Jofa Recent Media

By Ellen Levitt We know that we can pray on our own nearly anywhere, anytime, but Judaism does emphasize communal prayer. And many of us appreciate the group atmosphere: We ...

By Chaye Kohl Teachers are urged to be lifelong learners. My career, infused with professional development, a few degree programs, and some independent study, has modeled that practice for my ...

By Chaye KohlOn the last day of Passover, the Yizkor prayer helps us memorialize our dead. On Pesaḥ 2020 I recited the prayer in the solitude of my living room, ...

By Nomi KaltmannAustralia, for most people, conjures images of cuddly koalas, beautiful beaches, and picturesque landscapes with laid-back people. I was born in Melbourne, Australia, and can confirm that for ...

Devorah ScholarsIn the spring of 2020, the Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance awarded Devorah Scholar grants to seven Orthodox synagogues. This innovative program, designed to seed the American landscape with women ...

By Susan Hornstein The Women’s Tefillah Group of Raritan Valley, based in Highland Park and Edison, New Jersey, has been meeting regularly for more than thirty years. Most of our ...

By Thalia Gur-Klein From one step on a ladder to heaven, I dreamed I was seen and seeing her, far beyond my locked down horizon. Yet underway back I tarried on a thoughtful mountain to wrestle a ...

By Talya Gordon After moving to a new city during a pandemic as a single twenty-four-year-old woman, I have grown to see the incredible gifts that Judaism has given me. ...

By Laurie Dinerstein-Kurs I am perplexed. I am amazed. I am also pleasantly moved by the degree to which I read and hear so many people lamenting the difficulties they ...

Educator of Jewish EducatorsJOFA mourns the passing of Dr. Chaya Gorsetman, a master teacher, champion of women’s inclusion in the day school curriculum, and mentor of Jewish educators. In her ...

Edited by Erin Leib SmoklerBen Yehuda Press. 2021, $24.95 Review by Atara Cohen How do we make sense of the suffering of the COVID-19 pandemic within a Jewish framework? Rabbi ...

By Michal S. RaucherIndiana University Press, 2020, $24.Reviewed by Roselyn BellIf you are tired of Ḥaredi women being portrayed as oppressed, uneducated, and subservient to their husbands, Michal Raucher’s Conceiving ...

By Sara Tillinger Wolkenfeld“I don’t know when window shades were invented, but clearly that isn’t an option the Gemara is considering here,” I found myself saying to a class of ...

By Devora Steinmetz “But why do you call it a yeshiva?? A yeshiva is for men. Women learn in midrashot!” This is often the first question that people ask when ...

Drisha opened its doors in September 1979. Brochures had been distributed listing classes from morning till evening, Monday through Thursday. Women could come to a single class or could come ...