Blu Greenberg

Blu Greenberg (; born January 21, 1936, Seattle) is an American Orthodox Jewish writer specializing in modern Judaism and women's issues. Her most noted books are ''On Women and Judaism: A View from Tradition'' (1981), and ''Black Bread: Poems, After the Holocaust'' (1994). Greenberg has worked to bridge Orthodox Judaism and feminism.

Early life and education

Bluma Genauer was born in Seattle to Rabbi Samuel and Sylvia Genauer (nee Genser). Samuel Genauer was born in Czernovitz, Austro-Hungary, and had immigrated to the U.S. at age two. Sylvia Genser was born on the Lower East Side. The couple moved to Seattle following Samuel's rabbinical ordination in 1933. Bluma was the second of three daughters; her older sister, Judy, was born in 1934, and her younger sister, Rena, was born in 1938. Blu grew up in a traditional and loving Orthodox household. Her father was invested in her and her sister's Jewish studies, and she received "a fine Jewish education, the best a girl could have," learning everything except Talmud studies, as per community tradition.

In 1946, the family moved to Far Rockaway, New York City. Genauer remained in the city for her schooling, graduating from the all-girls Central Yeshiva High School in 1953. From 1955 to 1956, she studied at the Hayim Greenberg Institute for Teachers in Jerusalem with Nechama Leibowitz.

She has a B.A. in political science from Brooklyn College (1957), a B.A. in religious education from Yeshiva University's Teacher's Institute (1958), an MA in clinical psychology from the City University of New York (1967), and an MS in Jewish history from Yeshiva University's Bernard Revel Graduate School.

Career and activism

After earning her Master's degree, she taught at the College of Mount St. Vincent beginning in 1969. She took a sabbatical during the 1974-1975 school year, which she spent as a lecturer at the Pardes Institute in Jerusalem. She left Mount St. Vincent after 1976.

Feminism

Greenberg's feminist leanings arose gradually, through many small moments of realized gender inequality. Such moments included when she was unable to extend her studies in Jerusalem with Nechama Leibowitz, and when only male relatives were allowed to attend her uncle's casket as it left the synagogue. Greenberg says it took her about 10 years to become a feminist. She was inspired by both secular feminists and Jewish feminists from the Reform, Conservative, and Reconstructionist movements. She later noted that although she "did not become one of them, a liberal Jew...their equality agendas for the most part seemed to me to be quite just and proper".

Greenberg's first major feminist decision occurred in February 1973, when she gave the opening address at the first National Jewish Women's Conference, which was held in New York City. The 1970s also marked the start of Greenberg's advocacy for agunot.

In 1981, Greenberg published her first book, ''On Women and Judaism: A View From Tradition'', in which she coined the saying, "Where there's a rabbinic will, there's a halakhic way." The quote, which argues that halakha is not objective, but interpreted based on social norms and needs, became a source of criticism from its first appearance. Also in the 1980s, she tried to build bridges between women of different faiths by helping to set up "Women of Faith" (1980–1992), and by her involvement in the "Dialogue Project" (1989–1994), which sought to unite Jewish and Palestinian women. Greenberg has stated since 1984 that she thinks she will see Orthodox women rabbis in her lifetime.

In 1997 and 1998, she chaired the first and second International Conference on Feminism and Orthodoxy, and she is the founder and the first president of the Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance.

She has lectured at universities and to Jewish communities in the United States and elsewhere.

She received the ''Woman Who Made A Difference'' award on January 26, 2000, from the American Jewish Congress Commission for Women's Equality during a ceremony at the Israeli Knesset in Jerusalem.

In the 2010s, Greenberg helped develop the International Beit Din (IBD), a United States-based beth din (religious court) which aims to find halakhic solutions to the problems of agunot. As of 2021, the IBD had helped more than 180 women to secure a divorce.

Blu Greenberg's papers and her audiovisual collection are held at the Arthur and Elizabeth Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America, a research library at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Harvard University.

Personal life

Blu married Irving Greenberg in 1957. Greenberg is also a well-known author and professor. The couple had five children, all born in the 1960s. In 2002, one of their sons was in a road accident in Israel and sustained severe brain damage. She and her husband opted to donate his organs, a rare decision in the country.

Born Bluma, she later legally changed her first name to Blu. Greenberg considers herself a Zionist. She and her husband made aliyah to Israel in 2017, and split their time between Israel and the United States.

Publications

Books

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Chapters

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Articles

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See also

* Jewish feminism
* Role of women in Judaism
* Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance
* Ms. (magazine)#Advertising policy (about a 2008 incident that Greenberg commented on)

References

External links

Greenberg profile
on ''Beliefnet''
Blu Greenberg, b.1936
article at the Jewish Women's Archive
"Orthodox, Feminist, and Proud of it"
Belief.net, undated, retrieved January 27, 2006
Articles by Blu Greenberg
on the Berman Jewish Policy Archive @ NYU Wagner
Short biography of Greenberg
(among other board members) on the website of the Jewish Orthodox Feminist Alliance

{{DEFAULTSORT:Greenberg, Blu
1936 births
Living people
20th-century American Jews
20th-century American non-fiction writers
20th-century American women writers
21st-century American Jews
21st-century American non-fiction writers
21st-century American women writers
21st-century Israeli Jews
21st-century Israeli non-fiction writers
21st-century Israeli women writers
American emigrants to Israel
American feminist writers
American Jewish theologians
American Orthodox Jews
American women non-fiction writers
American Zionists
Brooklyn College alumni
CUNY Graduate Center alumni
Israeli feminists
Israeli Orthodox Jews
Jewish American non-fiction writers
Jewish ethicists
Jewish feminists
Jewish American feminists
Jewish women activists
Jewish women theologians
Jewish women writers
Orthodox Jewish feminists
Women theologians
Writers from New York City
Writers from Seattle
Yeshiva University alumni