8 May 2011

“DROWNING IN THE MARSH”: ISRAELI ORTHODOX THEATRICALREPRESENTATIONS OF THE SINGLES SCENE1

Reina Rutlinger-Reiner

ABSTRACT

This article examines the phenomenon of prolonged singlehood in Israeli orthodox society on the basis of interviews and two scenes from plays performed by two orthodox theaters during 2006–07. These plays reflect thevibrant discourse taking place within orthodox circles2 on this pressing issue, and the article contributes to understanding of the orthodox singles' problematic statusin a pro-family society by combining analysis of the theatrical presentations and information gathered throughqualitative research methods: interviews, field journal entries, and observations. The inter-disciplinary approach adopted here incorporates the fields of gender studies, anthropology, literature, and performance studies. It allowed me to bridge the gap between the personal experiences I learned about in the interviews and the theater produced by the singles. Prolonged singlehood is presented in the plays as a religious trialfor unmarried adults, and their future release from theirproblematic status is in God's hands. This ostensible solution and explanation of the phenomenon enables singles to invalidate the communities' criticism of them and to subvert their own self-criticism.

INTRODUCTION

This article examines the phenomenon of prolonged

singlehood in Israeli orthodox society on the basis of

interviews and three plays performed by two orthodox

theaters during 2006–07.3 These plays reflect the vibrant

discourse taking place within orthodox circles on this

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pressing issue. The article will contribute to

understanding of the orthodox singles' problematic status

in a pro-family society by combining analysis of the

theatrical presentations and information gathered through

qualitative research methods: interviews, field journal

entries, and observations.

During the past five years, conferences on the issue

of orthodox singles have been organized by rabbis,

educators, and orthodox organizations such as Emuna and

Kolech,4 and the topic has been treated in the media as

well as in the academia. However, until these plays were

produced, and later in 2008 the TV series Srugim was

aired,5 the voice of the singles themselves was not

presented in the public sphere. Therefore the most

important feature of these plays is that they demonstrate

how orthodox singles deal with the communal

stigmatization of singles as failures and anomalies.

The plays use parody as a means to resist the

negative attitude toward unmarried adults, but they also

reinforce the singles' connection to the community

through their fervent belief in God. The theater groups

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differ in both their life styles and their approach to

theater work, but they end by transferring the social

problem, namely prolonged singlehood, into the religious

sphere. Prolonged singlehood is presented as a religious

trial for unmarried adults, and their future release from

their problematic status is in God's hands. This

ostensible solution and explanation of the phenomenon

enables singles to invalidate the communities' criticism

of them and to subvert their own self-criticism. If the

solution is in the hands of the Almighty, all they can do

is to act piously: turn to God in direct supplication,

pray ecstatically, and believe in His ability to change

their status whenever He wishes. It is interesting,

therefore, that the potential subversiveness of theater

has been transformed by these orthodox artists into a

fervent religiosity, a tool to emphasize mystical belief

in fate and Divine Providence. This idea was clearly

stated by one of the actresses, Tal, in an interview:

In the play there is a scene where I'm asked: "What do youdo in the meantime?" I answer: "I'm dealing with 'active waiting,' trying for it to happen." What does this mean? We try to make it happen. Then she asks, "What if it doesn't?" I answer: "There is Someone Else who directs theworld and the things that happen in it and although I don’t understand now why – I guess it is for my benefit.

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For the moment, the only thing left for me to do is to believe in this and not to sit idly. That's it. That's thework I have to do. And I believe it's coming near. I believe that tomorrow morning or maybe even tonight, this thing I am waiting for – will arrive and then every part of my life will connect, one by one, and I will understandwhy now is the best time for it to happen …” (Tal, interview, 2007)

PLAYS ABOUT ORTHODOX SINGLES

Three plays about orthodox singles were produced during

2006–07. The Shacharit Theater, whose members are

graduates of the theater department of Emuna Women’s

College in Jerusalem,6 produced a play called “In Sadness

You Will Date Men” (Be’etzev Te’zeey Im Banim). They performed

11.I would like to thank Talpiot Academic College for its support of this research.2. I use the term “orthodox” to designate national-

religious orthodox Jewish society; the nature of

this society will be explained later in the article.3. I deal here with only two of them since the Amuka

Theater was stand-up comedy rather than a play.4. Two orthodox women's organizations.5. A sitcom directed by two orthodox graduates of

the orthodox school for cinema, Be'maale, Hava Divon

and Eliezer Shapira. It was well accepted by secular

and orthodox viewers and instigated many public

discussions.6. This is the only all-women orthodox college with

a theater department.

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for all-women audiences all over Israel for over four

years.7 The second group called the Heref Ayin theater,

the only mixed orthodox theater group, whose members are

men and women, produced a play “For the Sake of

Unification” (Leshem Yihud) for the Akko Festival of

Alternative Theater in 2006. A third group, not discussed

in this article, called “Amuka”, an all-men group,

produced a stand-up comedy called “Miracles and Marriage”

(Nissim Venisuin).8 The two theater groups discussed in this

article (Shaharit and Heref Ayin) represent two sectors

of Israeli orthodox society. The first, all-women group

Shacharit is more observant and belongs to the Hardali

faction, while the other, a mixed theater group of men

and women, Heref Ayin, associates itself with the more

liberal faction known as modern orthodoxy.9

METHODOLOGY

The inter-disciplinary approach adopted here incorporates

the fields of gender studies, anthropology, literature,

and performance studies. Semiotic analysis of the

theatrical production included examination of the

staging, choice of props, lighting, costumes, and music.

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This was combined with phenomenological analysis of the

theatrical events and also with literary analysis of the

scripts, press reviews about the plays, and articles

about the topic of extended singlehood in Israeli

orthodox society. The two theater groups gave me

videotapes of their performances and provided the scripts

so I could recapture the theater experiences. Blending

methodology from literature and theater studies with

those connected to the social sciences widened the range

of relevant data and exposed many underlying intricacies

of the social phenomenon as presented through art. By

adopting Chaney's view that "studies of representation in

7. By that time the actresses, all in their

thirties, had married.8. They chose the site of pilgrimage to a tomb in

the Galilee where singles pray to find a match, as

their group’s name. I will not be dealing with their

production.9. One of the principles each actor and actress had

to agree with when joining this group was that if

they were in doubt about halakhic issues they would

not consult a rabbi but rather deal with the problem

within the group itself. Orthodox society will be

discussed later in the article.

