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Tuesday, March 2, 2010 3:50:34 PM
THE REINTERPRETATION OF THE PROHIBITION ON HOMOSEXUALITY (from the Hebrew texts)
A HETEROSEXUAL JEWISH REBBE'S VIEW
(SEGAN) RABBI GERSHON CAUDILL (THE ECOREBBE) RECLAIMS LEVITICUS FROM THE BIGOTS WHO WOULD USE THE ANCIENT HEBREW TEXTS TO WRONGLY PERSECUTE AND CONTROL GAYS AND LESBIANS.
Over the past decade, I have been involved in a study of the so-called anti-homosexual texts of Leviticus in the original Hebrew versions extant, the Dead Sea Scrolls, and with the help of a Catholic Priest and a Protestant Biblical Languages student at Emory University, I have studied translations of the Greek and Latin texts.
This study has involved reviewing Talmudic texts and other materials of a collateral nature to the subject matter being studied; history, anthropology, archaeology, philology, and etymology, to name but a few.
As a result of my research, I am convinced of two things.
1. THE ORIGINAL HEBREW TEXTS HAD ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO DO WITH HOMOSEXUALITY!
2. The texts of Leviticus (and Deuteronomy) were utilized by the teachers and Rabbis of the Jewish religious tradition to condemn homosexuality only at a MUCH later date, about 1500 years later. This change of direction happened in the 4th to 6th centuries under THREAT from the dominant and controlling Christian governmental and ecclesiastical authorities. The theologians of the Church needed to have the perceived Jewish interpretation of the texts to be in accordance with their own commentaries and teachings on homosexuality and what they believed (falsely) to be sexual perversion.
Within the Hebrew Torah readings of Achare Mot (Leviticus 16: 1-18: 30) and Kedosheem (Leviticus 19: 1-20: 27) are found the verses that have been utilized for the past sixteen hundred years, by Jewish and Christian fundamentalist teachers to wrongly persecute and punish a small portion of the human population.
These specific texts are:
Leviticus 18: 22; which states: V-et zachar lo tishkav mishkevey eeshah toeyvah hee. Do not lie (sexually) with a male as you would with a woman, since this is an abomination (TOEYVAH).
And, Leviticus 20: 13, which states: V-eesh asher yishkav et-zakhar mishkevey eeshah toeyvah. Asu shenayhem mot yumatu dameyhem bam. If a man has sexual intercourse with a male person, in the same manner as with a woman, they have both committed a toeyvah (disgusting perversion). They shall die by their blood being upon them.
It is at least a millennium AFTER these verses were written in Leviticus, during a period of historical time when Jews were in contact with a European based, Syrian-Greek Hellenistic hedonistic culture that had an openly promiscuous sexual modality, that the very first Talmudic references to PUBLIC DISPLAYS of homosexual like activity as a perversion of JEWISH religious practice are recorded. (Sanhedran 54A)
According to Rabbi Jacob Milgrom, the translator and commentator of the prestigious Anchor Bible Series Translation of the Book of Leviticus, and the Jewish Publication Society Commentary on the Book of Numbers, these texts are referring to non–Israelite RELIGIOUS sexual and sexual abuse practices that Israelites were not to imitate in the Land of Israel. It has nothing to do with what we today term as being homosexuality.
This then presents us with several questions:
1. Did the Hebrew people who wrote the original text of Leviticus see it as referring to homosexuality as a sexual orientation and did they see homosexuality as something that was of little or no real concern to the normal operation of the group?
2. Did the Jewish people of a thousand years later, during the time period that coincides with the beginnings of Christianity, view homosexuality as a problem or as a subject of major concern? Did they view homosexuality in the same way we see homosexuality today?
3. Or do our texts refer to PRIESTLY prohibitions only, and not to the everyday rank and file Israelite sexual practices?
4. Or are the texts referring to the inability of a person within the community to control their sexual urges by telling them to get a hold of your emotions, control your bodily functions? and thus, not really referring to orientation at all?
It is my opinion that like all indigenous peoples, including Native American Indians, the Jewish people were not overly concerned about male homosexuality within the community, where two men lived together in a monogamous, sexual relationship. As a rule, it did not get any notice. How do we know this to be true?
In Jewish society, ALL males were under requirement to marry and have children. No provision was made for celibate or homosexual orientation.
According to the Jerusalem Talmud in Tractate Ketubot and in the commentary Rokeach 12, as quoted in the 18th century Sephardic Commentary on the Bible, MeAm Lo'ez, Vol. 1, page 124, Rabbi Chisda (3rd-4th century Babylonian Amora) said; I am better than my colleagues because I was married when I was sixteen years old. But if I had married at age thirteen, I would not have had (seminal emissions) and would have spit in the Satan's eye. (In other words, a young married man will not spill semen in vain.)
The Sages taught that the commandment to marry and have children is more important than that to build the Temple. It was the VERY FIRST COMMANDMENT. They taught that a boy should be under the obligation to marry, (he should have already signed the prenuptial document) by his thirteenth birthday. This was the origin of the Bar Mitzvah. If he had not married by his twentieth birthday, the court could compel him to marry. (ibid.)
