Making Mikvah Meaningful

The Eden Center

Featuring: Dr. Naomi Marmon Grumet, Founder & Executive Director

Jewish identity is based on three foundations, according to Dr. Naomi Marmon Grumet, the Sabbath, the laws of kashrut and mikvah, ritual bath. In fact, our sages tell us that it is incumbent on a community to build a mikvah before building any other communal structure including a synagogue. They say that it is so important a community should sell a Torah scroll to acquire the funds for the construction of a mikvah. (Rabbi Naftali Tzvi Yehuda Berlin, Meshiv Dabar, 1:45 and  Rabbi Shneur Zalman Lesches. "understanding Mikvah"). This helps us to understand the importance our rabbis placed on the rituals and laws surrounding ritual immersion. If mikvah is of such importance, it must serve a sacred role to protect women both emotionally and physically. 

During her university studies, Naomi was interested in women’s connections to Judaism. She recognized that Shabbat lighting candles, baking challah and going to the mikvah are the three major mitzvot that are specifically incumbent on women.  Of those three, she know the least about the laws regarding mikvah and choose to study this mitzvah deeply. From her intense studies and numerous conversation, The Eden Center was born.

Their Mission
The Eden Center focuses on enabling all women to have a personally meaningful and welcoming experience in the mikveh, providing support and resources for crisis and lifecycle moments and transforming the mikveh into a vehicle to promote women’s emotional and physical health, intimacy and well-being.

Their Story
For millennia, the mikveh was the pivotal institution for Jewish women, and considered central to Jewish family continuity. It provided women with a sense of connection and time for introspection and spiritual intimacy. Today, however, mikveh has lost meaning for many women and has even become a source of discomfort and alienation. Even among traditional and religiously committed women, research shows that increasing numbers stop immersing after negative experiences.  The disrepair of many mikvaot in Israel sends the implicit message that Jewish women are not valued. Moreover, many non-religious women, who encounter the mikveh as a state-ordained marriage requirement, become hostile toward Judaism and religious authority as a result of their experience. This makes Eden’s mission to make mikveh welcoming and relevant for modern women all the more imperative. The Eden Center imagines the mikveh as a focal point for addressing a variety of dynamics related to the Jewish woman and family, including but not limited to: 

• Promoting tolerance and inclusiveness;
• Promoting women’s mental and physical health;
• Using the mikveh as a tool that connects women to sources of support within the community
• Empowering women and enabling meaningful religious, spiritual and personal experiences;
• Increasing public awareness of issues of women’s health and women’s well-being, including encouraging the intimate female voice in the context of marital relationships;
• Allowing all wome