A successful event is more than just a headcount. Good events leave lasting impressions, build relationships and help engage participants in a Jewish community.

Moishe House Blog

During the Second Temple period in ancient Israel, women were able to actively participate within the larger society, both socially and religiously. Women served as leaders of synagogues, participated in ritual services, learned and taught Jewish law, were counted in a minyan, and from archaeological evidence, do not seem to have been physically separated from men during prayer. There was active participation of women in all facets of Jewish ritual life. According to Shmuel Safrai:

In the Second Temple period women were religiously the equals of men: ancient Jewish sources from the land of Israel and from the Diaspora show that women frequented the synagogue and studied in the beit midrash (study hall). Women could be members of the quorum of ten needed to say the “Eighteen Benedictions”…and like men, women were permitted to say “Amen” in response to the priestly blessing.[1]

Archaeological evidence supports that women were not necessarily separated from the men in the synagogue. This is the result of no apparent evidence from any of the numerous synagogues that have been excavated that would seem to indicate men and women were required to sit separately. Archaeologist Zeev Weiss, of Hebrew University of Jerusalem, has noted:

By now it is widely accepted among scholars that synagogues from the early centuries of the Common Era did not have a separate women’s section. This might surprise people whose knowledge of Jewish synagogues derives from contemporary Orthodox or pre-Second World War European examples.[2]

This scholarly assumption is supported by Safrai, who comments, “Rabbinic sources mention various functions for synagogue balconies and upper rooms, but there is never a connection made between these structures and women.”[3] The first reference to a mechitza is connected to Abaye (4th Cent. CE) in the Babylonian Talmud (Kiddushin 81a). In many opinions, it is unrelated to the synagogue.[4] As a result of recent scholarly insight into this arena, any kind of inference of women’s inferiority based on supposed separation during prayer is not supported by archaeological or textual evidence.

Inscriptions discovered in ancient synagogues from the early centuries also testify to women having served in various leadership capacities throughout the Jewish world. These inscriptions include heads of synagogues (αρχισυναγωγος), leaders (αρχηγισσα), and elders (πρεσβυτερα and other parallels).[5] These inscriptions (in feminine conjugations) bear witness to the very public roles of women. Thus further proving that women were indeed active members within their spiritual communities.

This positive outlook toward women is found both within the standard canonical scriptures, as well as extra-biblical writings. Although women’s roles later became more traditionally subservient to men, with very little ability to fully participate, this was not always the case. There was indeed a time when women actively participated in religious life.

Can Ascension to Heaven happen physically or only in a vision? And does the New Testament serve as a link between earlier biblical thought on Heavenly Ascent and later rabbinic and mystical thought?

This idea was originally introduced and raised by the experiences of Enoch and Elijah, who were both described as having been taken to heaven (see Gen. 5:24, and 2 Kings 2:1-11).

1 Enoch

Yet the idea of heavenly ascent takes on a whole new meaning with the introduction of the Book of Watchers, as preserved in 1 Enoch:

This account draws heavily upon the prophetic accounts of Ezekiel, Isaiah, Daniel and others (esp. the famous merkavah account in Ezek. 1) in which the throne room of G-d is described in detail.

What makes Enoch’s experience unique is that he is described as having ascended to heaven to experience the celestial throne room and the manifest presence of G-d. The continuity with the earlier prophets is that his ascension is still described as having taken place in a vision: “And it was shown to me thus in a vision.”

2 Corinthians

This is not all that different from an experience described by Paul in 2 Corinthians 12:

Paul describes his experience of ascending into paradise and having witnessed things that are impossible/unlawful to recount. Although we do not have the throne room vision in Paul’s account as we do in Enoch, the connection of ascension to heaven is clear.

However, Paul notes something that sets his experience apart from Enoch’s in that he specifically mentions he cannot explain whether his ascension was strictly in a vision, or whether it actually took place bodily. Enoch’s experience was clearly a vision, because he says so.

It seems to me that this reference, in connection with other citations of bodily translation preserved in the New Testament (for example, Phillip’s being snatched away after his encounter with an Ethiopian eunuch in Acts 8:39), highlights another transition in Jewish Ascension thought – that heavenly ascent could happen bodily or within a vision. Paul’s mention of the possibility that it could have taken place bodily did not discredit his account.

Due to the fact that there seems to be some type of a transition in ascension thought to include the possibility of the event taking place bodily, Paul’s account could well indeed serve as a link between older Jewish ascension texts (like 1 Enoch), and stories preserved in rabbinical sources (like the Four Rabbis Who Entered Pardes), and the later Merkavah and Heikhalot mystical texts.

His views consumed him, and in doing so, not only destroyed his life, but destroyed our family and ruined our lives as well … For a long time, I believed this was our family's cross to bear. Now, it is not only my families' lives that are in shambles, but those who were directly affected by his actions, especially the family of Mr. Johns, who bravely sacrificed his life to stop my father.

What he did was an act of cowardice … To physically force your beliefs onto others with violence is not brave, but bullying. Doing so only serves to prove how weak those beliefs are. It is simply desperation, reminiscent of a temper tantrum when a child cannot get his way.

-Erik von Brunn (son of the shooter at the U.S. Holocaust Museum)

In the early years of Conservative Judaism a century ago, according to Cosgrove, "Americans were seeking to make sense of their lives as immigrants.” Now, “This story is over. We’ve arrived. We’re here.” The question Jews ask today, he said, is not “how to arrive in a secular culture, but how to cross back over to tradition.”

According to Rabbi Wayne Dosick, in his book Dancing with G-d:

Despite all of Judaism's outward manifestations of success in America, the vast majority of Jews are 'voting with their feet' ... The contemporary Judaism we have created does not speak sufficiently to searching Jewish hearts and does not sufficiently nourish hungering Jewish souls; it has become, for far too many, stale, hollow, and irrelevant.

If Judaism is to survive into the future it will need to reinvent itself. Guided by the past, it must find a way to provide a spiritually meaningful path for the next generation. It will need to overcome the modern obstacles of intermarriage, over-institutionalization, and find a way to include numbers of non-Jews (especially those intermarried into the Jewish community). Messianic Judaism is not the only movement wrestling with these issues.

We must learn from one another, and those communities that are enjoying success with the next generation.  The Judaism of the future will not necessarily reflect the Judaism of today, but if we do not begin striving for it now there may not be a Judaism for tomorrow.

For the Hasid, spiritual pride is the greatest roadblock on the spiritual journey. As we engage in this or that spiritual exercise, we imagine ourselves growing more holy. This is pride. The quality of your spiritual practice rests on the quality of your intention. And there is only one right intention: to do what you do for its own sake, what Judaism calls lishmah. To engage in a spiritual practice with the intent of gaining something in return is to practice idolatry.