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general see themselves as 'deconstructing' social

phenomena",10 the plays were analyzed as a means to gain

insights into orthodox singles' society in general and

for examining it from a variety of perspectives.

I also employed qualitative research methods when I

engaged in ethnographic work. I recorded, transcribed,

and analyzed formal, in-depth interviews and spontaneous

conversations with actors, actresses, and the director of

one of the plays. By keeping a field journal of my

personal observations of the plays as well as the

interviews, I became aware of my own subjective reactions

as a participant observer examining the artistic

presentation of social phenomena. As I was already

familiar with methods of feminist ethnography,11 I felt

comfortable sharing my analysis with the informants.

Their comments have been woven into the final analysis of

10. David Chaney, Cultural Change and Everyday Life

(Basingstoke, UK and New York, 2002), 4.11. I engaged in this type of fieldwork in my

previous research on orthodox women's theater in

Israel, The Audacity of Holiness: Orthodox Women's Theater in

Israel (Jerusalem, 2007) [Hebrew], which is presently

being translated into English.

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the article dealing with complexities of prolonged

orthodox singlehood in Israel and their theatrical

representations. These inter-disciplinarian research

methods enabled bridging the gap between the personal

experiences I learned about in the interviews "to the

broader, less tangibly graspable spaces of public

culture".12

THE PROFILE OF MY INFORMANTS

In this study, I put more emphasis on analysis of the

scenes from the plays than on ethnography. Interviews

were conducted with ten orthodox singles, seven of whom

were women in their late twenties or early thirties, most

of them actresses or students in Emuna College in

Jerusalem, the only orthodox college with a theater

program and with one woman in her mid-thirties who was

about to become a single parent.13 I also interviewed

three single men of the same age, including an actor in

one of the plays mentioned later. All of those

12. Chaney, Cultural Change and Everyday Life, 98.13. She received a sperm donation from a religious

homosexual who intended to share parenthood

responsibilities with her.

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interviewed defined themselves as national religious or

modern orthodox and had all received the same kind of

upbringing and had followed the same path: after

graduating from orthodox single-sex high schools they

studied in a single-sex higher center of Jewish studies

(yeshivas or midrashot for the women), served full

military or national service, and then carried on

studying in academic institutions. I also interviewed the

head of the well-known voluntary orthodox matchmaking

service called Yashfe, Haim Falk, whose articles have

been posted on the Internet and will be mentioned later.

NATIONAL RELIGIOUS/ORTHODOX SOCIETY

Outwardly, orthodox society appears to be homogeneous,

but a closer look reveals that it is composed of many

segments with different ways of life, political opinions,

and beliefs, as well as different styles of dress.

However, the boundaries among these segments may be

fluid, and contacts among them are dynamic, open to

trends of thought from within and from without.14 Modern

orthodoxy seeks to combine strict observance of Halakha

with integration into the general national culture. This

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community grew up under the influence of the ideology of

the Mizrachi Movement,15 which evolved into the (now

defunct) National Religious Party. In relation to the

Jewish religion, it places itself in the middle, between

ultra-orthodox and liberal streams of Judaism (which are

a negligible presence in Israel, unlike in North

America). This middle way demands considerable ability to

maneuver, openness, and flexibility, along with great

diligence in keeping the commandments. The other streams

in Israeli society – the ultra-orthodox, on the one hand,

and secular Jews, on the other – offer clearer

ideologies, and consequently to some degree they are more

seductive. In fact, the modern orthodox Jew deviates from

the traditional Halakha in three areas: the status of

women, relations between men and women, and the attitude

toward secular culture. This deviation derives from deep

commitment to universal human values such as equality and

freedom. Rabbi Ronen Luvitz, one of the rabbis of this

sector, claims that “Modern orthodoxy is not concerned so

much with rebellion as with the search for a spiritual

path in the post-modern age, and therefore it opposes a

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one-dimensional world and seeks to make possible a life

of Torah along with a life of the spirit and culture of

our times.”16 Rabbi Daniel Sperber, also a university

professor, adds, “Accordingly, I propose that we restore

halakhah to its glory by reverting to the old ways of

reaching decisions; that we strive to increase

recognition of the maxim that, in fact, “the force of

permissive ruling is paramount”; and that we enhance

sensitivity to questioners by personalizing responses,

taking account of their effects on the questioner’s life.

All this must be done, of course, within the framework of

traditional, normative halakhah, as it has come down to us

through the utterances and writings of the great halakhic

scholars through the generations."17

In the past decade, the national religious orthodox

community in Israel has become more diverse and complex.

New Age and Hassidic practices have become part of

religious services (liturgy) and also of life styles and

discourse of many young members in this society.18 The

influx of newly religious [Hozrim Betshuva]19 within the

community has also become influential. While in the past,

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newly religious artists abandoned their art when joining

the “ranks” of orthodox society,20 today these artists

legitimize their artistic endeavors as a means to express

their devotion to Judaism.21

14. Orthodox society is aware of its own diversity,

and it is no coincidence that many terms are used by that

society to characterize the sub-groups within it. Among

others there are: hazbatnikim [people new to the religion,

hozrim biteshuva]; datlashim [former orthodox now secular],

hardalim [ultra-orthodox Zionists]; benishim [yeshiva

students, bnei-yeshivot], gushnikim [people connected with

the Gush Etzion yeshiva], Hasidei Bratslav, who study the

teachings of Rabbi Nahman of Bratslav, and Merkaznikim, who

are connected with the Merkaz Harav Yeshiva in Jerusalem.16. Ronen Luvitz, "Man (again) Seeking Meaning," Daot

7 (2000): 20 [Hebrew].15. This movement was founded in 1902. Its basic

ideas, formulated by, among others, Rabbi Yitzhak Ya’akov

Reines (1839–1915) include acceptance of Zionism as a

tool for preserving the Torah and the Jewish people. It

sought to expand religious feeling within Zionism and to

accentuate the connection between the Jewish people, the

Land of Israel, and the Torah.17. Daniel Sperber, "Friendly Halakha and the

Friendly 'Poseq’," The Edah Journal, A Forum of Modern Orthodox

Discourse, 5 (Sivan 5766) 2.

