New Reform Commentary to Courageously Challenge Assumptions Nobody Holds Anyway

As we start the new cycle of the Torah, replete with strong and distinct matriarchs, we must remember that many in the Reform Jewish community are not able to read Hebrew, have not studied the Chumash, but know that it is very sexist.

Fortunately, there is a new “A Women’s Commentary,� and though it won’t be read by many outside of narrow academic circles and Reform clergy (the Reform masses are not particularly devoted to old scrolls), it will function to plagiarize offer alternative ideas through modern interpretations.

The JTA reports,

“How many people know that when the Torah describes Abraham mourning the death of Sarah, it’s the only time in the entire text that a man mourns a woman?�

Now sexist apologists might note that when Miriam died, they no longer had a well running in her merit, and all sorts of rock abuse occurred in exasperation, and the whole camp in its entirety mourned. But that’s different! The whole camp is not one man! Gotcha, traditionalists!

“Or that Adam and Eve were equal partners in crime?�

Clearly, the JTA and “A Women’s Commentary” is correct. When G-d kicked both their asses out of paradise, we thought this was because G-d wasn’t sure who was at fault, and that He was simply administering collective punishment.

And there is more! Much more.

More than traditional commentaries, the new volume will focus on women when they’re in the text of the Torah — and also when they’re glaringly absent, editor Tamara Cohn Eskenazi said.

For instance, Chayei Sarah deals with the death of Sarah and the courting of Rebecca. Abraham’s slave finds Rebecca at a well, where she offers him water, and he asks her family if he can take her back to Canaan to wed Abraham’s son.

The women’s commentary is careful to point out that Rebecca gives her consent. Rebecca is an active, not passive, character from her very introduction in the Torah, the commentary says.

This is a fascinating chiddush. Most of us assumed that Rebecca, credited as a heroine among depravity, was, in fact, abducted against her will at the well, according to Abraham’s directive.

So how about that. She actually said “yes,� and was not wed against her will in flagrant violation of Jewish law, both in terms of forcing a marriage and kidnapping.

Well, I’ll be a son of a bitch!

And there is this as well,

While the description of Eve being created from Adam’s rib is commonly taken as a sign of Eve’s inferiority, it’s more a statement of their equality, she says. They’re described in Genesis 1:26-28 as being of the same flesh, both “created in God’s image and blessed with fertility and power.

Amazing what brand spanking new ideas the Reform can come up with when someone actually checks the Hebrew version. Fortunately, that won’t happen with most of their constituents, so by all means, present these very modern new egalitarian insights as your own.

If I were a Reform rabbi, I would do exactly what these women are doing. Steal from commentaries throughout the ages and claim I am writing an updated socially modern one.

Who’s going to check? It ain’t in the King James version!