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“I am not a rebellious girl by nature,” said Devorah Silberstein. “I’m doing the most traditional thing a woman can do: I’m trying to be more frum.” And yet, she’s doing something most ultra-Orthodox women have not: advanced Talmud study. Silberstein, 22, is part of a growing movement of women in Haredi communities who are confronting women’s illiteracy about fundamental Jewish texts and the gendered inequality in serious text-based learning opportunities, specifically of Talmud. These ultra-Orthodox women are seeking to overhaul the average Haredi girl’s education, with its steady diet of biblical subjects, but very little study, if any, of Gemara or Mishna, the two sets of writings that constitute the Talmud. Unlike the boys’ yeshiva school system, which is founded on intimate study of Talmud, female Haredi education entirely excludes it. “People say that women don’t need it,” said Silberstein. “But it’s a huge part of my Judaism, and you can so tangibly see the lack when you look at the frum [religious] community. You see the hole in our education, because we don’t teach women Halacha [Jewish law] from the sources.”

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