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In addition, orthodox feminism has encouraged many

women to become more expressive and active in the public

domain as well as in the religious sphere. Women’s prayer

groups exist in some communities and many young women

attend thriving higher education centers [midrashot] in

order to study the Jewish canon intensively. Women

litigators appear in rabbinical courts, and social and

political activism is encouraged by most educators and

community leaders. The orthodox women's organization

Kolech works intensively to improve orthodox women's

status in society and deals with injustices that women

encounter, especially in legal situations. Theater can be

http://www.edah.org/backend/coldfusion/journal_images/eda

h_journal_5_2_updated.pdf18. Because many young Israeli orthodox youth have

traveled to the East after their national or military

service.19. All explanations in square brackets have been

added by author.20. Famous performers such as Uri Zohar and Pupik

Arnon, no longer performed after becoming ultra-orthodox.21. Some famous performers are Shuli Rand, Irit

Sheleg-Neriya, and Ehud Banai.

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considered another means for conscious raising

activities, self-expression, and activism.

WHAT IS ORTHODOX THEATER?

Theater created by orthodox Israelis in the past two

decades differs in its aims, content, and also its

audiences from secular Israeli theater. Most orthodox

actors, directors, and playwrights feel that they are

establishing an alternative to the secular Israeli

theater, which they find crude and abusive. For that

reason, instead of performing plays from the Western

repertoire or searching for suitable material in theater

archives, they write their own plays. In many cases, they

base their plays on texts from the Jewish canon (from the

Bible, from prayers, from the Talmud, Midrash, and other

rabbinic sources) as we will see in the case of the play

Leshem Yihud discussed in detail below. Even if they deal

with mundane topics – life histories, social issues such

as domestic abuse or marital strife,22 and even political

right wing ideology23 – the texts are rich with references

to the Jewish canon. Secular audiences, the Israeli

artistic hegemony, are not interested in these

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performances and find them lacking in dramatic action and

professionalism. When they do acknowledge orthodox

theatrical endeavors, in the framework of fringe theater,

they do so as patrons of the arts and adopt a

supercilious position, which marginalizes orthodox

theater even more.24

Orthodox theater must also be analyzed in the

context of dynamic Israeli current events – Prime

Minister Rabin's assassination in 1995, by Yigal Amir, a

religious, right wing law student, caused a rift in

Israeli society. Ten years later, in 2005, the

disengagement from Gaza affected many national religious

settlers' lives.25 These two major political events have

widened the gap between the orthodox national religious

community, which tends to be right wing, and secular

Israelis, many of whom hold left wing political views.

The reaction of right wing orthodox society has been to

create social enclaves within cities and establish their

own settlements in the West Bank and the Galilee, where

they have organized an educational system that largely

ignores Western culture. The series of compensating

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actions within the crisis-ridden orthodox community26

include a search for new modes of spirituality and a

surge of artistic creativity, which serve as a

counterculture27 to the Israeli secular culture.

Those who create and perform have had to contend

with traditional opposition to theater, which appears as

early as the Talmud (Bavli Avoda Zara, 8b and Bavli

Shabbat 150a) when the Sages warned that “theaters and

circuses" were places of idol worship, of sitting with

frivolous people, and a waste of time that should be

devoted to Torah study. That opposition seeped deep into

22. Noa Ariel's puppet theater Domem Medaber [Objects

Talking], dealt with these topics and Rachel Keshet is now

(2011) performing in a play about sexual harassment in

the orthodox society called Zot Omeret.23. Dancing with the Wolves, street theater based on the

famous fairy tale of The Three Little Pigs as an allegory to

what may happen after the disengagement; Naomi performed

by students of Emuna College; and At the End of the Rope/Region

(in Hebrew the same word hevel), a play about prospects of

relinquishing the Gaza area performed by women of the

settlements there.24. See the discussion on the citation given to the

Dosiyot and by judges of the Akko Festival competition in

2001 in my book The Audacity of Holiness, 231–2.

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the Jewish consciousness and restricted theatrical

activity to festive occasions such as the Purimshpil,28

Hanukkah plays, and wedding jesters. Although the Yiddish

theater began to develop in Eastern Europe in the second

half of the nineteenth century, it was secular and

anchored in mundane Jewish life; its source was the

Enlightenment that penetrated the Jewish community.

Theater in Eretz Yisrael was initiated at the beginning

of the twentieth century by idealistic teachers of Hebrew

25. In the summer of 2005, the disengagement from

Gaza took place and about 8,000 settlers in the area,

most of whom were orthodox, were displaced; until now

many have not yet established new permanent homes.26. I adopt Victor Turner's terminology about “social

dramas”.27. A religious school for movies, Be'maale, a

department for Dance in the orthodox women's college

Orot, and lately also a dance group of orthodox men Kol

Azmotai Tomarna; Literary journals Dimuy and Masheev

Haruach are devoted to orthodox artists and there are more

graduates of art and theater in the women’s colleges

Emuna and Talpiot who participate in exhibitions. Music

composed and performed by orthodox musicians is

flourishing. See David Sperber, "Israeli Art Discourse

and the Jewish Voice," Images 4 (2010): 109–31.

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and new settlers from Eastern Europe and envisaged as a

means of reinforcing Zionist ideology and reviving the

Hebrew language. It, too, aroused the rabbis' opposition.

Thus in orthodox circles, theater was limited to school

or family festivities.

Nevertheless, in the late 1990s, groups of orthodox

women who had not even been formally or professionally

trained, followed later by orthodox men, began performing

throughout Israel, mainly in halls that were filled with

orthodox audiences. The theater groups were composed

exclusively of either men or women, and only one mixed

group existed for a period of three years. This

grassroots activity coincided with initiatives of

orthodox artists in other fields such as literature,

painting, music, and even dance. Theater departments

opened in orthodox high schools and orthodox teachers

28. “Shpil” in Yiddish (cognate with German Spiel)

refers to a popular, satirical skit presented on the

Purim holiday. Central to it are the characters of

Mordecai and Esther or other biblical figures. The genre

developed during the Haskala (nineteenth century

enlightenment) period, and Yiddish theater grew out of

it.

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were much in demand. As a result, Emuna College opened a

theater program for future teachers. Because of Halakhic

restrictions, most orthodox women perform in front of

all-women audiences29 – while men can perform freely in

front of mixed audiences of men and women, since there

are no restrictions on men's use of body and voice in the

public sphere.

