In the Spotlight: The Women of Maharat

In this special episode, author, journalist and JBS favorite Abigail Pogrebin sits down with three dynamic women from the Maharat Yeshiva: Rabba Sarah Hurwitz, the Co-Founder and President of Maharat, the first institution to ordain Orthodox Jewish women as clergy; Rabbanit Devora Zlochower Academic Dean and Rosh Kollel at Maharat; and Rabbi Dr. Erin Leib Smokler, Dean of Students at Maharat. These three fascinating women discuss the creation of Maharat, the institution that they all have ties to, and how it has proved revolutionary for Orthodox women seeking leadership roles in their Jewish communities. They discuss power dynamics in Jewish communal life, and how challenging it has been for women to make headway with the all-male establishment that rules Judaism. When knowledge equals power, as it almost always does with regards to rabbinic authority, and women are cut off from knowledge, it completely curtails the possibility of women attaining any semblance of control over their own lives or what is taught in the community. But over the last forty years, these tides have been turning, and these three extraordinary women explain how their progress came to pass. They talk about their new titles ("Rabba," "Rabbanit"), as well as how they consider themselves feminists, and what they do when they encounter misogny in real life, or even within halachah itself.