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The Path to Redemption:

The Revolution of Women’s

Torah Study

Shira Lankin Sheps

I Luminaries like Sarah Schenirer, Prof. eyes bright with joy as they form their

feel lucky to have been born in this
own insights.
generation.
Nechama Leibowitz, and many other
female pioneers over the last century
When I reflect on our shared histo-
ries and look toward the future, I believed it was essential for women to One of the reasons I moved to Jerusalem
was because I wanted to continue my own
comfort myself with the ever-burgeoning learn – that we could enrich the lives of growth in Torah study. I wanted to have
awareness that we are shifting to a new Jewish women and the broader Jewish access to a well-spring of knowledge, to
stage of Jewish history, a pre-Messianic community by teaching Torah to women. teachers who would welcome me in their
The last hundred years have yielded
era that is transforming the future of our groundbreaking role models and insti- classrooms. I chose the Matan beit midrash,
people. I see the evidence every day. founded thirty-five years ago by Rabbanit
tutions that have shaped a new path Malke Bina, to be my spiritual home. For
The world is in a state of flux. Old sys- forward. five years, I’ve had the incredible oppor-
tems that no longer serve the shifting The community of women I have learned tunity to study from my teachers, Dr. Yael
consciousness of this world are break- with throughout my lifetime is hungry. Ziegler and Rabbanit Shani Taragin, who
ing. Ancient prejudices, judgments, mis- They are professionals in their own I had learned from when I was in Israel
conceptions, and limitations are lifting. rights, excelling in all manner of fields during my year in seminary.
We are living in a time of self-actualiza- and practices, incredible homemak- Recently, I had the honor of hosting Rab-
tion, enlightenment, and even possible ers, wives, mothers, and community banit Shani, who gave a shiur to my com-
transcendence. members. They are devoted to spiritual munity in my home. I had been having

Not coincidentally for Jewish women like growth, to their relationships with G-d, many conversations with my teenage
me, a world that has been kept separate and to their pursuit of knowledge. daughter about what it feels like to fall
is opening up for us: the world of Torah For me, there is no feeling like sitting in love with Torah learning. She struggled
study. amongst women to understand what I meant; the way she
had been learning did not spark the
Only in recent generations has there been engaged in Torah same passion in her. I encouraged
a widespread initiative to teach Jewish study, their minds my daughter to come with me to
women Judaic studies. We were kept from alight with the love the shiur to learn from my
it, given only the information we needed of learning, their teacher.
to know to run our households and raise voices echoing the
our children. We were taught in stories, arguments of our
through oral narratives, and kept away ancestors, and their
from books. We wrote our own techines,
prayers in our own mama loshen, because
we weren’t taught Hebrew and Aramaic,
the languages of our Sages. Language,
words, and books have a way of opening
up the world. Even when I was in col-
lege, my teacher taught the women in
his class Gemara from xeroxed sheets,
to discourage us from purchasing our
own Gemaras.

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