Many orthodox performers have recruited rabbinical

authorities to legitimize their occupation. More

observant, all-women theater group members wish to

maintain modest behavior in the theater as in the rest of

their lives, so they consult rabbis during rehearsals not

only on the way to perform on stage modestly but also on

how to interpret texts. Many orthodox artists consider

their theater as "holy work" and so rabbis encourage and

29. Such as "the use of voice in public", the fact

that women engage in attracting attention. A whole

booklet of Rabbinic responsa has been published by Emuna

College, which stipulates guidelines about how to move,

dress, and engage in protest theater that is not

malicious. No such booklet has been published for men.

Yet some orthodox groups performed in front of “mixed”

audiences of men and women.

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promote these initiatives as educational and promoting

fear of God (Yirat Shamayim). Other artists consider

theater a safe space where they can expose social

malaise, with the hope that by bringing up intimate

topics in the public sphere an open, honest, corrective

discourse will follow and social problems such as abuse

against women, sexual harassment, and stigmatization of

singles will be effectively addressed by the

establishment: rabbis and educators.

In many plays actors and actresses recite prayers,

sing traditional songs whose lyrics are taken from the

Bible or from prayers, engage in ritual activities such

as putting on a tallit and tefillin, or perform the

ritual washing of hands (netillat yadayim) as part of the

dramatic action onstage. The secularization of rituals by

presenting them onstage as dramatic action demystifies

them and "creates a world of imagery that can be used to

subject Judaism to a critical but loving examination."30

BACKGROUND INFORMATION ABOUT ORTHODOX SINGLES

30. See page 129 in David Sperber, "Israeli Art

Discourse and the Jewish Voice,” Images 4.1 (2010): 109–

31.

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In the past, the Israeli orthodox society ignored

familial, social problems. But since the phenomenon of

extended singlehood is growing, many articles about

unmarried adults, divorces, and agunot31 have been

published in the orthodox press and in Shabbat

pamphlets.32 The topic is the focus of sermons delivered

by rabbis and educators. According to the statistics

published by Haim Falk, head of the matrimony bureau

"Yashfe", there are more than 57,000 unmarried members in

the community within the age range of 25–41.33 Falk has

recruited more than a hundred voluntary matchmakers in

order to solve this problem. There are blogs and active

forums dealing with singles on orthodox Internet sites

such as Kippa and Datili, and a special place in the

secular portal of Tapuz. Empowerment workshops, support

groups, and public prayers at the Western Wall have been

held to deal with what heads of the community, social

workers, and orthodox social organizations consider the

problem.34

The issue is different for the sub-groups in orthodox

society. For example, the more observant young adults

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refrain from any intimacy with the opposite sex until

marriage, so dating is for marriage purposes only. This

creates tension and awkwardness.

I know that I'm checking him out on the phone instead of wasting my time. I even tell him I want to ask a few questions: What are you looking for? What am I looking for? How do you define yourself? What kind of previous connections did you have? … otherwise it is a waste of time. Talking about the weather is a waste of time …. (Tal, interview, 2007)

On the other hand, many more liberal, modern orthodox

young singles in their late twenties and thirties adopt a

dynamic life style that includes professional progress

and intensive social contacts between men and women.

According to single women I interviewed, the problem lies

with men's reluctance to commit:

There were two forty-year-old men in my life and they both wanted to be fathers. But they both thought that their ability to reproduce was unlimited and they didn't want to obligate themselves – I know that they're still looking around. There is a big gap between the men's desire for a family and their actual settling down. (Ronit, interview, 2007)

Men think that a woman is a kind of fantasy. So I had nothing to communicate with them because I felt they were on the lookout for my faults. They have a kind of fantasy and they're looking for it. It's not like you are embarking on a new path … . Stop judging – put this aside … (Nena, interview, 2007)

Some singles dare to challenge rabbis and the more

conservative factions of orthodox society with demands to

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change the traditional prohibition against premarital

sex, single parenthood, and cohabitation prior to

marriage.35

THE MARSHES

The two scenes from the plays discussed in this article, 31. Women whose husbands have disappeared (e.g., if

they are presumed dead but their bodies were never found)

or abandoned them without granting them a divorce are

forbidden by Jewish law to remarry and are called agunot.32. There are even separate pamphlets dealing with

the portion of the week geared especially for singles

“Zoog o Peret” [“Even or Odd”] with articles by rabbis

and psychologists. They deal with the portion of the week

but also refer specifically to issues connected to

singles and courtship.33. Haim Falk, "More bachelors than spinsters but the

[statistical] table lies," Ynet, 24 May 2007 [Hebrew].34. On 10 October 2005, a public prayer assembly was

attended by 2,500 singles and prominent rabbis at the

Western Wall. Special prayers for a match were composed

by prominent rabbis and recited together in the afternoon

service.

http://www.primetime.co.il/community/showthread.php?

t=14758 In April 2006 Emuna sponsored a well-attended

conference at Bar Ilan University offering singles,

engaged couples, and newly-weds workshops and lectures

and panels on the topic. A workshop was also organized by

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as well as the sitcom Srugim, present the problems of

orthodox singles who live in dynamic social enclaves

nicknamed "marshes".36 These are particular neighborhoods

mainly in Jerusalem (Katamon and Nachlaot) and in Givat

Shmuel (near Bar Ilan University) where orthodox singles

mingle quite freely and engage in social interaction with

the other sex, often without committing themselves to

serious relationships. Specific synagogues are designated

as meeting places and so they rent apartments in these

areas or within walking distance to them so that during

the Shabbat they can eat communal meals in a family

atmosphere. Having a close, supportive network of friends

empowers many young adults and helps them overcome

anxiety and inferiority feelings transmitted from the

older and more conservative factions of orthodox

Israelis. It also serves as an alternative to domesticity

which they have not yet established. Although the singles

in the marsh are still on the lookout for more meaningful

the orthodox feminist movement "Kolech" at the conference

of 2007.35. Jenny Rosenfeld, "Sexual Ethics for Orthodox

Single Men and Women," Daot 43 (2009) [Hebrew].

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relationships outside this milieu, the marsh serves as a

safety zone where they can feel less of an anomaly in

orthodox society.

