Jerusalem saw a mammoth convention on the Jewish family for women this week. The annual Binyan Shalem conference hosted tens of thousands of women, who attended dozens of lessons on central tenets of the Jewish home. The conference packed the Binyanei HaUma (Jerusalem Conference Center) building and spanned three days.

The lessons were about concepts like 'shalom bayit' [lit. “household peace”, referring to peaceful relations between husband and wife], married life and education of children.

Rabbi Ohad Tirosh, one of the heads of Binyan Shalem, told Arutz Sheva's Hebrew language service that the number of women attending the conference grows every year. “We expanded [the conference] this year from two days to three because the number of people is so great that Binyanei HaUma can't hold the public. That is why we spread the convention over three days to enable everyone to learn and enjoy themselves.”

While the convention is run by Midreshet HaRova, a religious women's institute in the Old City of Jerusalem, many non-religious women attended as well. Tirosh said several Knesset members were also present. “One of the Knesset members told me that she immigrated to Israel from Bukhara 30 years ago and that she sees this convention as a realization of her dream of how the Land of Israel should look.”

Rabbi Tirosh noted that the variety of lessons allows everyone to find their own niches. “At any given hour between seven and ten lessons were being given by male and female lecturers, and the innovation this year was that in the first days we had lecturers who were also psychologists and they gave fascinating lectures about everything from life as a couple, education of children all the way to lessons on cutting vegetables and arranging the table.”