ABSTRACT
Whether as exemption or prohibition, a reading of the few canonical texts yields a clear legal result: women should not learn Torah. What little they do learn is not the exhaustive learning in response to the commandment to learn Torah, but the minimum needed to perform in traditional gender roles. Beginning in the nineteenth century, however, the changing face of Jewish communities bears new features of secularism, nationalism, and assimilation. Intentionally or not, many of these options were introduced through educational systems granting access to Jews. Women who learned foreign languages introduced secular literature to their brothers who studied in the yeshiva. They were able to work in non-Jewish institutions and enter a wider, non-Jewish social circle. Modern governments and Jewish organizations following the Enlightenment ideal of universal education offered opportunities for women. Yet the rabbinical establishment, seeing such change as antithetical to traditional Jewish life, was slow to act.
