The Whole World Is Confused About Gender And I Think I Know Why

 

Identifying The Problem

Gender has become a knotty problem, at least in the West. News, entertainment and social media outlets are full of stories about people who identify as transgender, gender-fluid, non-binary, genderqueer, agender, gendervoid. By some published accounts, there are now as many as 60 or 70 terms to describe gender expression.

Email signature files announcing a person's preferred pronouns are becoming increasingly common, even in corporate settings. There is a related, shocking social trend, documented by Wall Street Journal writer Abigail Shrier in her book Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters of unprecedented numbers adolescent girls and young women declaring that they have gender dysphoria.

In the Orthodox Jewish community, another wrinkle in this gender confusion appears in the ridiculously offensive erasure of women in all public spaces. I watched a new Tisha B'Av video whose central message is the importance of unity among all Jews... and not a single woman appeared in hours of footage. The irony of calling for Jewish unity while erasing half the Jewish population is staggering.

Proposing An Explanation

There is a prophecy in Yermiyahu (Jeremiah) that promises that geula (redemption) will restore the power of feminine spiritual energy and will bring a major upgrade to the stature and dignity of women. The prophecy is found in Jeremiah 31:21:

“For the Lord has created something new on the earth, a woman shall go after a man.”

The last three Hebrew words of this verse are “nekeva tisovev gever”. These words have been variously translated as: a woman will encircle a man, a woman shall go after a man and/or a woman will court a man. In all cases, something new and positive will happen with the status of women at the time of the final redemption.

Chaim David Targan, a Tzfat-based kabbalistic healer and mystic who works to help bring the redemption, explained that prophecy of “nekeva tisovev gever” does not mean a battle between the sexes.

“‘Nekeva tisovev gever’ does not mean that women will dominate men. It means that the feminine energy, which has been repressed since Adam HaRishon (the Biblical Adam) will surface again as a full partner. This refers to both women specifically, but also to the feminine energy in men themselves.”

Eventually, explained Targan, the spiritual energy of women will be a crucial aspect of geula.

“Women have always been closer to Hashem’s perfected will, but the more aggressive, dominant energy of the masculine has dominated history.  Male energy is about doing. Female energy is more about being – which is a higher level.

"In the pre-geula world, our focus has been achievement – doing mitzvahs and building a better world. In the times of Moshiach, the focus, as we all know, is to know Hashem. This is more a state of being (i.e. feminine) after the perfected action-oriented life (i.e. masculine) of the pre-geula world."

There is a well-known story from the Talmud (Chulin 60b) that, at the beginning of Creation, God created the sun and the moon the same size. The moon, as it were, objected to the wisdom of this decision, saying, "Two kings cannot share the same crown." God, as it were, acknowledged the correctness of the moon's argument and, in response, reduced the size and radiance of the moon.

The moon represents women and the sun represents men. We therefore can conclude that men and women were originally created equal but that feminine spiritual energy was diminished in some way. The Moon's Lost Light: A Deeper Torah Perspective on Geula and Feminine Equality by Devorah Fastag elaborates on the spiritual significance of this contraction.

In our days, the most significant point is that, as we get closer and closer to full-blown geula, there is a shift happening in the balance between masculine and feminine spiritual energy. 

It's my contention that the gender confusion we are witnessing is the tumah or klipah (the impure spiritual forces) side of this shift toward the strengthening and the increasing influence of the feminine. People are responding to what's happening in the shifting balance on a spiritual plane without consciously knowing what's driving their behavior. They are responding to something, but not in a healthy way.

Further, I suspect that the escalating erasure of women is driven by the same dynamic - an unconscious push back against the strengthening of the feminine in the spiritual realm.

If my contention is correct, it doesn't change all the painful things we're seeing and experiencing, but it does give it context. It does help us understand the fact that the whole world is befuddled about gender identity and expression is not a random occurrence but is, in fact, very much related to geula.

It will take increasing Messianic light to show the world how to cope, in a mature and spiritually healthy way, with what they unconsciously and intuitively sense, but do not understand.

Until then, we wait, and watch as the world becomes ever more snarled up over questions of gender.

 

And Yet, I Am Not The Same

 

Once, after I had been in bed for many days, sick with what turned out to be an ordinary bug from which I fully recovered, I needed to attend to an important errand.

Just being out in the world was a bit of a shock to my system after having spent the past 10 days lying alone on my mattress. Suddenly, I was surrounded by people, by noise, by the many by-products of human endeavor.

