Elana Maryles Sztokman

Activism and communal work

While working on her doctorate, Sztokman relocated to Melbourne, Australia, for three years (2002-2005), where she worked as Educational Director of JNF Victoria, and as an educator at the Florence Melton Adult Mini-school. At the Melton school, in addition to teaching the "Rhythms" course, she also taught a series of graduate classes on gender-related topics, including Gender in Jewish Law, Biblical Women, Gender Issues in Jewish Life, and others. She was also marginally involved with NCJW Australia, and wrote for the Australian Jewish News.^[7] From 2005-2012, Sztokman worked as a writer, lecturer and organizational consultant. She lectured in gender as an adjunct professor at Bar Ilan University, the Efrata Teacher Training college, while regularly writing for publications including The Forward, The Jerusalem Post, Lilith Magazine, The Jerusalem Report, Jewish Educational Leadership, Ha'aretz, and Slate. As an organizational consultant under the business name "Spirit Consulting", Sztokman worked with organizations on "crafting the message" and creating educational and cause-marketing materials. She worked with Beit Hatfutsot (The Museum of the Jewish People), Eshel Avraham Masorti Synagogue, The Hartman Institute, Eretz Acheret Magazine, Israeli Flying Aid, The Israel Association for Adult Education, Jewish Congregation of Maui, The Center for Women's Justice, and others.^[8] While working with these organizations, Sztokman continued to write regularly on gender for The Forward and other publications. During this period, she also produced two books on gender.

The Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance

In 2012, Sztokman became the Executive Director of JOFA, the Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance. While at JOFA, she helped launch The Torch^[9] blog on Orthodox feminism at My Jewish Learning. She also played a key role in launching JOFA UK^[10] under the leadership of JOFA UK Ambassador Dina Brawer, and in June 2013, JOFA UK held the first ever JOFA conference on Orthodox feminism in the UK, and then launched two partnership minyan.^[11] Other new initiatives launched under Sztokman's leadership include a video webinar series on social change in Orthodoxy, and the Joan S. Meyers Torah Lending Project, which provides a Torah scroll for bat mitzvah girls who want to read from the Torah as part of their celebration. During Sztokman's tenure, JOFA co-sponsored a historic Agunah Summit^[12] to resolve the issue of agunot, or "chained women".^[13][14] Blu Greenberg announced later on that year that as a result of the summit, a new beit din would be established to free agunot from unwanted marriages.^[15] Sztokman is also credited with significantly raising the JOFA public profile, and under her leadership, JOFA was covered in the media no less than 75 times.^[16] In January 2014, Sztokman left her position as the JOFA's executive director.^[17]

Books

• The Men's Section: Orthodox Jewish Men in an Egalitarian World

Sztokman's first book is the first English-language book to examine gender identities of Orthodox Jewish men. A qualitative ethnography based on interviews with 55 men who attend partnership minyan, The Men's Section was met with acclaim and won the 2012 National Jewish Book Council Award for women's studies. Barbara Sofer wrote in The Jerusalem Post that it is "refreshing to read a scholarly woman’s analysis of Orthodox men. The author describes the little-discussed subject of life on the men’s side of the divider."^[20] Amanda Borschel-Dan at Times of Israel wrote that the book is "a story about tension, identity and dialogue. About living on the borders of a culture, yet still navigating within them. About negotiating, pushing back, and yes, acceptance. Its tale is particular, yet so universal that scholars and laymen all over the world are picking up Elana Sztokman’s new work, The Men's Section."^[21] Rabbi Mishael Zion wrote at The Forward that the book makes “a vital contribution well beyond the scene of liberal Orthodoxy," and that it "provides the intellectual tools through which we can reconstruct traditional gender identity in novel ways.”^[22] Rabbi Jack Reimer wrote in The Jewish Jewish Journal that "I can only hope that when we have more women like Dr. Sztokman, who are learned, articulate and committed to both equality and halachah, that things will eventually change.”^[23] The book currently has a 5.0 star rating on Amazon (5 ratings) and a 3.5 star rating on Goodreads (10 ratings).