The Dead Sea community of Zadokites (Sadducees) evidently thought the Book of Leviticus ESPECIALLY important for their community. Sixteen separate manuscripts (none complete) of Leviticus have been discovered in the caves near the Qumron community. Of these, three show no deviation from what we read today. Four manuscripts were written in a Paleo-Hebraic script in use prior to the exile into Babylon. Our particular verses do not seem to have survived although both chapters are represented.
According to the Dead Sea Scroll, The Messianic Rule, (1QSa,I, 9-11); At the age twenty years old, a youth shall be enrolled (in the Community) to enter upon his allotted duty to raise a family and to be joined to the Holy Congregation. He shall not lay with a woman before then for he does not yet know the difference between good and evil.
From the above texts we see that within both Pharisaic and Qumronic Sadducean Judaism, as represented by the Talmud and the Dead Sea Scroll texts of Qumron, EVERY Jewish boy was married by the time they were sexually active no matter what their sexual orientation was. In fact, the signing of the prenuptial documents were part of a boys coming of age (Bar Mitzvah) ceremony.
Although both the Qumronic community and the Priestly element of Rabbinical Judaism were obsessed with sexual purity and seminal emissions, I cannot find specific references to homosexuals in committed relationship as being in a prohibited activity for Jews.
In a closely knit community of this kind, true homosexuality is usually accepted without fanfare or notice. This is similar to the practice among many Native American tribes where a man who takes upon him female ways is fully accepted as being among the women, including the right to marry a husband. He is termed a person with TWO-SPIRITS. Native Americans have a wide variety of gender roles which designate a person who has both male and female spirits within himself or herself.
Almost all Jewish halakhic authorities agree that nowhere in the specific texts of the Torah does the Torah prohibit homosexual acts by WOMEN, which shows that homosexuality as a sexual orientation is not the intent of the subject verses in Leviticus.
In the 3rd century CE, the Talmud records that Rabbi Huna (the miracle working rain making Rabbi) tried to legislate against lesbians being able to marry a High Priest, a Cohen, but his colleagues ruled against him (BT Yevamot 76a). They said that it was not permissible to prohibit what the Torah permits.
If the Torah was referring to homosexuality in general, why would it just address only male homosexual activity and not also female homosexual activity?
On the basis of the Baraitha d'Rabbi Ishmael in the Sifra, on Leviticus, written in the mid-second century of the Common Era, Rabbi Ishmael says: The Torah is interpreted by means of thirteen rules. When a generalization is followed by a specification, only what specifies applies (Miklal u'frat). The generalization is the text; A man shall not lay with a man.... The specification is the text; ...as you would with a woman.
Based upon this earliest method of Jewish Torah interpretation, the biblical passages in Leviticus 18: 22 and also in Leviticus 20: 13 do not refer to homosexual activity at all as one of the males is heterosexual or perhaps bisexual.
These texts are really referring to ritual and promiscuous sexual practices, which can be the substitution of others, including relatives, animals, and members of the same sex, to satisfy the animal urges of sexual lust, either for ritual purposes or for ones own gratification.
It is not the normal homosexual practice for one man to lie with another man as though he were laying with a woman. In fact, if a man was thinking of his sexual partner as though he were a woman, and not a man, it would not be a homosexual relationship, as one of the parties involved is PRETENDING that the person he is laying with is a woman. It is actually a permissive sexual situation in which the first man does not have control over his sexual emotions, but uses others to satisfy his sexual desires. If we read the Torah this way, it is warning this kind of person that certain types of substitutional sexual behavior are not permitted.
In the Greek texts reference to Lev. 18:22 from the Septuagint (translated in 3rd century BCE), the words are: koimithisi koitin gynaikos (you may not lie as with a woman). This is the way it is usually rendered. The above translates the Hebrew words mishkevey, (to lay sexually with) (mem-shin-kaf-beyt-yud) and eeshah, (woman) (aleph-yod-shin-heh). It is attested in three of the earliest papyri, A, B, and F, which support the word gynaikos -- (as with a woman). It implies a substitution of some sort. Later Christian Greek renditions have used arsenos (young male) instead of gynaikos, which shows a decided anti-Hellenistic or Christian bias.
Rabbi Gershon Winkler has written (in the Bible Review, June 2001):
The Jewish scriptural prohibition against homosexuality appears in the context of laws concerning cultic rites performed by seven specifically named nations whose religious worship rites we were being instructed not to emulate in our worship of God (Leviticus 18:3,22, 20:13,23; Deuteronomy 23:18).
Therefore the wording is; to lay with a man as with a woman, something a true homosexual man does not do. The sin is about a horny heterosexual man using another man for sex, which occurred in ancient religious worship among some of those very same nations that our ancestors were warned against emulating.
To translate that prohibition, therefore, as applying to any homosexual relationship is to exit the realm of divine ordination and enter instead the realm of subjective, mortal homophobia.
