Your views on the Women of the Wall

The votes are in and the result is clear: The Kotel should be open to different interpretations and not be dominated by Orthodox Judaism. We’re talking about Women of the Wall (WoW), and our recent poll asking IJN users for their take on whether the current situation at the Kotel.

Let’s back up; first a quick overview. WoW is an Israeli organization that aims to secure the rights of women to pray aloud, read from the Torah and wear religious garments at the Western Wall; their actions have upset members of the Orthodox Jewish community, particularly those who operate the Kotel, and in several instances, women who are part of the group have been arrested at the Kotel for violating “local customs”.

The overwhelming majority (62.5%) of people who participated in our online poll are clearly in favor of the Kotel becoming more inclusive of different strains of Judaism. A smaller percentage (15.6%) say they support gender equality, but think retaining tradition is important, and an even smaller group of people (12.5%) say that WoW represent a small group of people and shouldn’t override prevailing tradition. The Kotel has always been run by Orthodox authorities and any sort of compromise with groups like WoW does present a sharp divergence from tradition.

But it is a divergence gaining support from both Diaspora Jewry and the Israeli government, which just ruled that women participating in WoW’s monthly service are not breaking the law. And Natan Sharansky has been hard at work on his Robinson Arch compromise, which entails expanding the area already set aside for egalitarian prayer.

The surprise of our survey, however, is that only 9.4% believed that Sharansky’s plan is a good one. So we’ve got a follow up question for the 62.5%, who would like to see a change at the Kotel:

What kind of change to you envision? What should prayer at the Kotel look like?