• Educating in the Divine Image: Gender Issues in Orthodox Jewish Day Schools

Sztokman's second book, written in collaboration with Dr. Chaya Rosenfeld Gorsetman, is an exploration of Orthodox Jewish day schools and the ways in which schools construct gender identity. The book examines issues including: single-sex versus coed education; dress codes; sex education; gender in books; gender in pedagogy; gender in school ritual and gender in school leadership. Sztokman told Sara Ivry at Tablet that the book was based on ten years of work, and compiled several different sources of qualitative research, mostly in North America but also in Israel.^[24] This book won the 2013 National Jewish Book Council award in Education and Identity, making Sztokman one of only a small group of authors to win this award twice—and it is very rare to win two years in a row.^[25]

• The War on Women in Israel: How Religious Radicalism is Stifling the Voice of a Nation

Sztokman's third book was released in September 2014 to very positive reviews. Publishers Weekly wrote, "With outrage and bewilderment, [Sztokman] chronicles how Israeli business leaders, lawmakers, politicians, and police have caved to the demands of an ultra-Orthodox minority to remove women’s faces, voices, and even their physical presence from public venues, creating 'female-free zones' in the name of modesty. She exposes the 'entrenched culture of sexism' in the Israeli army and legislature, and explores how the Orthodox rabbinical courts cause disproportionate harm to women in their governance of “personal status” issues (marriage, divorce, and conversion), among other concerns." Kirkus Reviews called the book "A worthwhile and eye-opening study." Library Journal wrote, "Sztokman's articulate call for attention toward and action on behalf of women's rights in Israel will be of interest to all readers with a passion for global feminism and Jewish women's lives."

• Masala Mamas: Recipes and Stories from Indian Women Changing their Communities through Food and Love

Sztokman's fourth book takes a leap from her previous work in several ways. First of all, it is not about Jewish anthropology but about gender and poverty in India. Second, it is not academic or political in tone. It retains her sharp anthropological lens and interest in women's lives in traditional society but in a lighter way, focusing on food as a cultural tool. Also, proceeds from sales of the book go to the women whom she interviewed.^[26]

On feminism as compassion

Sztokman frequently writes about feminism as an expression of compassionate spirituality, based on the teaching that all people—women and men—are created in the divine image. She wrote at the Wexner Foundation, for example:

The women – and men – who have dedicated their lives and spirits to protecting women’s places in religious life are the spiritual warriors of our generation. We continue to put forth an alternative vision for Orthodoxy, one that does not see 'stricter' or more 'radical' as more 'authentic' but actually views compassion and gender equity as foundational elements of Torah. We are not looking to proponents of radical Orthodoxy for approval...The fight for women’s rights in Orthodoxy is not just about women, and it’s not just about rights. It’s about constructing a vision for a Jewish society that values both adherence to Torah and the perpetuation of a spirit of humanity and compassion...The feminists are literally on the frontlines of the battle to create a community that can actually consider itself a light to the nations, a community that is not afraid of cooties but is afraid of what will happen to us when we stop appreciating that all humans were created in the Divine image.^[31]

Sztokman's positions on issues such as women's inclusion in partnership women, women rabbis, women wearing tefillin, and solutions for the problem of agunot, are all premised on this "spiritual feminism" that seeks to build a compassionate Jewish community.

On the female body and "modesty"

Sztokman's views on women's bodies and on the practices of "modesty" or "tzniut" are based on this blend of radical feminism and spiritual feminism. Sztokman views some rabbinic approaches to women's body as "oppressive" and calls for women to reject body restraints and rabbinic language of body cover and instead adhere to their bodies own needs and desires. As she writes in her doctoral dissertation, "language of comfort and language of desire are completely absent from discussions about women's dress in Orthodox Judaism". Sztokman said in an interview in Tablet that girls' religious identities are so bound up in their own body cover that religious girls and women often do not even know how to describe their own religious identities outside of descriptions of their clothing.

