The Hebrew Midwives of Exodus—and Jewish History

The first rebellion in the book of Exodus is staged by the midwives Shifra and Puah. They alone subvert Pharaoh’s demand to kill each male newborn as it emerges from its mother’s womb: “The midwives, fearing God, did not do as the King of Egypt had told them.” (Exodus 1:17)

Postbiblical Jewish law presupposed that babies would be delivered by midwives, and proceeded to ask questions like “can a midwife travel on Shabbat to assist in a gentile birth?” and “can a Jewish woman call upon the assistance of a gentile midwife?” The Talmud even raises questions that seem a bit less to the point, like “may a midwife light a lamp during Shabbat day to settle the nerves of a blind laboring woman, even if the midwife herself can see perfectly well in the daylight?” (Shabbat 128b) However this is not such a trivial question, since in this hypothetical case there is, presumably, no rabbi in the room to decide whether the laboring woman is sufficiently distressed or will be sufficiently soothed by breaking Shabbat. It is up to the midwife to decide.

An important mishnah in tractate Ohalot implicitly recognizes a much more radical fact: Midwives must be empowered to make life-or-death halachic judgments and decisions. If a choice must be made between the fetus and the mother, the mishnah says, “they cut up the child in her womb and bring it forth limb by limb”—the mother’s life takes priority. Presumably, no rabbis are in the room when this decision must be made, and if no action is taken both mother and child will die. So, who decides it is time to cut up the fetus? The Mishnah and Talmud do not say, but in the silence, we are left to assume: Shifra and Puah’s successor, the Jewish midwife.

Only in modern times does one find rabbis, such as Rabbi Moshe Feinstein, arguing about whether women can see male obstetricians and gynecologists; the idea was previously inconceivable.

I had assumed the decision-making power of midwives was under-discussed in halachic texts because their rabbinic authors were hesitant to ascribe such agency and responsibility to women. Then I happened upon an article by Jordan Katz, a historian at UMass Amherst. In “Jewish Midwives, Wise Women, and the Construction of Medical-Halakhic Expertise in the Eighteenth Century,” Katz suggests an intriguing alternative: perhaps the powerful medical and legal roles of midwives was such an obvious social fact that only moderns like us would need it spelled out.

Katz’s article begins with an astonishing responsum by Rabbi Joseph Steinhardt, published in his 1773 collection Zikhron Yosef. A questioner from Breslau asked how a woman with a uterine prolapse who had to use a pessary should manage the laws of Niddah during her menstrual cycle. Rabbi Steinhardt responded that he didn’t know, so he asked the local “wise women,” who gave him detailed instructions of what to do. He relayed them verbatim, despite the fact that they were developed by local midwives rather than rabbis.

In another collection of responsa from the late 1700s, Rabbi Aaron Aurich of Friesland wrote to Rabbi Ephraim Heksher in Altona that, because of his diminishing eyesight, he had consulted local female experts on questions of niddah.

Katz also cites a number of cases where midwives are trusted for their medical advice or for sensitive information learned from birthing mothers (particularly about the baby’s paternity), but to me, the above two cases are the most fascinating.

The roles women are described as playing in these responsa are easily imaginable today, at least in parts of the halachically observant world. Many Orthodox communities employ yo’atzot halacha, women who are trained and certified as experts in these areas of Jewish law. But it is astonishing to learn that this was more or less also the case in the 1700s. These learned women were simply called “wise women” or “midwives” instead of yo’atzot, rabbaniyot or even rabbis.

As in Egypt, those midwives took the law into their own hands, because that was their job, and their communities needed them.