Across the table from me, through a hazy screen of smoke that certainly doesn’t come from a cigarette, Reuven peers bleerily at me. The little red budgie on his shoulder chirrups. Her name, of course, is Shamayim (Heavens). “I am confused,” Reuven blinks. Considering the strength of the substance he’s consuming, I’m not really surprised, but he’s determined to get to the bottom of this quandry – namely, what I’m doing in Jerusalem.
“You’re in yeshiva? In yeshiva?” He’s baffled. And to be honest, I can see why. Opposite him in this noisy, chaotic bar in Machane Yehuda market sits a woman in jeans, drinking her strawberry and banana-flavoured cocktail, telling him that she studies Torah from nine in the morning until six in the evening, davens three times a day, wraps tefillin and attends Women of the Wall Rosh Chodesh services.
“In yeshiva? B’emet?” I nod, trying to be patient despite the incredulity. “And you learn Gemara?” I nod again. He’s trying to make sure I understand the distinction between a yeshiva, where you learn Gemara, and a midrasha, where you do not. In Reuven’s world, women study in midrashot, and men go to yeshiva to learn Gemara.
“You know I was in yeshiva,” says Reuven’s friend Shimon, who has hit on me in an impressively aggressive way several times already this evening. “I had payot down to here.” He points to his nipples, then checks, “You know what payot are?” I assure him that yes, I do – my brother has them.
I’m an enigma to these men. A woman, dressed as I do, behaving as I behave, cannot inhabit the world of Judaism that they recognise, the world that they think I’m trying to describe. To them, yeshiva is for skinny boys in white shirts and black velvet kippot, and girls who pray three times a day wear knee length skirts and are long-since in bed. But the truth is, in Jerusalem, I inhabit an entirely different world altogether, one that exists in quiet subtlety in living rooms and basements around Rehavia, Ba’qa and Nachla’ot.
I’m not really that annoyed by the scepticism anymore. I’m used to Israelis – especially the men – having absolutely no idea what to make of me. The thing that is still frustrating, though, is the fact that my kind of Judaism – religious, egalitarian Judaism – is actually pretty popular elsewhere in the world. All over Europe, the United States and South America, women are reading from the Torah, studying halacha, keeping Shabbat and becoming rabbis. And Orthodox communities in the diaspora know that it’s happening, whether they like it or not. In Israel, though, many secular men like these two are amazed that such a Judaism even exists.
To be fair, it’s not at all one kind of Judaism. In my beit midrash alone there are students with degrees in Talmud from the Jewish Theological Seminary, cantors from California, soldiers on active duty who spend twelve hours a day in the building and rabbinical students whom I see once a week. One student is brand new to tefillah but uses mysticism to enrich his spiritual practice; another finds himself able to converse freely with God when he wakes up in the morning but is struggling to experience traditional Jewish prayer as genuine or meaningful. Every person is here for their own reason and is on their own journey.
And me? Well, partly I’m here because I’m trying to work out what to do with my life. I’ve had several stop-and-start careers at this point and so far the only places where I feel like I fit in are places like this, where everyone else is trying to work things out, too. Partly I’m here to tempt what sometimes seems like an inevitable fate – getting sucked into the vortex of rabbinical school myself. And partly I’m here because, for various reasons and due to various experiences, I’m currently incandescently furious with God, and if I don’t have space to rage and scream about it, I think I’ll explode.
In our classrooms and over meals we’re struggle with these things together. We’re talking about loss and grief, about gender identity, about kashrut and diaspora and occupation and angels. Above and beneath and around it all we’re talking about Torah. The majority of this country would have absolutely no idea what we’re doing here, but we’re here nonetheless, in quiet corners and cocktail bars, doing the Judaism we need to do, just as Israelis do – or don’t do – theirs.
Reuven offers me a puff of his definitely-not-a-cigarette, but I decline. It’s late, whatever he’s smoking seems pretty deadly, and anyway, I’m leading shacharit at 7.45 tomorrow morning. I don’t want to be late for my appointment to shout at God.
The names in this have been changed.
