Meanwhile, in the Muslim lands, all sorts of philosophical and scientific advances had been occurring for several hundred years, with the West slowly becoming aware of them. Many of these scholars, Moor and Jew, lived in the Iberian Peninsula, during what has been called the "Golden Age of Spanish Jewry." Whether one agrees with this description or not, it certainly wasn't so golden a time for Jewish women, whose rabbis forbade them to study Torah or perform any of the men's mitzvot, and who for the most part did not participate in commerce or synagogue life.
The earliest known Muslim scholar, al-Khawarizmi, lived in the 9th century. His work on algebra initiated the subject in a systematic form and he developed it to the extent of giving analytical solutions of linear and quadratic equations. The very name Algebra has been derived from his book Al-Jabr wa-al-Muqabilah. His arithmetic synthesized Greek and Hindu knowledge as well as introduced the Indian system of numerals (now generally known as Arabic numerals). His own contributions included the use of zero, operations on fractions, and the decimal system, so that the overall system of numerals, algorithm or algorizm, is named after him. It was through his work that the system of numerals was first introduced to Arabs and later to Europe.
Another early scholar was al-Basri [11th century Persia], who discovered Fermat's principle of least time and Newton's first law of motion, described the attraction between masses and was aware of the magnitude of acceleration due to gravity. He also discovered that the heavenly bodies were accountable to the laws of physics, presented the earliest critique and reform of the Ptolemaic model, first stated Wilson's theorem in number theory, pioneered analytic geometry, and proved the earliest general formula for infinitesimal and integral calculus. His optical research laid the foundations for the later development of telescopic astronomy.
The glory of Toledo in the 11th century was the development of exact sciences. The leading mathematician and the foremost astronomer of this time was al-Zarqali. Here also lived mathematicians al-Waqqadi and al-Tugibi, as well as astronomers/geometers Ibn al-Attar and Ibn Hamis. Cordoba produced philosopher ibn Rushd, author of several commentaries on Aristotle, while Saragossa native ibn Bajjah, whose many scientific works have not survived, had his astronomy and physics preserved by Maimonides. Each of these Andalusian scholars criticized the Ptolemaic model of Earth-centric planetary motion, and some suggested that the inner planets, Venus and Mercury, might actually orbit the sun. Interestingly, a solar-centric model for all the planets, including Earth, was being investigated, but would eventually be proven by an Arab astronomer a few centuries later [well before Copernicus].
Not all scholars in Andalusia were Muslims. Jews too were scientists and philosophers. More on them in my next post.
More about leaned Jewish women in the 11th-12th centuries. Rashi's daughters weren't the only women who studied Torah or carried on a profession. His granddaughters, Hannah, Miriam, and Alvina, were scholars as well. According to Shoshana Zolty's "And All Your Children Shall Be Learned - Women and the Study of Torah in Jewish History," other educated women of this time include: Miriam, wife of Rabbenu Tam [Joheved's son]; Bella, sister of French scholar Isaac ben Menachem; the nameless wife of French Tosafist Samuel ben Natronai; Dulce, wife of Eleazar ben Judah of Worms and their daughter Bellette. Abraham ben Hayim of Falaise and Hayim ben Isaac of Vienne both decided issues of Jewish Law based on the testimony of their wives.
In "Written Out of History: Our Jewish Foremothers," by Emily Taitz and Sondra Henry, we learn of noted women scholars such as: the daughter of Samuel ben Ali of Baghdad, who taught Torah and Talmud to her father's students from behind a screen; Miriam Shapira Luria, who lectured in Talmud in Italy; Dulcie of Worms, plus Rashi's daughters and granddaughters. We also learn of Jewish women doctors – Sarah of Giles and Rebecca of Prague. Jewish businesswomen apparently thrived in England, or at least their names were better recorded there: Mirabel of Gloucester, Avigay of London, Belassez of Oxford, Henne of York, and Belia of Bedford. Of course there were countless other Jewish women merchants, financiers, doctors, and even scholars, whose names are lost to us.
