blogs/rabbi-huberman

Silence Breakers - Forgotten Women of the Torah

Years before I decided to become a rabbi, our congregation in Canada interviewed several people for our then-vacant rabbinical position.

One candidate, leading the Amidah prayer, began chanting the names of Judaism's patriarchs and matriarchs.

"We praise you, God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob."  So far so good.

And then he added words which set the congregation in a spin. "And we praise the God of Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel and Leah - and Bilhah and Zilpah."

A gasp rose from the pews.  "Who are Bilhah and Zilpah?" some whispered. "Throw this guy off the bimah!"

I've reflected on this moment, and that rabbi's choice, quite a bit since then, and it could be that he was right. For, as the Torah tells us, Jacob fathered twelve sons, each of whom founded a tribe of Israel.

Leah bore six sons: Reuben, Shimon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, and Zebulun.  And Rachel gave birth to Joseph and Benjamin.

So the question remains: Who were the mothers of the remaining four tribes?

The answer is Bilhah and Zilpah. 

Billah served as Rachel's handmaid, and Zilpah labored as Leah's servant. Bilhah gave birth to Dan and Naphtali, and Zilpah bore Gad and Asher.

What this means is that many Jewish people-a third, actually- descend not from Leah and Rachel, the 'bluebloods' of Jewish ancestry, but from two common, largely forgotten women.

Jewish tradition, for the most part, has ignored Bilhah and Zilpah.  It is believed that they are buried in the Tomb of the Matriarchs in Tiberius, but little else is known.

Did they enter motherhood willingly? Were they performing a duty? Were they coerced? We will never know.

The voices of Bilhah and Zilpah, and those of so many other women in the Torah, are largely absent from the Biblical narrative. 

One of these is Dinah, daughter of Jacob and Leah. As the Torah describes, Dinah was sexually assaulted by a non-Jewish prince named Shechem.  Shechem falls in love with Dinah and asks for her hand in marriage.

We are clear that Jacob's sons, in particular Shimon and Levi, were enraged by what they likely saw as an assault on their family honor.

But was this a sexual assault? Or was Dinah, as some gender theologians now posit, exercising her right to make her own choices without the blessings of the males in her family?

Whether this was assault, or one of the Torah's first cases of intermarriage, is something we will never know, because Dinah is silent in the Torah.

The same goes for Timna, who, we are told, was a princess - future queen to a non-Jewish nation. She asks Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, according to the Talmud, if she can join the Israelite people, but each of them refuses.

And so she becomes the concubine of Esau's son, Eliphaz. "Better for me to be a handmaiden to this nation (Israel), and not a noblewoman of that (non-Israel) nation," our tradition quotes her as saying.

Bilhah,  Zilpah, Dinah, Timna.  And these are only a handful of women's narratives that live obscured within the pages of the Torah. 

Reading between the lines, we're now beginning to realize that many of these stories may be of women who suffered exile, manipulation, even abuse. Our tradition reminds us that there are "seventy faces to the Torah."  So many of these faces have been overlooked, misinterpreted, trivialized.

This week, Time magazine chose its "Person of the Year" for 2017. Time calls them "The Silence Breakers:" women who have survived sexual assault, manipulation, extortion, and harassment, and who are now-loudly-re-asserting their dignity and agency.

Their voices are no longer silent.

In choosing this group of women and men, Time noted that The Silence Breakers "are often the most vulnerable in society-immigrants, people of color, people with disabilities, low-income workers and LGBTQ people... If they raised their voices, would they be fired? Would their communities turn against them? Would they be killed?"

In our recent Torah readings, the names of Bilhah, Zilpah, Dinah, and Timna pass us by with barely a mention. It is time to understand the weight of their silence.

Each carries a common thread. Each is referred to by our tradition in terms of sexual utility or liability, nothing more. In these narratives, whether they gave themselves willingly or were coerced-even forced-doesn't seem to matter.

As we open our eyes to the heinous crimes of those who have abused women-and begin to comprehend how much sexual assault has been, and continues to be, endured in silence or ignored-we must also muster the courage to examine our own texts and traditions.

Reclaiming the narratives of so many of these silent women, and beginning to see them in three dimensions instead of only sexually, is important and overdue work.

After so many years, women's voices-and many modern commentators, both women and men, are listening now-must be woven into the fabric of the Torah - Judaism's living document.

Was the rabbinical candidate in Edmonton all those years ago correct to number Bilhah and Zilpah among the names we invoke in our prayers?  Was Dinah a progressive women or a victim? How did Timna actually feel about being a concubine when what she'd wanted was to join the nation of Israel? How is it possible that Hagar slept with Abraham, bore Ishmael, and was then discarded, even despised? 

The Silence Breakers identified this week byTime honors those whose courage has moved us during the past year.

Let us as Jews exhibit the same courage, and elevate those forgotten women within the Torah - many defined only by their sexual purpose.

Let us explore the silence of our tradition. 

And perhaps, this week, as we recite our standard prayers, let us recall the mothers of four tribes of Israel.

Let us remember Bilhah and Zilpah, and so many others. For these were more than surrogates.  They were women with feelings, passions, hopes and dreams.

For the Torah of three thousand years ago remains the Torah of today.

Let us all agree that it is time.

Shabbat Shalom, v'kol tuv,

Rabbi Irwin Huberman