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Friday June 27, 2003

Emotional first visit to Kotel led to life as a Jewish feminist

LIZ HARRIS
Bulletin Correspondent

"Not everyone can identify the turning point, a single fork in the infinitely branched road of our lives, that sets the stage for future dreams and passions, even a life's work. I can."

Those closing thoughts in Rebecca Schwartz's recently published essay refer to her highly emotional first visit to the Western Wall in Jerusalem. But it wasn't a prayerful experience or one that induced her to become more halachically observant. In fact, it radicalized her, leading her to become a Jewish feminist and devote herself to such causes.

Her essay, "Turning Point," appears in the new book "Women of the Wall: Claiming Sacred Ground at Judaism's Holy Site." Using personal accounts such as Schwartz's and including various interpretations of traditional Jewish texts, the 2-inch-thick volume covers the birth and growth of Women of the Wall, a grassroots group that has sued the state of Israel and its Ministry of Religion on behalf of Jewish women's religious rights.

Schwartz, who lives in San Bruno and teaches through Lehrhaus Judaica, was 22 and fresh out of college when she joined a group of women going to pray at the Kotel, the historic Western Wall. It was March 1989, and the Michigan native was spending a year abroad as a student at Hebrew University. She'd heard about the upstart women's group -- it had certainly been getting a lot of local press coverage -- and finally decided for herself "to see what was going on down there."

She and a friend decided to join the others for prayer, though "I had no idea what to expect," she now relates. She went mostly out of curiosity, but also out of a sense that the women were being treated unjustly.

Never did she expect the near-riot that ensued. "We happened to be there the day that the worst violence occurred," said the 36-year-old Schwartz.

The assault began just as their prayer service was starting. In a vivid description of the onslaught, she writes: "Over our leader's voice I had heard yelling and shushing from the beginning, but when objects started flying over the mechitzah [divider to separate sexes], I realized how much trouble we were in. The young woman in front of me...collapsed at my feet as a chair crashed into her head.

"A police officer tossed a canister of tear gas into the attacking mob, but an old man wrapped himself in his prayer shawl, picked up the canister and threw it directly into our midst. We all ran, coughing and choking, trying to escape...The men were still screaming at us: "Whores, lesbians -- go home!"

Later that day, as she tried to make sense of what had transpired, she knew it was useless. She writes: "I asked myself, 'Why would the sight of Jewish women praying and singing together at Judaism's holiest site cause offense to Jewish men? Why would they desecrate their own sacred space with verbal and physical violence? Did we, in our long skirts and head scarves, post such a threat to their tradition?'"

Despite years of legal proceedings, court decisions and appeals, Women of the Wall has yet to achieve its goal of unfettered egalitarian prayer at the Wall.

Though Schwartz hasn't been back to Israel since 1995, she follows the group's progress, or lack thereof.

Upon her return from the Jewish state, "I became more active [Jewishly] in my general life," she says. She and her husband, Roger, are involved members of Peninsula Temple Sholom in Burlingame.

But beyond that, her professional life has revolved and evolved around the Jewish community. Her first job after moving to the Bay Area in 1991 was as program director at Stanford Hillel. The position had two immediate benefits, she says. First, "I was pushed right into the Jewish community." Second, "It was a lot of fun. It was a great way to meet other young adults my age and be connected to the c

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