THE SACRED CIRCLE OF SISTERHOODSisterhood president.In the beginning I was in my own Sisterhood bubble.Later, when I became a part of the WRJ president’s listserv,I learned that the majority of Sisterhoods acrossNorth America shared the same membership strugglesand worked to overcome them through simple, fun socialprogramming planned during peak temple hours.Q: It seems the interests andpurview of Sisterhood womenchanged with the times. How haveSisterhoods stayed current?Dolores: By the 1980s, more women were working andfurthering their education, making long-term participationin Sisterhood projects less likely. We urged Sisterhoodsto adjust to the new realities by being flexible instructuring, scheduling, and programming. In a presidentialspeech, I referred to the then popular commercial,“This is not your father’s Oldsmobile,” stating, “This isnot your mother’s Sisterhood. This is the new generationof Sisterhood.” Sisterhoods began to adjust meetingtimes and events, to transform long-term responsibilitiesinto “one-shot jobs” or short-term projects, and to createnew models of shared leadership and responsibility.Our vitality is testimony to the ability of each new generationto change with the times.Lynn: Now that women play new roles in congregationallife—we are rabbis, cantors, educators, temple presidents,and anything else we wish to be—we are able tomultiply this power by the thousands, collectively accomplishingjust about anything imaginable! The quintessentialexample is The Torah: A Women’s Commentary(urjbooksandmusic.com), which reshaped the arc ofJewish history by collecting and creating women’s scholarshipinto the first complete commentary on Torahwritten by women.At the 1993 NFTS/WRJ assembly Cantor Sarah Sagerchallenged hundreds of women to imagine a Torahcommentary written by women. WRJ then conveneda “pilot” weekend of Sisterhood executive board membersand women scholars to plan it, hundreds of otherwomen joined to implement the plan, and thousands ofwomen—the Women of Reform Judaism—turned theplan into reality.One of the highlights of my life involves this commentary.At the 2011 Biennial assembly in Washington, DC,I was one of a small group of Movement leaders invitedto meet President Barack Obama. I introduced myself asthe president of Women of Reform Judaism and presentedhim with the volume. President Obama looked at it care-fully. Then, holding up the book, he asked the assembledmale Movement leaders, “Is this book the ‘true’ story?!”I replied that it was the story that hasn’t been told in thelast 2,000 years. “Michelle would really like this book,”he replied, to which I added, “As will your daughters.”Dolores: The WRJ Torah commentary has not only given“voice” to women in the context of the Torah; it hasraised the profile of women as rabbis, cantors, scholars,teachers, and students. It’s a symbol of the evolution ofSisterhood/NFTS/WRJ commitment to Jewish education,from its earliest years, which focused on rabbis andreligious schools, to the intellectual and spiritual developmentof its own women, which is also evidenced in WRJTorah study guides, WRJ books (the Covenant series),a WRJ-commissioned women’s Torah (Torat Nashim),and pre-Shabbat e-mail messages.Q: Today, Jewish women have anynumber of opportunities for Jewishengagement and leadership. Why do somany choose involvement with WRJ?Dolores: For many of the same reasons they always did—the opportunities to support meaningful causes while alsobenefitting from the bonding, sharing, caring, mentoring,learning, and growing that is characteristic of women’sgroups within the special context of her spiritual home.And, because our congregations deal in some of the mostsensitive areas of people’s lives—faith, family, illness, lifeand loss, etc.—so do Sisterhoods. We are there to sharethe laughter and tears, support and cheer, congratulate andcomfort. For 50+ years, I have been part of this “sacredcircle,” and I still cherish every moment it affords me.Lynn: Each woman has the opportunity to grow in her ownway. Some women want companionship and connection.Others seek an entrée into more active temple life. Somewant to be involved in their children’s Jewish education.Many wish to deepen their levels of Jewish literacy. Stillothers are driven to help heal our broken world, and havejoined with WRJ to advocate for such important issues ascivil rights, women’s health, GLTBQ equality, and womenin the rabbinate—the latter nearly two years before anyoneelse in the Movement made a public statement.I became a more literate Jew because of Sisterhood.When I grew up, my brothers studied for bar mitzvah butI was not required to study for bat mitzvah. At Sisterhoodevents as an adult, I participated in Torah study groups,unique worship services, and study sessions with fascinatingteachers. Among an encouraging community of friends,continued on page 46<strong>reform</strong> <strong>judaism</strong> 36 winter 2012
