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Patheos Featured Writers

Anna Batler

Contributor

Anna Batler is a writer and an attorney based out of Washington, D.C. She writes about faith, feminism, spirituality, and religious identity at Sotah.net

After moving to New Jersey from Azerbaijan, Anna attended an Orthodox Jewish parochial school that first inspired her faith while simultaneously prohibiting her from running for student body president because she was not observant. She became an Orthodox Jew when she started attending a public high school and was a regular at religious outreach events. Today, she no longer affiliates with a specific Jewish movement - though she is involved in a local, lay led, egalitarian community.

After college, Anna completed a one year fellowship at Drisha Institute, in New York, where she studied biblical texts and Talmudic law. She has been a Jewish educator at various schools in New Jersey and was a past programming co-chair at LimmudNY.

Anna conducted ethnographic research studying the lives of traditionally religious Christian, Muslim, and Jewish women at Rutgers University. In the process of getting to know the women, Anna attended evangelical Christian rock concerts, Islamic campus festivals, and classes on menstruation purity laws.

Anna holds a B.A. in English from Rutgers College and a J.D. with honors from The George Washington University Law School.

Works by Anna Batler

Hillel vs. History at Chanukah

Anna Batler | December 21, 2011

The real miracle of the Chanukah story is our willful forgetting of the historic......

A Concubine on the Fringes

Anna Batler | December 07, 2011

The Torah's sexual ethic emerges in the narratives of Dina and Bilhah. Above all else is......

God Is Not the God I Knew

Anna Batler | December 01, 2011

Jacob discovers that his God had been too small, that his God was a God without borders....

A Thanksgiving Drash

Anna Batler | November 23, 2011

This Thanksgiving, may we dream not about first class citizenship for some, but about......

The Free Rebecca

Anna Batler | November 17, 2011

In this archetypal narrative, we see the myth of the powerful woman and the whipped man....

Telling Abraham's Story for Him -- and for Us

Anna Batler | November 01, 2011

Did God choose Abraham, or did Abraham choose God?...

Toying with Genocide

Anna Batler | October 27, 2011

The image of a child playing with Noah's Ark ought to be jarring. Why isn't it?...

The Genesis of Economic, Cultural, and Social Change

Anna Batler | October 18, 2011

Discomfort and ambiguity toward economic, social, and technological change is, perhaps,......

Dwelling in the Sukkah

Anna Batler | October 09, 2011

In the Sukkah the problem of the human gaze is resolved through the mutuality of simple......

You Say You Want a Revolution?

Anna Batler | September 27, 2011

Those of us seeking revolution and dissent can find a model in Hannah's famous prayer......

God, I Am Sorry You Feel That Way

Anna Batler | September 20, 2011

In approaching Rosh Hashanah and repentance, we must turn to the Torah and reconsider......

Afraid of the Dark? Or of Being Seen?

Anna Batler | September 13, 2011

What Michel Foucault's panopticon has to do with the Torah....

Dealing with Deuteronomy

Anna Batler | August 30, 2011

The dark and difficult Deuteronomy is the last book of the Torah, but it is not......

Destroying Idolaters, Destroying Ourselves

Anna Batler | August 23, 2011

Idol worship and human sacrifice are closer to the heart of the Torah than we might......

Not by Bread Alone: From God's Might to Human Want

Anna Batler | August 16, 2011

How Moses' speech in Deuteronomy shifts our attention between God's might and human......

Judaism's Fighting Words

Anna Batler | August 12, 2011

One Sh'ma, two translations: How should monotheism be expressed? ...

The Unreliable Narrator in the Torah

Anna Batler | August 02, 2011

When we read Deuteronomy, are we listening to Moses or God?...

How the Torah Anticipates Social Change

Anna Batler | July 26, 2011

Some ancient laws belong to an ancient time....

God Will Forgive Her

Anna Batler | July 18, 2011

The Torah helps us forgive ourselves for standing between our dreams and their......

Inheriting Justice

Anna Batler | July 13, 2011

How to both honor and bypass the ancient law....

Summer Camp Zealotry

Anna Batler | July 06, 2011

Does the Balak portion bear witness to a God who was wrong?...

Miriam, the Red Heifer

Anna Batler | June 28, 2011

I return to Miriam's proverbial ashes to exhume a feminist voice in our tradition even......

What If Korach Was a Woman?

Anna Batler | June 21, 2011

I imagine a woman, gathering her sisters in rebellion and going to the men in her......

The Stoning of the Wood Gatherer

Anna Batler | June 14, 2011

When the tradition finds itself facing a savage God, the tradition transforms the......

Outlaw Prophets: Eldad, Medad, and Miriam

Anna Batler | June 07, 2011

The text affirms that even before God we are not all equal, and yet the hint of an......

The Sotah Ritual: A Defense of Magical Thinking

Anna Batler | May 31, 2011

It is easy to forget that the ancients believed in magic. When the magic is abandoned......

On Abandoning Flags to the Angels

Anna Batler | May 24, 2011

I understand the desire to surrender to the flags, to be like angels, forever consumed......

Jainist Worship in D.C.: Three Jewels and Parental Hopes

Anna Batler | March 07, 2011

The children leave to study and to grow, but what will they be like upon returning is......

Tikkun Leil Shabbat

Anna Batler | February 03, 2011

Be the change you wish to see in your potluck community....

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