It was disorienting.

And that's how I feel today, as Israel unfolds itself from the COVID restrictions with which we have been living since March 2020.

I've started to attend in-person Torah lectures. I went to shul last Friday night for the first time in a very long time. I made theater reservations and bought tickets to a community fundraising event. I've begun hosting Shabbat guests and thinking about going to see a movie with my husband. I'm excited to see which of our favorite restaurants survived. We've gone swimming and made reservations for a quick birthday trip up north.

We're once again making plans.

Just last night, I told my husband how amazing it feels to have things to write on the family calendar, things to look forward to.

It's like Hashem pressed a huge red reset button and the world, much of which we have been holding at bay, is rushing back in.

And yet, I am not the same as I was 16 months ago.

In April, I left the work I had been doing since 2014 to take on new projects. I am learning (and teaching) a lot more about the inner aspects of Torah. I am (finally!) meeting new people. I am eating better quality food and I am trying (truly I am) to overcome my natural night owl tendencies. 

A successful day now is one in which I've been able to help someone else. I am directing my energy toward preparing myself for redemption more than ever. I avoid posting controversial opinions on social media and routinely unfriend or block people who spew negative energy into cyberspace.

I'm working on my emuna all the time, looking for God's Hand in world events and focusing on the big picture, endeavoring not to get preoccupied with the details.

As I emerge from the torpid months of COVID, I feel like new growth on an old vine.

Tender.

But also well-rooted.

My Other Birthday Is Today

 

I was born on June 29. 

That's as true a fact about me as there is.

And yet, a bit more than 30 years ago, when I was taking those early steps toward discovering my Jewish identity, I learned that I have another birthday.

It was during the Jewish Festival in Baltimore, a community event that used to be held at the end of every summer. There was a Chabad booth where they were giving out Hebrew calendars for the new year that was starting on Rosh Hashana. And if you told them the month, day (even time of day) and year you were born, they would circle your birthday on the Hebrew calendar.

That's when I learned that besides being born on June 29, I was also born on the 23rd day of the Hebrew month of Sivan.

In some vague way, I've known that fact for the past 30-odd years. Since making aliyah, I've met many people who celebrate on their Hebrew birthdays, but I could barely remember mine, let alone notice where it fell on the Gregorian calendar.

Until this year.

Suddenly, 23 Sivan looms large. It's the day that the Ten Tribes were cut off from Jerusalem by Yeravam (Jeroboam), the first king of the northern Kingdom of Israel and it's the exact day that Haman's decree to wipe out the Jews in ancient Persia, was nullified. 

And the king's scribes were summoned at that time, in the third month-that is the month of Sivan-on the twenty-third day thereof, and it was written according to all that Mordecai commanded, to the Jews and to the satraps and the governors, and the princes of the provinces from Hodu to Cush, a hundred and twenty-seven provinces, every province according to its script and every nationality according to its tongue, and to the Jews according to their script and according to their tongue. (Esther 8:9)

23 Sivan is a day with tremendous spiritual power. On this day, we are encouraged to pray and ask God to annul any and all harsh decrees that exist against us.

According to Rabbi Alon Anava, there are a number of specific actions that we can take to change our mazal on this day. So if your life is absolutely perfect, you don't need to do a thing.

But if there are situations you'd like to change, here are some spiritual actions you can take before sunset TODAY that will allow you to put the power and spiritual energy of the day to work for you.

God knows, we need it.

So happy birthday to me. There is a Jewish tradition that we have a special power to bless others on our birthday. My blessing for all of us is that we rapidly see the demise of evil and disunity in the world and that we soon witness the coming of Moshiach ben David with our physical eyes.

Now I'm off to pray.

It's A Lot... And What To Do About It

Corona.

Vax/anti-vax.

Unstable non-existent Israeli government.

Meron.

4,300 rockets in 11 days.

Riots.

Spiraling anti-Semitism.

It's a lot.

If you find yourself glued to the news cycle, you can easily get sucked into the vortex. It's so easy to focus one's energy on a specific news story, following it closely and debating it obsessively.

A few months ago, I did exactly that with the vax/anti-vax issue, to the point that I was following the news on nine different groups and dealing with hundreds of rage-filled comments every time I posted a thought counter to the vax narrative. In the end, it became so toxic to my system that I left most of the groups, suspended my Facebook account and resigned from my career in journalism.

I decided to focus my attention on finishing my next book and on learning more Torah.

And that is where I have found the balm for my inflamed emotions.

