Patience is an important virtue. It’s important of course interpersonally with one’s spouse or child one’s students and friends and everyone else. And — perhaps this one is the hardest of all — with oneself.
But it can also be an important tool to employ in addressing those who pose spiritual threats. Sometimes the best strategy is to allow such people to drop the pose and reveal who they really are and what they actually seek to do.
This seems to be what has happened with the Women of the Wall (WOW) whose chairlady Anat Hoffman has finally admitted that much of WOW’s agenda had nothing to do with prayer at the Kosel and everything to do with seeking to subvert Orthodox Judaism. As Haaretz reported Hoffman’s conditional agreement to move her group’s services to the Robinson’s Arch site was based on the realization that “changing the mindset of Orthodox Jews was not possible. ‘Women of the Wall is the right group for bringing about change in Israel but not the right group for bringing about change in the Orthodox world ’ she said.”
To her credit Ms. Hoffman also stated that “[o]ur Haredi sisters also have rights and we saw last Rosh Chodesh that they really don’t want — maybe not all of them but many of them — do not want to see a woman in a tallit and tefillin and they also have rights.” She appears to have come around to agree that the issue of WOW’s presence at the Wall ultimately comes down to one thing as discussed in this space some months ago:
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