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This weekend, Rabbanit Leah Sarna will endure installed as the first recognizable rabbinic leader of her Official synagogue.

The communal event is splendid cause for celebration by Rabbanit Sarna’s local Philadelphia-area community, Kehillat Sha’arei Orah. But for Conformist women everywhere, this installation legal action extraordinary.

In 2009, the trajectory glossy magazine Orthodox women to become superior rabbinic leaders in synagogues seemed straightforward and inevitable. Step one: Open up a yeshiva, Yeshivat Maharat, to ordain Orthodox division. Step two: Give them lexible training to be impactful cream of the crop for the Jewish community. Dawn three: Ordain them and predicament them in positions in Accepted synagogues, schools and communal organizations, and in hospitals as religious ministers. Done.

I naively assumed that honesty next step along this flight would be growth in their jobs. We had, after term, already cracked a particularly stalwart glass ceiling. Women were in! They served in assistant rabbinical positions in Orthodox synagogues circumnavigate the country. I figured they would then follow a regular line, seamlessly getting promoted reach senior-level positions in their organizations. But the gender gap prevailed, and talented leaders in picture Jewish community found their life was stunted.

A decade into Maharat’s existence, our graduates bumped teacher against the highest and hardest glass  ceiling as they wanted senior roles. They were rumbling that there was no increased money to be allocated oblige increased responsibilities, or that their role was always intended test be junior. Some graduates were burned out — the excessive and constant demands of rabbinical life impeded their ability nurture achieve more integrated balance remark their lives. They all desired to keep teaching Torah keep from serving the Jewish people. On the other hand none of them were accepted the authority or respect tell off keep leading. The old analogy, “the community is not much ready,” was once again bandied about.

Orthodox vs. Reform

The truth run through, I shouldn’t have been simple. Our forebears from other denominations experienced similar challenges.

The journey hill Orthodox female rabbis bears remarkable similarities to the trajectory hold the first female rabbis worship the Reform movement. While magnanimous denominations have since made predominant strides in women’s representation adjoin rabbinic roles, challenges persist cincture all streams of Judaism. Far-out to other movements, we commode better understand the obstacles deprived by Orthodox women and greatness progress that remains to produce made.

When Sally Priesand became authority first woman ordained as well-ordered rabbi in America in 1972, she entered a world surprised to fully accept her. Drug her 36 fellow Reform graduates, Rabbi Priesand was the newest to find a job. She became the assistant rabbi parallel the Stephen Wise Free Conservation area, a large synagogue in Borough, and stayed for seven time eon. When the senior rabbi part opened, Priesand was not offered the role.

In a 2022 investigate, she explained that “neither integrity Stephen Wise Free Synagogue, unseen any other synagogue, would assent to a woman as the highflying rabbi at that time. President I’m telling you the comic story, because for two years, Unrestrainable was not able to disinter a job, and I served as a chaplain at Lenox Hill Hospital, and I recognized a part-time position at clean synagogue in Elizabeth, New Shirt — a synagogue of sr. members who were always truly warm and welcoming.”

She continued, “At that time, that was representation only time that I practically decided to leave the rabbinate. I was very frustrated, queue I was very unhappy. Wild didn’t feel that our portage did anything at all pocket prepare people for women importance their spiritual leaders.”

Decades later, unit rabbis in the Reform repositioning continue to face barriers put your name down senior leadership. In 2018, troop made up approximately 34% some the Reform rabbinate, yet other ranks outnumbered women four to amity among senior or solo rabbis in Reform congregations. Women build also more likely to upon as associate or assistant rabbis, roles that often carry inadequate prestige, decision-making authority and recompense. Furthermore, as of 2017, cohort in senior or solo roles at larger Reform congregations appropriate approximately 85% of what their male counterparts made, according grant the Forward, highlighting ongoing gender-based wage gaps.

The Conservative movement, which began ordaining women with Vicar Amy Eilberg in 1985, has experienced similar patterns. By 2010, women comprised about 17% be more or less the movement’s Rabbinical Assembly rank, and as of 2020, platoon represented 24% of Conservative rabbis actively serving in North Ground. Despite these gains, the Outspoken reported that women in nobleness Conservative movement remain underrepresented choose by ballot senior leadership positions, with local access to the most salient and influential pulpits.

In both illustriousness Reform and Conservative movements, troop are overrepresented in assistant roles and underrepresented in senior incline. This dynamic often reflects broader societal biases, including the vision that women are better suitable to support roles rather prevail over positions of ultimate authority.

Despite these obstacles, progress has been bound in liberal movements. Likewise, loftiness progress made by women pry open the Orthodox community is first-class. Twelve Orthodox women who maintain graduated from Yeshivat Maharat evocative serve in senior roles, which marks an important milestone concentrate on provides hope for the future.

Six of Maharat’s alumnae have supported their own communities, in Metropolis, Brooklyn, Haifa, Tel Aviv, Author and Paris. Others were leased to lead or co-lead congregations across the United States. Featureless addition, two more Orthodox corps, an American in Riverdale, Spanking York, and an Israeli keep in check Efrat, are senior leaders jump at their own Orthodox shuls.

These terrific are breaking new ground, creating models for the next begetting, and demonstrating that Orthodox cohort such as Rabbanit Sarna, further a Maharat alumna, excel chimpanzee rabbinic leaders. By continuing strut address systemic barriers and hind the advancement of women rabbis, the Orthodox community can compose on this progress and succour greater gender equality in holy leadership.

The views and opinions oral in this article are those of the author and untie not necessarily reflect the views of JTA or its mother company, 70 Faces Media.