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THEOLOGICAL
MYTHS
Different ways of looking at traditional beliefs.
RABBI JEREMY ROSEN
THEOLOGICAL MYTHS Different ways of looking at traditional beliefs. RABBI JEREMY ROSEN CAN SEX AND RELIGION GO TOGETHER ?Sex is fun. So religious people can't really approve, can they ? Growing up in a Christian world and in a world that also contains very strong reactions against its values, we are inevitably influenced by the attitudes of the dominant culture. Nowhere is this more evident than in matters of sexuality. The Catholic ideal is the celibate Pope and the Dalai Llama is single too. In Judaism our leaders are expected, indeed required to be married and have children. Why the difference ? The Christian attitudes are very much influenced by the story of the Fall Of Man and Original Sin. Adam and Eve disobey God. They eat from the fruit of the tree that God forbade them to. Interesting is the assumption that the fruit was an apple. The text does not say so. But in Latin an apple is 'Malum' and similarly , evil is ' Malum' too. Perhaps that is where the idea came from. The Jewish tradition suggests a fig, because they covered themselves with fig leaves. D.H.Lawrence would appreciate the relevance of that given his use of the fig as a sexual symbol. Alternatively they suggest the vine, given the dramatic impact its fruit can have on people getting them to behave in an irrational and degrading way. The Talmud also suggests corn as the fruit because it is the very basis of the human diet. Whatever the fruit was, the act of disobedience led to Adam and Eve realizing that they were naked. Before disobeying God, the Torah says ' And they were both naked and they were not ashamed.' Afterwards it says that Adam excused himself . 'And he said 'I heard your voice in the garden and I was frightened because I was naked and I hid'. And He ( God ) said ' Who told you that you are naked? Did you eat from the tree I commanded you not to eat from?' Was it the eating of the fruit or the act of disobeying God that transformed man? The Jewish tradition sees this as the 'first sin' but not as 'Original Sin'. The difference is that Original sin has humanity henceforth existing in a State Of Sin from which only Grace can rescue it. Human beings are then seen as essentially evil, by nature, from birth. For Judaism this incident in the Torah was one example of how humans can and do disobey God and find themselves more limited as a result, not freer as they might think. Obedience to God helps humanity fulfill its potential and help make the world a better place. Disobedience leads to domination, corruption, the realization that a good and natural process such as sexuality can be used as a weapon of exploitation and inhumanity. It was this realization, that anything can be abused and that sexuality is perhaps the primal tool of abuse that made man ashamed of his nakedness. The original scheme of creation put human beings in a special position. They were given a garden to tend and to protect. They failed . They were given one simple instruction and that was not enough to keep them on the 'straight and narrow'. They were exiled and had to cope with a harsher reality. But in this situation, already from beforehand, man had discovered that companionship meant more that simply physical gratification. He might have found that amongst the animals who all passed before him and who he named . But he did not. It is immediately after this that God decides than man needs a companion. The companion is symbolically taken from the ribcage which protects the heart. This asserts the fact that sexuality is only one dimension of the male-female relationship. The phrase ' support alongside him ' reiterates the relationship rather than simply the means of pro-creation. It is crucial that the word for sexual union is ' knowledge' . Knowledge of a person is far more than simply knowing how to do something.2Can sexuality be seen as something bad or even negative in the Torah? Not in itself. However, its abuse is a major theme. 'The sons of the judges ( or however one wants to translate the ambiguous Hebrew ) took the daughters of man as they chose.' What was wrong, it appears was the act of choosing wherever men felt like it, an act of selfish gratification and domination rather than willing partnership. That this attitude continued after Noah's flood is evidenced by the incident in which Abraham fearing for his life because of Sarah's beauty, tries to protect himself by saying that she is his sister . It must have been common, at that time, to kill a man to take his wife. The real issue that the Torah emphasizes is that the abuse of sexuality was perhaps the major underlying evil of pagan society. We know from archeological evidence that many of the things the Torah specifically outlaws, Temple prostitution, sex with animals and giving oneself to whoever comes along as a religious rite, were common features of contemporary society. This was the atmosphere that prevailed amongst the Canaanite tribes was the reason for