Conservative Judaism Admits Female Cantors

After several frustrating years of trying to break the male-only barrier, 14 women were inducted into Conservative Judaism’s Cantors Assembly during the international body’s annual convention this week in Los Angeles.

Conservative Judaism, which has often taken middle positions between liberal Reform Jews and the strictly conservative Orthodox, ordained its first woman rabbi in 1985. Reform Judaism already had women cantors and rabbis; Orthodoxy has remained solidly against any change.

Votes were repeatedly taken to admit women to the Cantors Assembly, but many members felt that Jewish law prohibited female cantors. A two-thirds majority vote was required.

Nor was the Cantors Assembly persuaded after the Jewish Theological Seminary, an arm of Conservative Judaism, decided to grant hazzan (cantor) diplomas to two women in 1987.

Last August, the executive council of the 44-year-old Cantors Assembly decided that its bylaws permitted it to make the decision. The council voted 29 to 1 to admit women cantors as full-fledged members, starting with the 1991 convention.

Among the women inducted were Marla Barugel of Rumson, N.J., a longtime advocate of dropping the ban against women, and Alisa Pomerantz Boro of Congregation Tifereth Israel in San Diego, the only Southern Californian. Eighteen male cantors were also inducted.