April 20th, The Day We Witnessed History Being Made.

This morning stared off with many sighs, yawns, and unhappy faces, being as we were woken up at 5:30 AM to go to the Kotel to celebrate Rosh Hodesh with the Women of the Wall. I'll admit, for the first 30 minutes we were there, I was pretty bored. I'm a reform jew, and all of these women were fairly conservative, singing in many tunes that I didn't recognize. My friends and I sat down against the back wall for a few minutes, resting, and taking everything in. That's when we noticed a group of men from above spitting water at us. We got up to see what the commotion was about, and we were told that the full-sized Torah from the men's side was brought over to the women's side. This was a huge deal, as it was the first time that this has ever happened before. We all stood in awe, witnessing the history that was being made. I was so shocked that all of this was done so calmly, considering the division and conflict at the Western Wall. All of a sudden, Orthodox men began to push over to the Women's side, trying to steal the Torah back. The police came, and they were on OUR side, which felt safe and empowering. Today, the Women of the Wall were able to read an entire Torah service out of the full sized Torah. This is the type of thing that you hear about in the news, but I can't explain how special and empowering it was to be able to be a part of it.