The ancient rabbis must have had some sense of this problem when they ruled two thousand years ago that any homosexual sexual activity short of anal intercourse is not included in the biblical prohibition (Babylonian Talmud, Yevamot 54a-56a; Sotah 26b; Niddah 13a; Maimonides, Perush L'Mishnayot on Sanhedrin 54a).
Why did they bother to offer that qualification if it was so clear to them that homosexuality was forbidden? Also, lesbianism, according to Jewish law, was never prohibited; Maimonides—who personally abhorred such behavior—ruled that; it is neither a biblical nor a rabbinic prohibition. (Perush L'Mishnayot on Sanhedrin 54a.)
In fact, the rabbis in the Gemara (Tractate Yevamot) specifically say that that passages in Leviticus refers to an androgynous being and not to male-male sex. Since the rabbis' interpretations are the basis of halakhah, anyone claiming that Judaism is against homosexual orientation based upon that passage is simply incorrect.(End of Rabbi Winkler's article. See SACRED SECRETS by Rabbi Gershon Winkler)
The Torah begins chapter 18 of Leviticus by having YHVH–God state; I am YHVH your Creator–Force! You are not to follow the practices of Egypt where you lived, nor of Canaan, where I will be bringing you. Do not follow any of their customs.
If we wish to determine what kind of customs the author of Leviticus is referring to we must ask ourselves: What were the supposed homosexual practices of the religions in Egypt and in Canaan in the 14th century-10th century BCE (the time represented by Leviticus)?
According to the Egyptian Jewish philosopher Philo (1st century CE Alexandria); They (the pagan TEMPLE PRIESTS) would apply themselves to deep drinking of strong liquor and dainty foods and forbidden forms of intercourse. Not only in their mad lust for WOMEN did they violate the marriage of their neighbors, but also men mounted males.... Then, little by little they accustomed those who were by nature men to submit to play the part of women.... (On Abraham, Chapter 26, pages 134-136.) This Egyptian practice is a SUBSTITUTION of the male body for a female body in male to male sexual activity. It is not homosexuality. The practices being referred to are those of cultic ritual promiscuous sexual behavior.
The passage in Genesis 19 that is used to give the nomenclature of sodomy to homosexual sex (from the 17th or 18th century BCE account), actually does not refer to an act of consensual sex or to homosexual sex at all, but to an act of sexual violence and degradation and male rape, as also does the passage in Judges 19: 22. These are acts of VIOLENCE that are committed by parties seeking, by sexual brutality, to show their hatred for those they are degrading. It is not an act of love or of caring nor is it based upon sexual orientation.
The Hebrew Prophet, Ezekiel, actually addresses the question of what the sin of Sodom was. In Ezekiel 16: 49, Behold, this was the INIQUITY of your sister Sodom; PRIDE, FULNESS OF BREAD (gluttony), AND ABUNDANCE OF IDLENESS was in her and in her daughters, NEITHER DID SHE STRENGTHEN THE HAND OF THE POOR AND NEEDY. (Social injustice, waste, overindulgence, and insolence were the crimes of Sodom, not homosexuality).
The male prostitutes of I Kings 14: 24, 15: 12, II Kings 23:7 (proscribed in Deuteronomy 23: 18) are described in the Talmud (BT Sanhedrin 54b) as providing homosexual sex. Yet, Targum Onkelos (2nd century CE Babylonian Aramaic Jewish translation of the Hebrew texts) reads the text to show that they provided sex to the FEMALE visitors to the Idolatrous temples. If this is the case, there is some question if these male prostitutes were providing homosexual sex to men or if they were providing heterosexual sex to women.
In any case, the male rapes of Genesis and Judges, and the promiscuous male sexual activity of I & II Kings does not describe monogamous, loving and caring homosexual relationships anymore than the case of Lot’s daughters incest describes monogamous, loving and caring heterosexual relationships.
Thus, a look at the internal evidence shows that the words (toeyvah hee), which are translated as "an abomination" or "a disgusting perversion," means much more than that.
The word TOEYVAH is used to describe three CATEGORIES of actions in the Torah as abominations or disgusting perversions. These are laws around IDOLATRY (as in Deuteronomy 17: 4), laws around the eating of forbidden animal species or bodily fluids (as in Deuteronomy 14: 3), and laws around the male sexual prohibitions, (as in Leviticus 18 & 20), which include incestuous relationships, bestiality, and same sex substitution. The word TOEYVAH (or a form of the word), is a CATEGORY of idolatrous forbidden action, and is used over 100 times in the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh).
TOEYVAH is used only 26 times in the Torah; 2 times in Genesis; 1 time in Exodus; 6 times in Leviticus; 0 times in Numbers; and 17 times in Deuteronomy. In all these cases it refers to a form of substitution. The one time it is used in Exodus (8: 22), it refers to the concept that what Israelites sacrifice is an ABOMINATION to the Egyptians.
We thus learn that TOEYVAH refers to a concept akin to adultery against God, by substituting the idolatrous behaviour of another religion as a method of worshipping the Israelite concept of God.