FOCUS: ShandaWhat Will the Neighbors Say?!Considering how society has changed what it deems a disgrace,when shaming is harmful or useful, and how to break the cycle of unjustified shame.RJ interview with dale atkins & Edythe mencher© Kimscreativehub / Dreamstime.comAron Hirt-Manheimer (editor,Reform Judaism magazine):“Shanda” is the Yiddish word for“shame or disgrace inthe eyes of another.”Do Jews have a particularsensitivity tohow we are perceivedby the outside world,and if so, what cultural,historical, sociological,and psychologicalfactors havecontributed to this?Dr. Dale Atkins (psychologist;author; TVcommentator; memberof Temple Israel in Westport,Connecticut): The common Yiddishexpression is a shanda far die goyim.In other words, don’t give ammunitionto non-Jews who might seize the opportunityto hold a socially unacceptablebehavior against all Jews. If a Jew doesa bad thing, we may all be judged andpunished for it.Rabbi Edythe Mencher (URJ Facultyfor sacred community, clinicalsocial work psychotherapist):Actually, I think we’ve worried muchmore about looking good to the Goldsteinsthan to the gentiles. Often theexpression used is “a shanda un acharpeh—a shame and a disgrace”—which refers both to acting inappropriatelyin front of non-Jews as well asother Jews, and in our own eyes.I first heard the word shanda used inrelation to a father who beat his son—itwas a shanda that he treated his son insuch a way, or alternatively a shandathat he did not live up to Jewish standards.The shanda label was also a wayfor parents and community to controlunwanted adolescent behaviors: If a girlwore a revealing dress, if a boy drankor smoked, it would besmirch thefamily name and actually even thewhole community’s honor.Coming of age in the break-free 60s,most of my peers dismissed attempts byour elders to label what we chose towear a shanda. Yet we did not reject thenotion that certain actions or beliefs,such as violence, poverty, mistreatmentof children, racism, and antisemitism,were shandas. We saw the value ofshaming as moral assessment but resistedit as a way of enforcing what we construedas stiflingly middle-class values.Dale: When a shanda involves an ethicalviolation, an entire community maybe at fault. For example, if the Jewishcommunity covers up a case of sexualabuse, both the act and the cover-upmay constitute shandas.Edie: Yes, but the very concept ofshanda may also be at the heart of theproblem. When the shame is associatednot just with the perpetratorbut also the victim—suchas in societieswhere the person whohas been raped ormolested is treated assoiled and ruined—peopleunderstandably hideincidences of abuse. Inthe same way, if a wholereligious group is liableto be attacked broadlybecause some of its leadershave been sexualpredators, then people onthe inside who cherish the faith traditionwill conceal those abuses. The challenge,then, is for society to attach theshame to the crime and to the perpetratorwithout having it spill over onto thevictim and the whole group. In such anenvironment cover-ups are unlikely tobe tolerated by the community.Joy Weinberg (managing editor,Reform Judaism magazine):What did our biblical ancestorsconsider shandas?Edie: The word shanda derives fromthe Germanic word “scandal” or theFrench “escandale,” referring to ignominyor disgrace. The Hebrew root“bosh” figures more in Jewish tradition.It is used in the Bible in the context ofshameful, disobedient actions that aredispleasing to God, such as idol worship,Sabbath desecration, dishonesty inour dealings with others, the disregard-<strong>reform</strong> <strong>judaism</strong> 37 winter 2012
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