From Texas to Jerusalem: A Woman's Search for Truth and Her Journey to Orthodox Judaism

“In our home, you were not allowed to ask questions,” Ayelet Elnecave says at the start of her story, revealing something important about the world she grew up in. Elnecave was born into a tightly religious Christian family in a small town in Texas in the United States. “My parents were the ‘Neturei Karta’ of the Christians,” she says with a smile. “I was an only child in my family living in the second largest state in America. Every Sunday we went to church, and our entire life revolved around the Christian religion.”

The Dream of Becoming a Missionary

Given that background, no one was surprised when the devout daughter asked to study religions at the University of Texas, hoping to fulfill her dream and become a missionary one day. But it was in the secular university environment, where her eyes opened.

“Suddenly I could ask questions,” she says. Ironically, the person who taught her Christianity at the university did not even believe in the religion. He allowed her to think critically about its claims. That opportunity opened new horizons for her, and what she discovered shook her world.

“Suddenly I realized that everything I grew up with was one big lie.”

What lies did you find in Christianity?

“Someone who is not familiar with Christianity will have a hard time understanding the depth of the falsehood on which this religion is built,” she explains. Still, she offers one example among many.

“I was taught many things as a child and was told they were written in the New Testament. But when I researched on my own, I concluded that those things are not written there at all. They simply do not exist. On the other hand, there are things that are written in the New Testament that Christians somehow ignore, like the obligation to cover the head. When I asked about it, they told me, ‘That is not our culture.’”

From Texas to Givat Shaul

Ayelet Elnecave went through major upheavals until she finally reached what she describes as a place of calm and security, as a righteous convert married to a kollel student in a Haredi neighborhood in Givat Shaul, Jerusalem.

“A stranger who comes to visit here would not see any difference between me and my neighbors, despite the background I grew up with,” she says with a smile.

Today, she sees it as her mission to deliver a message to Jewish girls and women about how much they should thank God and feel proud to belong to the Jewish people. But we will not get ahead of ourselves.

Leaving Christianity and Beginning the Search

After the discoveries that shook her faith, six months after starting university, Elnecave left Christianity, leaving her family angry and disappointed. At that point, she began searching for her path.

“It was clear to me that there is a God, because it did not make sense to me that there could be creation without a Creator, and that all my life in this world was temporary. But I understood that Christianity had distorted the words of the Creator, and I needed to search for the truth somewhere else,” she says.

“Like Avraham Our Forefather, I Began to Search”

At the age of eighteen and a half, Elnecave began the long, winding journey to discover the truth.

“At the beginning of the journey I told myself: if there is a God, there must be a way to reach Him. And like Avraham our forefather in his time, I began to search.”

Her first step was to turn to the Protestants, hoping perhaps she would find the truth there. “I quickly became disappointed when I discovered that they believed in even more nonsense than I did before, as a Catholic,” she says.

A Dark Detour

After leaving the Protestants, Elnecave entered a world that she describes as genuinely frightening.

“I connected to a religion called Wicca, where they teach people how to become witches. These people basically took witchcraft and turned it into an official religion. In Wicca, believers communicate with the dead through séances and try to change nature.”

She shares one especially chilling incident.

“One day, several of us gathered and wanted to have this kind of experience, where we call on spirits. After the ceremony ended, I felt that someone was walking with me and watching me. That feeling continued for several days and would not leave me. Because of that, I decided to go to a friend of mine, a veteran witch. When she saw me, she reacted with huge surprise and asked me: ‘Who is the woman walking next to you?’”

Over time, the sense of dread intensified. She describes doors in her home opening suddenly, nightmares every night, and waking up with a heavy, lingering fear.

“It was frightening and terrible. I felt it was something bad. Today I know to call it forces of impurity.

“At a certain point, when my patience ran out, I decided to leave them. I told myself: I am searching for God, for love, not for this awful feeling.”

A Turning Point: “Introduction to Judaism”

Throughout that period, she continued her university studies, until one day everything changed.

“In one of the classes at the university, as part of our religion studies program, there was a course called Introduction to Judaism,” she recounts. “To be honest, at that stage I planned to start researching Islam, but because a course on Judaism began, I decided to explore Judaism first. And the rest is history.”

The Religion of Questions

At first, she entered the course for practical reasons. Then came an unexpected surprise: the lecturer was Jewish.

“I was very excited,” she admits. From that moment, her journey toward the Jewish people began.

“He said that Judaism is the religion of questions, where you can ask any question that comes to mind. That really spoke to me, a girl who grew up in a home where you were not allowed to ask questions.”

The lecturer also described the Passover Seder as a night built around questions. “On this holiday we sit our children down and teach them to ask questions,” he said. “Why do we do this? So the child will understand what he came into this world for.”

Ayelet embraced the freedom to ask. “We began learning the Bible, and I asked the lecturer all the questions I had never understood as a Christian. Suddenly, the verses and passages that had not made sense to me became clear. The questions I carried from childhood finally found answers. It became clear to me that the answers existed specifically among the Jews.”

Conservative Conversion and the Plan to Become a Rabbi

From there, her path moved quickly. Guided by her lecturer, she approached a nearby Conservative institution and told them she wanted to join the Jewish people.

“The Conservative conversion resembled the usual Orthodox conversion,” she says. “They told me I needed to keep Shabbat and kosher, but they did not address modesty. They also told me I would need to attend prayers on Shabbat and holidays. During that period I began learning Hebrew, blessings, and more. And I completed the Conservative conversion process.”

Her next goal was to become a Conservative rabbi.

“I bought a tallit and tefillin. I started learning to blow shofar in Elul. And in between, I was learning in a yeshiva, studying Talmud in depth,” she says, laughing.