TOEYVAH is in the Major Prophets 57 times. 5 times in 1 & 11 Kings, 3 times in Isaiah, 8 times in Jeremiah, 1 time in Malachi and 41 times in Ezekiel. It is not found at all in the Minor Twelve Prophets.
In the Writings, TOEYVAH is found once in Psalms and 25 times in Proverbs. In every case that toeyvah is found, it is referring to prohibitted activity centered around IDOLATRY.
Now, as to the laws around idolatry, considered a TOEYVAH in Torah, there are many in the Jewish community that see in the depiction of the Christian doctrine of the Trinity idolatrous views, but they represent a very small minority opinion. Most traditional Rabbinical halakhists do not see the Christian concept of Trinity as idolatrous, but rather accept that Judaism, Christianity and Islam all worship the SAME GOD by different Names and concepts of understanding the nature of God.
Even the Mormon–Christian anthropomorphic view of God as having a body of flesh and bone does not qualify them as idolators in the eyes of most Jewish halakhic authorities. There are certainly no authorities within mainline Judaism that would consider any of the variants of Christian or Moslem faiths as “a disgusting perversion or abomination,” with the exception of those groups that advocate violence or hatred based upon race, religious differences, ethnicity, or sexual orientation.
The eating of forbidden animal, bird and fish species, as well as eating a kid cooked in it's mother's milk is considered toeyvah in Deuteronomy 14: 4, as well as the eating of blood (forbidden even in the early Jewish–Christian community, see Acts 15: 20 & 29. It was changed in the early Christian community by virtue of a “revelation” from the leadership of the group, though Seventh Day Adventists and many other biblically food observant groups would disagree that the Vision of Peter was intended to annul the laws prohibiting the eating of certain meat and fish species. Their opinion is considered the MINORITY OPINION.)
However, we Jews do not obligate any other religion to the observance of the Torah laws, which were given specifically to the Jewish people and their descendants, including converts. This is with the possible exception of the seven Noahide Laws, and there is dispute among the halakhic authorities as to which seven laws non-Jews need observe IF they are indeed required to observe any Torah laws at all.
Among us who are practicing religious Jews, none in the Reform, Renewal or Reconstructionist communities would say of those who do not observe the Biblical kosher laws, that they were doing an act that was a disgusting perversion, even if it was an act of eating pork or shellfish. (At least, they would not say it publicly.)
More of the Jews in the above movements would be likely to refer to the eating of any animal, even a kosher animal as a disgusting perversion, due to their misplaced missionary zeal for vegetarianism.
Anthropological studies and modern genetic and social science has shown that homosexuality is the natural state of being for some human beings and other animal species. If that is truly the case, and I believe that it is, then it is God who is responsible for the condition of homosexuality just as it is God who is responsible for the condition of heterosexuality. To say that homosexuality is a deviant behavior is to say that God made a mistake.
Rabbi Ted Alexander (Conservative) of San Francisco, California's Jewish community has stated that; This is the way God has created them (homosexuals), and if God has created them this way, I'm willing to give them the blessings (of marriage). Furthermore, anyone who has any hesitation to give blessings to same-sex people should not say the Sabbath Psalm, 'How great are Your works, oh God,' because that includes everybody.
In March 2000, the 111th Convention of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, representing The Union of American Hebrew Congregations, (Reform), passed a Resolution On Same Gender Officiation whereby they resolved to support a Reform Rabbi that would perform same gender marriage rituals. They also supported the right of Rabbis to choose not to perform same gender marriage rituals.
As a Jewish Flexodox Rebbe, I commend the Reform Rabbis for taking this important step towards full Jewish religious equality in our communities. I pray for the day when the other communities of Jewish thought; Conservative, and Orthodox, also follow suit.
In the San Francisco area, and, I suppose, other areas of intellectual progressive thinking, some Rabbis belonging to the Conservative movement have begun performing same-sex marriages. Rabbis of the Renewal and Flexodox areas of Jewish thought are also performing same-sex unions.
It is of utmost importance for us Jews who are students of the Torah to reclaim our texts that have been kidnapped by the Fundamentalists among us, the Moslems, and the Christians and used to hurt and make afraid. We must follow the example of our blessed Rabbis of Talmudic times and retranslate the Torah in EVERY generation so that we might live in it and not die by it. The Torah is our life and length of days. It is Eternal! It is TRUE!
The Hebrew Torah is the CONSTITUTION of the Jewish people, but it is the Rabbis who, like the Supreme Court, tell us how the Torah directs us in our current generation. The INTERPRETATION of the Torah is a New and Everlasting Continuing Revelation (kabbalah).
In fact, Rabbi Hayyim Palachi writes that: ...the Torah gave permission to each person to express his opinion according to his understanding.... It is not good for a sage to withhold his words out of deference to the sages who preceded him if he finds in their words a clear contradiction.... A sage who wishes to write his proofs against the kings and giants of Torah should not withhold his words nor suppress his prophecy, but should give his analysis as he has been guided by Heaven.