The marsh? That is a bunch of women and men who are looking for love and are even not connected to their ownfamilies and so they create a kind of small family. Really! Different kinds of small families that go shopping and eat together. There is a rota, nothing wrong in that – but today the "marsh" leads people to all kind of … [behavior]. I don’t want to be malicious but in the marsh everyone lives with everyone. There aresome good girls … but everything there is freer. It is naïve to think that if you eat meals with a guy for a whole Shabbat that you can remain [in a relationship] like his older sister or his mother and he does not think about you in different ways. I am very opposed to this – it is not healthy emotionally and it just increases singlehood. From a religious point of view they define themselves as "religious-lite", "new orthodox" but they are not really looking … [for marriage]. (Tal, interview, 2007)

Not many couples emerge from this social network,

and, according to some of my informants, after some time

the marsh becomes "suffocating" and "unhealthy":

There are girls there among the hevre [a group of friends] of Nachlaot [a neighborhood in Jerusalem]. I, for example, didn’t belong because I felt I didn’t need hevre. I needed a boyfriend – just one. This togetherness is a solution. It alleviates the stress. Instead of making an effort [to find a partner] you think: “There are a lot of people like this, so what if it takes another few years?” (Nena, interview, 2007)

I think they are called marshes due to the dating policy there. There is the same reservoir so if someone is dating – it is with friends of theirs and they exchange dates and that perhaps creates the image of something sticky, drowning and stinky.

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Religious society has done itself in. Adults don't know how to flirt with each other and that forces people to meet through matchmakers instead of just doing things themselves. And rabbis use this fact and that's why they have to write manuals – like Rabbi Avineri did – in which they tell guys to use deodorants and that they should buy a drink for their dates. (Amit, interview, 2007)

Educators, spiritual leaders, rabbis and their

wives, social workers, and psychologists have called for

the drying up of the marshes by offering empowerment

workshops and creating volunteer matchmaking services.

Interestingly enough, one of the young men I interviewed

claims that the younger generation's rebellion against

the older generation has taken the form of a more

stringent attitude towards observing rules of modesty,

which has caused social problems when men and women begin

dating. He accuses the rabbis of intentionally over-

emphasizing the problem in order to gain more control

over young adults in their communities:

The younger generation behaves differently than their parents. It's a kind of rebellion, and so they become more observant … I don’t understand why in every Shabbatpamphlet there is talk about “the problem”. I don’t think there is one – what if there are older singles? Let people live their own lives! If some people suffer and want to get out of the loop and get married, if theyneed help – they should find therapists or go to

36. The most famous are situated in the neighborhoods

of Katamon in Jerusalem, and Givat Shmuel in Ramat Gan.

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workshops – there are so many. I don’t think there have to be activities organized by the communities. When someone like Shifra Greiner [an orthodox therapist dealing with singles writes [in her pamphlet] "We will solve your problems because you don’t know how" it is imperative to say to the older generation: "You screwed it up for us and you are to blame!" You didn't know how to stand up for your principles when the ultra-orthodox infiltrated into the national religious schools and intothe youth movements bringing different norms to the community.37 Now – let go! Don’t get involved now – let the young ones solve their own problems. … Don't the rabbis have more pressing issues to deal with?" (Amit, interview, 2007)

"IN PAIN YOU WILL DATE MEN"/SHACHARIT THEATER

Three actresses, women in their thirties,38 wrote and

directed this play. Its name, In Pain You Will Date Men, plays

upon the biblical verse dealing with Eve's punishment

after tempting Adam to transgress: “In pain thou shalt

bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy

husband, and he shall rule over thee.” (Genesis, 3:16)

The play is composed of vignettes – dramatized real-life

37. He is referring to the late 1980s when the more

observant Merkaz Harav students started teaching in

national religious schools and in youth movements, and

demanded that boys and girls should not be together at a

very young age. Modesty became a very central issue

preoccupying these circles.38. One single, one “just married”, one remarried

divorcee.

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situations, using movement and music. Besides a few boxes

on wheels, which they arranged according to the

requirements of the scenes, and a few items of clothing,

they used no other props. These wheeled boxes became

seats at the Western Wall, a car, a card table, and a

bed. The actresses appeared in simple black costumes,

tightly fitted tops, pants with short skirts over them.

Their style indicated their affiliation with the more

conservative faction of national religious society.39

The play is an authentic, rich social document that

relates realistic, painful anecdotes connected to their

social status in a comic tone. Some scenes resemble

stand-up comedy, but as they accumulate their comic

character becomes disturbing. Between the scenes and

sometimes ending them, the actresses present the captive

all-women audiences with heart wrenching, intimate

monologues, and also with criticism of society for

stigmatizing them as failures.

While I was single there were very difficult things. My pupils for example asked: "How come you're not married?"

39. The women in the faction do not wear pants.

Lately they have begun to do so, but only if they wear

skirts or dresses over them.

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Most of the people who asked how and why asked out of pity, and I know they were thinking that there was something wrong with me … What was once an easy topic became painful after some years. You drown in singlehood –I had some terrible moments but I always managed to get myself out of that situation by thinking: "O.K. My time has not come yet." And so when my friends approached me atthe beginning about the play, I said that I would be the director because I felt I could not present this topic onstage. Slowly I joined in. And just then I met Shimon.40

We went out throughout the rehearsal period and that made everything much easier for me. (Nena, interview, 2007)

As the play progresses, the audience feels the burden of

being single in a pro-family orthodox community. One of

the actresses, still single at the time, stated in an

interview: "This is similar to our experiences with

dating: one after another in succession, endlessly."

(Orit, interview, 2007)

“CHARMS”: DESCRIPTION OF THE SCENE

This scene is full of movement with hardly any text.

There is only a phrase that is repeated in a sinister

manner by a witch-like matchmaker figure who appears and

re-appears onstage: “It is not sufficient” [referring to

all the efforts they making in order to get married]. The

actresses indulge in irrational activities: going to holy

tombs to light candles, praying devoutly at the Western 40. Her future husband. The interview took place a

few months after she got married at the age of 31.

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8 May 2011

Wall, vowing to keep silent for forty days, dancing

wildly with brides, sitting on the bride’s special chair

after the marriage ceremony, grabbing the wine cup used

by the newly-weds in order to sip from it, buying charms,

rubbing their bodies with holy oil, and hiding charms

underneath their pillows. The rituals they embrace are

incongruous to their Western way of life. Their

exaggerated movements make them look frenzied and crazed.

