body-cover in Islam, Sztokman vehemently rejects approaches of cultural relativism, and argues that feminism is at odds with relativistic ideologies. Citing Ayaan Hirsi Ali as one of her strongest influencers, Sztokman writes:

The voice of “cultural relativism” is a smokescreen. It is the argument put forward by people who really do not want feminist interference. And who would that be? It’s not the women who are suffering from genital mutilation or honor killings who are asking you to butt out. It’s not the women who face violence, polygamy, and corporal punishment for showing ankles and wrists who are demanding that you step aside in the name of some abstract, twisted notion of intellectual consistency. The ones asking feminists to be quiet are the ones who want to continue harming women. And those are voices that do not deserve to be heeded...Aggressors — whether on the playground or in the boardroom or in the bedroom — like to demand neutrality from observers. But let’s not kid ourselves. Passivity in the face of aggression is not neutral. It empowers the aggressors. So the stance of “Leave them alone; don’t interfere; it’s their culture,” is actually a false stance of neutrality. It gives the attacker free reign [sic] and leaves the victim without an ally in the world. The bully laughs at our ambivalence.

Feminism never claimed to be value-neutral, nor should it, because not all ideological positions are equal. Just as a Jewish community would never claim that a Neo-Nazi has as much right to his ethical stance as the rabbi, so, too, we should not think that people have the right to advocate for violence against women just because, well, it’s a legitimate idea. It’s not a legitimate idea, any more than Holocaust denial is. Some ideas are just plain evil.

We have to stop apologizing for caring, and we have to stop apologizing for fighting to save women’s lives.^[34]

Rebecca Shischsa, an Orthodox feminist blogger, debates Sztokman's position on cultural relativism. "I find your arguments insightful," she wrote to Sztokman in her blog, "but I’m still worried that although you say that women who suffer from various forms of oppression within religious groups are not the ones telling western feminists to butt out, I’m not sure if this is always the case. There are many women within Islam who will passionately advocate their ‘right’ to cover themselves from head to toe with a burka or niqab, just as there are many women within communities in Africa who may still passionately encourage their female offspring to be circumcised, even in this day and age. It is these women – who we claim are oppressed, but who themselves argue that these forms of oppression are actually a form of religious freedom, that I worry about when I feel the urge to give a blanket condemnation."^[35]

Sztokman responds to this by citing Martha Nussbaum's work, Women in Human Development: The Capabilities Approach, which discusses issues of agency and empowerment within the language of choice. Nussbaum's work with traditional Indian women informed her approach of integrating a respect for women's lives with a critique of forms of body oppression. Sztokman heavily cites Nussbaum in her doctoral thesis on this topic of choice and traditional religious women:

Nussbaum argues that while an appreciation of ethnicities often leads to the adaptation of a stance moral relativism, whereby feminists accept that gender reform in certain societies is something of a patronizing cultural imposition, such a stance is wrong-headed. Rather, there is a certain set of human values, which she conceptualizes in terms of “human development”, that need to be demanded across cultures. These values, which include issues such as bodily integrity, bodily health, emotions, life, and affiliation, are denied to women in often extreme numbers. So, for example, she argues that to talk about a practice such as genital mutilation as “cultural” is a misuse of ethnic appreciation that leaves women suffering. Similarly, she writes that practices of domestic abuse and marital rape should not be looked at as cultural but as negations of fundamental human capabilities, leaving women to lead lesser lives.

Nussbaum’s argument rests on a vital analysis of the role of choice in culture and identity. ... Nussbaum understands that her own approach of universal capabilities can be seen as a paternalistic intrusion that conflicts with the notion that women need to choose their own resistance, and admits that her list of universal capabilities goes against "not just other people’s preferences about women, but, more controversially, against many preferences (or so it seems) of women about themselves and their lives” (p. 112, italics in original). Indeed, she introduces a woman who stayed in a battering relationship for many years until she left and then became a domestic abuse advocate; another woman fights for “bodily integrity” but does not challenge the unequal wage structures where she works; an entire village that had no clean water supply never protested because they “knew no other way,” but when a consciousness-raising program changed the water, the women said “Now we are clean” (pp. 113-4).

Thus, there is a difficult tension between universal capabilities and choice. Nussbaum offers a lengthy and detailed analysis of the role of preference within feminist goals to change women’s lives. She demonstrates that preference-based philosophies are faulty, and argues that they are “unable to conduct a critical scrutiny of preference and desire that would reveal the many ways in which habit, fear, low expectations and unjust background conditions deform people’s choices and even their wishes for their own lives” (p. 114). Nussbaum does not adapt the opposite extreme of a paternalistic disregard for preference. Rather, she incorporates a middle position that accepts preferences that reflect human capabilities but discounts those that do not. In other words, women’s preferences that preclude human capabilities – that is, they lack dignity, integrity, or a value of life – are not considered valid preferences, but those that do reflect human capabilities are.