their being driven and replaced. ' It is not because of your righteousness or your honest hearts that you are going to inherit their land. But it is because of the wickedness of these nations.' The list of forbidden sexual acts in the Torah is prefaced by this introduction ' Do not behave like the Egyptians amongst whom you lived and do not follow the behavior of the land of Canaan where I am bringing you. Do not follow their laws'. For all the list of forbidden marriages, nowhere is there any suggestion that celibacy is acceptable or that marriage is any way a concession. Not only that, but the Torah actually specifies the legal obligations of marriage and these include sexual activity ( of course there are other aspects to a marriage relationship but these are far more difficult to legislate on ). The three obligations of marriage are ' Food, clothing and Sex'. If the Torah did not see man as basically evil and sexually corrupt, how did the Torah saw human behavior? Was man seen as essentially good or evil? Despite the repeated failure of mankind to live the sort of life that God approved of and despite God's repeated disappointment with mankind, nowhere is man described as evil from birth. However there is something called the 'Yetzer', the inclination, that seems to be the cause of evil rather than man himself. It is as though man is neutral but is being led by this inclination to do 'bad' things. 'And God saw the that the evil of man was increasing on earth and that the inclination of the thoughts of his heart were only bad all the day.' We can only guess at the intention of the original test. 'Heart' is usually the code word for emotions as opposed to 'head' being the code for intellect. So it is the tendency of emotion to mislead mankind that is to blame. Does this tendency come inborn as a sort of instinct ? The Torah says after the flood ' And God said in His heart ' I will not continue to curse the ground any more because of man, for the inclination in the heart of man is bad from his youth.' The tendency does not come with birth but from youth. Humans learn to abuse and misuse from a very early age. It almost sounds Freudian. When man is created the first record uses the word ' VaYivra', 'And He created'. The second time, the word used is ' VaYitzer' ' And He fashioned' and the word has two letters 'Yud' in it. The rabbis use this to make the homiletic point that God created man with two inclinations, a good one and a bad one. However the so called 'bad' one is not completely bad ' Without the bad inclination a man would never get married or build a house or plant a vineyard' To support the idea that the evil inclination is not in built, they said ' The evil inclination starts as a guest and afterwards becomes the owner of the house'. The two are in a state of constant competition for control. Man is caught up in this struggle and has to find ways of enabling the good inclination to triumph. ' A person should always excite his good inclination against the bad one' and the rabbis give advice along the lines of studying Torah and keeping oneself busy. The rabbis were very much aware of the power of temptation, 'There are two things a person really deeply desires, sex and theft.' There seems to be a solution for someone who has difficulty coping. ' If a man feels that his inclination is getting too strong for him he should go to a place where no one recognizes him and dress in black and cover himself in black and do what his heart desires and not desecrate the name of heaven in public,' The commentators disagree as to whether this was meant literally and he could act on it, Rashi, or whether the whole idea was to try and find a way of delaying and getting him to cool off, Tosafot. Either way, the rabbis recognize the difficulties of the constant battle with sexual urges but they do not suggest that it is an evil that is intrinsic. The attitude to sin in general, is less harsh in the Biblical tradition than it is in others. There is no 'state' of sin into which one falls, only habits. The words used for sin, all indicate an action that takes one off the straight and narrow; 'Avera'( to pass by )or 'Cheyt'( to miss the mark ) or 'Avon'( to mistake ) or 'Pesha'( to fall short ). The implication is that one can easily correct the error by getting it right or stepping back on to the track. This is the function of 'Teshuva' , repentance, which literally means ' to return'. Nowadays this is a process that, broadly speaking, anyone can do at anytime. There is no need for priestly intervention. In the past there was a procedure that involved first putting right anything wrong done either to another person or to God. This would be followed by a confession, a private and personal statement to God accepting and specifying what one had done wrong. These procedures were required before one could proceed with the sacrifice of atonement which was a ritual confirmation and penalty. The general term or sexual misdemeanor is ' Gilui Arayot' 'Revealing nudity', or 'that which should not be revealed'. There is no odium attached