Between each of these activities the witch-like figure

enters and says: "But it is not sufficient." The scene

ends with the women collapsing on the floor, after

performing all the marriage promoting activities, while

the witch-like, crazy-looking woman (matchmaker?) repeats

the phrase, wickedly, hovering over their exhausted

bodies.

The play In Sorrow You Will Date Guys ends with a series of

questions the actresses address to God as if he were

their friend:

Isn’t it true that I forget that you decide on everything?Isn’t it true that you are the only one who really understands me?Isn’t it true that I have not forgotten my belief?Isn’t it true that I am just one small part of

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the general divine plan?Isn’t it true that it isn’t terrible that all the others are engaged and I am still single?

ANALYSIS OF THE SCENE

According to Bakhtin, parody "has the effect of

establishing a distance between language and reality",41

and so it serves as an emancipating strategy. In this

case, it empowers the singles to criticize “normal”

society and specifically their malicious accusations that

they are still single because "Perhaps you do not want it

enough". This is a variation of another re-occurring

sentence that was heard throughout the scene: "It is not

sufficient.” The change from neuter to second person

singular insinuates that the problem is within these

individual’s psyches. Neither ritual nor exterior

activity will help change their status. The black humor

of this scene is combined with a slapstick quality and

this creates a therapeutic distance between the

stigmatized singles and their distressing, humiliating

situation. This allows them to examine their status and

41. Michael Bakhtin, The Dialogical Imagination, trans.

Caryl Emerson and Michael Holquist, ed. Michael Holquist

(Austin TX, 1981), 61.

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their society more clearly:

"It isn't terrible if I went out with a hundred guys?" People laugh [when I say this line] you don't know how much … I understood that people are laughing because they identify, because it is true. I too went out with many guys, and if now people would tell me, I would laugh too. It’s embarrassing but everyone knows it hurts. There is a thin line here. (Ora, interview, 2007)

It is at this low point that the singles retaliate by

criticizing society’s wickedness and insensitivity:

Once people thought simply and naively but today people indulge in self-searching and the search for self-fulfillment and fulfillment through a partner (cynically).They are looking for the fantastic but that does not really exist. That is why they continue searching and the searching process becomes an obsession…I have gone throughterrible humiliations from guys and also from people I metrandomly…The play makes people understand they shouldn't judge others and not say sentences just like that – it is difficult for us. Yes, it is to educate the audience but still to believe ... I still believe it will happen. (Ora,interview, 2007)

"The stories we tell about reality construe the real

rather than merely reflect it."42 Thus, when women

ridicule their own hysteria and show how far they are

willing to go in order to get married (to fast, to keep

silent for forty days, to attend weddings so that they

can get blessings from the bride), they are acknowledging

their willingness to abandon rational behavior in order

42. See page 143 in Susan Rubin Suleiman, Subversive

Intent: Gender, Politics and the Avant Garde (Cambridge, MA, 1990).

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to find a husband and settle down. The scene is a double-

edged commentary on themselves as intelligent individuals

succumbing to social pressures and also on their society,

which is insensitive and judgmental.

The phenomenon exists and it is not our fault – we are notto blame. Nobody of us decided to get married late and nobody expected this [to happen]. We are orthodox girls and we do not go to "mixed" parties [men and women]. That doesn't happen so we don’t have many place to meet and what can we do? … not every second auntie is a match- maker … . (Nena, interview, 2007)

The parody that appears in many scenes of this play

perhaps wishes to alleviate the painfulness of their

situation. Goffman analyzes the relationship between the

stigmatized and "normal" society and how mechanisms of

stigmatization work.43 Publication of the stigma, in this

case performing it onstage, has a specific purpose:

It is meant to convince the public to use a softer social label for the category in question … to give voice to shared feelings and to provide a forum for presenting some division of opinion as to how the situation of the stigmatized ought best to be handled.(Goffman, 1963, 23–5)

Following the instructions of the "wise women”, as

Goffman calls "normals" who offer remedies to the

stigmatized, exhausts the actresses. They become almost

43. Ervin Goffman, Stigma: The Management of Spoiled Identity

(Englewood Cliffs, NJ, 1963), 25.

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lifeless puppets in the hands of those who advise them to

engage in these activities. Thus the play invites the

audiences to reflect on the way social status connected

to domesticity affects their lives and “how much they

participate in their own oppression”.44 According to Nena,

one of the actresses I interviewed, revealing the

singles’ stigmatized situation onstage in the public

sphere transformed her from being passive and humiliated

into becoming active and critical of orthodox society.

She considered theater on this topic therapeutic since it

created a workable distance from her feelings of failure

because she was still single at the age of thirty.

By presenting the naïve, direct questions to God at

the end of the play the actresses demonstrate that

despite their doubts and disappointments they are still

fully committed to an orthodox way of life and to belief

in God. The supplication to God indicates that they are

afraid that their cynicism about the effectiveness of

charms and superstitions as transformative powers may be

44. Natalie Schwartzberg, Kathy Berliner, Demaris

Jacob, Single in a Married World: A Life Cycle Framework for Working with

the Unmarried Adult (New York, 1995), 70.

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translated as disassociation from orthodoxy, so they

stress their belief that all is in God's hands.

LESHEM YIHUD/“HEREF AYIN” THEATER

The play Leshem Yihud was first produced for the Akko

Festival for Alternative Theater in 2006 by an orthodox

theater group called Heref Ayin [A Split Second]. This is

the first and only mixed theater group of orthodox men

and women in Israel.45 It is composed of five actresses

and three actors, all modern orthodox, although one of

the actresses admitted she was having doubts whether to

continue this way of life and was considering leading a

secular life style. It was directed by Basmat Hazan and

written jointly by Hazan and Netan'el Lifshitz. The play

received a citation for its "unique ensemble work for

beginning actors" during the Akko Festival for

Alternative Theater in 2006.46 The name of the play,

Leshem Yihud, has a double meaning. Yihud refers to the

presence of two people of the opposite sex in the same

space without a chaperone, and this is forbidden

according to Halackha unless the couple is related.47 Yihud

also alludes reverently to God, the One and Only.