Rabbi Palachi notes that even though Rambam wrote with Divine inspiration, many great sages of his generation criticized his work. There are numerous examples of students refuting their teachers: Rabbi Yehudah ha–Nassi disagreed with his father; Rashba disagreed with Ramban; The Tosafists disagreed with Rashi. Respect for the authorities of the past does not mean that one cannot arrive at an opposing opinion. (See Hikekei Lev, vol. 1, O. H. 6 and Y. D. 42.)
Rabbi Marc Angel (an New York Orthodox Sephardi Rabbi, and past President of the Union of Sephardi Congregations, and past President of the Modern Orthodox Rabbinical Council of America) writes: Diversity of opinion is a reality well recognized in Jewish tradition.
The Talmud (Berakhot 58a) records the ruling that one is required to make a blessing upon seeing a huge crowd of Jews, praising God who is Hakham ha–razim, who understands the root and inner thoughts of each individual. Their thoughts are not alike and their appearances are not alike. God created each individual to be unique; He expected and wanted diversity of thought. (Seeking Good, Speaking Peace.)
Rabbi Hayyim David Halevi, and Rabbi Yaakov Emden both gave their opinions that; a student should question their rabbis’ teachings as best they can. In this way, truth is clarified. (See Aseh Lekha Rav, 2: 61 and She’elot Ya’avetz, 1: 5)
Rabbi Halevi further quotes Rambam (Hilkhot Sanhedrin 23: 9), who states the principle that En le–dayan ella mah she–enav ro’ot – (A judge has only what his eyes see). In other words, a judge must base his opinion solely on his own understanding of the case he is considering. No legal precedent obligates him, even if it is a decision of courts greater than he, even of his own teachers.
In Judaism, we teach that ALL the Torah was given to Moses at Mount Sinai, and that even the most future Responsa of a future Rabbi was included in that Revelation.
We do not change the past teachings arbitrarily, but examine the present needs, look at all the past teachings on the subject, closely inspect the inner–meanings of any textual materials that are relevant to determine if we can deduce a new and “the true” meaning of the texts, and with a prayer towards the concept of unifying the Jewish people so that they last on into the coming generations, we do what needs to be done.
WHY DOES THIS MATTER TO ME, A HETEROSEXUAL RABBI?
In the early 1990s, the legislature of the State of Idaho was presented with a bill that would deny civil rights to gays and lesbians.
As the Lay-Rabbi of Boise's single Jewish community, I was presented with a conflicting internal wrestling match. On the one hand, no segment of any population ought to be denied their civil rights based solely upon their sexual orientation, and on the other hand, I had been taught that homosexual acts were expressly prohibited by the teachings of the Torah as being not just sinful acts but acts that were abhorrent to God.
I resolved my own inner conflict by deciding to follow the Torah dictate of "tzadakah v'chesed" (justice tempered with mercy), and support the gay-lesbian desire to obtain and keep the civil rights that were rightfully theirs as citizens of the United States of America and of the State of Idaho.
The Torah stipulates 32 times that one shall not oppress the "stranger" that dwells among you. To deny any person, or group of persons, their civil rights was definitely a form of oppressive behavior.
Having resolved my quandary, I then began to actively support in public the gay-lesbian rights movement as a friend of the gay-lesbian community and as a representative of Boise's Jewish community.
This public action on my part led to a speaking engagement at a retreat that was being held by one of Boise's more gay-friendly churches. It was my intention to address the Torah concept of the oppressive nature that any legislation passed by the State against any segment of its population represented. I did not intend to address the issue of my own personal beliefs as to the rightness or wrongness of homosexuality within Judaism.
However, evidently God had other ideas. That evening I retired to my room to study and sleep. I recited my evening and bedtime prayers and began to read a new book that I had received just that day (Paradigm Shift, by Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi) while I lay on my bed.
In the course of the night, I began to dream about the Kabbalistic Tree of Jacob's Ladder and how EVERY person possessed within themselves the energies of this Tree, which is an inner psychological Tree. This Tree was represented in my dream by a visual "Shiviti" ( a mandala) that was pictured in "Paradigm Shift."
I dreamed that in bringing the individual's inner energies through the various energy centers within this inner Tree; through the masculine oriented places and through the feminine oriented places; to the central balancing places, from the "Heavenly realm" to the "Earthly realm," one unified the Sacred Name of God; Yod, Heh with the Vav, Heh.
Suffice it to say that along with the visual representation seen in the dream, I also received audio explanation. This "Voice" told me that it was God who determined the sexual orientation of every person on earth who is created in the Divine Image as a physical-spiritual representative of the Divine on earth, as represented by their head being associated with the Yod of God's Sacred Name, their shoulders and arms with the Heh, their spine and torso with the Vav, and their hips and legs with the final Heh.
So impactful was this dream on my consciousness that upon awakening I jumped out of my bed and ran to the Art Cabin where I drew the representation of the dream on the back of the sweat shirt that I was using as a pajama top due to the extreme cold night Fall temperatures of 4:00 A.M. in McCall, Idaho.