to the act of sex itself but rather to the effect it has when it used wrongly ( interestingly, there is no special word for incest ). To reveal can be a good and necessary process but it can also be a negative one. Some things need uncovering others do not. This dual use of a word is an important feature of the Hebrew language. The word for Holy , KaDoSH, is also the word for a prostitute, KaDeSH . The word to sin ' CHeT ' is also the word used for cleansing the altar or other vessels. The word for kindness ' CHeSeD' is also the word for corruption. There are other examples but these specifically in the sexual context emphasize again that it is not the act of sex that is wrong but the misuse of it. The context is what decides the morality of an act. The mood of the Torah on sexual matters, seems to us nowadays , to be remarkably tolerant. The incident of Yehuda and Tamar is primarily concerned with the honesty of Tamar rather than with the behavior of Judah. But there is no direct suggestion that Judah was wrong. On the other hand Joseph is admired for not giving in to Potiphar's wife's entreaties but this is because she was a married woman and the issue was more one of betrayal than sexuality. The Torah even makes certain concession to the sexual urge. In battle a man may face all kinds of temptations and the law of the beautiful captive allowed a man to take a woman home ( there is a debate amongst the authorities as to whether he was allowed to give in to his urges in the heat of battle or not ). One might wonder at the relaxed approach of the Bible to the story of Esther. She is forced to enter the competition to find a wife for Ahasuerus. Some rabbis have her being taken forcibly, others suggest it was a plan devised by Mordecai. She becomes the queen of a non-Jewish monarch. The Talmud has a fascinating range of opinions about what she ate ( kosher or vegetarian ) and about whether or not she continued to sleep both with Mordecai and with Ahasuerus . This uncensored discussion says a great deal about the relaxed and positive attitude of the Jewish tradition to sexuality.3The Biblical laws of marriage require, as we have mentioned, a man to provide for his wife sexually. ' Her maintenance, her clothing and her sexual satisfaction' are required and grounds for compelling a husband to divorce if not met. Of course one can point to a great deal of inequality in sexual matters. The male could have more than one wife. The master could give his female servants for procreation. The father could betroth his under age daughter. The permission to divorce could be seen both as an advantage and as a disadvantage to women. It was an advantage in that it might free her from an unhappy marriage. But it might be a disadvantage in removing her from financial and social security. In some circles a divorcee was forced back into he parents house and kept in a position of virtual slavery. This is why later on the rabbis sought to ensure that divorcees had some financial security. Nevertheless, divorce is inscribed in Jewish law and approved of as a way of avoiding hatred and tension. Any odium attached to divorce has been absorbed from non-Jewish society. The qualification of not taking back a divorced wife after she remarries could be seen as a way of trying to prevent the frivolous use of divorce. My aim here is not to try to explain away anything that seems problematic to our twentieth century conventions but simply to underline the very different attitude that the Torah evinces to sexuality at a time before external values came to be imposed on Jewish thinking. The Torah and the rabbis set down very strict rules about whom one could have sex with. It is possible to come up with theories to explain them, just as people try with the dietary laws. There are historical and utilitarian explanations. There are mystical and rational ones. In the end they are part and parcel of the unique Jewish experience which by its own account is beyond human logic. In order to reinforce these laws in what is an extremely delicate, not to say passionate area, they set down additional rules to act as buffers, rules such as not being alone with someone one could not marry and not even touching, let alone kissing those one is barred from intercourse with. Sex with an unmarried woman and someone eligible for marriage was seen in Biblical times to be in itself a quasi act of marriage. If one did not complete the process there were penalties. Premarital sex was forbidden both because it would have devalued the woman on the marriage market and because it might have threatened the system of early betrothal which applied commonly in earlier times. We may find these ideas strange but they still hold sway in many parts of the world to this day and death is often meted out to those who infringe these conventions. In addition to limiting who one can marry, the Torah also forbids intercourse during a woman's period. This had the effect of practically forbidding sex before marriage since one could only have sex after going to the Mikvah, the ritual