Innovation and Authority 29
Chief Rabbi dated 1 Tevet 5750(Dec. 29, 1989) Goren says that women are not permitted to say devarim she-be- gedusha when they pray together and characterizes his previous opinion as a purely theoretical exercise.
21. R. Moshe Feinstein , Igrot Moshe Orah Hayyim, 4:49.
22. Ibid., 4:49.
23. The term hashuvot is important, see Norma Baumel Joseph , who points out that the term has a halakhic history indicating women who are to be treated with special respect because they are learned wealthy, or powerful. She argues that the women referred to are clearly insiders and notes two passages unusual in a responsum:(1) the lengthy theological section that reiterates the credo that the Torah , written and oral is divinely ordained and may not be questioned, followed by a biological determinist justification of gender roles: and(2) the apologetic exaltation of women’s status. I would add that the content of these passages, a rehearsal of ideology that the elite submitter of the responsum would regard as common knowledge, indicates that the responsum is designed to be“overheard” by the learned rebels under discussion. Norma Baumel Joseph ,““Those Overconfident Women’: Heretical Insiders in Rabbi Moshe Feinstein ’s Responsa”(unpublished manuscript, 1998).
24. For a study of women who support these strategies by participating in prayer groups, see Ailene Cohen Nusbacher,“Efforts at Change in a Traditional Denomination: The Case of Orthodox Women’s Prayer Groups,” Nashim: A Journal of Jewish Women's Studies and Gender Issues, no 2,(Spring 1999): 95- 113.
25. Compliance with the prohibition on devarim she-be-gedusha is neither uniform nor consistent. In a communication with R. A ryeh A. Frimer dated July 25,1997, Ms. Haut confirms that the Flatbush prayer group, basing itself on the repudiated responsum of R. Goren cited here in note 20, still permits women to recite mourner’s qaddish, a policy the Frimers condemn as “halakhically improper, unfounded and indefensible.”(80) Aryeh A. Frimer and Dov I. Frimer ,“Women’s Prayer Services—Theory and Practice: Part 1:Theory.” Tradition 32:2(Winter, 1998): 5-118.
26. Women of the Wall(WOW) has its own organization, The International Committee for Women of the Wall, which raises funds for its legal expenses. WOW has e-mail and a web page. See“Haim Shapiro,“Women at the Wall,” Jerusalem Post (March 30, 1989); Deborah Brin,“Up Against the Wall” The Reconstructionist 54(June 1989) 13-17; Deborah Budner,“Facing the Wall: The Politics of Women and Prayer,” New Outlook(June/July 1989): 25-26; Bonna Devora Haberman,“Women Beyond the Wall: From Text to Praxis,” Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion 13:1(Spring 1997) 5-34.