That morning, at my lecture, I threw away my notes and instead I used the pajama top as a visual aid representation to describe the dream of the previous night and its meaning for me. That dream had taught me to be totally accepting of homosexuality as a God based and God ordained sexuality and not as an "abomination." Several of those who attended my lecture told me that my explanation cleared up for them why they knew that homosexual orientation was the way that they had been born and not a learned behavior.
Kol brakhot tobot (all good blessings)
Copyright 2000 by Segan Rabbi Gershon Caudill, (the Ecokosher Rebbe)
A HETEROSEXUAL JEWISH REBBE LOOKS AT PAUL'S VIEWS
THE APOSTLE PAUL ON MALE SEX IN ROMANS 1: 26-2: 1
I have been asked, how do I as a Jew who is not a Christian, understand what the Christian Apostle Paul wrote in Romans 1.
I find that what it seems to me that Paul is discussing is NOT homosexuality, as I understand homosexuality to mean, but sexual promiscuity and lust. He is NOT referring to two men in a positive homosexual "marriage," but to men who (verse 26) God gave up to their own vile affections, i. e. even their women (thus it is speaking of heterosexual perversion) did change the natural (heterosexual) use into that which is against nature (substitution of a similar sexual partner for that of an other sexual partner in a lustful relationship.)
(Verse 27), And so also the men, they leave the natural (heterosexual) use of the woman, and burn in their LUST towards each other, (heterosexual) men with (heterosexual) men doing that which is an abomination ( toeyvah-substitution); they take to themselves wages of mischief that are envisioned in their fleshly bodies. (They are practicing hedonistic sexual license.)
The further evidence is found in verses 29-32, followed by the clincher in chapter 2: verse 1; "Therefore, do not free up (get caught up) yourself, son of man, in judgments of who you should be as one that judges another; in doing so, you condemn yourself, for one that judges is doing a similar thing (as the one he judges.)
The way this reads to me further backs up what I am saying: It is not HOMOSEXUALITY per se, that Paul is in opposition to, but men SUBSTITUTING men's bodies for women's bodies. A true homosexual man is not substituting another man's body as a vehicle for sexual perversion. He is deeply in "love" with his companion, just as a heterosexual man is deeply in "love" with his companion.
The Levitical laws against male to male SUBSTITUTION cannot be viewed as a prohibition against what we know today as HOMOSEXUALITY anymore than the Levitical prohibition against incest can be viewed as an, across the board, laws against heterosexual sexual practices, although every case cited in the text (Leviticus 18: 6-17) is between sexual partners of opposite sexes. The sexual practice itself, neither heterosexual nor homosexual, is not what is in question either in the text of Leviticus nor in your Book of Romans, rather it is the EMOTION of LUST, without LOVE, that creates the sin. When LUST reigns unbridled, it can quickly turn into hatred and rape, as at Sodom. This practice is also condemned by myself.
I do not support sexual license between couples, either heterosexual or homosexual, unless they are in a committed relationship with each other. And then it is none of my business what they do behind closed doors.
Most of what is being condemned as "homosexual" behavior in the Bible is also mirrored in heterosexual behavior by couples engaging in group-sex or switching partners sex. This is not a committed relationship, either in a homosexual or a heterosexual relationship. AND, it is this sexual license that both the Hebrew Torah AND the Christian's Greek New Testament texts seem to find abhorant (in the Hebrew category of "toeyvah"), on a par with idolatry, and eating unconsecrated meat (see Isaiah 66: 17.)
http://hometown.aol.com/ecorebbe/myhomepage/rant.html
A HETEROSEXUAL JEWISH REBBE'S VIEW
(SEGAN) RABBI GERSHON CAUDILL (THE ECOREBBE) RECLAIMS LEVITICUS FROM THE BIGOTS WHO WOULD USE THE ANCIENT HEBREW TEXTS TO WRONGLY PERSECUTE AND CONTROL GAYS AND LESBIANS.
Over the past decade, I have been involved in a study of the so-called anti-homosexual texts of Leviticus in the original Hebrew versions extant, the Dead Sea Scrolls, and with the help of a Catholic Priest and a Protestant Biblical Languages student at Emory University, I have studied translations of the Greek and Latin texts.
This study has involved reviewing Talmudic texts and other materials of a collateral nature to the subject matter being studied; history, anthropology, archaeology, philology, and etymology, to name but a few.
As a result of my research, I am convinced of two things.
1. THE ORIGINAL HEBREW TEXTS HAD ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO DO WITH HOMOSEXUALITY!
2. The texts of Leviticus (and Deuteronomy) were utilized by the teachers and Rabbis of the Jewish religious tradition to condemn homosexuality only at a MUCH later date, about 1500 years later. This change of direction happened in the 4th to 6th centuries under THREAT from the dominant and controlling Christian governmental and ecclesiastical authorities. The theologians of the Church needed to have the perceived Jewish interpretation of the texts to be in accordance with their own commentaries and teachings on homosexuality and what they believed (falsely) to be sexual perversion.
Within the Hebrew Torah readings of Achare Mot (Leviticus 16: 1-18: 30) and Kedosheem (Leviticus 19: 1-20: 27) are found the verses that have been utilized for the past sixteen hundred years, by Jewish and Christian fundamentalist teachers to wrongly persecute and punish a small portion of the human population.
