Women's Minyan

by Naomi Ragen

  CHANA: Shut up! I’m not your house slave anymore, Gitte Leah. You’ve sworn to listen, so listen! Now, it’s my turn to speak.

  FRUME: Nu! So talk already, so we can get this over and done with.

  GITTE LEAH: Today, if it’s not too much to ask. The rest of us have lives to get back to.

  SHAINE RUTH: [quietly, to SHEINHOFF.] Mameh Goldie, did you take your oath?

  BLUMA: Of course she did!

  CHANA: [to SHEINHOFF.] Shaine Ruth is right. We forgot about you [holds out the Bible].

  SHEINHOFF: [takes Bible reluctantly, shaking her head.] Chanaleh, why don’t you listen to me? Let the wounds heal, I tell you, instead of scraping away at them, causing more pain. If you insist on doing this your way, who knows where it will end…

  As SHEINHOFF speaks, the SHOUTS outside increase. The women’s attention is diverted. SHAINE RUTH goes to the window.

  SHAINE RUTH: Look at that woman! She’s gone meshugah. To fight her way through all those men. They’ll kill her!

  WOMEN and CHANA hurry to the window. Now their backs are to SHEINHOFF, who stares indecisively at the Bible, then puts it down without taking the oath. Outside, the tumult increases, shouts of “Pritzah! Zonah! and Sotah!” are heard.

  SHAINE RUTH: [at window.] It’s Zehava! She’s gotten through! She’s coming upstairs!

  CHANA is the first to run to the front door. WOMEN mill around helplessly. In the melee, no one notices SHEINHOFF has not sworn her oath.

  Scene five

  CHANA opens the door. Enter ZEHAVA, disheveled and injured. The WOMEN cringe from her, distancing themselves.

  CHANA: Rebono shel olam (Lord of the Universe)! Zehava! [taking care of her.] Criminals!

  ZEHAVA: What about you? All Meah Shearim is talking about what they are going to do to you. I couldn’t sit home. I just couldn’t.

  CHANA: [bitterly.] I’m all right.

  ZEHAVA: Why didn’t you call? I didn’t know what to think when you took so long. It’s hard for you to say good-bye to the children…

  CHANA: Zehava…[on the verge of tears.] They’ve hidden them.

  ZEHAVA hugs CHANA. The WOMEN are scandalized, misinterpreting this supportive gesture as something sexual. FRUME covers SHAINE RUTH’s eyes.

  FRUME: [to CHANA and ZEHAVA.] May God strike you both dead, you shameless creatures!

  CHANA: Remember her, Zehava? Madame Kashman.

  ZEHAVA: Of course, your mother. Shalom [extends her hand.].

  FRUME: [spits and turns away.] You came here to flaunt your perversions…

  CHANA: [cutting her off.] What?! Perversions!? Girls! Go bring some antiseptic and bandages.

  Exit BLUMA and SHAINE RUTH. CHANA seats ZEHAVA and treats her wounds.

  GITTE LEAH: Don’t play the saint with us. A woman who loves another woman. We’re not so innocent here, we know what you are—Latvians! (mispronunciation of “lesbians”.)

  ZEHAVA: [defiant.] Yes, I love Chana. She is my sister, my mother, my friend. As long as I live, I will never desert her the way you have.

  GITTE LEAH insulted, exits.

  ZEHAVA: [mockingly.] Who started these rumors? Eta? Tovah?

  ETA and TOVAH: [reluctantly.] Hello Zehava, how are you?

  FRUME: [looking daggers at ETA and TOVAH.] You are also friends of this degenerate?

  ETA: God Forbid!

  TOVAH: We’re practically strangers.

  ETA: [to FRUME.] She used to join us when Chana gave us classes on a woman’s role in the family.

  TOVAH: We don’t know anything about her.

  ETA: Only that she has ten children, and one of them is autistic, and her parents forced her to marry a man twenty years older who beat her and she’s had dozens of miscarriages and was just about ready to kill herself when….

  TOVAH: Shhh! [elbows her.] Chana brought her.

