This highly fashion-magazine-ized look into the fascinating world of contemporary Hasidism from Refinery29 raises the question of hair as a sacred or sacrosanct space // cheesy wrap-up maxims, surface-skimmed issues of body and faith, what it means to be feminine, beauty shots and all // I do appreciate the glimpse, though. In particular what the video has to show us about hair in this Jewish subculture and the world of religious wigs. In the video, one of the women describes natural hair as a special and private space, to be enjoyed between two spouses. It makes me think about Hair as a secret, as sacred or rarified material, as elemental; too fine too personal to share with the world.
There are many faiths and cultures that opt to cover their hair and those whose symbolic hair styling forms a pillar of their belief. Indeed many men in Hasidic culture choose not to shave the corners of their head–those curly ringlets that fall over their ears–per particular Biblical interpretation. These men and boys grow out their payot as symbolic of their unerring faith and adherence to the bible. In this video, the women describe the rules or laws of Hasidic faith as mitzvot, or good deeds, demonstrations of good faith rather than as suppressive of their beauty and freedom.
I wonder about–as in, it fills me with wonderment–how hair came to be the place, the stuff of religious expression and faith for these religions and cultures. Whether it is the material or alchemical aspect of hair? Or a certain symbolic, ethereal capacity that carries the weight of expression. The matter of modesty, or where heat escapes the body, or the closest point to a heavenly source. Does hair become the bridging of symbolic substrates?
A fascinating and beautiful subject, the glorification of hair the material, hair the symbolic gesture, hair the private spot or the point of vulnerability. The simply symbolic stuff of hair.
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