In a response to an essay by Rabbi Michael Broyde on the "sheitel", or practice of women covering their hair with wigs, Sztokman writes:

[Broyde] argues that “modesty” — i.e., rules of excessive cover of the female body — is an antidote to belly-button rings, which in turn are an indicator of promiscuity and recreational sex. Really? This line of thinking has more leaps than an equestrian course. At the risk of stating the obvious, let me say that there are more than two choices for female attire. There is a whole series of gradations between the sheitel and the music video outfit. There is a lot of variation in between. Women who choose to wear jeans and a t-shirt, who play with ways to put their hair up in a scrunchy or let it flow naturally over their shoulders, who wear leggings to go bikeriding in the park — these are women who, according to this reckoning, are immodest, likely to have sex as often as they eat, and dangerously on the edge of social norms.

This black-and-white view (no pun intended) is particularly disturbing because it leaves out an entire range of female experience. The possibility of women freely choosing the way they exist in their bodies is outside of this dichotomy. It leaves out the very possibility that our clothing decisions are not based on the male libido but simply on our personal preferences. And by the way, not all women who have belly-rings engage in recreational sex.

Both the fervently Orthodox worldview and the MTV worldview involve a sexual objectification of women’s bodies. Both expect women and girls to dress a certain way because we are objects of male desire. Both are dominated by men making determinations about what women should or should not wear based on their own inability to see us as more than a body. Orthodoxy, as opposed to MTV, says, okay, so cover up and then maybe we’ll respect be able to put aside our sexual desire and have a conversation with you. But you know, the Taliban makes a similar argument. It’s a no-win situation for women, and leaves us completely passive and helpless.^[32]

Sztokman's linking of Orthodox practice to radical Islam on the issue of women's body cover is met with criticism by some Orthodox Jews who claim that these cultures are different. As one commenter wrote: "[Sztokman] likens Orthodox Judaism to the Taliban, an ethos in which women are kept illiterate and routinely endure physical beatings.What do you say to the observation that such an incendiary comparison is over the top and borders on hate speech?"^[32] Sztokman argues that much of the rabbinic writing on the subject of women's bodies is based on misogynistic ideas about women's proper role in society. In one story about a rabbi allegedly recommending to a girl that she cut her legs rather than submit to her parents' requests that she wear pants, Sztokman writes, "Orthodox Judaism has issues with the female body, to put it mildly. In a culture defined by the degree to which women are kept silent and invisible, pressured to have as many babies and possible while maintaining the home and covering as much flesh as possible," it is not surprising that some rabbis make extreme recommendations regarding women's bodies.^[33]

On cultural relativism

In debates over Jewish reactions to women's body-cover in Islam, Sztokman vehemently rejects approaches of cultural relativism, and argues that feminism is at odds with relativistic ideologies. Citing Ayaan Hirsi Ali as one of her strongest influencers, Sztokman writes:

The voice of “cultural relativism” is a smokescreen. It is the argument put forward by people who really do not want feminist interference. And who would that be? It’s not the women who are suffering from genital mutilation or honor killings who are asking you to butt out. It’s not the women who face violence, polygamy, and corporal punishment for showing ankles and wrists who are demanding that you step aside in the name of some abstract, twisted notion of intellectual consistency. The ones asking feminists to be quiet are the ones who want to continue harming women. And those are voices that do not deserve to be heeded...Aggressors — whether on the playground or in the boardroom or in the bedroom — like to demand neutrality from observers. But let’s not kid ourselves. Passivity in the face of aggression is not neutral. It empowers the aggressors. So the stance of “Leave them alone; don’t interfere; it’s their culture,” is actually a false stance of neutrality. It gives the attacker free reign [sic] and leaves the victim without an ally in the world. The bully laughs at our ambivalence.

Feminism never claimed to be value-neutral, nor should it, because not all ideological positions are equal. Just as a Jewish community would never claim that a Neo-Nazi has as much right to his ethical stance as the rabbi, so, too, we should not think that people have the right to advocate for violence against women just because, well, it’s a legitimate idea. It’s not a legitimate idea, any more than Holocaust denial is. Some ideas are just plain evil.