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This play is very different from the one described

above. It has post-modern qualities: fragmentation of the

original text by inserting colloquial, personal

monologues or interjections of canonical texts with high

language, the use of verbal games, exaggerated use of

voice and movement. Unless you are familiar with the

central theme of a midrash known as "The Rat and the

Pit",48 it is hard to follow the play. The presence of men

and women onstage together allows for sensual almost

erotic scenes to take place, though no actual physical

contact occurs. According to Hazan, the director of the

play, and Benny, one of the main actors, the play was

created naturally from personal anecdotes the actors and

actresses brought to rehearsals. Most of them dealt with

the problematic interactions between men and women during

singlehood.

Someone said that we are creating theater of unmarried people, and we don’t understand anything about life, so I said: “Listen, these are our lives, and they are complex."If you ask people who are about 28 years old what they aredealing with I think 95% will say that this is the most pressing topic in their life, and you can’t talk about something so personal without taking it apart and examining it. This is what came out of it. We didn’t want the topic to come out, but when it did, dealing with it served therapeutic purposes. (Benny, 2006)

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THE PLOT

The play tells the story of a youth strolling through a

forest who hears the cries of a young woman coming from

the bottom of a well. She tells him that she fell into it

and asks him to help her get out. He makes her promise to

marry him if he succeeds, and she agrees after she is

sure he is Jewish. When he manages to rescue her and sees

she is good looking, he makes sexual advances, but she

stalls him and makes him swear to come to her parent’s

house for proper Kiddushin – marriage. She calls upon a

well standing nearby and upon a rat, which rushes pass

them, as witnesses of their betrothal, and they both

return home, with the understanding that they are

betrothed. But the young man forgets and marries another

woman. In contrast, the young girl discourages all

advances made by men to marry her and remains true to her

oath, although she does not share the secret of her

betrothal to anyone.

The man, now married, has two children who die

unnaturally: one falls into a well and the other is

devoured by a rat. His wife understands that these

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unnatural deaths were retribution of some sort and she

confronts her husband. When she hears about the

unfulfilled pledge to the maiden, she annuls their

marriage and tells him to return to her and keep his

promise. The woman, true to her oath, has pretended to

45. This was not the first time there has been

cooperation between the sexes. In my book, I mentioned

the political street theater that took place before the

disengagement form Gaza, when female theater students

directed the theater event and yeshiva students from

Otniel participated as actors.46. The press related to its authenticity and

candidness and to the fact that it "opened a peep-hole

for others to get to know to 'a closed society'." This is

a strange observation since these young men and women

come from the orthodox faction, which is totally immersed

in secular Israeli society: they have served in combat

units in the army and even most of the women served in

the army rather than doing national service. They had all

completed their academic studies in secular universities

and colleges and certainly do NOT belong to a "closed

society". This lumping together of the entire "orthodox

society” as one homogeneous group is typical of the way

many secular Israelis perceive orthodox society. Another

critic said, "There can be no doubts as to the honesty

and courage of the people behind these boxes of love

(they too use boxes which also serve as old-fashioned,

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lose her mind in order to discourage men from wooing her.

Only after being convinced that he was the man who had

saved her from the well, did they marry and live happily

together.

Throughout the play, the actors keep on repeating

the phrase, “She remained true to her oath.” Another

recurring element is the song "Ana Hashem", which is

taken from the prayers, a statement asking salvation from

God. The first word Ana – if spelled with “aleph” means

"please" but spelled differently (with the Hebrew letter

"heh"), it means "where". So this supplication not only

sounds like a request – but in fact is a question about

the whereabouts of God.

The second part of the play inserts personal stories

about being single between the fragmented repetitions of

the original story. We see a woman preparing a Shabbat

wooden suitcases), and they were all impressed by the way

a midrash was incorporated with personal monologues about

solitude and the search for love."47. The time when a bride and groom spend together

alone right after the religious ceremony ends is also

called “Yihud”.48. Rashi’s commentary on Tractate Taanit.

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table for one person only, a heavy set woman clearly

representing someone with eating disorders. She devours a

tuna sandwich and talks obsessively about it, about

singles answering a matchmaker's questions, about fights

between a boyfriend and his girlfriend, and about

fantasies about being a married woman. The inter-

textuality between contemporary life of singles and the

canonical text "constitute not a break but a challenge

the culture from within”.49 The play ends with the group

singing the traditional song “Ana Hashem” with which it

began. The volume of the song increases as the group

progresses in its singing.

“HEADCOVERING”: DESCRIPTION OF THE SCENE

The scene is erotic, although (or perhaps because) the

actor and actress, who stand very close to each other and

even touch the same object – the head covering – never

touch each other.50 It lacks a verbal text but the

pantomime is rich and full of erotic insinuations. Hazan,

the director, explains that it began as a

49. Linda Hutcheon, A Poetics of Postmodernism: History Theory

Fiction (New York and London, 1988), xiii and passim.

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scene of fantasy … a dream of a single woman who has all the options ahead of her, but in her fantasy she encounters her fear of disintegrating within the framework of marriage and in the eroticism of it. (Hazan, interview, 2006)

An actress dressed in white envisions herself married by

pretending to look in a mirror and covering her hair with

a white shawl. She examines herself in the mirror and one

of the male actors poses behind her as if to complement

the picture, the fantasy that she has a husband. She

tries out three different types of head coverings and

each time another man stands behind her. It is

interesting that each type of head-covering "demands" a

certain type of man. There is a subtle connection between

the way the man looks and poses behind the actress and

the type of head covering she chooses.51 Her imaginary

posing as the bride in a newlywed photo is interrupted

when one of the male actors positions himself behind her

and, as she begins tying the white shawl around her head,

he takes one end of the shawl from her and ties it around

50. According to Halakha, married women should not

show their hair to others. To do so is not considered

modest. Consequently, great interest in types of head

covering has developed in modern orthodox society as well

as haredi – ultra-orthodox society.

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her head. This third head covering is typical of stylish,

modern orthodox Israeli women – tied so that only the

crown of the head is covered but the rest of her hair

falls loosely on her shoulders. This time the woman loses

control over her act of covering her hair and

demonstrating modesty as a wife. Both the actress and the

actor become involved in this intimate act. The stage

becomes a site of eroticism without the man and woman

touching each other.52 Avoiding the transgression

connected to physical contact between the sexes yet

standing very close and fondling the object that is meant

to “neutralize” eroticism creates another form of

eroticism – no less powerful and perhaps even more.

Gradually the man becomes increasingly active; instead of

tying the shawl around the woman’s head he uses the rest

of the shawl to cover her eyes and then her whole head.

