• The Longing for Jewish Homes, Jewish Babies, and the Trouble with Jewish Women
• Karla Goldman (bio)

The question of whether a scholar guilty of sexual harassment may also be guilty of suspect scholarship takes on particular resonance in connection with Steven M. Cohen and his long-standing investment in the project of Jewish continuity. As Lila Corwin Berman, Kate Rosenblatt, and Ronit Y. Stahl suggest, the combination of Cohen's abusive behavior, his academic hyperfocus on women's fertility, and his unique influence in facilitating and amplifying conversations centered on anxieties about women's marriage and reproductive choices is particularly galling.

Some admire and others look askance at the way Cohen's scholarly agenda has been driven by his devotion to sustaining Jewish peoplehood. More distanced observers might note the irony of how Cohen's behavior and scholarship ultimately undermined his professed commitment to feminism, progressive values and liberal Judaism.¹ The embrace of women's equality and autonomy, after all, are key to the elements defining the non-Orthodox, but still committed, "Jewish middle" that he has fought so assiduously to protect.

As Berman, Rosenblatt, and Stahl point out, Cohen was not the first, only, or last advocate for Jewish peoplehood to target women, their changing roles, and their choices, as the foundational problem for Jewish continuity. To add to the authors' work in placing Cohen's research within the context of evolving anxieties about American Jewish vitality, I want to use this opportunity to think more pointedly about the dynamics—beyond the inexorableness of demography—that may be at stake in these considerations. The pioneers of Jewish women's history pointed to the multifarious ways that changing understandings of women's roles were implicated in Jewish responses to modernity, but it seems important to mark the way that dire concern over changing roles [End Page 195] for women can disrupt the professed values of progressive Jewish leaders in their attempts to respond to the press of modernity.²

The desire to find solid ground in the ongoing quest to define a sustainable American Jewish identity transcends the demographic panic of twentieth- and twenty-first-century sociologists documented by Berman, Rosenblatt, and Stahl. Pretty much from the beginning of their settlement in the New World, North American Jews set about reconfiguring Jewish practice, belief, and ritual in keeping with the changing demands and contexts in which they found themselves. This effort took on heightened emphasis with the advent of a formal movement dedicated to the reform of Jewish practice with an eye toward modern sensibilities and prevailing expectations for public and private behavior.³

One of the most influential American Jewish reformers was Rabbi Kaufmann Kohler.⁴ Urgently seeking to secure Judaism's footing in a modern context, Kohler advocated radical changes in the structure and content of Judaism, altering or doing away with what most considered essential markers of Judaism. Most notably, in 1874, Kohler introduced the practice of Sunday Sabbath observance for Jews.⁵ He also abjured laws related to home observances as "void of all moral lessons and suggestive thought," offering nothing "that ennobles and refines the soul."⁶ He hoped that these adaptations would convey to both Jews and [End Page 196] non-Jews that Judaism was a religion of ethics and reason, unsullied by superstition or practices that would separate Jews from their neighbors. Kohler looked at traditional Judaism's restrictions upon women as hopelessly outdated and an affront to modern sensibilities. Moreover, he considered the achievement of "perfect equality" between men and women essential to the Reform project and to societal acceptance of Judaism as a rational religion.

Kohler believed that these and other refinements of Jewish practice and belief would highlight what he considered the pure essence of Judaism, but he did not introduce them lightly. While he desperately wanted Jews to observe the Sabbath, he brooked no illusions that the Saturday Sabbath could stand up to the demands of the American market. More tellingly, even as he saw the laws governing homebound Jewish practice as crude and isolating, he desperately yearned for a distinctive Jewish home life, marked by the warmth and comfort that he associated with his own youth in...