We have to stop apologizing for caring, and we have to stop apologizing for fighting to save women’s lives.^[34]

Rebecca Shischsa, an Orthodox feminist blogger, debates Sztokman's position on cultural relativism. "I find your arguments insightful," she wrote to Sztokman in her blog, "but I’m still worried that although you say that women who suffer from various forms of oppression within religious groups are not the ones telling western feminists to butt out, I’m not sure if this is always the case. There are many women within Islam who will passionately advocate their ‘right’ to cover themselves from head to toe with a burka or niqab, just as there are many women within communities in Africa who may still passionately encourage their female offspring to be circumcised, even in this day and age. It is these women – who we claim are oppressed, but who themselves argue that these forms of oppression are actually a form of religious freedom, that I worry about when I feel the urge to give a blanket condemnation."^[35]

Sztokman responds to this by citing Martha Nussbaum's work, Women in Human Development: The Capabilities Approach, which discusses issues of agency and empowerment within the language of choice. Nussbaum's work with traditional Indian women informed her approach of integrating a respect for women's lives with a critique of forms of body oppression. Sztokman cites Nussbaum extensively in her doctoral thesis on this topic of choice and traditional religious women.

On masculinity and men's gender identities

Sztokman is also one of the first Jewish feminists to look at gender identity among men. “I want to help break open the boxes that Orthodoxy puts men—and women—into,” she said in a 2013 interview. "We have to pay attention to how men deal with this if we are going to successfully create equitable, compassionate communities,” she also said, adding that “We have to understand that feminism can liberate men, too.”^[36] Sztokman's approach to men veers from much of liberal feminist thought which focuses on men as partners in feminism. She writes that much of the discussion about feminism and men takes place in negotiations "over the kitchen sink". This female-centric approach to men and feminism creates a "zero-sum game" of gender and is not always helpful to men. Rather, her book is about men and their own gender identities. She uses Paul Kivel's "Be a man box" as a theoretical basis and applies it to Orthodox men, creating the notion of the "Be an Orthodox Man Box" which socializes men into a set of behaviors around performance, perfectionism, seriousness, and emotionlessness. By unraveling the many messages that Orthodox men receive around the idea of "be a man", Sztokman uses feminist theory to enable men to reject their own confining elements of gender socialization.^[37]

On gender essentialism

Sztokman's feminism is also based on an application of cultural feminism in an Orthodox Jewish context. In an interview with Susan Reimer-Torn at the Jewish Women's Archives, Sztokman described the delicate balance between accepting a women's "culture" while fully rejecting essentialist differences:

"The discourse of gender differences is very problematic, and that’s why we have to be really careful when we talk about a woman’s 'way.' The second we start talking about a 'women’s way,' we run a risk of falling into old patterns and traps of seeing women as 'less,' as 'softer,' as less capable of dealing with pressure, as less assertive, as less logical, or whatever. When we start to couch this in language of brain differences, we are basically turning sexist attitudes into some kind of pseudo-scientific data...."When we talk about women’s contributions to transforming society, it’s based on culture, not biology. If men are typically acculturated into a kind of sterile individualism, women are acculturated into relationships, caring, and other-centeredness. Both of these personas are part of the human spirit, and all human beings need access to both characteristics, that is, individualism and connectivity. So the point is that bringing a 'women’s culture' into Jewish life is not about 'femininity' as an essence but rather about restoring cultural balance to a world that has overly valued the culture of sterile individualism that has been typically owned by men."^[38]

Despite the rejection of essentialist differences, Sztokman makes some striking observations about how Orthodox women and men are socialized into difference, and how these differences find expression in response to the feminist movement. In the epilogue of The Men's Section, Sztokman writes:

The relationship between Orthodoxy and feminism is more complicated than [expecting women] to run to minyan three times a day on time – acting like men, if you will. As I’ve said many times, there is a whole slew of reasons why women do not come “on time” or perhaps at all – whether it’s that they are still doing the bulk of childcare and food preparation on Shabbat, whether they are still recovering from years of alienation and a private resistance that makes reading the paper on Shabbat morning very attractive, or whether they have internalized the message that if they don’t count for minyan, it doesn’t really matter if they come anyway. But more than that, the assumption that feminist resistance entails women acting like men is misguided.