pool, something confined to married women. But it also had the effect of strengthening sexual excitement within marriage by creating monthly periods of abstinence that heightened attraction and desire within marriage itself. Again, one is reluctant to suggest that this was the utilitarian reason for the law. But it certainly is an effect. But all these negative regulations were intended simply to shift the emphasis in a positive way onto married life and sex within marriage.4The Talmud looks at sex within marriage from two angles. Everyone agrees that there is a positive command to reproduce. The schools of Hillel and Shammai argue as to when one can be said to have fulfilled this command, a boy and a girl or two boys. There is also disagreement as to whether the obligation only applies to men or also to women. Everyone agrees that sex is a requirement and that there is something lacking in a person who is not married and has not participated in intercourse. The Mishna discusses the obligation of sex this way ' The amount required ( to fulfill the Torah obligation to have sex with ones wife ) is for men of leisure, every day, laborers twice a week, donkey drivers (who travel limited distances) once a week, camel drivers (who are away for longer stretches) once in thirty days, sailors. Once in six months according to Rabbi Eliezer.' There is disagreement about the attitude one should take to sexuality, hardly surprising given the inevitable influence of Greek thought. Some rabbis took the view that draws from the Stoic school. The world has two substances, spirit and matter. Spirit is superior and matter is inferior. Anything material is inevitably a handmaiden of the spirit. Sexuality therefore is a necessary procedure for reproduction but something that should be regarded as a necessity rather than a pleasure. This approach is best illustrated by this conversation ' They asked Imma Shalom ' Why are your children so good looking ? She replied (My husband) does not talk with me ( a euphemism for sex ) at the beginning of the night or at the end but in the middle, and when he talks he reveals a tephach ( of nakedness ) and then covers a tephach and he behaves as though an evil spirit was forcing him.' This very stoic approach sees intercourse as a requirement to be taken seriously and with the objective of satisfying ones wife. It is not the basis for the myth that Orthodox Jews make love through a hole in a sheet. The only time I have ever come across this custom it was in a film by a Mexican Catholic. Of course nowadays we might even be inclined to think that self control and trying to keep partially detached was very good advice for prolonging love making. How the rabbis conducted themselves during intercourse was even considered part of Torah education. Rabbi Kahana crept under the bed of Rav Shemaya and heard him talk and laugh before he had intercourse. When he remonstrated he replied 'It is Torah and I have a duty to learn.' The question of modesty was very important 'One should not have intercourse by day, or in front of children.' But there is no dispute about the importance of pleasing one's wife ' It is forbidden to force one's wife even if it is for a mitzvah ( of reproduction ).' The other point of view regards sexuality as a Divine gift and pleasure and one to be indulged in with enthusiasm , if moderation. The same Gemara goes on to quote Rabbi Yochanan as saying ' Whatever a man wants to do with his wife he may do.' Which is elsewhere qualified by saying that of course this must be with her consent. There is even a sort of Epicurean strain in the Talmud. Two rabbis who traveled around Babylon as teachers and judges would come into town and declare ' Who will be my wife for a night.' The Gemara is divided as to whether this was literally the case or just a device for avoiding temptation. It was recognized that the sexual urge was a very powerful one. 'Theft and sexuality are the things that man most strongly desires and wants.' This was one of the reasons that marriage was encouraged and at as early an age as possible. The general rule was that eighteen was ideal, twenty at the latest and according to Rav Chisda fourteen would be desirable. Later on the Shulchan Aruch tries to incorporate both positions. ' As a man's wife is permitted to him, he may do whatever he wants, to have intercourse at any time and to kiss anywhere he wants and to have intercourse in any position and in any way...but when he has intercourse it should be like someone paying a debt because of his duty to reproduce…He should not have intercourse against his wife's wishes and if she is not in the mood he should try to win her over until she agrees.'5Altogether sexuality is considered more favorably in Judaism than other Western religions. It goes to the Talmudic approach to life which is a very positive one. The concept of joy is enshrined in the biblical instruction to rejoice on festivals . And the idea of blessing God is an act of rejoicing in the good and giving expression to ones feelings . The model of King David, combining a full material life with a deep spirituality is the typical Jewish role model rather than the ascetic. A person has to constantly thank God for the bad as well as the good. One should not derive any pleasure without thanking God but of course the corollary of this is that one should seek out pleasures so as to be able thank God as much as possible. Not only should one enjoy pleasurable things but ' A person will have to give evidence and account in the future, for anything his eye saw and he did not eat.' The Nazirite who deprives himself of wine for anything above thirty days has to bring a sin offering as atonement for having deprived himself of a legitimate pleasure. 