Introducing social change among underprivileged women, then, is a process fraught with complexity and ethical dilemmas and the risk of a feminist form of patriarchy. The balance between respecting rich traditions and fighting human suffering is delicate and difficult. But I believe that Nussbaum's (1999) “human capabilities” approach has tremendous potential for providing an analytical framework for understanding gender resistance in religious communities. She writes that many feminists tend to look at religious women as “simplistic” or “following the herd” by adhering to ancient religious practices, but such a view "misunderstands religion and fails to appreciate the complexity of women’s identities. Secular humanists who marginalize religion tend to treat religion as an enemy of women’s progress. In so doing, they make a most unfortunate concession to their traditionalist opponents; they agree in defining religion as equivalent to certain reactionary, often highly patriarchal voices. ...But her error is also a theoretical error about what a religious tradition is…No religious tradition consists simply of authority and sheeplike subservience. All contain argument, diversity of beliefs and practices, and a plurality of voices – including the voices of women, which have not always been clearly heard. All, further, are dynamic: because they involve a committed search for ultimate meaning; and because they are forms of communal organization, they shift in response to their members’ judgments about the sort of community in which they want to live." (2000: 181-2)

In other words, trying to understand female resistance within religion requires not a simplistic disregard for all of tradition as irrelevant, ancient, and incapable of change, but rather an appreciation of the complexity of traditions as ever-changing, dynamic systems in which a female, feminist resistance is an essential part – often muted and invisible, but nevertheless present. Religious feminism, embedded in a knowledge of ethnic and socio-economic differences, can be a powerful social force.

^[36]

Sztokman's application of Nussbaum's theory of human capabilities to Orthodox Judaism is an unprecedented and compelling approach to feminist social change within Judaism.

On masculinity and men's gender identities

Sztokman is also one of the first Jewish feminists to look at gender identity among men. “I want to help break open the boxes that Orthodoxy puts men—and women—into,” she said in a 2013 interview. "We have to pay attention to how men deal with this if we are going to successfully create equitable, compassionate communities,” she also said, adding that “We have to understand that feminism can liberate men, too.”^[37] Sztokman's approach to men veers from much of liberal feminist thought which focuses on men as partners in feminism. She writes that much of the discussion about feminism and men takes place in negotiations "over the kitchen sink". This female-centric approach to men and feminism creates a "zero-sum game" of gender and is not always helpful to men. Rather, her book is about men and their own gender identities. She uses Paul Kivel's "Be a man box" as a theoretical basis and applies it to Orthodox men, creating the notion of the "Be an Orthodox Man Box" which socializes men into a set of behaviors around performance, perfectionism, seriousness, and emotionlessness. By unraveling the many messages that Orthodox men receive around the idea of "be a man", Sztokman uses feminist theory to enable men to reject their own confining elements of gender socialization.^[38]

On gender essentialism

Sztokman's feminism is also based on an application of cultural feminism in an Orthodox Jewish context. In an interview with Susan Reimer-Torn at the Jewish Women's Archives, Sztokman described the delicate balance between accepting a women's "culture" while fully rejecting essentialist differences:

"The discourse of gender differences is very problematic, and that’s why we have to be really careful when we talk about a woman’s 'way.' The second we start talking about a 'women’s way,' we run a risk of falling into old patterns and traps of seeing women as 'less,' as 'softer,' as less capable of dealing with pressure, as less assertive, as less logical, or whatever. When we start to couch this in language of brain differences, we are basically turning sexist attitudes into some kind of pseudo-scientific data...."When we talk about women’s contributions to transforming society, it’s based on culture, not biology. If men are typically acculturated into a kind of sterile individualism, women are acculturated into relationships, caring, and other-centeredness. Both of these personas are part of the human spirit, and all human beings need access to both characteristics, that is, individualism and connectivity. So the point is that bringing a 'women’s culture' into Jewish life is not about 'femininity' as an essence but rather about restoring cultural balance to a world that has overly valued the culture of sterile individualism that has been typically owned by men."^[39]

Despite the rejection of essentialist differences, Sztokman makes some striking observations about how Orthodox women and men are socialized into difference, and how these differences find expression in response to the feminist movement. In the epilogue of The Men's Section, Sztokman writes:

The relationship between Orthodoxy and feminism is more complicated than [expecting women] to run to minyan three times a day on time – acting like men, if you will. As I’ve said many times, there is a whole slew of reasons why women do not come “on time” or perhaps at all – whether it’s that they are still doing the bulk of childcare and food preparation on Shabbat, whether they are still recovering from years of alienation and a private resistance that makes reading the paper on Shabbat morning very attractive, or whether they have internalized the message that if they don’t count for minyan, it doesn’t really matter if they come anyway. But more than that, the assumption that feminist resistance entails women acting like men is misguided.