These specific texts are:
Leviticus 18: 22; which states: V-et zachar lo tishkav mishkevey eeshah toeyvah hee. Do not lie (sexually) with a male as you would with a woman, since this is an abomination (TOEYVAH).
And, Leviticus 20: 13, which states: V-eesh asher yishkav et-zakhar mishkevey eeshah toeyvah. Asu shenayhem mot yumatu dameyhem bam. If a man has sexual intercourse with a male person, in the same manner as with a woman, they have both committed a toeyvah (disgusting perversion). They shall die by their blood being upon them.
It is at least a millennium AFTER these verses were written in Leviticus, during a period of historical time when Jews were in contact with a European based, Syrian-Greek Hellenistic hedonistic culture that had an openly promiscuous sexual modality, that the very first Talmudic references to PUBLIC DISPLAYS of homosexual like activity as a perversion of JEWISH religious practice are recorded. (Sanhedran 54A)
According to Rabbi Jacob Milgrom, the translator and commentator of the prestigious Anchor Bible Series Translation of the Book of Leviticus, and the Jewish Publication Society Commentary on the Book of Numbers, these texts are referring to non–Israelite RELIGIOUS sexual and sexual abuse practices that Israelites were not to imitate in the Land of Israel. It has nothing to do with what we today term as being homosexuality.
This then presents us with several questions:
1. Did the Hebrew people who wrote the original text of Leviticus see it as referring to homosexuality as a sexual orientation and did they see homosexuality as something that was of little or no real concern to the normal operation of the group?
2. Did the Jewish people of a thousand years later, during the time period that coincides with the beginnings of Christianity, view homosexuality as a problem or as a subject of major concern? Did they view homosexuality in the same way we see homosexuality today?
3. Or do our texts refer to PRIESTLY prohibitions only, and not to the everyday rank and file Israelite sexual practices?
4. Or are the texts referring to the inability of a person within the community to control their sexual urges by telling them to get a hold of your emotions, control your bodily functions? and thus, not really referring to orientation at all?
It is my opinion that like all indigenous peoples, including Native American Indians, the Jewish people were not overly concerned about male homosexuality within the community, where two men lived together in a monogamous, sexual relationship. As a rule, it did not get any notice. How do we know this to be true?
In Jewish society, ALL males were under requirement to marry and have children. No provision was made for celibate or homosexual orientation.
According to the Jerusalem Talmud in Tractate Ketubot and in the commentary Rokeach 12, as quoted in the 18th century Sephardic Commentary on the Bible, MeAm Lo'ez, Vol. 1, page 124, Rabbi Chisda (3rd-4th century Babylonian Amora) said; I am better than my colleagues because I was married when I was sixteen years old. But if I had married at age thirteen, I would not have had (seminal emissions) and would have spit in the Satan's eye. (In other words, a young married man will not spill semen in vain.)
The Sages taught that the commandment to marry and have children is more important than that to build the Temple. It was the VERY FIRST COMMANDMENT. They taught that a boy should be under the obligation to marry, (he should have already signed the prenuptial document) by his thirteenth birthday. This was the origin of the Bar Mitzvah. If he had not married by his twentieth birthday, the court could compel him to marry. (ibid.)
The Dead Sea community of Zadokites (Sadducees) evidently thought the Book of Leviticus ESPECIALLY important for their community. Sixteen separate manuscripts (none complete) of Leviticus have been discovered in the caves near the Qumron community. Of these, three show no deviation from what we read today. Four manuscripts were written in a Paleo-Hebraic script in use prior to the exile into Babylon. Our particular verses do not seem to have survived although both chapters are represented.
According to the Dead Sea Scroll, The Messianic Rule, (1QSa,I, 9-11); At the age twenty years old, a youth shall be enrolled (in the Community) to enter upon his allotted duty to raise a family and to be joined to the Holy Congregation. He shall not lay with a woman before then for he does not yet know the difference between good and evil.
From the above texts we see that within both Pharisaic and Qumronic Sadducean Judaism, as represented by the Talmud and the Dead Sea Scroll texts of Qumron, EVERY Jewish boy was married by the time they were sexually active no matter what their sexual orientation was. In fact, the signing of the prenuptial documents were part of a boys coming of age (Bar Mitzvah) ceremony.
Although both the Qumronic community and the Priestly element of Rabbinical Judaism were obsessed with sexual purity and seminal emissions, I cannot find specific references to homosexuals in committed relationship as being in a prohibited activity for Jews.
In a closely knit community of this kind, true homosexuality is usually accepted without fanfare or notice. This is similar to the practice among many Native American tribes where a man who takes upon him female ways is fully accepted as being among the women, including the right to marry a husband. He is termed a person with TWO-SPIRITS. Native Americans have a wide variety of gender roles which designate a person who has both male and female spirits within himself or herself.
