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This article examines the attitude toward gender affirmation surgeries expressed in a particular work of Jewish law (halakhah), Dor tahpukhot (A generation of radical change, 2004) by Idan Ben-Efrayim, an ultra-Orthodox rabbi of Sephardi origin. By following the hermeneutical maneuvers used by the author to accept transgender people, post factum, into the religious community, our against-the-grain reading of Dor tahpukhot reveals that the Orthodox halakhic approach is more complex and empathetic than might be expected. In our reading, Dor tahpukhot reinforces the notions that genitals are not the essential sign of gender, that the classification of persons as of one gender or another does not always work, and that the concept of gender in religious tradition is a more flexible concept than has commonly been thought. This analysis contributes to the growing field of transfeminist religious studies as well as to scholarship on Jewish religious feminism, by demonstrating that where there is a rabbinic will, gender essentialism can be overlooked. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses that Rabbis Barmash and Labovitz address the gender inequalities inherent in traditional Jewish marriage practices. Barmash advocates for reinterpretation within existing structures to create egalitarian ketubah ceremonies, while Labovitz suggests abandoning kiddushin altogether in favor of new egalitarian marriage ceremonies, both aiming to reconcile halakhic tradition with feminist values within the Modern Orthodox community.

This article contributes to the expanding field of trans-Jewish-feminist studies in general, and to the scholarship about Jewish law in particular, by analyzing the ways in which the Reform movement has gradually legitimized transgender people and accepted them fully. Applying Judith Butler's ideas about the heterosexual matrix as an analytical tool, the article demonstrates how the Reform movement, in a slow and gradual process, has left the entire heterosexual matrix behind, although it can be claimed that the process (of leaving behind the heterosexual matrix) has not run all the way to a complete dissolution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present article examines the way in which Jewish theology deals with the potential clash between Divine injunctions and moral imperatives. I take Modern-Orthodox feminism (“religious feminism”)1as my test case, scrutinizing some of the ideas it has developed about dealing with contradictions between religion and moral principles. The decision for religious feminism is based on the fact that its theoretical writings offer a trenchant moral critique of religious patriarchalism and the injustices done in its name, chiefly to women, but also direct this criticism inward, in pursuit of internal revision of the religious system, in a process that tries to preserve the obligation to obey Divine commands rather than challenge them. This leads to the question of whether a religious approach that has accepted certain moral principles (in this case, gender equality) can serve as a privileged model for examining the relationship between religion and morality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]