So What?
I’m sorry to say that I was disappointed with the Winter 2001 issue of the JOFA Journal. Reading it, one would imagine all religious Jewish women were unwillingly trapped, barefoot and pregnant, in their kosher kitchen barely able to read a recipe.
The frum world hasn’t accepted every demand of the Orthodox feminists. Well, so what? There are opportunities for women that now exist. Are things perfect? Of course not! But life is not perfect. Tensions will exist within the Orthodox community over the roles of women. This is natural, as change is difficult.
Ethel C. Fenig
Chicago
“At Whose Expense?”
Janet Dolgin is halakhically and emotionally quite correct in pointing out that a woman can make kiddush for her husband. In our home we even go one step further. Every Shabbat one of our teenaged daughters makes kiddush for the entire family. Their Hebrew is flawless; their melody is perfect, and their voices are infinitely more mellifluous than their father’s.
Am I ashamed that they make kiddush for me? I would be ashamed if they couldn’t. As my wife and I listen to them, we see and hear a kiddush Hashem in more ways than one.
Issac Steven Herschkopf,
M.D. New York
Clarification
The mandate of Yeshiva University is Torah U’Maddah. It would be wrong to suppose that my article, “At Whose Expense?” published in this newsletter, is in any way critical of this mandate. In my view, Y.U. is an impressive institution of significance to American Jews and to the general academic community.
Janet Dolgin
New York
“What Makes Women Sick?”
I was sorry to see the review of Susan Sered’s book – What Makes Women Sick? – in the Winter 2001 Journal. The book (and review) take it as a given that Israeli women are weaker and sicker as compared to women in other countries, whereas the World Health Organization reports that female life expectancy in Israel ranks twentyfourth among UN members – ahead of the US and UK. That said, Sered’s thesis that Israeli women are subject to any particular stresses, and her list of such stresses, are ludicrous to anyone with minimal knowledge of Israeli society. I hope to see the Journal exercise a bit more discretion and purpose in the future in its choice and manner of book reviews.
Mordy Hurwich
Jerusalem