Judith Plaskow, "Standing Again at Sinai: Jewish Memory from a Feminist Perspective" (Tikkun Magazine, 1986), p.33, " Feminist Ritual"

Liturgy and ritual, therefore, have been particularly important areas for Jewish feminist inventiveness. Feminists have been writing liturgy and ritual that flow from and incorporate women's experience, in the process drawing on history and midrash but also allowing them to emerge from concrete forms. One of the earliest and most tenacious feminist rituals, for example, is the celebration of Rosh Hodesh, the new moon, as a woman's holiday. The numerous Rosh Hodesh groups that have sprung up around the country in the last decade have experimented with new spiritual forms within the framework of a traditional women's observance that had been largely forgotten. The association of women with the moon at the heart of the original ceremony provides a starting point for exploration of women's symbols within Judaism and cross-culturally. At the same time the simplicity of the traditional ritual leaves ample space for invention. Feminist haggadot, on the other hand, seek to inject women's presence into an already established ritual, building on the theme of liberation to make women's experience and struggle an issue at the Seder. Drawing on history, poetry and midrash, they seek to integrate women's experiences into the central Jewish story and central ritual enactment of the Jewish year. These two areas have provided basic structures around which a great deal of varied experimentation has taken place. But from reinterpretations of mikveh, to a major reworking of Sabbath blessings, to simple inclusion of the imahot in daily and Sabbath liturgies- which, however minimally, says, "We too too had a covenant; we too were there"- women are seeking to transform Jewish ritual so that it acknowledges our existence and experience. In the ritual moment, women's history is made present.

Time Period: Contemporary (The Yom Kippur War until the present-day)