WOMEN OF THE WALL: Claiming Sacred Ground at Judaism's Holy Site

For the past 14 years, a multidenominational group of women has tried to conduct a women's prayer service—Torah scrolls, prayer shawls and all—at the Western Wall in Jerusalem. Since their first attempt to pray there in 1988, Women of the Wall (WOW) has engaged in a political, legal and religious struggle against the State of Israel that continues today, though the group is hardly anti-Israel or anti-religious. This anthology traces the genesis, history and impact of what is now an international grassroots effort on behalf of Jewish women's religious rights. Haut, an Orthodox Jew, and Chesler, a feminist author and psychologist, present essays from 30 women who recreate the drama of praying together; explore the Jewish legal issues around women wearing and using ritual objects, and express their deep connection to the Wall. The essays reflect the diversity of voices, but the repetition of basic information in almost every piece slows the narrative flow and dilutes the book's power. The first two descriptions of the first prayer service, at which the women were "cursed, threatened, pushed, shoved, spit upon and bitten," injured by heavy metal chairs thrown at them, hospitalized and arrested, are horrifying. By the fourth mention, however, it's almost old hat. Still, the universal themes that erupt in this specific context are worthy of broad reader interest: discrimination, democracy, religious pluralism, anger at the silencing of women, solidarity, sisterhood and the sacredness of place. (Jan.)