Jewish Pregnancy Customs

[Yael]

Hi lrf:

First of all I would like to welcome you to Bellybelly – I can see that you have just joined! I would just like to point out that this response is coming from me not as a moderator but as an orthodox woman.

I would like to say that from a traditional point of view I also believe you should always respect other people’s choices in regards to whatever religion, level of observance or religious standpoint they are coming from. This is one of the most basic fundamentals of Orthodox Judaism. I also agree that Jewish customs and beliefs are complex and that there is definitely not one homogenous group – Judaism is most definitely heterogeneous in nature – both in practice and beliefs! And of course family ties are paramount; you will see that the concept of family is central in many areas of Jewish practise (e.g. the Passover seder, traditional Sabbath meals etc).

However, to keep in line with this particular thread, and not to diverge into the differences between Conservative and Orthodox Judaism, I would like to address some specific points. In terms of anecdotal evidence from elderly women about their view on traditional pregnancy customs my experiences have been quite different. It is widely practiced within my community – not just here in Australia but right around the world – that young orthodox men and women who are engaged and are about to be married receive some instruction about the laws of family purity and various aspects of family life - such as various customs during pregnancy. Traditionally this instruction tends to be taught by the individual’s parents – the girl from her mother, and the boy from his father. Therefore the various customs that I have mentioned are generally taught from the older generation to the younger generation – and I personally know many elderly women who remain true to these customs.

I would say that many individuals right across the age spectrum choose to become either more or less observant everyday – so I guess it just depends on who you mix with. In fact it has been fairly well documented that in recent decades that more and more people who have in the past been connected to less orthodox communities are returning to orthodoxy in great numbers. This group has been named as part of the ‘ba’al teshuvah’ movement. How these particular people act in their old age remains to be seen. However, there seems to be little doubt that as these people’s children begin to get married they are teaching them the more orthodox approach to family life, including pregnancy.

Also, historically speaking one would need to say that given the vibrancy of the orthodox community throughout the last couple of millennia, the vast majority of the elderly do not give up their orthodox beliefs that easily. There will always be small numbers (or around the time of the enlightenment, perhaps these numbers were slightly higher), however, I don’t think this would be representative of the community at large.

Unfortunately, as you said

“Just because there is a biblical law or some custom of unknown origin that was appropriate in the past”

will have to remain a point of disagreement. Obviously, as an Orthodox person I believe these customs do have known and genuine origins, and equally obvious is the fact that I would believe the bible is divine in origin. However, this is a matter of my personal beliefs and research, and I would encourage everyone to do their own research and develop their own beliefs in line with what is best for you and your families.


I believe this thread was started to discover what is the traditional Jewish way to act during pregnancy to which I responded, and I’m sorry that I haven’t answered everyone’s questions so far – I’m still intending to, its just things are a little hectic for me at the moment!

I never intended to preach to anyone that this was the one and only way to act during pregnancy, and I apologise if this was the way it was taken. I welcome anyone else’s input into what are the different Jewish customs during pregnancy. I have only answered from my personal experience – that being of Jewish customs within the (ultra) orthodox Eastern European perspective (and there are many other ultra orthodox groups from Eastern Europe, who would have slightly different customs, but for the most part they would be very similar).