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Top Ten Women's Jewish Books
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1. Mystics, Mavericks, And Merrymakers: An Intimate Journey Among Hasidic Girls by Stephanie Wellen Levine, Carol Gilligan |
| In this refreshing portrayal of girls who are
strongly independent and deeply spiritual a contrasting path to that
of mainstream adolescent girls.
Levine spent a year living as a "participant observer" in the Lubavitcher community in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. What she found instead is that Lubavitch culture nurtures girls' inner and outer voices. Levine invites readers to share the "pure delight" of knowing these girls, and challenges us to draw on Hasidism as an unexpected source in helping us develop into secure, confident adults. |
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2. The Blessing of a Broken Heart
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| Mandell, an American-born writer raising her family in Israel, sent her 13-year-old son off to school on May 8th, 2001.
But Koby skipped school to go hiking with his friend
Yosef. The two boys' bodies were found the next day—bludgeoned to death in a cave near
Koby's home in Tekoa. Mandell might have used Koby's death to fuel the flames of haterd. But instead she offers a beautiful memoir, written almost like a prose-poem that recounts her transformation from grief into love and compassion. |
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3. The Woman Who Defied Kings: The Life and Times of Dona Gracia Nasi by Andre Aelion Brooks
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| The
first modern, comprehensive biography of Doña Gracia Nasi, an
outstanding Jewish international figure during the Renaissance. A
courageous leader, she created an "underground
railroad" that saved hundreds of her fellow jews from the horrors of the
Inquisition. She also spearheaded one of the earliest attempts
to start an independent state for Jews in Israel. Some historians have called her the most
important Jewish woman since Biblical times.
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4. The Receiving : Reclaiming Jewish Women's Wisdom
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| The astonishing stories of seven remarkable but almost
unknown Jewish women form the center piece of this treatise on feminine spirituality. Mystics, sages,
prayer leaders and miracle workers, the women lived in the second to 20th centuries, in countries
from Germany to Kurdistan. Tirzah Firestone, a rabbi and psychotherapist allows each
woman's story to serve as a springboard for exploring an aspect of Kabbalah, which literally means
"the receiving." This book allows us to receive the wisdom of
generations of extraordinary women. |
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5. The Flying Camel:
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Many of us have stereotypes of what "Jewish" looks like—and for many of us that image is white and European. This book blows that notion apart. Focusing on the experiences of Jewish women of two rich and varied regions, The Flying Camel reveals the hidden worlds of Jewish women often misunderstood or maligned by both the cultures in which they live and the European-Jewish community. An extraordinary, diverse tapestry of the many ethnic strands of multicultural Judaism. |
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6. Her Face in the Mirror Jewish Women On Mothers And Daughters edited by Faye Moskowitz (£14.95) |
| An astonishing collection of poems, stories, and essays,
this is a penetrating
look at the mother-daughter bond from the perspective of Jewish women. A
wide range of writers from Grace Paley and Tillie Olsen to Sandra Bernhard and Irena Klepfisz
raise their voices in these haunting and remarkable pages.
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7. Engendering Judaism An Inclusive Theology and Ethics by Rachel Adler
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| How can women's full participation transform Jewish law,
prayer, sexuality, and marriage? What
does it mean to "engender" Jewish tradition? Pioneering
theologian Rachel Adler gives this
timely and powerful question its first thorough study in a book that
bristles with humor, passion, intelligence, and deep knowledge of traditional biblical and rabbinic
texts.
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8. Expanding the Palace of Torah: Orthodoxy and Feminism by Tamar Ross
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| Writing as an insider (herself an Orthodox Jew), Ross
confronts the radical feminist
critique of Judaism as a religion deeply entrenched in patriarchy. Ross seeks to develop a theological response that fully
acknowledges the male bias of
Judaism's sanctified texts, yet provides a rationale for transforming
today's world. Her book shows that the feminist
revolution in Orthodox
Judaism reaches beyond its practical effect upon individual lives to teach
us something more
profound about the nature of religious practice in general.
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9. Yentl's Revenge: The Next Wave of Jewish Feminism by Danya Ruttenberg, Susannah Heschel |
| Ruttenberg, a San Francisco-based writer and contributing
editor to the Jewish feminist journal Lilith, has assembled a provocative collection of impassioned essays by an
unorthodox group of young Jewish feminists. With a foreword by noted Jewish scholar and feminist Susannah Heschel, this cutting- edge anthology is a welcome testament to how Jewish Gen-X women are finding their own distinctive voices. |
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10. Beginning Anew: a Woman’s Companion to the High Holy Days by Gail Twersky Reamer and Judith Kates |
| In illuminating commentaries on the biblical texts read on Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kipper, a
number of contemporary female authors, scholars, theologians, and educators offer a fresh
perspective on Jewish history, tradition, and religion.
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