Proof of Jewish women's high status in medieval Ashkenaz is demonstrated by 3 takanot [edicts] of Rabbi Gershom that radically altered their position in marriage - for the better. First, despite what it says in the Torah and Talmud, a Jewish man may not have more than one wife at a time. Second, though the Torah states that a man may divorce his wife if he finds something unseemly in her [i.e. for any reason] and she has no recourse in the matter, Rabbi Gershom decreed that a man may not divorce his wife without her consent.
Third, and most extraordinary, Jewish women in this time were given a mechanism to divorce their husbands. Should this be her desire, the Jewish wife went to the bet din [Jewish court] and announced, "I find this man repulsive, I cannot live with him." The court replied, “No one should have to share a basket with a snake [!]" and compelled the husband to write his wife a get [divorce decree] by threatening him with excommunication. Considering that most Jewish men earned their livelihood by trading with other Jews, excommunicating him essentially put him out of business. Which is why I never saw a case where a Jewish man refused his wife a divorce if she wanted one. Pretty amazing stuff considering the problems a woman has getting a divorce in Israel today.
So now I’m going to talk about Jewish women's high position in the 11th-12th centuries. For all practical purposes, this means Ashkenazi women [living under the Christians], since Sephardic women [living under the Muslims] don't seem to have improved their status like their Western European sisters did. As I researched the religious lives of medieval Jewish women, in order to determine the truth of legends about Rashi's daughters being learned and wearing tefillin, I found plenty of evidence that they were learned. I also discovered that some women in his community did wear tefillin, and that some women wore tzitzit, blew the shofar, dwelt in the sukkah, and performed circumcisions – all ritual obligations from which women are exempt [and rabbis in Sepharad would say forbidden]. Jewish women attended synagogue as often as men, and there were indications that Ashkenazi women were permitted aliyah to the Torah.
Torah education was not forbidden to these women, and apparently was common enough that an anonymous student of Peter Abelard in 12th century Paris was quoted as saying, "If the Christians educate their sons, they do so not for God, but for gain, in order that one brother, if he be a cleric, may help his father and mother and his other brothers … But the Jews, out of zeal for God and love of the law, put as many sons as they have to letters, that each may understand God's law … and not only his sons, but his daughters."
Jewish sources at this time give us two quotes about learned women:
1. "He [the father] must teach her Torah, for if she does not know the laws of Shabbat, how can she keep them? And the same goes for all the commandments, in order that she be careful in their performance."
2. Regarding a father teaching a daughter more advanced texts; "Women whose hearts have drawn them to approach the Holy One - surely they may ascend the mountain of the Eternal. Scholars should treat them with honor and encourage them in their venture."
I posted previously on Christian women at Judy Chicago's Dinner Table, and ended by mentioning a Hebrew woman, Rachel. Sure enough, when I found the page that described Rachel in more detail, her bio read, "Rachel was one of the daughters of Rabbi Shlomo ben Isaac, a preeminent biblical and Talmudic scholar. One text quotes Rashi as saying that, because of his infirmities, Rachel acted as his secretary, taking dictation from him. This would have required her to possess knowledge of Hebrew, which would have been unusual for a woman of that time. It suggests that she must have been trained by her father, as that would have been the only way for her to have acquired such an education."
One of the fascinating things I discovered about the 12th Century Renaissance was the many women involved in it, as opposed to the later Italian Renaissance where women were pretty much nonexistent. In Judy Chicago's monumental work of feminist art, The Dinner Party, 39 prominent women, from the dawn of history through the 20th century, are represented at the table. Four of them lived in the 11th-12th centuries - historian Hrosvitha of Germany, physician Trotula of Salerno, Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine, and Abbess Hildegard of Bingen. Sadly, the 4 women before these hail from the 5th century and those after from the 15th-16th, demonstrating what an isolated island in time this was for accomplished women.
