Israel will allow women to take the rabbinic exams that Orthodox men take as the pathway toward official ordination, marking what NPR described as the first time women have been permitted to sit for the tests. But the rabbinate’s position remains narrower: Israel still does not ordain women as Orthodox rabbis, even when they complete the required examination. NPR reported the change on May 19 from Jerusalem.
NPR said three Orthodox Jewish women completed what it described as a nearly six-hour rabbinic exam, and that their religious teachers greeted them singing after the testing. Avital Engelberg, who teaches Jewish religious texts to women, told NPR the women were “doing a milestone in history,” and Batya Krauss said, “As far as glass ceilings go, in Israel, we broke the glass ceiling of learning.” Krauss added that in earlier years, a woman seeking advanced study would have had to hide.
The requirement in Israel for official Orthodox rabbinic ordination has long been tied to gender and exam performance. NPR said that to be officially ordained as an Orthodox rabbi in Israel, a man must take a course of study and pass a series of official exams. Israel’s rabbinate does not ordain women as rabbis, but the court dispute focused on whether women should be permitted to take the exams themselves.
In the background of the legal fight, NPR said American-born Rabbi Seth Farber—of the Jewish advocacy group ITIM—tried to negotiate with Israel’s religious officials before the lawsuit. NPR reported Farber as telling the story of a meeting at the Ministry of Religious Affairs in which the director general told him “over my dead body will women ever study texts like this,” and that “These texts were not meant for women.”
After an eight-year court battle, NPR reported that the Israeli Supreme Court ordered that the exams be opened to women. NPR said that after the ruling, Israel’s rabbinate refused to administer the exams to anyone for more than half a year, and Farber said that was because the rabbinate would “rather not give exams to men than give exams to anybody.”
NPR reported that the court intervention led to women being allowed to take the exam “a couple weeks ago.” One participant NPR identified was Dr. Ruth Agiv, a 44-year-old dentist, who NPR said completed the first exam and later described what she wanted from Jewish study. NPR reported Agiv as saying, “Women need to be part of the world of Torah,” and “We should not need to be outside. It belongs to us.”
NPR also said Agiv is not seeking the formal title of rabbi, but wants recognition as a learned authority in Jewish law so she can provide women with religious guidance they might otherwise seek from a man. The report placed the Israeli policy change alongside a broader contrast: in the United States and in Israel, more liberal Jewish streams have ordained women rabbis for decades, and NPR said that in recent years there has also been a small number of Orthodox women rabbis outside the Israeli rabbinate’s system.