In The Ishmaelite Exile by Rabbi Yechiel Weitzman (one of my favorite books of all time), I found this quote from the Chofetz Chaim.

"Before the coming of Moshiach, Hashem will act in a hurried manner so wondrous that even all who are wise of heart will be unable to fathom it. The troubles and persecutions [of the Jewish people] will follow each other so closely that there will be no space between them. Just as for an expectant woman who is about to give birth, the more intense her contractions and her pain, and this is her most reliable indication that the birth is nearing, so too, the wheels of the era will turn faster at the time of the birth pangs of Moshiach."

Just reading this quiets my breathing. It reminds me that we are in the process of geula. And the best way (maybe the only way) to get through this turmoil is to cling to Hashem.

I can't allow myself to get distracted by the news cycle. In fact, it makes sense to me that, at this point in history, we are supposed to subdue our reliance on anything that isn't Hashem, whether it's the media, the government, the police, the medical establishment or any other institution upon which we have heretofore relied. Breaking those dependencies reminds us that Ein Od Milvado - there is nothing but God.

Back in Adar, Rabbi Alon Anava offered some concrete suggestions for dealing with the chaos in which we find ourselves (and which has only intensified since March). I find these suggestions so powerful for righting my ship when I am about to capsize under the weight of the whole holy mess.

• Trust only the Master of the Universe. Know that Hashem is running the show.
• Don't believe in human actors. Don't put your trust in any human being.
• Don't live in fear.
• Help people. Do acts of kindness for others.
• Focus on learning the pnemius (hidden, mystical aspects) of Torah.

And whatever you do, don't obsess about the news. Most of it is wildly distorted anyway.

Fear only God.

That is the spiritual secret to getting through these troublesome times.

Jewelry Repulses Me

 

When I was a toddler, I had a kiddie-sized charm bracelet. A treasured possession, my mother kept it in a small cardboard jewelry box in a special drawer of her dresser. It rested on a layer of fluffy white cotton and was protected by a second layer above. On the rare occasions I was permitted to wear it, I squealed with toddler delight and pride.

That charm bracelet is the singular recollection I have of deriving pleasure from jewelry.

I have no conscious memory of the shift from toddler joy to total aversion to jewelry, but at some point in my childhood, it hit.

And it hit hard.

At 16, a family friend returned from vacation with a necklace as a gift for me. Without understanding why the thought of donning the necklace made me shiver with fear, I politely declined. My father, baffled by my refusal to graciously accept a gift from his friend, pushed and pushed until I ran to my room, crying copious tears of teen angst. Every one of us was embarrassed by the power of my seemingly irrational reaction to his gift, proffered with affection.

Months ago, I was sitting in my sister’s dining room. She and one of my adult daughters were sorting through bags of costume jewelry. In order to avoid looking at what they were doing, on a total lark, I picked up my phone and entered the search term “fear of jewelry”.

Bam! Kosmemophobia.

In that instance, I identified as a kosmemophobe. After decades of being physically disgusted by jewelry and assuming it was my own private weirdness, I discovered that my lifelong visceral aversion has a name and a small, internet-based fellowship.

During my first year of grad school, in a profoundly ironic act, I got engaged to a man whose parents owned an upscale jewelry store. During our engagement period, my future in-laws decided to liquidate their inventory and close the store. They needed extra sales help to work during the liquidation sale and my fiancé and I were conscripted.

For a period of months, several times a week, I stood behind the sales counter, forced to act as if my skin wasn’t actually crawling at the thought of touching the bracelets, diamond studs, rings and necklaces I was expected to sell. In retrospect, I don’t know how I got through it.

For reasons unrelated to my kosmemophobia, the marriage didn’t last. I knew it was definitively over the moment my ex-husband showed up for our first marital counseling session wearing jewelry.

For the past 24 years, I’ve been married to a rabbi, famous for his sense of humor, who had a jewelry saleswoman in his former congregation. One day, he visited her in her jewelry store on other business. Ever the saleswoman, she suggested that while he was there, he should look for a piece of jewelry to buy for me.

“My wife doesn’t really like jewelry,” my husband demurred.

“Haha Rabbi. You’re so funny!” she replied with total disbelief. Despite being in the jewelry business, she had never heard of kosmemophobia.

Though it’s categorized as a phobia, kosmemophobia isn’t actually a fear. It wouldn’t be accurate to say that I fear jewelry the way, for example, arachnaphobes fear spiders or those with claustrophobia fear being in a confined or crowded space.

