From the Baltimore Jewish Times

A Spiritual Experience: How to give pregnancy and birth a Jewish Twist

by Barbara Pash- Assistant Editor

Chana Weisberg had no idea how popular her book would turn out to be. After all, it took several years to write it, her original publisher went bankrupt, and she created her own website to publicize it.

But since the international release of Expecting Miracles: Finding Meaning and Spirituality in Pregnancy through Judaism in August, the publisher, Urim Publications, in Jerusalem and New York, has already put out a second printing and Mrs. Weisberg has signed a book contract to write a sequel.

"Not to get mystical on you, but I feel this book was meant to be," says Mrs. Weisberg in a telephone interview from her home in Jerusalem.

For the 352-page hardcover book, Mrs. Weisberg interviewed 30 women in the religious Jewish community of Jerusalem about pregnancy and childbirth- 24 mothers, two midwives and four female teachers. Interspersed among the interviews are a kabbalistic birthing meditation, birth teachings from the Breslov Chasidic tradition and other resources.

"I talked to more experienced mothers about how Judaism enriched their experiences. You get their voices in the book. It ended up being not only about their pregnancies, but about their lives as women and mothers," says Mrs. Weisberg.

Mrs. Weisberg grew up in Baltimore, where her family lives in Mount Washington and belongs to the Beth Am Synagogue. Her father, Matthew Freedman, is a radiologist; her mother, who goes by her maiden name, Gladys Arak, is a psychiatrist.

A graduate of Friends School, Mrs. Weisberg was a Russian and Government major at Bowdoin College in Maine. She was supposed to spend her junior year in Russia but, because of the instability in that country at the time, she opted instead to go to Israel and work with Russian immigrants.

It was her first visit to Israel and she was impressed. After college, she made aliyah, and met her husband, Joshua, an Orthodox rabbi from Canada who teaches at a women's yeshiva. Mrs. Weisberg got a master's degree from the School of Social Work at Hebrew University before motherhood intervened. The family now includes three daughters, ages 6, 4, and 2.

Mrs. Weisberg says that during her second pregnancy, the idea for the book came to her "in a flash." Like many women, she was fixated on her condition. There was a lot of information about the physical aspects, but as a religious woman she wanted to make it a religious experience, too.

"There is almost nothing written in the traditional text about pregnancy, so I decided to write a book," says Mrs. Weisberg, who found herself waking up at 3 in the morning reviewing the order of the chapters. "I felt I was inspired by G-d."

Before the book was published, Mrs. Weisberg decided to publicize it herself by creating a Web site called JewishPregnancy.org. She debuted the site in 2001, and, much to her surprise, it took off. The site was soon getting 25,000 hits a month and now, since its opening, has racked up over 1 million hits.

"Because of the Web site, people knew the book was coming out. I'd get letters asking when is it happening?" says Mrs. Weisberg.