Jewish women remain conspicuously absent from traditional historical scholarship, creating a distorted view of Jewish communal life across centuries. Critical methodologies for examining Jewish women's history have emerged through four distinct approaches: compensatory history of exceptional individuals, contribution analysis of social movements, family-centered social histories, and women-authored source interpretation. By adapting theoretical frameworks from general women's history—including gender analysis, status patterns, and broadened definitions of political activity—to specifically Jewish contexts, clear patterns emerge showing how women's historical experiences diverged significantly from men's. These differences demand specialized analytical tools such as life-cycle role analysis, community-level political participation studies, and examination of religious, educational, and economic roles within Jewish communities. Traditional male-centered periodization schemes prove inadequate for capturing women's experiences, necessitating alternative temporal frameworks. Current scholarship remains heavily weighted toward biographical works and organizational studies, with few comprehensive analyses employing conscious women's history methodologies. Moving toward truly holistic Jewish history requires expanded source materials, interdisciplinary approaches incorporating behavioral sciences, and systematic integration of women's experiences—ultimately transcending the limitations of "women's history" as a separate specialized field.