It’s more like xylophobia, which can express itself as a revulsion at the thought of touching things made from wood. A xylophobe could never eat a popsicle, for example, because when the frozen confection is gone, they would experience anxiety at the thought of touching the remaining wooden stick with their tongue.

Kosmemophobia is more of a repugnant aversion than an actual fear.  It was challenging for me to pick an image for this post because I had force myself to look at pictures of jewelry.
 
As quirky personality traits go, kosmemophobia is a relatively tame one. Over the years, I’ve developed multiple means of subterfuge to avoid coming into contact with jewelry. At craft festivals, I avert my eyes when passing the displays of handmade jewelry. In malls, I walk swiftly past the jewelry stores. Online, I quickly scroll past images of jewelry that pop up.

Nevertheless, there are social consequences associated with being a kosmemophobe.

I feel anxious touching people who are wearing jewelry, especially shaking hands with someone who is wearing a dangly ring or has a thin chain hanging from their watchband. I’ve never been able to be in a romantic relationship with someone who wears jewelry. In that respect, kosmemophobes who date women have it much worse than I do.

I can’t admire other people’s jewelry or help them decide which pieces to buy or wear, which can seem rude. When my daughters were growing up, they knew not to come to me for help clasping a bracelet or taking off a necklace. I enlisted the help of a babysitter to remove their earrings because I was so grossed out by the thought of touching them.

If I’m in someone’s bathroom and spot discarded jewelry near the sink, my stomach turns. I'm grossed out by  even the sight of it.

The only pieces of jewelry I wear are a watch and a wedding ring. My wedding ring is a solid, chunky piece of gold which does not set off my kosmemophobic revulsion. And, because I don’t have doraphobia, which is a phobic aversion to fur or leather, a chunky watch with a leather band doesn’t cause me any anxiety at all.

It’s okay. You can laugh.

I know it sounds eccentric, but I promise that if you met me in a jewelry-free context, you would never guess that I have a pathological aversion to jewelry.

Chances are, even if you don’t experience a specific phobia yourself, you know someone who does. More than 100 phobias have been identified and some are even more specific than mine. Leukophobia, for example, is the fear of the color white and pteridophobia is a fear of ferns.

Overall, phobias are more common in women than in men and the US National Institute of Mental Health estimates that 8% of adults in the US wrestle with at least one phobia.

You’ve probably seen the meme that advises, “Be kind. Everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about.”

Kosmemophobia is one of mine.

Metamorphosis: The Great Transformation

Let's be real.

The entire world is upside down.

I'm not going to list all the problems, shocking events and assumptions of normality that are being challenged every day because A) you probably know them already and B) it can be depressing/anxiety-producing to look at the whole list at once.

What is clear is that something dramatic is going on. The very foundations on which we’ve built our lives are shaking. Social norms (and statues) are crashing.

Is there a person alive who isn’t impacted by the global uncertainties that are rocking the world right now?

I’ve experienced a whole range of emotions in reaction to this new reality. Boredom. Slothfulness. Depression, Grief. Irritation (mostly, but not exclusively, caused by social media). Shock (mostly, but not exclusively, caused by news reports). Frustration. Fear.

Life feels surreal.

I can’t stay in these negative places for a prolonged period without losing my equilibrium. So I’ve been trying to find ways to regain balance.

Here’s what I have so far.

Sometimes in nature, something has to deteriorate before it can grow. A seed decomposes in the ground before it sprouts. A caterpillar dissolves into caterpillar soup before it recreates itself as a butterfly.

Similarly, we are undergoing some kind of global metamorphosis. I feel, on a very deep level, that things are never going to “go back to normal.” Whatever is coming will look very different from that to which we had been accustomed.

We are on a new path.

Part of the way I’m coping is by turning inward. I’m trying to remember that God runs the world. It’s become ridiculously obvious that I have no control. I can’t make sense of anything of significance.

But I can still my racing thoughts.

I can spend less time reading and watching videos about the disquieting breakdown of what passed for society just four months ago. I can stop commenting on social media in a futile attempt to convince someone to change their mind about hot button issues.

I can focus on my breathing. I can remind myself that God is running the show. I can nestle in the knowledge that He has a plan and He is taking us somewhere. I can study more Torah. I can stay open to the something new that is being birthed.

These are the things on which I'm working now.

If you have your own spiritually-driven way to cope with the bewildering changes through which we are living, I would love to hear from you.

Let's strengthen one another.