The actress, who, minutes before, had seemed fully in

control, is transformed into what looks like an immobile

mummy-like figure, incapable of making contact with the

outside world. Her partner has almost imperceptibly taken

over and reversed the power structure of the scene. After

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a few seconds, the young woman recovers, fights back, and

rips the shawl off her head.

ANALYSIS OF THE SCENE

Many plays I have analyzed deal with the ambivalent

attitude of modern orthodox women toward covering their

hair after their marriage. On the one hand, they desire

to abide by this custom and consider head covering after

marriage a status symbol, although it restricts them and

sometimes is uncomfortable. Many monologues show women

stomping on their hats, tossing them off, and reminiscing

with friends how they looked and felt before they had to

cover their hair.53 According to Tannen, hair plays an

important part in women's lives and "playing with each

other's hair is a frequent part of girls’ intimacy as

friends", and recapturing the intense physical intimacy

that existed between mothers and daughters in childhood.54

This affirms the importance orthodox Judaism attaches to

women's hair as a focus of erotic attention and the

importance attached to head-covering as a symbol of

limiting the male gaze. In fact the scene demonstrates

feminist theories connected to the crippling effects of

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the male gaze, which objectifies women as objects of

desire. The female body is "in its duplicity as asexual

maternal and sexual feminine, is the very emblem of the

contradictory coexistence of transgression and

prohibition, purity and defilement that characterizes

both the 'inner experience' of eroticism and the textual

play of the pornographic narrative.”55 Here too we witness

the duplicity of modesty and sensuality within one female

body. Hazan says that perhaps this scene was intended to

be “gentle criticism” of the norm that "orthodox women

51. Married women’s hair is considered erva-nakedness.

Ultra-orthodox women cover their head completely with a

kerchief, hat, or wig and in some factions they even

shave their hair immediately after their marriage and

cover their head completely with a black head cover. More

liberal factions symbolically cover just a part of their

hair in different ties, styles. One can discern social

affiliation according to the head covering, a phenomenon

comparable to the types of skullcaps men wear to show

their social affiliation with a certain orthodox faction:

black for haredi, crocheted for national religious, white

– for hassidic (Bratslav).52. This actress left the group after a year of

working together since she felt it was inappropriate and

no longer felt comfortable working with men onstage.

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automatically cover their hair after marriage without

really understanding the consequences or what this

obligation entails." (Hazan, interview, 2006)

CONCLUSION

The connection between performance and anthropology has

been made by prominent sociologists, anthropologists, and

performance theorists such as Goffman, Turner, Schechner,

and Sauter.56 Bahktin's functionalist theory minimizes the

influence of theater on society by stating that theater

functions "as a safety valve" that allots specific spaces

and times to revolt against authorities.57 In our case,

the orthodox singles who created these plays were making

a combined effort to force the hegemony to address the

topic of changing family life styles openly and

empathetically. They can be considered as engaging in

active opposition to the community's tendency to

stigmatize them. Yet it is interesting that the endings

of both plays undermine the very criticism they voice by

transferring the social issue into the realm of religious

belief.

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The scenes I have described and analyzed present the

confusion and tension among the younger generation in

modern orthodox society between the demands to conform to

traditional life styles and the desire to attain personal

fulfillment. I have demonstrated that this tension is

reflected in the type of theater that orthodox artists

are creating by blending high culture (texts from the

Jewish canon) with low culture (personal monologues using

colloquial Hebrew), and by including stylized,

ritualistic behaviors in the scenes. According to

Sperber, this hybridity characterizes the works of

religious Israeli artists:

Many artists draw upon Jewish ritual objects alongside realia from contemporary Israeli culture, and in a manifestly postmodern and post-Zionist act, empty them allof their meaning. Jewish symbols and texts often undergo intentional flattening. The “Jewishness” of objects and forms is then just one element among the wealth of cultural influences: deconstructed master narratives become empty forms of staged ritual.58

53. In my book I describe scenes like this, which

took place in 1997 in a Women’s Theater Festival in Haifa

and in 1999 at Emuna College for the Arts in Jerusalem.54. Debora Tannen, You're Wearing THAT?: Mothers and

Daughters in Conversation (Ballantine, 2006), 41.55. Ibid., 85.

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In addition, I have described the context in which

these plays have been created and performed. Orthodox

Israeli society promotes marriage at a young age and

forbids premarital sex. Those who do not conform to this

norm challenge society, and although they criticize its

lack of empathy, its stifling educational system, and the

way it stigmatizes singles as failures, they wish to

remain in the fold. Some orthodox young people seek a

compromise by leaving home and living in “marshes”,

social enclaves that serve as a convenient base from

which they either continue their search for a partner or

function in self-made alternative families, without

committing themselves to one partner. Rather than

conceding to marriage just for the sake of normalization,

56. Ervin Goffman, The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life

(New York, 1959); Victor Turner, The Ritual Process: Structure and

Anti- Structure (New York, 1969); Richard Schechner,

Performance Studies: An Introduction (London and New York, 2002);

Wilmar Sauter, The Theatrical Event – Dynamics of Performance and

Perception (Iowa City, 2000).57. Mikahail Bahktin, Rabelais and his World

(Bloomingdale, IN, 1984), 61.58. Sperber, "Israeli Art Discourse and the Jewish

Voice," 131.

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some orthodox singles engage in intimate relationships

and even consider single parenthood. These people have

become catalysts for change in orthodox family patterns

and have initiated public discourse on more liberal

family patterns such as single sex relationships and

cohabitation prior to marriage.59

Although they took a different approach to the topic

of prolonged singlehood in theater, both theater groups

chose to end the plays with clear religious messages. The

final scenes, which included direct questions to God and

fervent religious sentiments, create the impression that

singlehood is a theological issue otherwise "this is a

world of crazy injustice". (Tal, interview, 2007)

Declarations that singlehood is a part of a larger,

incomprehensible divine plan legitimizes and even extols

it. After criticizing and condemning orthodox society,

59. The more liberal faction of rabbis has been asked

to deal with sexuality and intimate ties between singles,

and some orthodox single women who decide to engage in

premarital sex go to the mikva. The chief rabbi, Yona

Metzger, has made a public statement against allowing

single women to immerse in a mikva prior to marriage.

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these young orthodox singles choose to use the theater as

a tool to reinforce their connection with the community

through acts of religious devotion.

NOTES

49