  ETA: It was Chana’s doing. She knows her.

  BLUMA and SHAINE RUTH enter with first-aid. CHANA takes care of ZEHAVA’s wounds.

  ZEHAVA: [with derision to TOVAH and ETA.] Such dishrags!

  CHANA: [as she dabs Zehava’s wounds.] They can’t even imagine a real friendship between women; that one woman would stand by another even when she’s being shunned, would take her in when she’s homeless, would take the blows meant for her on her own body….

  ETA: [to TOVAH, in a whisper.] The Modesty Patrol, two years ago, did you forget? They broke into the house, beat her, farshteyst? Broke her hand—

  TOVAH:—and her leg!

  FRUME: Her head they should have broken…

  ZEHAVA: Believe me they tried, Mrs. Kashman. They came to take Chana back to her husband by force, but “the poor things,” they only found me. One beat me with a bat but still I wouldn’t tell them anything. The second one would have killed me if I hadn’t sat down on him until the police came. Thank God for blessing me with a healthy appetite and something to show for it. I’d do anything for her….

  ETA: Of course you would, because you and she [waggling two fingers at her, to indicate their sexual relations.]

  TOVAH: Exactly.

  CHANA: [while taking care of ZEHAVA.] Didn’t I say it? They don’t trust friendship, just wicked gossip. A whisper here, a raised eyebrow there…It’s enough to explode an entire life of good deeds. They do it in the synagogue during the Torah reading, or waiting for their turn to purify themselves in the ritual baths….

  TOVAH: [with righteous denial.] Gossip, in my ritual baths…?

  CHANA: [cynically.] I know, I know. You don’t permit gossip.

  ETA: [defensively.] Someone from the yeshiva said Rav Aaron himself saw you dressed like a slut walking down Ben Yehuda street…

  CHANA: So, our saintly Rabbi, our uncle, was standing out on street corners staring at women?

  FRUME: [to BLUMA and SHAINE RUTH.] Girls! Stop up your ears!

  CHANA: No one ever saw me dressed immodestly. When I was fifteen years old, I gave myself permission to be anything I wanted, and I chose to be a religious woman because I loved God. [pointing to window.] And no wheeler-dealer who calls himself a Rabbi can change that!

  ZEHAVA: It doesn’t surprise me that the men are behind all these rumors. [getting up to leave.] They’re terrified we women will band together and give each other strength. So, to keep us weak, they make us suspicious of one another. They enforce marriage and divorce laws that keep us chained like prisoners to men we despise. A man doesn’t need a gun to kill a wife. He can squeeze the life out of her drop by drop…. [heavy silence.] Come, let’s go Chana. From them [contemptuously.] you’ll get nothing. [her wounds are dressed. She turns to leave.]

  CHANA: I can’t. Not yet.

  ZEHAVA: Why? Your children aren’t even here.

  Enter GITTE LEAH.

  CHANA: They’ve sworn to listen. Once they hear the truth, they’ll have to let me see them.

  ZEHAVA: Don’t—Chana! Don’t give them another chance to step all over you! You’ve got a court order!

  ADINA: Wait! [counts.] Now we have a minyan.

  SHAINE RUTH: [counting.] Right! With Zehava we’re ten.

  ETA: Naye rabonim hobn nisht keyn minyen. Tsen shotn hobn a minyen.

  [To zehava:] Farshteyst? Understand?

  ZEHAVA: No.

  ETA: A Jew who doesn’t know Yiddish? A shiksa!

  ZEHAVA: [ironically] No. Just a Moroccan…

  ADINA: It means nine rabbis are not a minyan—

  ETA:—but ten fools are!

  SHAINE RUTH: [brings CHANA the Bible.] Ima, she has to swear.

  ADINA: All of us have already taken a sacred oath.

  SHEINHOFF shrinks in her place.

  CHANA: Zehava, it’s my only chance of seeing the children today. Please, swear! [holds out the Bible.]

  ZEHAVA: This is a terrible mistake, Chana [she sighs.]. All right, all right, God help us….

