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Overview
Early
Influences
Establishing
a Reputation
"The
Maiden in the Temple"
Breaking
Down Barriers
Career
of a Lady Preacher
The
First Woman Rabbi?
Jewish
Women's Congress
Paradoxical
Positions
Marriage
and New Directions
Later
Years
Legacy
Timeline
Bibliography
Artifacts
Alphabetically
Artifacts
Sorted by Source
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Overview
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"My position this evening is a novel one....
To be at any time asked to give counsel to my
people would be a mark of esteem; but on this night
of nights, on Yom Kippur eve, to be requested to
talk to you, to advise you, to think that perhaps I
am to-night the one Jewish woman in the world,
mayhap the first since the time of the prophets to
be called on to speak to such an audience as I now
see before me, is indeed a great honor..."
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Ray Frank's position in American Jewry was truly
a novel one. In 1890, she became the first Jewish
woman to preach formally from a pulpit in the
United States, inaugurating a career as "the Girl
Rabbi of the Golden West" that would help to blaze
new paths for women in Judaism. Virtually
overnight, Frank became a sensation in the Jewish
world, and she would remain so for nearly a
decade.
Coinciding with a broader emergence of public
roles for Jewish women, Frank's career
reinvigorated and redirected an ongoing
conversation about the proper boundaries of the
female sphere. Earlier in the nineteenth century,
women like Rebecca
Gratz had explored new responsibilities
in many area, including education and philanthropy.
But the expansion of American Jewish women's social
and cultural opportunities had not been matched by
expansion of their religious roles. Although women
had become the majority at many congregations'
services, their participation in public ritual was
still limited to the occasional mixed-sex
choir.
Despite the fact that Frank claimed to have no
interest in becoming a rabbi, her actions forced
American Jewry to consider the possibility of the
ordination of women seriously for the first time.
Frank spoke passionately about the abilities and
spirituality of Jewish women and had no doubt about
the necessity of their becoming a greater presence
in the synagogue. The content of her speeches and
her presence as a female religious leader not only
served as an inspiration to the women who heard
her, but also demonstrated to the Jewish world that
Jewish women were ready for widespread change.
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How to Cite This Page
For a bibliography:
Jewish Women's Archive. "JWA - Ray Frank - Overview." <http://jwa.org/exhibits/wov/frank/index.html>.
For a footnote:
Jewish Women's Archive, "JWA - Ray Frank - Overview," <http://jwa.org/exhibits/wov/frank/index.html>.
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