'Rabbi Elazar HaKappar said' In what way did he sin ? Because he deprived himself of wine. And there is a deduction to be made from this. If a man who deprives himself of wine is called a sinner, how much more so is a person who deprives himself of any thing ( that is permitted )?' Sex, in addition to being a means of procreation is also, of course, a source of pleasure. So much so that the Zohar and the later Kabbalists saw a sexual union as a metaphor of the union between God and man. The relationship between a man and a woman is of course the ultimate human relationship. A man without a woman is without joy and not a complete person . This why rabbis in the Talmud who did not get married were unable to receive their due title. It is also why a judge can only be someone who has experienced marriage. Marriage is governed by the principle of love and the well known phrase ' And you should love your neighbor as yourself'. One may not marry without first seeing ones bride so that one may not come to despise her . The reason offered against some sexual practices is that they may turn one against one's partner . And the justification for divorce is to avoid hatred and increase love. Of course there are problems that may emerge from a whole range of decisions both within marriage and without. But the Halachic approach is to enjoy life, to respect and care for ones partner and to increase the amount of love in the world.6The restrictions that Jewish law imposes have been subjected to critical analysis by such giants as Marx and Freud. Freud saw them as means whereby authority could exercise psychological control over the masses using frustration as a tool. But this ignores the active encouragement of sex that underlies Biblical and rabbinic law. On another level these laws have been used by some as an excuse for laxity. One often hears it said that if Judaism is so strict and sets such unattainable standards, well then, one can hardly be expected not to want to find some other outlet. It certainly seems that sexuality is one of the major areas of backsliding. But sexuality is also the major area of hypocrisy given the tendency of some societies to suppress sexuality. The result is that even with Jewish life, which in principle is very positive about sexuality under controlled conditions, there are signs of distorted attitudes. There is a myth in some circles that intercourse with non-Jews is not forbidden. The evidence of the Talmud does not support this.' Whoever has intercourse with an Aramean ( non Jewish ) woman , the zealous ones are allowed to kill him.' The debate about intercourse with a non-Jew has several aspects to it . There is the special law of Ezra against intermarriage . Previously the Torah had forbidden inter-marriage with the Canaanite tribes. Ezra now extended this. But the law forbidding a male or a female prostitute was taken to go beyond the 'profession' and to apply to anyone having casual sex. The later rabbis specifically forbade intercourse with non-Jews . The only issue was whether the ban was seen as a Torah law or as a Rabbinic one. The Zohar says ' There are three people who drive God's presence away from this world…he who sleeps with the daughter of a non-Jew.' One of the issues that Maimonides puts great emphasis on is that any intercourse is forbidden that may lead to a forbidden marriage . In effect he outlines five separate Rabbinic laws against intercourse with a non-Jew. Suggestions that one may indulge oneself outside the confines of ones tradition find no support in Halachic sources. The ideal, of course, was to confine sex to a committed relationship in marriage to create a stable environment in which to bring up children and be loyal to the Jewish religious tradition. The objection to intermarriage was not because of anything intrinsically objectionable in a non-Jew. It was simply based on concern for the weakening of the Jewish family atmosphere and involvement with Jewish life. But none of this is to be seen as being against sex as such. It was part of campaign to defend Judaism and to fight for Jewish survival in an atmosphere of assimilation and attrition. Within its prescribed boundaries, sex was overwhelmingly regarded as both an obligation and a pleasure. Its use as a metaphor by the kabbalists for union with God shows the positive attitude towards the sexual act that characterizes Jewish religious thinking. |