Besides our 4 headliners, Judy Chicago lists over 100 other women of note for the 11th-12 centuries. Because daughters were allowed to inherit positions of leadership at this time if they had no brothers, some women ascended to rule medieval kingdoms, including Margaret of Scotland, Marie of Champagne, Blanche of Castile, and Matilda of England. Many more were sovereigns of duchies, baronies, and other small fiefdoms - including two mentioned in my novels, Adelaide du Bar and Adela de Blois, widows who ruled in the name of their young sons.
Our time period also saw a sudden blossoming of veneration for the Virgin Mary, with Notre Dame cathedrals rising in many European cities. The increase in women's religious status saw the population of convents mushroom with women eager to study theology. Great abbesses included Heloise of Paraclete [Peter Abelard's lover], Clare of Assisi, Agnes d'Harcourt, and Gertrude of Germany. Many were members of royal families, and as such were allowed the rights and privileges of feudal barons. Women also studied medicine and became physicians, as noble ladies preferred to be treated by one of their own sex.
Among the long list of Christian women in The Dinner Party, I was surprised and delighted to discover the name Rachel [ca 1070-1100] - Hebrew legal scholar. Rachel’s nationality wasn't given, but who else could she possibly be except the heroine of "Rashi's Daughters: Book III?"
The 12th Century Renaissance in Western Europe occurred during, and partly as the result of, the peace that existed between the final Norse invasion and the start of the One Hundred Years War. Ironically it was through the efforts of two unknown inventors that this period of prosperity, tolerance and intellectual accomplishment was set in motion. Midway through the tenth century, the ideas of covering both a plough's wooden nose and a horse's delicate hooves with metal precipitated a revolution in agriculture. With the power of a horse hitched to his sturdy steel-plated plough, a peasant was able to work the heavy soil deeper and faster. Productivity skyrocketed and for the first time in its history, these Christian lands yielded more food than its inhabitants could eat.
Peace and surplus produce meant that not all men were needed to work the land and defend it. Men [I'll get to women later] of intelligence and curiosity became traveling scholars, flocking first to cathedral schools, and later to newly created universities in Salerno, Paris, Bologna, Cologne and Oxford to study law, medicine, the arts, and theology. Education in Christian Europe was controlled by the church and entirely in Latin. [Trivia alert! At the start of the 11th century, there were four written languages in Europe - Greek, Latin, Hebrew and Arabic - each with its own alphabet.] But by the end of the 12th century, non-clerics had put various vernacular languages to the Latin alphabet, creating ballads, romances, and all sorts of written works outside of the Church’s purview.
During the 11th century, some of these traveling scholars found their way to Spain, where they discovered an entire corpus of Greek scholarship that had been preserved by Muslims who translated it into Arabic and often improved upon it. The greatest works of Aristotle, Ptolemy, Archimedes, Euclid, and Plato, previously thought lost, were quickly translated into Latin and devoured by Western Europe. With them came the writings of Muslim scholars who had advanced the study of philosophy, mathematics, astronomy, and medicine while composing poetry on the side. An intellectual revolution soon arose in the West that continued for over 200 years.
For the next few weeks, I'll be posting about the extraordinary, yet mostly unknown, time in which my three "Rashi's Daughters" novels take place - what scholars today call the "Twelfth-Century Renaissance." To quote one of these modern scholars, Studying the Renaissance of the Twelfth Century recaptures the early Middle Ages from the dustbin of Dark Ages ignorance where all the centuries between the Fall of Rome and the better-known Italian Renaissance of the 15th Century are thrown."
This vibrant and vital period in Europe's cultural and intellectual history actually lasted about 200 years, 1050-1250, during which great strides were made in social organization, technology, intellectual pursuit and education. Scholarship and learning were vigorous, the liberal arts flourished in towns, cathedrals, monasteries, and the newly founded universities and therein lay the salvation of the Latin classics and laws, and rediscovery of Greek philosophy, literature, and sciences, and the influx of Arabic learning that was so influential in the later eruption of learning that led to the greater Renaissances and modern times.
