Feminist Rereadings of Rabbinic Literature
ISBN: 9781611686098
Platform/Publisher: Project MUSE / Brandeis University Press
Digital rights: Users: Unlimited; Printing: Chapters; Download: Chapters
Subjects: Feminism; Women in Judaism.; Women in rabbinical literature.;

This book offers a fresh perspective on classical Jewish literature by providing a gender-based, feminist reading of rabbinical anecdotes and legends. Viewing rabbinical legends as sources that generate perceptions about women and gender, Inbar Raveh provides answers to questions such as how the Sages viewed women; how they formed and molded their characterization of them; how they constructed the ancient discourse on femininity; and what the status of women was in their society. Raveh also re-creates the voices and stories of the women themselves within their sociohistorical context, moving them from the periphery to the center and exposing how men maintain power. Chapter topics include desire and control, pain, midwives, prostitutes, and myth. A major contribution to the fields of literary criticism and Jewish studies, Raveh's book demonstrates the possibility of appreciating the aesthetic beauty and complexity of patriarchal texts, while at the same time recognizing their limitations.

SIMON RAWIDOWICZ was the first chairman of the Department of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies at Brandeis University and Philip W. Lown Professor of Jewish Philosophy and Hebrew Literature. A prolific writer, he founded two publishing companies and established the World Union for Hebrew Culture. His son, BENJAMIN C. I. RAVID, is Jennie and Mayer Weisman Professor of History at Brandeis University. MICHAEL A. MEYER is Adolph S. Ochs Professor of Jewish History at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion.

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