“It’s the Taj Mahal of mikvahs,” says Pat Bergman, the attendant at the only other South Bay mikvah, in San Jose. “Their dressing room is as big as our whole mikvah. Ours is a bare-bones kind of place — we call ours ‘Cinderella’s maid’s mikvah.'”
About 60 to 70 women now use the San Jose ritual bath; Bergman expects a third of them as well as newcomers will find the “fancy-shmancy” Palo Alto location more convenient and enticing.
About 250 people attended the mikvah’s grand opening this spring.
“People are walking in and saying they’ve never seen anything like it before,” says Rabbi Yosef Levin of Chabad of Greater South Bay, who led the effort to build the new mikvah, which is open to the Jewish community at large. “Perhaps some who aren’t so sure will be encouraged to use it.”
The mikvah is used primarily by Orthodox women, in a ritual seven days after the end of their menstrual periods, marking a return to conjugal relations, according to the laws of family purity (tacharat hamishpachah). In addition, brides traditionally visit the mikvah before their weddings. Some men use the mikvah before holidays like Yom Kippur, some before Shabbat, and Chassidic men use it daily before prayer. According to the Web site Mikvah.org new converts to Judaism and new dishes also get a dunking.
More recently, Jewish women of other movements have been taking the plunge, and several mikvaot that are not Orthodox-affiliated have opened across the country. While early feminists decried the whole concept, feeling that it labeled women as impure during the menstrual cycle, a more recent interpretation of the mikvah is that it empowers women.
“A lot of literature from modern Jewish feminists say that the laws really give women control over her own body,” says Sheri Robbins, who belongs to the Conservative Congregation Kol Emeth in Palo Alto and contributed to the building of the mikvah. “It has become a much more popular tradition among non-Orthodox women, and I’m very happy that it is here for the community.”
The center is planning a series of programs and speakers to introduce the mikvah to newcomers. For women, the suggested donation is $25 per visit; an annual membership is $250. The private appointments take place in the evening, and only the female attendant knows who is scheduled to come in. The mikvah is in the Chabad’s new building, a striking example of minimalist architecture. The tall rectangle of pale gray stone, simple and austere, has a purity of its own. The offices are on the second floor; the mikvah takes up the entire first floor, with separate women’s and men’s entrances. The women’s side has two large bathroom-changing areas, where women prepare by becoming as physically clean as possible first.
It’s not about cleanliness, according to Levin, who uses the mikvah himself most weekday mornings and on Friday before Shabbat. “According to [12th-century physician-theologian] Maimonides,” he says, “it’s symbolic of immersing yourself in waters of pure knowledge — you’re getting away from the negatives of the world.”
The mikvah is in its own room, with a trompe l’oeil sky and stars painted on the domed ceiling. The small tiled pool is about 4 feet deep, with a handrail and steps. Inscribed on a plaque on the wall is the mikvah blessing, which women say after they submerge themselves completely in the water. Since the mikvah is supposed to be a natural body of water, like the ocean or a stream, a separate tank of rainwater is connected to the main pool. Numerous technical niceties allow the water to be filtered, chlorinated and heated — and still be a kosher mikvah.
“This was a huge undertaking,” says Levin, as he shows off the mikvah’s intricate system of pipes, with all the enthusiasm of a techie explaining the details of his souped-up computer. The building, which cost $1.1 million, took three years to complete. The main challenge was getting broad-based community support and financial contributions for the mikvah.
“Jewish law says that a mikvah comes before building a synagogue,” says Levin. “You can put up a tent, or pray outdoors, but a mikvah has to be a real mikvah.”