Most books and Internet articles about the 12th century focus on scholastic advances brought to Western Europe by Christian men like Adelard of Bath, Anselm of Canterbury, Albertus Magnus, Peter Abelard, and Hugh of St. Victor. , but great as these men were, this renaissance was far more universal. It took place in the Levant, in Spain, in Byzantium, involving Jews and Muslims, as well as women [probably not Muslim women though]. Some of these historical figures show up as characters in my books, especially the final volume, "Book III - RACHEL," which partly takes place in Toledo, Spain, where King Alfonso set up a school for Muslim, Jewish and Christian scholars to translate the ancient Greek classics from Arabic [original Greek versions having been lost] into Latin.
Today is my introduction to the subject. Next post will concentrate on the Christian men of Western Europe, and get them out of the way, so to speak. Then the really interesting part will begin.
Finally I'm starting to deal with all the Rashi's Daughters business I had to let slide when my father died. Now Shiva is over, my sister and I have been up to his house to do a quick inventory [plus empty the fridge and freezer], and his banks and credit cards have his address changed to my house. So I take a deep breath, write a long to-do list, and tackle my email in-box as I count down 8 weeks until RACHEL's book launch on August 4.
I wonder what the print run will be; I guess it depends on whether Costco orders any copies. They took 10,000 when MIRIAM came out in 2007, and had the good fortune [or good foresight] for those books to arrive in stores the week between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. I was in my local Costco 3 times that week [not just to check on my books] and every copy was gone by my third visit, the day before Yom Kippur, when I picked up our shul's "break-the-fast" order.
Saturday morning, 2 hours before I was scheduled to get on a plane to Canada for a 11 day book tour, I received a phone call from my father's caregivers in Santa Barbara that he had died during the night. Besides being 91 and in no so perfect health, there was no reason to suspect that my father would die so soon. As deaths go, it was a good one - peacefully in his sleep, in his own bed, no pain or suffering, and still maintaining his faculties. Certainly it was a relief for me and my sister - no moving him out of his long time home, no long painful decline, no dealing with hospitals or nursing homes, no decisions about life support or not.
Of course I canceled my flight, but after some thought and discussion with my family [and after making funeral/cemetery arrangements], I flew to NYC on Monday to honor my commitments and get some very important book business done. I know my father would have wanted it that way. Ironic, but "Book III - RACHEL" was dedicated to my father, Nathan George Anton, and there was still time to change the that page to "In memory of." He was inordinately proud of my success as an author, especially since I wrote under my maiden name, Anton.
Those of you who have heard me speak know that the stealth reason I wrote "Rashi's Daughters" is to encourage more women and liberal Jews to study Talmud. Well, now's your chance. In Rashi's time, students spent 2 to 3 years learning Mishnah before going onto Gemara, and now you have a chance to study Mishnah, with explanations, everyday. This is courtesy of the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism (USCJ), who will send you a daily lesson via email. Yesterday we started tractate Zevahim, Ch 10, and I want to share it with you because it has some relevance to how we pray together.
Mishnah 1 -- Reading for Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Introduction: The first five mishnayot of this chapter deal with the order in which different sacrifices are offered. There are two general rules, one that we will see in this mishnah and one in the next mishnah.
Mishnah I
1) Whatever is more frequent than another, takes precedence over the other.
2) The daily offerings precede the additional offerings;
3) The additional offerings of Shabbat precede the additional offerings of Rosh Hodesh;
4) The additional offerings of Rosh Hodesh precede the additional offerings of Rosh Hashanah.
5) As it is said, "You shall present these in addition to the morning portion of the regular burnt offering" (Numbers 28:23).
Explanation
Section 1: This is a general principle that is today often invoked when determining which prayer, or which blessing is recited first (for instance over the matzah on Pesah). As is frequently the case, a principle that plays a large role in later halakhah, has its origins in sacrificial law.
Sections 2-4: Here, the principle is invoked in connection to the daily offerings and the additional offerings (musaf). A more frequent sacrifice is offered first.