  CHANA: I, Zehava Toledano, accept upon myself this sacred oath—

  ZEHAVA: I, Zehava Toledano, accept upon myself this sacred oath—<
br />
  CHANA:—to listen to Chana honestly and to judge her righteously.

  ZEHAVA: With all my heart, to listen to my friend Chana with honesty and to judge her righteously.

  Music. MOTIF OF THE OATH. CHANA begins to pray. The change from reality to ritual.

  INTERMISSION.

  Act II

  Prologue

  The women stand behind the table. Before each is a basin and a two-handed ritual cup. In unison, they grasp the cup in their left hand, and pour water twice over their right fist, repeating with the other hand. A beam of light touches each one. They fade. A halo of light surrounds the table, widens and encircles the stage. The realistic room disappears. The women move outside the circle. CHANA stands alone in the center, her eyes closed, she prays. The MAN’S VOICE who has read the laws in the opening scene, returns to do battle with the power of the women’s minyan, delegitimizing it to weaken and demean them. CHANA’s prayer does battle with it, overcoming and silencing it, fending off the male intrusion into the women’s mystical circle, the sacred oath that now binds them.

  MALE VOICE: A group of ten men of Israel, over the age of thirteen, are a “congregation”, a society, a minyan for the purposes of public prayer or other holy activities. Even if one hundred women pray together, they have no authority to perform a sacred act. They may not publicly declare God’s Oneness. They may not lead the congregation in prayer. They may not perform the Priestly blessing, or a public reading of the Torah or of the Prophets. They may not convene a public event or a council. They may not publicly comfort the mourner or bless the bridegroom or say grace after meals because, as it is written: “I will be blessed amongst the Children of Israel,” and throughout the entire Torah, the “Children of Israel” refers to free, male adults. A woman is a golem, a lump of clay, without stature, who cannot make a covenant with God, and therefore, cannot join a minyan.

  CHANA: [fighting back, with prayer.] To You, O Lord, do I lift up my soul. In You, O God, have I put my trust; do not let me be deceived. Do not let my enemies triumph. Let me find my way in Your truth. Teach me, for You are the God of my salvation, and it is for You I wait all day.

  MALE VOICE: “Even at a time of affliction for Israel, when individuals abandon the congregation, and doom themselves to hell, even at such a time women may not join a minyan to make up ten; even one woman with nine men. A woman does not join a minyan even for the purpose of witnessing a public display of martyrdom to sanctify the Holy Name. A woman may not judge, or be a witness. Gentiles, slaves, women, fools, and children are ineligible to give testimony. Women are not called a congregation.”

  CHANA: [escalating the battle.] Behold my enemies, how many they are and how they hate me. Watch over my soul and save me from them, let me not be ashamed that I have trusted in You. Innocence and righteousness will preserve me, for I have put my trust in You.

  MALE VOICE: [beginning to capitulate.] But ten women can gather together unto themselves for public service, or to read the Scroll of Esther on Purim. Ten women are considered a congregation for lighting candles, for drinking four cups of wine on Passover, and eating bitter herbs. Ten women are a congregation for the purpose of reconciling a man to his enemy.

  CHANA: [her prayers partially answered.] He guides the humble through judgment, and teaches the humble His way. Thus all the paths of the Lord are full of truth and loving-kindness to those who keep His Covenant. For the sake of Your name, Lord, pardon my iniquity. Troubles have already enlarged my heart—Oh lead me out of my affliction…For Your mercy is before my eyes and I have earnestly walked in your truth.

  The circle is formed. The oath binds them all within it until it is fulfilled. The WOMEN who surround CHANA turn expectantly toward her. She is deep in prayer. Her daughters enter the circle, approaching her.

  SHAINE RUTH: Talk to us, Ima! Tell us what happened!

  BLUMA: Why did you leave us?

  Scene one

  CHANA’S inner monologue, begun as prayer, transforms into confession. To BLUMA, SHAINE RUTH.

