Woody Allen's vision of a typical Jewish mother. (screenshot)[/caption]
By Stephanie Sylverne
The “Jewish Mother” is a well-known stereotype in the United States. She is considered demanding and pushy. She makes her kids feel guilty. She wants her sons to be lawyers and her daughters to marry doctors.
This figure is common in television shows, movies, and books. It is often assumed she represents all Jewish women. But the image is limited to a specific time and place in history—20th century American Ashkenazi mothers—and does not characterize Jewish women more broadly.
Ashkenazi refers to the Jewish tradition that developed in Germany and Eastern Europe hundreds of years ago, as opposed to the Jewish communities of the Middle East and North Africa, which date back millennia.
JEWS IN THE ARAB REGION
It is not widely known that by the eve of the Second World War, approximately 850,000 Jews indigenous to the region lived there. Most Jews in the United States, however, are descended from Ashkenazi immigrants who arrived in America around the turn of the 20th century.
Images of Jewish mothers (and Jewish women) are often culturally specific and do not represent Jewish women as a whole. In Israel, where more than half of Jews have at least partial Middle Eastern or North African ancestry, the “Jewish Mother” is known instead as ima Polania, the “Polish Mother.” The representation of a bossy, pushy mom who has no place interfering in her children’s lives is not understood as a Jewish norm, but a Western one.
MOTHER KNOWS BEST
Marjorie Ingall, American author of the book Mamaleh Knows Best: What Jewish Mothers Do to Raise Successful, Creative, Empathetic, Independent Children, believes that in reality Jewish mothers “have nurtured their children’s independence, fostered discipline, consciously cultivated kindness, stressed education, and maintained a sense of humour.”
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Her head covered by a napkin, a Jewish mother in London's Whitechapel district lights the Sabbath candles at the climax of Passover, 12th April 1952. Original Publication : Picture Post - 5829 - Passover Story - Whitechapel's Jews - pub. 1952 (Photo by John Chillingworth/Picture Post/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)[/caption]
Therefore the negative stereotype was actually an inversion of positive traits. Rachel, matriarch of the Jewish people, is revered for her selflessness. She is considered the ultimate mother figure because she sacrificed her own happiness for others.
Jewish mothers aspire to be a Woman of Valor, or Eshet Ḥayil. The Woman of Valor is the ideal woman of Judaism, as described in chaper 31 of the Book of Proverbs in the Hebrew Bible. It is customary for husbands to read it to their wives.
A woman of valor–seek her out, for she is to be valued above rubies.
Her husband trusts her, and they cannot fail to prosper.
All the days of her life she is good to him.
She opens her hands to those in need
and offers her help to the poor.
Adorned with strength and dignity,
she looks to the future with cheerful trust.
Her speech is wise, and the law of kindness is on her lips.
Her children rise up to call her blessed,
her husband likewise praises her:
‘Many women have done well, but you surpass them all.’
Charm is deceptive and beauty short-lived,
but a woman loyal to God has truly earned praise.
Give her honor for her work; her life proclaims her praise.
MATRILINEAL DESCENT
Though there weren’t, historically, many options for women outside of the home, Jewish women traditionally hold enormous power within the family. That power likely contributed to the perception of Jewish Mothers in the United States as overbearing. In fact even the question of who is Jewish and who is not, according to halacha, or Jewish law, begins with the mother, not the father.
In Jewish law, a child born to a Jewish mother is Jewish and will always remain so, regardless of whether or not he or she remains religious or even converts to different religion. Prof. Shaye D. Cohen of Harvard University, author of The Beginnings of Jewishness, believes this may have originated around the 2nd or 3rd century C.E., influenced by ancient Roman law that determined children’s citizenship status according to the mother’s. (Today, Reform and other liberal Jewish sects will also accept patrilineal descent, so long as the child is also raised in a Jewish home, but it’s a controversial stance.)
CENTRAL FIGURE OF THE HOME
As a migratory people in diaspora, often displaced and forbidden to own land, family and education were highly valued, portable assets, so mothers—on the front lines of childrearing and homemaking—were paramount. Mothers are considered the akeret habayit, the mainstay or central figure of the home. As such they’re responsible for shalom bayit, or domestic peace. They keep the home kosher by following dietary laws similar to halal which forbid consumption of certain animals and the mixing of dairy and meat, among other rules. All Jewish women are expected to adhere to tzniut, rules concerning modesty, though only married Jewish women are commanded to cover their hair. Every Friday night, Jewish mothers mark the beginning of the Sabbath by reciting prayers and lighting candles as the matriarch Sarah did thousands of years ago, and teach their daughters to do the same. It is customary to give tzedakah, or charity, before Sabbath as well, so in this way they teach their children generosity and obligation to care for the community.
DIARY OF A JEWISH WOMAN
Few records remain of Jewish women’s lives before the 20th century, so it is difficult to determine how their day to day habits compared to contemporary ideals, but one remarkable example has survived. Published as The Memoirs of Glückel of Hameln, the diaries of a 17th century Jewish woman suggest that Jewish values have remained remarkably constant. Glückel was a forty-four year old widow with fourteen children who managed a business after her husband’s death. She ran the household. She was involved in her community. The negative “Jewish Mother” of the Western imagination does not apply to her, except so far as she’s concerned with securing her children’s futures. Though she lived long ago, Glückel has much in common with the contemporary Jewish mother around the world.
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Bertha Pappenheim, a descendant of Glückel bas Judah, poses as Glückel for this portrait painted by the artist Leopold Pilichowski.[/caption]
