Jen Taylor Friedman
Tefillin Barbie
USA, 2006
Painted PVC, synthetic fibres, cotton
Museum Collection
Must Know
The creator of the Tefillin Barbie is Jen Taylor Friedman, a soferet (that is Jewish ritual scribe) and the first woman ever to have completed a Torah scroll. The creator says that the connection between the Barbie and the tefillin started as a joke but quickly got out of control. A Barbie doll with a long skirt ignited the idea, as it reminded her of the cloths her friends from the yeshiva used to wear, most of whom used to put on tefillin or ran away and struggled to do so. It inspired her to make a tallit and a tefillin to the Barbie, and then she took a picture of it and posted it on her Facebook page. To her surprise, they went viral. The combination of the Barbie doll, that is a feminine American symbol, and the tefillin, that is masculine Jewish-religious sacred object, provoked reactions among many people, both for the better and for the worse. Especially because according to Orthodox Judaism, women are exempt from the mitzvah of putting on the tefillin.
More Info
Women in liberal communities, who put on tefillin, urged that the Tefillin Barbie is as an artistic expression, but also urged to give away tefillins to women in need as a mitzvah gemilut hasadim (that it “the giving of loving-kindness”). Many Jewish communities give away tefillins only to men who cannot afford them, but usually, there is no such service for women. Friedman started the initiative to collect and repair old tefillin and lend them to women who needed them but could not afford them.
