Houses of Study: A Jewish Woman among Books

By Ilana M. Blumberg

Book Overview

To learn was to live, and to learn well was to live well. This was the lesson of both cultures of the Modern Orthodox Jewish world in which Ilana Blumberg was educated, with its commitment to traditional Jewish practice and ideas alongside an appreciation for modern, secular wisdom. But when the paths of Jewish tradition and secular wisdom inevitably diverge, applying this lesson can become extraordinarily tricky, especially for a woman. Blumberg's memoir of negotiating these two worlds is the story of how a Jewish woman's life was shaped by a passion for learning; it is also a rare look into the life of Modern Orthodoxy, the twentieth-century movement of Judaism that tries to reconcile modernity with tradition. Blumberg traces her own path from a childhood immersed in Hebrew and classical Judaic texts as well as Anglo-American novels and biographies, to a womanhood where the two literatures suddenly represent mutually exclusive possibilities for life. Set in "houses of study," from a Jewish grammar school and high school to a Jerusalem yeshiva for women to a secular American university, her memoir asks, in an intimate and poignant manner: what happens when the traditional Jewish ideal of learning asserts itself in a body that is female--a body directed by that same tradition toward a life of modesty, early marriage, and motherhood?

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0803213670
• ISBN13: 9780803213678
• Release Date: March 2007
• Publisher: University of Nebraska Press
• Length: 182 Pages
• Weight: 2.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.8" x 1.0" x 6.0"

Customer Reviews

Great book

I enjoyed this book. The language Ilana Blumberg uses is exquisite and one can truly get a sense of her struggles and thought processes. I recommend this to everyone.

Seriously Wonderful!

Ilana Blumberg takes her life and her choices seriously and writes about them clearly. How refreshing and impressive! I am looking forward to reading the continuation!

Lush story and fascinating education for this gentile

The little I know about Judaism comes from novels I have read by Chaim Potok, Henry Roth and Michael Chabon. None of these have offered the unique, first-person perspective not only of Jewish women, but especially of Jewish women scholars. Blumberg's preface to Houses of Study lays out a fundamental tenion: that between the traditional role of an Orthodox Jewish woman and that of a particular Orthodox Jewish woman who aspires to honor both her religion and her personal desire for knowledge and advanced study. The story of Blumberg's religious and academic education unfolds against this backdrop. She tells the story beautifully. Her desire for immersion in studies, such as her male counterparts at Yeshiva receive, is aching and intense. That it parallels her developing woman's contemplation of love and union enhances its intensity and sensuality. We follow her journey from the midwest to Israel to the east coast an on. Blumberg is a trustworthy narrator. A bonus for this reader was the concurrent education in Jewish history, culture and religion. Hebrew words were used but also translated to English spellings and definitions. I could follow her story but still feel that it was written by Jew, for Jews. In short, this is a richly-described, morally-tensioned account of one woman's exploration of gender, religion and scholarship. Well worth the read.

Astonishing

Cerebral and sensuous all at once, hugely passionate but completely controlled -- hands down the best book on the readerly life that I have read. Anyone who wants to know what it means really to study the Bible should own this book.