For one thing, everything that men are expected to do as “Orthodox” – whether being “on time” three times a day or standing without talking from beginning to end of the service – assumes female servitude. The only reason men have been able to insist on “on time” and fulfilling all their other rigid, ritualistic obligations is because they have always been able to count on women to cook, clean and watch the kids. These assumptions persist today – not only in Orthodoxy. It is not uncommon for men to plan business trips without regard to home needs, they continue to work the longest hours they can knowing that someone at home is picking up the slack, and as such they continue to buy into notions that they should be praying in a group of ten men three times a day despite the strain these assumptions place on female labor. To wit: Nachum’s entire model for Orthodox masculinity is the “yeshiva bachur,” the single student whose every need is taken care of by – whom? The community? The mother? The wife? It doesn’t matter. There continues to be an idealization of religious practice that is fully dependent on the servitude of someone else, usually women. So if women want access to this, they have a problem. Who is serving their needs so they can freely and happily get to shul?

More than that, there is a more profound point: I submit that women find the standard male practice absent of meaning. Female cultures of spirituality are emotion-filled, personal, engaging, musical, spontaneous, surrounded by people, connections, children, and friendships. Jews have been praying more or less the same way from a certain book with the same pages upon pages of words for recitation for, oh, a few thousand years give or take. So when push comes to shove and women gain access to those practices, the celebration is short lived. For this we struggled so hard? This is what we were looking for all this time? No wonder so many women say, okay, but no thanks. Women seeking access to this space from which they are systematically excluded are disappointed with their own culture. Because it is not really their culture – it is men’s culture. The Orthodox synagogue, even when women are involved, remains a men’s space based on men’s culture.

Ultimately, I think that the real reason why women are not running to synagogue is found in the core of this research. If we look at Orthodox masculinity, and compare it to Orthodox femininity (leaving aside for the moment the issue of hierarchy between them and the exercise of power from one to the other), on the level of a simple collection of characteristics that we will call “male” and characteristics that we will call “female”, it becomes clear why women are not rushing into the male world. Women are socialized as carers, a role which undoubtedly entails servitude, physical restrictions, and enormous amounts of unpaid labor, but also involves love, warmth, friendship, relationship, care, flexibility, and home. Men, by contrast, are socialized as mechanistic performers, with all the accompanying status, power, strength, and freedom for sure, but the construct is emotionless, connection-less, cold, and demanding, and leaves little room for individual expression or even ambivalence. In fact, to be a man may provide personal power, and it certainly has physical, social and monetary rewards, but it does not necessarily involve freedom. Being mounted with expectations of three times a day rote repetition and performance among emotionless peers – and calling that prayer, as if it is actually a spiritual expression – is not all that attractive. It is especially not attractive to women who have experienced something else. Women who have experienced friendship, sharing, deep caring and the love between women look at what goes on between men and think, why would I want to become that? I think that’s the real reason women aren’t all that interested in running to do the man’s thing in synagogue. Being a woman, at the end of the day, is much nicer than being a man."

This segment has very strong echoes of Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex, as well as John Stoltenberg's "Refusing to be a Man". At the same time, Sztokman's calls for feminism as a compassionate stance are influenced by Nel Noddings and Karen Armstrong.

This combination of cultural feminism, radical feminism and spiritual feminism within the context of Orthodox Judaism gives Sztokman a unique voice. Moreover, her work combining activities of education, activism and scholarship is also unusual, and is arguably modeled on the life work of Prof. Alice Shalvi who similarly crossed between these three worlds.

El Al Incident

In September 2014, while on an El Al flight from the U.S. to Israel after just completing a tour to promote her new book, The War on Women in Israel: How Religious Radicalism is Stifling the Voice of a Nation, Sztokman was involved in an incident that received wide publicity. Several ultra-Orthodox men tried to negotiate with passengers to get them to move so the men would not have to sit next to women. El Al staff did not intervene to make passengers sit in their assigned seats, and the flight was delayed for take-off. Sztokman wrote in Tablet Magazine about how shocking and upsetting it was to be accosted by men who publicly insulted and denigrated her as a woman.^[40][41][42]

Honors and awards

• 2013 National Jewish Book Council Award, category of Education and Identity
• 2012 National Jewish Book Council Award, category of Women's Studies
• 2009 Hadassah Brandeis Research Award
• Lafer Center Award for Gender Studies

Organizations

• El Halev (Jerusalem, Israel). Board chair
• Mavoi Satum: The "Dead End" to help Agunot (Jerusalem, Israel). Co-founder; co-chair from 1997-2002
• Shira (Melbourne, Australia).
• Darchei Noam (Modi'in, Israel). Co-founder, board member 2006-2007.
• Modi'in Women's Fund (Modi'in, Israel). Co-founder

Books

• The War on Women in Israel: How Religious Radicalism is Stifling the Voice of a Nation. (Sourcebooks, September 2014)
• Educating in the Divine Image: Gender Issues in Orthodox Jewish Day Schools (with Chaya Rosenfeld Gorsetman) (Brandeis University Press, The Hadassah Brandeis Institute, 2013)
• The Men's Section: Orthodox Jewish Men in an Egalitarian World. (University Press of New England, The Hadassah Brandeis Institute, 2011)

References