the rebbitzen

You would think that with all of the scary books that I have been reading lately this one would not have been the one that killed me.

I read that damn Motherless Mothers book, the Joan Didion, even the one where the main character dies of a glioblastoma stage 4 brain tumor. Nothing. All of these books literary and lyrical, designed especially to make someone like me cry. I appreciated them as art. I learned from them. But I plowed on through, dry-eyed.

But, I can tell you right now I am putting down "The Rabbi's Wife." I am throwing it against the wall as hard as I can, listening for the satisfying clunk. It's not a book designed to make a person cry, certainly I'm sure the author did not intend to ignite any type of fury in her reader. It's an academic study for goodness sake. But it may just be the most heart-wrenching thing that I've ever read.

The author, Shuly Rubin Schwartz, is herself a rabbi's wife. She presents a history. She highlights certain American women throughout the twentieth century who personify to her what it means to be a rebbetzin. One of her recurring themes is that they type of woman who was attracted towards marrying a rabbi was often a fierce intellectual herself. The type of person who liked immersing themselves in books, in study, debate. Women who were passionate about Judaism. Usually women who were the most knowledgeable, fluent in Hebrew, at home in the synagogue. Often they were the daughters of rabbis, and had they been born at a different time, they may have chosen the rabbinate as a profession for themselves.

In other words, Mom. Now I know that she did love being a rebbitzen. I don't know much about it, but I know that she did not unequivocally love her role. She did not love all of the "hosting" elements, nor the constant scrutiny. Most of the women portrayed in the book did not. But how they loved having a chance to shine intellectually. To use their roles to fulfill their own needs to teach and lead and learn and grow. They founded the sisterhood. They taught adult education classes. They wrote articles, books. They were proud of who they were, proud to be the shining female stars of the Jewish world.

Did mom feel this way? She was obviously attracted to Dad because of his mind. There was nothing more exciting to her than intellectual prowess. And, as we all know Mom was fiercely attached to Judaism. It was perhaps her greatest passion in life. Of course she married a rabbi, of course she was a rebbetzin.

But did she love it? Did being a rebbetzin do for her what it could have, what it should have? I don't see how it could have. She never got to really fulfill this dream, did she? With all of the moving, the affairs? Did she ever experience even one drop of the satisfaction that she deserved from being the rabbi's wife? I'm afraid that she didn't. And this is a terrible tragedy. This book reminds me of everything that my mother never had. It is so incredibly sad.

Ironically, I feel like I did get to watch Mom move into that rebbetzin role, although it was several years after the divorce. At Beth Shalom she was on the board, the chair of the ritual committee. She was instrumental in getting that synagogue to include the "imahot" into the amidah. She read Torah, led services, and taught adult education courses. She was invited to participate and help lead a Shabbat afternoon women's study group for the intellectual elite of the congregation. She wrote articles for the Jewish newspaper criticizing the Orthodox synagogue who asked her to remove the tallit she had taken to wearing during services. She got a tremendous amount of satisfaction from her leadership role at Beth Shalom. She was the rebbetzin without the rabbi.

But now I wonder, did she do all of this because she wanted to? And did she want to because she never had the chance to be the rebbetzin that she could have been? This is why I am no longer reading this book. These questions hurt too much.