PRELUDE
INVENTORY REDUCTION
alum— MADE IN AMERICA
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The Alternative
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Crafts I Jewelry Z
1/7
2000
10
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from page 7
echoed the service from an updated
version of the Union Prayerbook, two
were oriented toward children and
one omitted any reference to God.
Today, leaders of the Reform move-
ment are urging Judaism's traditional
practices and a more unified
approach to synagogue worship.
The editors of the new prayer book
are designing it with that in mind.
Because of the strong traditional-
ist elements expected to be included,
"I'm certain it will be controversial
within the movement, which is not a
bad thing," said Rabbi Elyse
Frishman, co-editor of the new
prayer book.
Rabbi Frishman, a congregational
rabbi in Franklin Lakes, N.J., said
part of the controversy would occur
because the prayer book will be new
With the new traditionalist
approach "there's always the possibil-
ity of alienating part of the Reform
movement," said Rabbi Stanley
Dreyfus, who was the longtime chair
of the liturgy committee and over-
saw the publication of Gates of
Prayer. "I don't know if all these
changes are called for, but there's
certainly a degree of resistance along
with a large degree of acceptance,"
said Rabbi Dreyfus, adding that the
disapproval might be a quiet one.
"People who disapprove. tend simply
to stay away."
Rabbi Frishman and her co-editor,
Rabbi Judith Abrams, founder and
director of the Maqom School for
Adult Talmud Study in Houston, were
formally appointed in March, although
a committee has been discussing a new
prayer book for several years.
Rabbis Frishman and Abrams are
the first all-female editing team in
any of Judaism's central denomina-
tions to put out a major prayer
book. "It's a wonderful sign of the
degree to which we've really evolved,
to simply not regard this as an
issue," Rabbi Frishman said.
One of the editors' big challenges,
Rabbi Frishman said, is in addressing
the feminist critique, which points
to the solely masculine language
with which God is described and
addressed in traditional Jewish
prayer. She advocates integrating a
female voice.
A forthcoming Passover Haggada,
edited by Rabbi Sue Levi Blwell of
Philadelphia and to be published by
the Reform rabbis' organization next
spring, will include both the tradi-
tional Baruch Atah, or masculine
form of addressing God in blessings,
and Brucha At, or the grammatically
feminine version.
That is a route that the new
prayer book editors are choosing to
avoid. "We've rejected that idea in
some of the current work being done
because it would feel more like polit-
ical correctness than a spiritual open-
ness," Rabbi Frishman said.
"While it's important to respond
to the feminist critique, we don't
want to have a book that will feel
dated in five years. We haven't
resolved" how to address it in
prayers, she said. Another central
consideration is the prayer book's
design. Rabbi Abrams said they need
to concentrate on "a limited number
of services, which will also make the
book easier to hold, which is not a
trivial consideration."
It will also be published on CD-
ROM, making it possible for people
to create their own prayer services ❑
Corrections
In the picture, at right,
that ran with the letter to
the editor "Musical
Theater Still Delights"
(Dec. 31), the young lady
pictured was. Debi Kapen,
wife of Udi Kapen.
The National Conference of
Community and Justice,
formerly the National
Conference of Christians
Richard Jacobs, Udi Kapen and Debi Kapen.
and Jews, was founded in
1927 by national Christian
and Jewish leaders, not by Detroit Jews and Arabs as inferred in a text
block in last week's special report: "A Century of Jewish Detroit."