For one thing, everything that men are expected to do as “Orthodox” – whether being “on time” three times a day or standing without talking from beginning to end of the service – assumes female servitude. The only reason men have been able to insist on “on time” and fulfilling all their other rigid, ritualistic obligations is because they have always been able to count on women to cook, clean and watch the kids. These assumptions persist today – not only in Orthodoxy. It is not uncommon for men to plan business trips without regard to home needs, they continue to work the longest hours they can knowing that someone at home is picking up the slack, and as such they continue to buy into notions that they should be praying in a group of ten men three times a day despite the strain these assumptions place on female labor. To wit: Nachum’s entire model for Orthodox masculinity is the “yeshiva bachur,” the single student whose every need is taken care of by – whom? The community? The mother? The wife? It doesn’t matter. There continues to be an idealization of religious practice that is fully dependent on the servitude of someone else, usually women. So if women want access to this, they have a problem. Who is serving their needs so they can freely and happily get to shul?

More than that, there is a more profound point: I submit that women find the standard male practice absent of meaning. Female cultures of spirituality are emotion-filled, personal, engaging, musical, spontaneous, surrounded by people, connections, children, and friendships. Jews have been praying more or less the same way from a certain book with the same pages upon pages of words for recitation for, oh, a few thousand years give or take. So when push comes to shove and women gain access to those practices, the celebration is short lived. For this we struggled so hard? This is what we were looking for all this time? No wonder so many women say, okay, but no thanks. Women seeking access to this space from which they are systematically excluded are disappointed with their own culture. Because it is not really their culture – it is men’s culture. The Orthodox synagogue, even when women are involved, remains a men’s space based on men’s culture.

Ultimately, I think that the real reason why women are not running to synagogue is found in the core of this research. If we look at Orthodox masculinity, and compare it to Orthodox femininity (leaving aside for the moment the issue of hierarchy between them and the exercise of power from one to the other), on the level of a simple collection of characteristics that we will call “male” and characteristics that we will call “female”, it becomes clear why women are not rushing into the male world. Women are socialized as carers, a role which undoubtedly entails servitude, physical restrictions, and enormous amounts of unpaid labor, but also involves love, warmth, friendship, relationship, care, flexibility, and home. Men, by contrast, are socialized as mechanistic performers, with all the accompanying status, power, strength, and freedom for sure, but the construct is emotionless, connection-less, cold, and demanding, and leaves little room for individual expression or even ambivalence. In fact, to be a man may provide personal power, and it certainly has physical, social and monetary rewards, but it does not necessarily involve freedom. Being mounted with expectations of three times a day rote repetition and performance among emotionless peers – and calling that prayer, as if it is actually a spiritual expression – is not all that attractive. It is especially not attractive to women who have experienced something else. Women who have experienced friendship, sharing, deep caring and the love between women look at what goes on between men and think, why would I want to become that? I think that’s the real reason women aren’t all that interested in running to do the man’s thing in synagogue. Being a woman, at the end of the day, is much nicer than being a man."

This segment has very strong echoes of Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex, as well as John Stoltenberg's "Refusing to be a Man". At the same time, Sztokman's calls for feminism as a compassionate stance are influenced by Nel Noddings and Karen Armstrong.

This combination of cultural feminism, radical feminism and spiritual feminism within the context of Orthodox Judaism gives Sztokman a unique voice. Moreover, her work combining activities of education, activism and scholarship is also unusual, and is arguably modeled on the life work of Prof. Alice Shalvi who similarly crossed between these three worlds.

Organization involvements

• Democrats Abroad, Israel. Organization working to promote the American Democratic party among American expats in Israel. (2017-). Vice Chair for Media and Policy
• The Center for Jewish Peoplehood Education. Board member
• Hadassah Brandeis Institute. (Boston). Promoting Jewish feminist scholarship and research. Advisory board member. (2016-)
• El Halev (Jerusalem, Israel). Organization promoting empowerment self-defense for women. Board chair (2014-2017)
• Kolech. (Jerusalem, Israel). Promoting Orthodox feminism in Israel. English blog editor. (2008-2010)
• Darchei Noam (Modi'in, Israel). Partnership synagogue. Co-founder, board member (2006-2007).
• Mavoi Satum: The "Dead End". (Jerusalem, Israel) Organization working to free "chained women"(Agunot). Co-founder; co-chair. (1997-2002)^[42]