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 IX

WOMEN'S DISABILITIES

Among the disabilities of the women of Israel nothing is more remarkable than the position they occupied in the public services of the congregation. The Inner Court of the Temple, within which the whole of the official worship was celebrated was divided by a wall into two divisions—a Western and an Eastern. The latter (the Eastern)—the more remote from the Temple proper—was called "the Court of the Women," not however because none but women were admitted to it, but because women as well as men were allowed to enter it.

The Western division was reserved exclusively for men; in this division stood the Temple proper, including the Holy Place and the Holy of Holies.

In front of the Temple, to the West, stood the great altar of burnt-offering, at which, except in the matter of incense-burning, every act of sacrifice had to be performed. In this Western division of the Inner Court the victims were slaughtered. The Temple itself with the great altar of burnt-offering was again surrounded by an enclosure, within which as a rule none but priests might enter. This enclosure was sometimes called the Court of the Priests.

The men of Israel, however, being admitted into the Western division of the Inner Court, were spectators of and so assisted at the sacrifices offered on the great altar, from which they were only separated by the enclosure—into which, however, in certain circumstances, they were admitted.

But the women were never allowed to enter the Western division of the Inner Court—never might pass the wall of separation—never as it were assist at the sacrifices and the solemn ritual of the great altar which stood at the Western entrance of the Temple.