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THE CHRONICLE
hood. In Exodus 38, there is a
reference to the women who
were hosting at the opening of
the Tent of Meeting, which clear-
ly suggests that they had some
sort of official function – which
in some English translations has
been rendered as ‘ministering.’
There are many things to be
learned about the way in which
women contributed to the build-
ing of the Tabernacle.”
Employing an array of approach-
es, including historical and
literary criticism and deconstruc-
tion, Eskenazi’s scholarship
clearly filters into her teaching as
Professor of Bible at HUC-
JIR/Los Angeles. “There are two
important criteria for me when I
teach,” she says. “One is antici-
pating what our students in the
rabbinical, education, and com-
munal service professional
programs need to know – famil-
iarity with the texts and the
skills to become effective inter-
preters of those texts – given the
work that they will do when
they leave HUC-JIR. The sec-
ond is their own growth, so that
they continue to draw suste-
nance and significance as human
beings from study. When you
are a Jewish professional, the
community depends on your
capacity for profundity and wis-
dom, as well as skills and
knowledge. The Bible that I
teach is not just a tool for other
people, but a major life-long
resource that can nurture our
students and enable them to
nurture others.”
Her teaching is informed by
Biblical feminism, which she
defines as a critical approach to
text that looks at both men and
women, recognizing that gender
is an important element. The
Bible, she believes, does not seek
to promote the vested interest of
males over that of females, but
rather is concerned with the
community as a whole and with
perpetuating the traditions, the
teachings, and the values to the
next generation. “It is the priori-
ty of community and continuity
of values that is central to
Biblical text,” Eskenazi says.
“
The Bible was not written in the
21
st
century, therefore it expresses
itself in the criteria of its own
time. Its writers were primarily
urban people and males rather
than the entire population. And
so it speaks more clearly in those
voices of such educated elite who
were more often males,” she
explains. “But it does not deni-
grate the intelligence and
resourcefulness of women. In
fact, most of the women who do
appear in the Bible and have a
part in the Bible, are presented as
extremely resourceful – take
Huldah, for example.”
Huldah is a well-known Biblical
character to all of Eskenazi’s stu-
dents, but little known to most
others. According to Eskenazi,
“
Huldah, mentioned in II Kings
22,
was the woman who had
greater authority than probably
any other woman in Jewish his-
tory – and one of the most
authoritative Prophets in the
Bible. She was the Prophet who
authenticated the Book of
Deuteronomy in 621 B.C.E., as
a result of which King Josiah
instituted major reforms. The
reason we have the Book of
Deuteronomy in our Torah is
because Huldah validated it as
the word of God.”
Eskenazi praises Huldah for her
unquestioned authority in her
time. It is a fact that the leaders
of the nation went to her and
not to another living Prophet,
such as Jeremiah, who presum-
ably was alive at that time.
Eskenazi recounts a favorite
story about this Prophet. “The
rabbis were uncomfortable with
Huldah’s authority and won-
dered whether Huldah was really
a man or a woman. Someone
else said, ‘well maybe it’s her
husband who is the Prophet.’
And this is the part I love: we
know what her husband does.
He’s not a Prophet, but the
keeper of the King’s wardrobe,
which means he stayed in the
palace and took care of the
clothes while Huldah was out
there in public speaking the
word of God. It’s a wonderful
example of a professional couple
that reverses our stereotypes of
gender roles in antiquity!”
Having taught at the University
of Denver and having served as
Director of its Institute for
Interfaith Studies prior to com-
ing to HUC-JIR, Eskenazi feels
that there are important differ-
ences between the secular
university world and the semi-
nary environment. “Here, our
students are already dedicated
and eager to learn precisely the
things that we have to teach.
The passion they bring and
their desire to make a Jewish
difference in the world make a
tremendous difference to me.”
Eskenazi also values the oppor-
tunity to work with Hebrew
language in a Jewish context, so
that Hebrew is part of a living
tradition that has important
things to say to how we live our
lives, rather than serve as an aca-
demic discipline only.
Regarding her hopes for her stu-
dents, she says she wants them to
know the text of their tradition
and to be able to approach it criti-
cally, “to learn to read the Bible
from right-to-left, which is in
Hebrew and also means to read it
in terms of its own time and place,
and to learn how to read it left-to-
right, in our own time and place,
thereby honoring the questions
posed by the Bible as well as hon-
oring our own questions and
seeing how it speaks to our own
time. And it’s extremely important
to know the difference. The Bible
is scripture not because it’s simply a
historical document, but because it
proved able to empower people in
their lives for well over 2,000 years.
It was preserved because it has
something to say and we have to
hear it. But we also need to be very
clear as to what our questions are,
and what it can or cannot say to
our own time.”
(
continued from page 10)
Profile:
T
AMARA
C
OHN
E
SKENAZI
First meeting of the editorial board of The WRJ Women’s
Commentary on the Torah, Los Angeles, January 2002. From left:
Dr. Judith Plaskow, Rabbi Andrea Weiss, Dr. Sherry Blumberg, and
Dr. Tamara Cohn Eskenazi. Photo by Eve Roshevsky.