• 对犹太房屋，犹太婴儿的渴望，以及犹太妇女的麻烦
• 卡拉·高德曼（生物）

与史蒂文·科恩（Steven M. Cohen）及其对犹太连续性项目的长期投资有关，学者是否犯性骚扰罪还是涉嫌可疑奖学金罪的问题引起了特别的共鸣。正如莱拉·科温·伯曼（Lila Corwin Berman），凯特·罗森布拉特（Kate Rosenblatt）和罗尼特·斯塔尔（Ronit Y.Stahl）所暗示的那样，科恩的虐待行为，他对女性生育能力的学术高度关注以及他在促进和扩大以女性对婚姻和生殖选择的焦虑为中心的对话方面的独特影响尤其令人振奋。 。

有些人钦佩，有些人对科恩的学术议程如何受到他对维持犹太人的热爱所推动的方式存有疑问。距离更远的观察者可能会注意到具有讽刺意味的是，科恩的举止和学术成就最终破坏了他自称对女权主义，进步价值观和自由犹太教的承诺。¹毕竟，妇女平等与自治的拥抱是定义非东正教的要素的关键，但这些要素仍然是他为保护自己而孜孜不倦地奋斗的“犹太中间派”。

正如伯曼（Berman），罗森布拉特（Rosenblatt）和斯塔尔（Stahl）所指出的那样，科恩并不是犹太人以妇女，她们的角色变化和选择为目标的第一个，唯一或最后的提倡者，这是犹太人连续性的基本问题。为了增加作者在将科恩的研究置于对美国犹太人活力的焦虑日益加剧的背景下所做的工作，我想利用这次机会更加尖锐地思考人口动态（除了人口统计学的不可阻挡性之外），这些因素可能与这些因素息息相关。 。犹太妇女历史的先驱者指出，犹太人对现代性的反应牵涉到改变对女性角色的理解的多种方式，但似乎很重要的是要标记出人们对改变角色的担忧[End Page 195]妇女可能会破坏进步的犹太领导人自称的价值观，以应对现代新闻。^2个

在不断寻求定义可持续的美国犹太身份的过程中寻求坚实基础的愿望超越了Berman，Rosenblatt和Stahl所记录的20世纪和21世纪社会学家的人口恐慌。北美犹太人从他们在新大陆定居之初就开始着手重新配置犹太人的习俗，信仰和礼仪，以适应他们所处的不断变化的需求和背景。随着致力于犹太实践改革的正式运动的出现，这项工作受到了越来越大的重视，该运动着眼于现代感性以及对公共和私人行为的普遍期望。³

拉比·考夫曼·科勒（Rabbi Kaufmann Kohler）是美国最有影响力的犹太改革者之一。⁴科勒迫切寻求在现代环境中巩固犹太教的立足点，主张对犹太教的结构和内容进行根本性的改变，改变或废除最被认为是犹太教的基本标志。最著名的是，科勒（Kohler）在1874年介绍了犹太人遵守周日安息日的习俗。^[5]他也废除了与家庭守法有关的法律，因为它“没有任何道德教训和暗示性思想”，却没有提供任何“能使人心灵得到提炼和提炼的灵魂”。⁶他希望这些改编能同时传达给犹太人和[End Page 196]非犹太人认为犹太教是一种道德和理性的宗教，不受迷信或将犹太人与邻居分隔开来的习俗的s污。科勒将犹太教对妇女的传统限制视为绝望的过时和对现代情感的侮辱。此外，他认为实现男女之间的“完全平等”对于改革计划和社会对犹太教作为一种理性宗教的接受是必不可少的。

科勒认为，对犹太人实践和信仰的这些和其他改良将突出他所认为的犹太教的纯粹本质，但他并没有轻易介绍它们。当他拼命地希望犹太人遵守安息日时，他丝毫没有幻想周六安息日可以承受美国市场的需求。更具说服力的是，即使他认为管理犹太人家庭出游的法律是粗暴和孤立的，他也迫切渴望拥有独特的犹太人家庭生活，其特点是他与自己年轻的犹太人相处时所带来的温暖和舒适。