Section 5: This is the proof text that the daily tamid, the morning offering, is offered before the other additional offerings for holidays. The verse implies that the morning offering has already been offered before the other sacrifices are offered. Hence, whatever is more frequent comes first.
To get these daily short text studies of Mishnah, send a message to listserv@uscj.org that reads: subscribe MISHNAHYOMIT
I meant to post this last night, but the earthquake in Los Angeles [epicenter only a few miles away from my house] distracted me, even though we had no damage.
Hallelujah. After many designs and redesigns, plus testing all the pull-down menus and links, the new version of my website is up and running. Besides information on Book III - RACHEL, there are new links [under Resources], more articles I've written, a Rashi family tree, plus direct links to my Facebook group and the Rashi's Daughters page on Wikipedia. On the right side of this page, there are now links to other interesting Jewish blogs.
Go to www.rashisdaughters.com, then bring your cursor to rest anywhere on the toolbar. Pull-down menus should appear; move your cursor to explore the new goodies, including Chapter One of RACHEL . But if you’re desperate to read it immediately, click on the direct link.
According to the Jewish calendar, today is/was Lag b'Omer, the date I chose for Joheved and Mei's wedding in Book I: JOHEVED. An obscure holiday whose origins are shrouded in legend and myths,
Lag b’Omer is neither commanded in the Torah nor described in the Talmud. Yet it is now the almost universal practice among traditional Jews to observe the season of counting the "Omer" as a time of sadness, by refraining from activities that are associated with gaiety and celebration. This mourning period lasts from Passover until the thirty-third day, Lag b'Omer, hence the sudden profusion of Jewish weddings.
The melancholy mood of the Omer season is usually linked to the Talmudic tradition about how thousands of Rabbi Akiva's students perished between Passover and Shavuot. The Babylonian Talmud states that they died of a plague, though historians discern a reference to death in battle, in the ill-fated Bar Kochba revolt (in 135 CE) of which Rabbi Akiva was an active supporter. There is no mention of any respite on the 33rd day.
The earliest records of mourning during the Omer are contained in the Responsa of the Babylonian Geonim, who observed the restrictions during the entire 49-day period by holding no weddings and doing no work after nightfall. Not until the thirteenth century was the list augmented to include shaving and cutting the hair.
Medieval Ashkenazi Jews, instead of excluding the last third of the Omer period from the mourning observances, began mourning two weeks into the Omer--at the beginning of Iyar--and continued them until Shavuot. The intensity of their mourning was increased by forbidding additional activities, such as wearing new clothing, bathing for pleasure and trimming fingernails.
What were the tragic events these practices commemorated? In 1096, during the First Crusade, bloodthirsty marauders marched through the Rhine basin, slaughtering over 10,000 Jewish men, women and children. The worst bloodshed occurred between the first of Iyar and Shavuot. It is hardly surprising that subsequent generations of Ashkenazi Jews came to focus their grief on the massacres that had occurred during that time of the year, events that I was not able to ignore in writing Book III: RACHEL.
I want to share with you a fabulous blog I found by an Israeli woman who not only studies Talmud, but writes limericks about the text [as well as other interesting things in her life]. Here are a few of her poems, plus a link to her website
[Git 30a]
Said the man to his wife, "Have no fear
Have this Get if I do not appear
Back within thirty days."
There were dreadful delays
O'er the river, he called out, "I'm here!!"
[Git 23a)
A blind man cannot see a thing
Thus no image can any bells ring.
Well then how does he know
It's his wife who does go
With him into his bed, not his fling?
[Git 6b)
Says Rav Chisda, "No man should instill
Excess fear in his household." Men will
Come home before Shabbat
Say, "Did you light or not?"
But their tone must be calm and not shrill.
[Git 11b)
Says a man: "Give this Get to my wife.
Nope! I now change my mind! By your life!"
May the husband retract?
Can he take the Get back?
If he's causing her gladness, not strife.
