Jane Marcus
August 28, 2009

D'var Torah - Beth Am Women Shabbat

This week’s Torah Portion, Ki Teitzei, enumerates seventy-four (a full 12%!) of the Torah's 613 commandments.  It’s a lot to process, though many of the mitzvot are familiar to us including the inheritance rights of the first-born, burial and dignity of the dead, returning a lost object, sending away the mother bird before taking her young, the duty to erect a safety fence around the roof of one's home, the various forms of kilayim (forbidden plant and animal hybrids), the duty to pay a worker on time, the proper treatment of a debtor, and the prohibition against charging interest on a loan.

A number of the commandments address relationships between men and women.  These include the judicial procedures and penalties for adultery, for the rape or seduction of an unmarried girl, and for a husband who falsely accuses his wife of infidelity.  Also included are the laws of divorce, from which are also derived many of the laws of marriage, and the procedures for yibbum ("levirate marriage") of the wife of a deceased childless brother and halitzah ("removing of the shoe") in the case that the brother-in-law does not wish to marry her.

Marriage with a brother's widow was forbidden among the Jews except for the case of yibbum.  Because the deceased brother had no issue, the brother who agreed to marry his sister-in-law would be the sole benefactor of his brother's estate instead of splitting it with the family. If the levirate union resulted in male issue, the child would be named after the deceased brother. Levirate marriage was regarded as obligatory but was permissible only when the widow had no children of either sex.

Though viewed with disfavor, the surviving brother had the choice of halitzah, the ceremony by which a widow and her husband's brother could avoid the duty to marry after the husband's death.  This “safety valve” provided a choice to both the man and the woman with a specifically detailed public ceremony through which he is released from the obligation of marrying her, and she becomes free to marry whomever she desires. 

Under Jewish law divorce also involves the community.  A Jewish document of divorce, called a “get”, authorized by a rabbinical court, must be given to the wife or her agent.  A wife may sue in the rabbinical court, a “bet din”, to initiate a divorce compelling the husband to give the “get” if he has violated any of his numerous obligations

With the growth of Reform Judaism, the laws and practices related to widowhood and divorce changed.  In 1871, the Reform movement passed a resolution stating that the ceremony of halitzah is not essential to the remarriage of the childless widow.  With regard to divorce, Reform rabbis generally do not issue Jewish divorces, seeing a civil divorce as both necessary and sufficient.  Our rabbis do offer a religious "service of separation" which can be performed either with the divorcing couple or with one partner alone, to provide the comfort of tradition even at this difficult time.

Community is critical in providing compassionate support to those who are struggling with the stresses of modern life.  And, while some of us experience great connectedness and support here at Beth Am, we know that many members are socially isolated particularly those who are coming to terms with divorce and widowhood.

Losing a spouse to death or divorce means a shattering change in the lives of both men and women. Congregants who have suffered such losses often say that in the first weeks and first few months after their loss they get lots of calls from friends, but are not always up to accepting invitations during that time. Then, often, the friends stop calling. Couples sometimes stop including the newly-single in their activities, even when they are old friends. Those who have suffered loss sometimes isolate themselves, and if they are not out and about much, they are often forgotten by their friends and acquaintances victims of the “out of sight, out of mind” phenomenon. People sometimes feel that "others must know this person better and are reaching out to him/her." That is not necessarily so!

Men, who have often relied on a spouse to provide their social opportunities, are often left without many connections when the marriage ends. Jewish law (including many of the mitzvot in this portion) focuses especially on how we treat those who occupy a vulnerable position in society -- it requires special sensitivity, the ability to put oneself in another's shoes, and a proactive approach -- making a conscious effort to include those who are too emotionally drained to make overtures to others.  It's so easy to forget to “remember the widow, the orphan and the stranger” when our own lives are going smoothly...but this is a true test of friendship, and of a community.

Our Beth Am community should take some time to reflect on how well we respond to those who have gone through and who may be going through these experiences.  We should be particularly attentive to long-time members who may have lost their connections to the community and to new members who may be missing the support of old friends living elsewhere and are intimidated by our congregation’s size.

For the women of our congregation, Beth Am Women can be a comfortable entry or re-entry point into our Beth Am community, but we need to do a better job of getting more women to take that first step.  That’s why this year Beth Am Women is focusing on building community one woman at a time through interpersonal connections. It’s out of those connections that friendships grow. And it only takes one connection to become part of a social network – a small one focused on one common interest or the varied and multi-linked mini-communities that so enrich Beth Am.

The good news is that there are so many activities to choose from!  Beth Am Women’s sponsors many on-going groups that gather monthly as well traditional activities that serve the larger Beth Am community.   We have many new opportunities planned for the coming year including a powerful new exercise for identifying meaningful social action projects, a forum on the important topic of elder abuse, and continued dialogue with women of other faiths. November will see the grand opening of our new “mobile” gift shop, the Beit Tzedakah, offering beautiful Judaica items from Israel .  And, in March we’ll hold our first ever Beth Am Women Retreat with Rabbi Marder.

Details will follow.  A mailing with more information will go out to the entire congregation next month, and our Board members will be there at Rosh Hashana services to greet you and wish you a sweet new year.

An important event to put on your calendars is our Kick-off Dinner Block Party on Thursday, October 15.  Women from the various groups I’ve mentioned will be there to meet you, to tell you about what they do, and make that important woman-to-woman connection.  We’ll also spend some time exploring Beth Am’s electronic environment so that those of you who are “online” know where and how to find the information you need.  For those of you who aren’t “online”, we’ll introduce a new eBuddy program that pairs “web-savvy” women with those who prefer not dealing with computer technology.

Beth Am Women is changing.  We are working to be more integrated into the Beth Am community as an umbrella organization for the many activities that engage our large, multi-faceted, and multi-generational membership.  We hope to become an avenue through which the women of our congregation make connections, find meaning, and feel free to create and develop new projects that meet their own needs and the needs of the larger community.

I’d like to share a poem from The Torah: A Women’s Commentary, the Women of Reform Judaism’s remarkable gift to our movement that is now in its third printing.  The poem, by Rabbi Vicki Hollander, is in the Voices section devoted to this week’s Torah portion.  It is entitled, “The Passage of Divorce:  Paving One’s Way”:

To what does this compare?

To the earth

When it moves and quakes and shifts beneath one’s feet.

And when the movement stops,

One walks away transformed,

Touched,

Different.

These words capture the impact of divorce and widowhood on all who experience such loss, men and women alike.  I can’t say what it’s like for men, but I know that when such crises strike women, we need the company of other women, to connect, console, and commiserate.

So tonight, for the women of our community, we are paving the way toward a new tradition by initiating the first Sit with your Sisters Shabbat.  We’ll gather again on the final Shabbat of every even month to celebrate Shabbat together – (August is 8, October is 10, you get the picture!).   We hope that you’ll join us again on Shabbat and at at least one other event this year to sit with your sisters, sing with your sisters, stitch with your sisters, serve with, support and sustain your sisters and yourselves.  You can start by staying after services this evening to share some wine and shmooze.  Shabbat Shalom.