Free Song of the Magdalene by Donna Jo Napoli

The stone steps of the house of prayer were smooth with wear. Their steepness scooped in the middle from all the passing feet. I asked for help and two women I could not identify behind their veils worked with me to carry Abraham up and in. We took our place at the side. Abraham sat on the floor, propped against the wall.
    The people came in slowly. Some of them glanced at us and nodded. Others glanced and quickly looked away.
    The service began. The men prayed aloud. The women remained silent, their eyes lowered. Istayed very still, as well. I listened closely to the words. Prayer after prayer, each one strong and glowing. I wanted to memorize every word:
    Blessed be Thou, O Lord our God, King of the Universe. . .
    I was hot with the joy of being a Jew, a child of the King of the Universe. I closed my eyes in reverence. The prayer went on:
    who has not made me a Gentile . . .
    and, yes, I was grateful I was not born pagan,
    who has not made me a slave . . .
    and, yes, I was grateful I had not lived centuries ago when Israel suffered under the hands of the Egyptians,
    who has not made me a woman.
    My eyes flew open. Surely the men had made a terrible mistake. Everyone would be demandingthey start this prayer over. I looked around. But no one seemed upset. I turned to Abraham. He watched me, his eyes alert, as though he, too, expected something to happen.
    The prayers went on. Men’s voices in unison, but the words blended for me now, like the distant roll of thunder preceding the rains that overflowed the Sea of Galilee in early spring and again in fall.
    And then the women were reciting their own prayers, and I wasn’t even listening to them. I couldn’t hear anything outside my own head.
    The Creator had made me a woman. Should I be sad? Were all these women sad? Did they know something I didn’t know? Something that every mother taught her daughter but that my mother had overlooked telling me? Or perhaps I’d been too young when Mother died for her to tell me. And I wasn’t Hannah’s daughter, after all. It wasn’t her duty to tell me.
    The men had thanked the Creator for not making them women. Their words echoed in my head.
    These were the words of the prayer service. Holy words. I should have asked Abraham toteach me as much from the scriptures as he was willing. I shouldn’t have insisted on learning only the songs. Did the Torah explain why men should be grateful they weren’t women? But, surely, I could figure out the answer myself, even without the help of a mother.
    Women had the joy of raising children, but they also had uncleanliness every month when their blood came and they had the pain of childbirth. That must have been what the men were grateful for — that they would have no blood, no pain. Yes, it was right. The Creator made men and the Creator made women, and we all owed gratitude for the way we’d been made. A woman should be as grateful she hadn’t been made a man as a man was grateful he hadn’t been made a woman. For a man could never know the pleasures of motherhood. And while I, too, would never know the pleasures of motherhood, it was by my own choice. The Creator had granted me the power to give birth. I should be grateful for that gift. And for the gift of my wise father and gentle Hannah and mentor Abraham.
    Now I was able to listen again. The Levites’voices filled the air. They sang of clapping hands and triumphant shouts in praise of the King of the earth. They sang of mercy and blessings and fear. And then, oh truly merciful Lord, they sang the beautiful songs of love. It was so unlikely after their first songs. As unlikely as Mother’s insistence on love. The men sang the fourth canticle, the canticle I thought of as the canticle of the fawns, that canticle I first talked about with Father, my favorite of all canticles. I concentrated. And, yes, finally, I understood the love in this canticle not just as