“Sometimes You Can Bend the Texts”

While continuing those plans, she encountered a passage in the Talmud stating that women are exempt from tefillin. She brought it to the rabbi, but he dismissed it and insisted women could still be obligated.

“I told him: that is not what it says. But he explained that sometimes you can bend the texts. I was very angry. I told them: what is written here comes from God. It is truth. How can you distort it?”

Meeting Orthodoxy

At that time, Elnecave lived in Nashville, Tennessee. Near the Conservative synagogue were two others: Orthodox and Reform.

“Every day I would walk to the Conservative synagogue, passing by the Orthodox synagogue. That day, when I returned from the Conservative yeshiva where I had been, I decided to stop at the Orthodox synagogue.”

To her surprise, she discovered that Orthodox Jews did not hate women, as she had been told.

“I was especially surprised that they welcomed me warmly. After I asked a few questions to random people, they directed me to the rabbi’s home, where I found a listening ear. I spoke with the community rabbi and his wife, the rebbetzin, and they turned out to be exceptionally intelligent, wise, and kind people, exactly the opposite of what I expected.”

What did you decide to do at that stage?

“I started coming to the Orthodox community on Shabbat and became a regular there. Very quickly I understood that among Orthodox Jews, Judaism is truth that you live by. They keep exactly what is written in the Torah and do not cut corners. In addition, there I found an answer to every question. And it was clear to me that I had reached a place of rest and belonging.”

The Painful Discovery in the Sukkah

After a long period in the Jewish community, when Ayelet was sure she had arrived at peace and security, she discovered a painful truth.

“It was Sukkot. I was a guest in the sukkah of members of the local community, and during the festive meal the mother asked how I had converted. I told her. I remember that afterward, silence fell over the sukkah. It seemed as though she was choosing her words carefully. She turned to me and said: ‘We love you very much no matter what, but you are not Jewish, because you converted through a Conservative institution.’ I was stunned.”

She pauses, and it is clear that even years later the moment is difficult to relive.

“I started sobbing. I cried like a baby. Until then, I was completely sure I was Jewish, so sure that I had changed my entire life from end to end, from my clothing to keeping kosher. And suddenly I discovered the bitter, painful truth.”

Converting Again in Israel

Once the host family recovered from the initial shock, they tried to comfort her. “You will always be part of our home, and you can convert again,” they told her.

She accepted the suggestion. “I went to an Orthodox rabbi who told me I needed a valid conversion. At the same time, I continued my studies in California.”

She hurried to finish her studies and flew to Israel, where she converted through the Chief Rabbinate, according to the laws of Moses and Israel.

A Second Shock

Ayelet experienced another upheaval at age twenty five. After several years in Israel, she saw herself as Jewish in every way, like all her friends.

“I was studying in a seminary, and my life was calm. One day I had to go to the Interior Ministry because I had a debt connected to my student visa. When my turn came, I asked one of the clerks to find my name in the conversion documents. To my surprise, she told me I was not in the conversion records. ‘What are you even doing in Israel?’ she asked. I felt my world collapse. I ran back to the seminary and cried my soul out. My friends tried to calm me, but it did not help.”

Later, one of her teachers investigated and discovered the reason: the rabbi who converted her had also been involved with invalid conversions and had been dismissed, and all of his conversions were removed from the official lists. The teacher reassured her that she was fully Jewish, and that this was a bureaucratic issue unrelated to her personally, but recommended converting again so the missing documentation would not follow her for years.

That teacher accompanied her to the rabbinical court of Rabbi Nissim Karelitz, where she underwent conversion again, the third time, or more precisely, the second.

How did you meet your husband?

Today Ayelet lives in Givat Shaul, and is married to a kollel student.

“I am married to a precious man, a Jewish man of Mexican background who became religious. I met him through wonderful divine providence in the middle of my journey, when I went to Mexico to work as a teacher. We met at a Shabbat table, got married in Mexico, and immigrated to the Holy Land nine days after the wedding.”

What do you do for a living?

“My husband is a kollel student and I am the main provider. Part of our livelihood is this story. I go and tell my life story as a stand up performer to groups of women. I also teach women who became religious at Neve Yerushalayim school, where I teach about the role of women in Judaism, Chumash, and the Prophets.”

What would you say to Reform Women of the Wall who insist on wearing a tallit and putting on tefillin?

“They are usually like captured children,” she says. “They think what I once did, that Orthodox Jews hate women. That is what they told me too. But I discovered the truth after I saw that they lied about things written in the Torah, and I realized that if that is the case, maybe they are lying about other things as well.”

“It is very childish to think there must be equality between all people in the world. Every person has a different purpose and role. One is a prime minister and another is a CEO of a company. To think everyone must be in exactly the same position and do the same things is a childish and unintelligent idea.”

The Gift of Judaism

“When I moved to Israel, everyone told me to keep my story secret. But my rabbi told me that if I have a tool that can strengthen Jewish women, I must do what I can with it. Since then I go to schools and seminaries and almost anywhere I am invited, to tell this story.

“I want to make clear to Jewish women that they received their Jewish identity for free. I, in contrast, worked very hard for it. I invested many long years of my life to become a properly Jewish woman, and that is why I know more than many people what an enormous gift Judaism is.

“Everything I went through in my life was to reach the place you are in from the moment you were born, so that I could bless ‘who did not make me a non Jew’ and thank God for choosing me to be part of the chosen people. In my lectures it is important to me to clarify how much we should feel a great privilege in being Jewish, in having the gift of Shabbat, Torah study, and the Creator’s commandments. I am proof that it is truly not obvious at all.”