  CHANA: [looking around at the house, as if in a dream.] Twenty years of my life I gave to this house, hour by hour, day by day. To build something harmonious and good. For twenty years I held my finger in the dike, to keep the horror around me from flooding through. You never saw, never even suspected. But even a sponge gets full, so full it cannot hold another drop….

  The woman who ran away two years ago was not the mother you knew…. It had nothing to do with you, my innocent children…The dam finally broke.

  CHANA becomes aware of the circle of sacred oath.

  CHANA: I could have cowered—as always—allowed myself to drown. But for some reason, I stood up. A strong urge to live gave me strength I didn’t know I had. I turned my back on everything and ran for my life. Only later did the mind wake up, with regrets, pangs of conscience, longings—

  FRUME: Who were you running away from?

  ADINA: Who was chasing you?

  GITTE LEAH: Stories.

  TOVAH: You left for her. [points to ZEHAVA.]

  ETA: Everyone knows.

  ZEHAVA: Not one of you knows anything! You swore to listen, so listen!

  The WOMEN grow silent, remembering their sacred oath.

  CHANA: [focused on her daughters.] Blumaleh, Shaine Ruth, when I left I never dreamt that it would end this way. The minute I could, I tried to settle everything quickly and quietly so I could come home to you—my children. But you [pointing to FRUME.] all of you, blocked my way. The family, the community, my friends [looking at ETA and TOVAH.] you all stood together against me as I smashed myself again and again against the walls of your hard, cold hearts…

  SHEINHOFF: Chana, you gave us no other choice…

  FRUME: You left.

  GITTE LEAH: It’s your own fault.

  CHANA: [bitterly.] I thought so, too. I tried to figure out where I had gone wrong…what had happened to my marriage and why. It didn’t start out bad…. [looking at her girls.].

  GITTE LEAH: Not bad?! Why you ungrateful woman! You didn’t deserve a man like Yankele.

  FRUME: It was a miracle, such a match: a Talmud scholar, from a most respected family…

  GITTE LEAH: His father was an ADMOR…

  TOVAH: And his Uncle, Rav Aaron, was on the Council of Torah Sages—

  ETA:—and the head of a Yeshiva—A Grosse Yichoos! (a great honor).

  CHANA: Yes, Yankele was a gift. A match made in heaven…. by accident. I knocked on the wrong door and he opened it. Right after he saw me, he sent matchmakers to talk to my father. You were all so shocked. That such a family would want me! You never dreamed of looking into the background of the distinguished bridegroom. Who was I, after all? The despised failure. My sister was already burning to fix me up with a fat, newly religious Jew, with hairy knuckles and a bald head….

  FRUME: She was burning because you’d defiled your honor…

  GITTE LEAH: With a soldier! What a disgrace!

  ETA: [scandalized.] Vus!? (what) She was defiled?

  TOVAH: By a soldier!!!?

  GITTE LEAH: A soldier she met with all her running around. [to CHANA] You swore to tell the truth, so tell it!

  GITTE LEAH enters the circle and swivels CHANA around like a boxer in the ring.

  CHANA: [with sarcasm.] A soldier? Why not the whole platoon? The entire army? [to everyone, bitterly.] The truth was, a miracle happened. I was defiled by a letter.

  Shocked, aggressive responses.

  GITTE LEAH: [to everyone, disgusted.] Aren’t you ashamed to speak like that?! [to all.] Under my roof, she got a letter from a soldier. An envelope from the army came to the house of the ADMOR!

  CHANA: [dripping with sarcasm.] God save us! With an official army stamp which proved—beyond a reasonable doubt—that Chana had committed a mortal sin. Who cared that inside the envelope was a scientific paper? Or that it was from a soldier who started to speak to me on a train to Haifa because he’d never in his life spoken to a religious girl before? When I
told him I was interested in science too, that I was reading books underneath my blanket at night because the ADMOR—your husband—didn’t approve of secular studies for girls.

  GITTE LEAH: Profanity, that’s what you brought into the house of the saintly ADMOR. Filth.

  CHANA: [patiently.]—the soldier told me he was working on a project to turn salt water into drinking water, and offered to send me his paper on the subject…