Practicing Piety in Medieval Ashkenaz. Elisheva Baumgarten

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СКАЧАТЬ [blood] until she is white [not bleeding].”⁶⁴ Haim altered some of the details: rather than depicting pious women praying at a distance from impure peers, he suggested that menstruating women should stay away from the synagogue entirely. Moreover, his tone varies substantially from that of his father. Haim does not differentiate between pious women who choose to keep a distance from the synagogue and other women. Rather, following Eleazar of Worms, he recommends that all menstruants be proscribed from entering the synagogue.

      By the late thirteenth century, this prohibition seems to have become an accepted standard as indicated by Isaac b. Meir haLevi of Düren (a student of Meir b. Barukh from the second half of the thirteenth century), who wrote what can be considered the earliest manual pertaining to the laws of menstruation, Sha’arei Dura. His instructions echo the words of Isaac b. Moses (who, as we have seen, cited and built on teachings from Ra’aviah):

      A woman who is menstruating should not wear fine clothing or adorn herself, comb her hair or cut her nails. Neither should she say the name of God on the days when she menstruates nor should she enter the synagogue on any day when she sees [blood] until she is white. For it says: “And she shall not touch the holy and she shall not come to the Temple” (Lev. 12: 4). That [is to say,] she should not bring a sacrifice until seven clean days [have been completed]. This is what it says in Sefer haMiktzo’ot, but Rashi permitted her to come to synagogue.⁶⁵

      Isaac b. Meir does not specify that this course of action is that of pious women. Rather he suggests that this is the custom at large.

      Over a century later, in his Sefer haAgur, Jacob b. Judah Landau (fifteenth century) mentions only a prohibition against menstruants seeing the Torah,⁶⁶ whereas Isaac b. Meir of Düren noted a dual warning against both entering the synagogue and saying God’s name during menstruation. Landau’s account also introduces a new prooftext from Sefer haMiktzo’ot, a mid-eleventh-century source that transmits many rulings from Babylonian Ge’onim and is often quoted in late medieval Ashkenazic writings.⁶⁷ Simcha Emanuel has recently proposed that, in this particular case, thirteenth- and fourteenth-century rabbis were constructing a source rather than citing directly from the corpus available to them.⁶⁸ He proposes that this “construction” was correlated to innovative practices that were introduced at that time and the consequent search for precedents to validate them.⁶⁹

      Thus not only had the motivations for these customs changed, but the norms were in flux. The instructions provided in the sources cited above are ambiguous with respect to intended duration of these restrictions, for Jewish women’s menstrual impurity consisted of two distinct parts. The first encompassed the days when blood was seen. After bleeding ceased, women counted seven days, known as the “clean” or “white” days (because of the white clothing worn on those days);⁷⁰ not until that second set of days was complete would women immerse in the mikveh (the ritual bath) and resume sexual relations with their husbands.⁷¹ Did women refrain from going to synagogue and saying God’s name throughout their entire time of ritual impurity, or only when they were bleeding? Both Haim b. Isaac and Isaac b. Meir specify that these restrictions were in effect only while a woman was bleeding, “until she is white” (ad shetitlaben).⁷² Only Eleazar of Worms instructed that a woman must absent herself from synagogue “until she immerses in water.”⁷³

      Northern French sources do not discuss women’s presence in the synagogue with relation to menstruation, despite the initial appearance of this theme in texts attributed to Rashi. For example, thirteenth-century compendia that discuss the laws of menstruation, such as Semag (Sefer Mitzvot Gadol) by Moses of Coucy and Semak (Sefer Mitzvot Katan) by Isaac of Corbeil (d. 1280), mention no such restrictions.⁷⁴

      Thus, evidence for these restrictions is predominantly German in origin. These sources indicate that the practice of menstruants refraining from synagogue attendance continued well into the early modern period among Ashkenazic Jews. For example, in Sefer Terumat haDeshen, Israel Isserlein (1390–1460) discussed this custom as it was practiced in his lifetime:

      With regard to women who are impure, it is true that I have allowed them on the High Holidays and other days when many of them gather at the synagogue to hear the prayers and the [Torah] readings. And I have based my position on Rashi, who allowed women in [his writings on] the Laws of Niddah on account of spiritual pleasure (nahat ruah),⁷⁵ since [the prevailing custom] saddened their spirits and led to heartbreak⁷⁶ while the rest of the community was gathering and they were left standing outside…. Look in the Laws of Niddah written by my esteemed uncle, Aaron,⁷⁷ and you will see that he copied from Sefer Or Zaru’a in the name of the Ge’onim, where it seems to be absolutely forbidden [for menstruating women to enter the synagogue], but he also noted that in Sefer Or Zaru’a⁷⁸ certain women refrain [from entering the synagogue] and act admirably. From this [opinion] one can understand that this [practice is prompted by] enthusiasm (zerizut) and piety alone [and is therefore not required].⁷⁹

      Isserlein’s discussion underlines not only the popularity of this custom but also suggests that women may have stood outside rather than enter the synagogue, a possibility that is also raised by the pair of verbs used by the compiler in Sefer Likutei haPardes.⁸⁰ Isserlein highlights the individual and communal significance of synagogue attendance by noting the sorrow caused to women who were excluded from synagogue rituals, especially on holidays. Later sources, such as the commentary on the Shulhan Arukh by Remah (Moses Isserles, 1525–1572), include a summary of Isserlein’s opinion but then counter his prohibition by explicitly charging women to enter the synagogue:

      Some have written that during the days of her discharge a menstruant may not enter a synagogue, pray, mention God’s name or touch a Hebrew book, but others say that she is permitted [to perform] all these [acts], and this [latter] view is correct. However, the practice in these countries [meaning Ashkenazic lands] follows the first opinion, although during white days their custom is to allow [her to perform all these acts]. Even where the stringent practice is upheld, on the Days of Awe and other such occasions when many gather in synagogue, [menstruating women] are permitted to enter the synagogue like other women on account of their great sadness if everyone gathers [in synagogue] but they remain outside.⁸¹

      These restrictions that pertain to menstrual impurity and the synagogue belong to a broader class of practices relating to menstruation that were enforced during the High Middle Ages. Northern French and German sources instruct men to curtail physical contact with their wives throughout both phases of niddah. Not only was direct touch restricted, but handling common objects was also regulated (e.g., couples were not to eat from the same bowls or to pass objects directly to one another).⁸² In contrast to synagogue attendance, these domestic constraints were applied from the onset of bleeding until the woman had immersed. Indeed, some thirteenth- and fourteenth-century sources indicate that the rabbis were aware that they were demanding a degree of strictness that differed from previous generations.⁸³ Moreover, regulations regarding purity after childbirth also became much more rigorous during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, requiring couples to extend their period of abstinence from sexual activity from one week to at least six weeks.⁸⁴ As such, restricting menstruants from synagogue participation is consistent with stricter observances of that era. Not until the sixteenth century—when rabbinic authorities recognized that blocking menstruant women from synagogue attendance caused extreme distress and isolation—was this custom suspended.⁸⁵

      If we review the customs regarding the physical presence of ritually impure women in the synagogue in medieval Ashkenaz, we see that during the late eleventh and twelfth centuries some highly observant women stopped entering the synagogue while they were menstruating as an expression of reverence and piety. In Germany (at least), this behavior became increasingly normative for all women by the late thirteenth or early fourteenth centuries. Interestingly, this practice was only applied during the first phase of menstruation, СКАЧАТЬ