Women and Tefilla: Obligation or Benevolence?

Tefilla as we know of it today was instituted by a woman named Chana, wife of Elkanah, who pleaded with Hashem with such fervor that onlookers thought she was crazy¹. Since then we’ve seen over and over how women have changed the world through their words and prayers. It’s a given that women have a unique relationship with davening. Yet women are dispensed from serving as members of a minyan nor are they obligated to participate in most time-bound mitzvot. So to what extent are women obligated in tefilla, if any? And what is the role of formal and informal tefilla?

According to the Rambam, daily tefilla is a Torah obligation which is fulfilled through a spoken articulation of praise, request, and gratitude². The Torah commands us to “serve Hashem your G-d” which the Rambam tells us requires serving from the heart through prayer³. When Chazal formalized tefilla into three separate textual bodies coinciding with the daily sacrifices, they became time-bound mitzvot, from which women are generally exempt. In this way, we see the division of men’s tefillah and women’s tefillah, with the former taking place in a public forum. Men are required to form a minyan three times a day, while women can join but have no obligation to do so. Men can fulfill certain brachot and prayers that are not allowed otherwise, while women can pray personally and enjoy a direct line to Hashem. This is the ideal division of labor.

Although it is not mandatory for women to participate in public prayer, the aforementioned obligation to serve Hashem from the heart is not bound by time or social participation, and the Rambam rules that this obligates women in tefilla too. Chazal elaborate that “tefilla is the petition for mercy,” which women need just as much as men. In practice, this means that women are generally obligated to pray in both the Shacharit and Mincha services, albeit not necessarily with a minyan. 

The Gemara investigates this division of labor by looking at the source of the minyan itself, tracing its roots to the congregation of spies: 

Here, with regard to the sanctification of God’s name, it is written: “And I shall be sanctified among the children of Israel,” and there, with regard to Korach, it is written: “Separate yourselves from among this congregation” (Numbers 16:21). The meaning of the word “congregation” written with regard to Korach is derived by means of a verbal analogy to the word “congregation” written with regard to the spies sent out by Moses to scout the land: “How long shall I bear with this evil congregation” (Numbers 14:27). Just as there, the congregation of spies numbered ten, and all were Jews, so too here, concerning the sanctification of God, there must be ten, all of them being Jews⁴.

Thus, the requirement to pray in a minyan is itself a tikkun–a reparation–for the sins of Korach and of the spies, each of which involved ten men. These were congregations of men who publicly desecrated the Holy Name. Notably, however, women did not participate in either of these sins. They remained tzniut and out of the public eye. Because women did not sin, and thus have no reparations to make, Chazal did not see fit to include women in the rabbinic obligation of praying with a minyan or at fixed times. 

Although it is not mandatory for women to participate in public prayer, the aforementioned obligation to serve Hashem from the heart is not bound by time or social participation, and the Rambam rules that this obligates women in tefilla too⁵. Chazal elaborate that “tefilla is the petition for mercy,” which women need just as much as men⁶. In practice, this means that women are generally obligated to pray in both the Shacharit and Mincha services, albeit not necessarily with a minyan. 

There is another basis for exempting women from engaging in formal tefilla every day–the raising of children. The labor of “mother” and “wife” is so essential that it presupposes the feminine labor of tefilla. In particular, Chazal determined that a woman who is involved in the raising of children or tending to her family gains the status of terudot, or “occupied”⁷. Chazal were sensitive to the fact that the mother bears most of the burden in child-rearing. Whether it is in pregnancy, labor, nursing, or simply the fact that young children often naturally gravitate to their mothers even in households where gender roles are otherwise reversed⁸, a mother’s burden in this area tends to be greater than that of a father’s.

On this basis, halachic authorities consider women exempt from the framework of formal davening and instead rule that she is required to fulfill the Rambam’s concept of tefillah through a spoken expression of praise, request, and gratitude. Though Chazal encourage such occupied women to daven the Amidah and even advocate that husbands support their wives’ efforts to daven, they still rule that a woman who has children does not need to daven formally if she feels that she cannot⁹. 

This resolves an existing tension between what Halacha rules and what women have practiced over the centuries. Rabbi Nosson Scherman notes in his introduction to the Siddur Ohel Sarah that many of the rebbetzins of the great rabbis who ruled that women are obligated in davening did not themselves daven, especially when their children were very young¹⁰. He recounts a tale of Rabbi Yaakov Kamanetsky zt”l when asked about his Rebbetzin’s davening:

The Rosh Yeshivah said, “I’ll tell you what my rebbetzin used to daven when she was occupied with raising a young family. She recited Birchot HaShachar, the Morning Blessings.”

The visitor was surprised. “What about Shemonah Esrei? The Shema? 

Reb Yaakov recited a few lines at the end of the Morning Blessings. … May it Be your Will … that you accustom us to [study] Your Torah and attach us to Your commandments. Do not bring us into the power of error.” The Rosh Yeshivah smiled. “It’s a beautiful tefilla, no?”¹¹

The ideal labor of women’s tefillah comes secondary to the labor of women in the home. Both forms of labor are an external expression of an internal connection, the gift of women to pull down sparks of kedusha and build them into reality. As such, tefillah might be mandatory for women, but a woman’s priorities are “assigned by her Creator who ordained that she maintain the Torah atmosphere of her home.”¹²

1. 1 Shmuel 13 ↩︎
2. RamBam, Sefer HaMitzvot, Positive Commandments, Mitzvah 5  ↩︎
3. RamBam, Mishneh Torah, Hilchos Tefillah 1:1 ↩︎
4. Talmud Bavli, Megillah 23b, Sanhedrin 74b ↩︎
5. RamBam, Sefer HaMitzvot, Positive Commandments, Mitzvah 5  ↩︎
6. Magen Avraham 106:2 ↩︎
7. Menachem Nissel, Rigshei Lev, 82 ↩︎
8. See, Immermann, P. et al. (2022) Still mother after all these years: Infants still prefer mothers over fathers (if they have the choice), Soc. Sci. 2022, 11(2), 51, https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci11020051  ↩︎
9. Menachem Nissel, Rigshei Lev, 82 ↩︎
10. Nosson Scherman, Siddur Ohel Sarah xxx, Artscroll Mesorah Publishing, 2019 ↩︎
11. Nosson Scherman, Siddur Ohel Sarah xxx, Artscroll Mesorah Publishing, 2019 ↩︎
12. Nosson Scherman, Siddur Ohel Sarah xxx, Artscroll Mesorah Publishing, 2019 ↩︎