Essays & Shiurim

SVARA essay by R’ Becky Silverstein & Laynie Soloman | February, 2022

“For centuries, dayanim, judges, have not seen us. So often, Jewish communities are asking questions about trans people and trans bodies, and our cisgender comrades fail to fully “see” us, to share our assumptions, to acknowledge our dynamic and powerful experiences, to learn from the ways we inhabit our bodies. In this frame, judges cannot offer rulings about that which they cannot understand, places in which their ‘svara’ is not attuned.“


SVARA essay by R’ Becky Silverstein | April, 2022

“We know that queer and trans Jews have been adapting and creating ways of uplifting the holiness in our lives since the beginning of time. We see the Trans Halakha Project as an opportunity to respond to the challenge of puk hazi: “go out and see”. This aspect of our work, Minhag and Ma’aseh, is about both bringing together existing blessings and rituals that already support trans Jews in embodying Torah, and seeding the work of ritual creation for trans Jews so that when others go out and see, there is more to find.”

Evolve: Groundbreaking Jewish Conversations article by R’ Xava De Cordova | August, 2023

“The power of trans halakhah is that we are emboldened to claim the same tools of this construction for ourselves. Halakhah is and has always been a tool of self-creation. The crux of my argument about niddah, which this and many other texts I’ve included in my teshuvah show us, is that this social construction is fundamental to the halakhah. This means it is not that if someone bleeds, then they are subject to these laws. Rather, if someone is a woman (if we agree with Maimonides), then they are always going through cycles of niddah regardless of the presence or absence of blood. The question remains how to determine when that niddah potential might be actualized in the case of a trans woman, but the fact of her participation in the rhythm of niddah is undeniable.”

Evolve: Groundbreaking Jewish Conversations article by Laynie Soloman | July, 2023

“Euphoric halakhah is a halakhah that moves, that flows, that is people-driven, that takes seriously the “friendly” principles that have given it shape for thousands of years and that responds to the deeply human needs of all of us — our bodies, our intuitions, the mess and the delight of being human together. I want to experience — and I want us all to experience — halakhah that finds the places where we fit, where we learn and feel something in our tradition that clicks, that feels blissful and powerful and holy and good. We do not need to be solved. We need to be free.”

SVARA essay by Alyx Bernstein | February, 2023

“But as a trans Jew who cares very deeply about Jewish practice, this verse feels especially challenging. When I first came out as trans, I didn’t have any texts, any elders, any family to guide me. I had no one to ask. I was fortunate enough to find those things as I grew, particularly through the Keshet Shabbatonim, but being in any trans Jewish space is a constant barrage of, ‘how do I make Jewish ritual and halakhah work for me?’ How do I find the communities, the practices, the texts, the wisdom, to bring my whole self into Judaism and halakhic practice? There are Facebook threads and Google docs, oral answers repeated like broken telephones, and individually-created rituals kept in small communities.”

SVARA essay by R’ Becky Silverstein | June, 2023

“As I watch this body of work grow and evolve, shift and flow, I am reminded of how vibrant and alive it is. I am certain that this assertion of a halakha that reflects the joy and depths of being trans is a part of what Torah and Judaism need to truly reach their potential as the pieces of our living tradition. The deepening, the revisions, the edits, and the adjustments of this body of work inspire me to reflect a little bit more deeply on each of the emotions I shared above. Love, awe, holiness, and wholeness. Ahava. Yirah. Kedusha. Shleimut.”

SVARA essay by R’ Becky Silverstein | April, 2021

“Reading these project objectives I am overwhelmed by the possibility of what might emerge from this work. I am ready to dig in to the work of creating law that addresses trans experience authentically and without reservation with trans Jews from all over the world. I can feel the impact of saying to other trans Jews that not only do they matter but that their experience will now be woven into our Jewish tradition. I know that this work can save lives. I can barely glimpse what we might offer the halakhic project in new understandings of obligation, consent, and who knows what else. I can hear Laynie telling me that the Jewish tradition will never be the same. Most of the time I believe that that is a good thing.“

SVARA essay by Laynie Soloman | March, 2023

“The Talmud’s pages are filled with sages who find themselves equally precedented and unprecedented. Like us, they sit in the holy and messy tension between chutzpah and humility. Like them, we have to teach, because so many of the people who are teaching now do not know. Cisgender halakhic decisors and teachers are ruling about us without the proper learning, and it has put us in danger. In the US and globally, legislators are ruling about us without the proper learning, and it has put us in danger.”

“Trans halakhah encompasses every beautiful thing that can happen when the Jewish legal process unfolds with the values and wisdom of trans people at its heart.”

R’ Xava De Cordova, “Are Trans Women Obligated in Niddah? (Jewish Menstrual Law): Embracing Halakhah That Was Not Addressed to You”

Shiurim

A Day of Learning with the Trans Halakha Project: a discussion with the trans and non-binary authors of new teshuvot, blessings, and rituals (May, 2023)

Compiling the Next Trans Codex: a shiur series by Shel Maala and the Trans Halakha Project (Fall, 2023)

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