Almost all Jewish halakhic authorities agree that nowhere in the specific texts of the Torah does the Torah prohibit homosexual acts by WOMEN, which shows that homosexuality as a sexual orientation is not the intent of the subject verses in Leviticus.
In the 3rd century CE, the Talmud records that Rabbi Huna (the miracle working rain making Rabbi) tried to legislate against lesbians being able to marry a High Priest, a Cohen, but his colleagues ruled against him (BT Yevamot 76a). They said that it was not permissible to prohibit what the Torah permits.
If the Torah was referring to homosexuality in general, why would it just address only male homosexual activity and not also female homosexual activity?
On the basis of the Baraitha d'Rabbi Ishmael in the Sifra, on Leviticus, written in the mid-second century of the Common Era, Rabbi Ishmael says: The Torah is interpreted by means of thirteen rules. When a generalization is followed by a specification, only what specifies applies (Miklal u'frat). The generalization is the text; A man shall not lay with a man.... The specification is the text; ...as you would with a woman.
Based upon this earliest method of Jewish Torah interpretation, the biblical passages in Leviticus 18: 22 and also in Leviticus 20: 13 do not refer to homosexual activity at all as one of the males is heterosexual or perhaps bisexual.
These texts are really referring to ritual and promiscuous sexual practices, which can be the substitution of others, including relatives, animals, and members of the same sex, to satisfy the animal urges of sexual lust, either for ritual purposes or for ones own gratification.
It is not the normal homosexual practice for one man to lie with another man as though he were laying with a woman. In fact, if a man was thinking of his sexual partner as though he were a woman, and not a man, it would not be a homosexual relationship, as one of the parties involved is PRETENDING that the person he is laying with is a woman. It is actually a permissive sexual situation in which the first man does not have control over his sexual emotions, but uses others to satisfy his sexual desires. If we read the Torah this way, it is warning this kind of person that certain types of substitutional sexual behavior are not permitted.
In the Greek texts reference to Lev. 18:22 from the Septuagint (translated in 3rd century BCE), the words are: koimithisi koitin gynaikos (you may not lie as with a woman). This is the way it is usually rendered. The above translates the Hebrew words mishkevey, (to lay sexually with) (mem-shin-kaf-beyt-yud) and eeshah, (woman) (aleph-yod-shin-heh). It is attested in three of the earliest papyri, A, B, and F, which support the word gynaikos -- (as with a woman). It implies a substitution of some sort. Later Christian Greek renditions have used arsenos (young male) instead of gynaikos, which shows a decided anti-Hellenistic or Christian bias.
Rabbi Gershon Winkler has written (in the Bible Review, June 2001):
The Jewish scriptural prohibition against homosexuality appears in the context of laws concerning cultic rites performed by seven specifically named nations whose religious worship rites we were being instructed not to emulate in our worship of God (Leviticus 18:3,22, 20:13,23; Deuteronomy 23:18).
Therefore the wording is; to lay with a man as with a woman, something a true homosexual man does not do. The sin is about a horny heterosexual man using another man for sex, which occurred in ancient religious worship among some of those very same nations that our ancestors were warned against emulating.
To translate that prohibition, therefore, as applying to any homosexual relationship is to exit the realm of divine ordination and enter instead the realm of subjective, mortal homophobia.
The ancient rabbis must have had some sense of this problem when they ruled two thousand years ago that any homosexual sexual activity short of anal intercourse is not included in the biblical prohibition (Babylonian Talmud, Yevamot 54a-56a; Sotah 26b; Niddah 13a; Maimonides, Perush L'Mishnayot on Sanhedrin 54a).
Why did they bother to offer that qualification if it was so clear to them that homosexuality was forbidden? Also, lesbianism, according to Jewish law, was never prohibited; Maimonides—who personally abhorred such behavior—ruled that; it is neither a biblical nor a rabbinic prohibition. (Perush L'Mishnayot on Sanhedrin 54a.)
In fact, the rabbis in the Gemara (Tractate Yevamot) specifically say that that passages in Leviticus refers to an androgynous being and not to male-male sex. Since the rabbis' interpretations are the basis of halakhah, anyone claiming that Judaism is against homosexual orientation based upon that passage is simply incorrect.(End of Rabbi Winkler's article. See SACRED SECRETS by Rabbi Gershon Winkler)
The Torah begins chapter 18 of Leviticus by having YHVH–God state; I am YHVH your Creator–Force! You are not to follow the practices of Egypt where you lived, nor of Canaan, where I will be bringing you. Do not follow any of their customs.
If we wish to determine what kind of customs the author of Leviticus is referring to we must ask ourselves: What were the supposed homosexual practices of the religions in Egypt and in Canaan in the 14th century-10th century BCE (the time represented by Leviticus)?
According to the Egyptian Jewish philosopher Philo (1st century CE Alexandria); They (the pagan TEMPLE PRIESTS) would apply themselves to deep drinking of strong liquor and dainty foods and forbidden forms of intercourse. Not only in their mad lust for WOMEN did they violate the marriage of their neighbors, but also men mounted males.... Then, little by little they accustomed those who were by nature men to submit to play the part of women.... (On Abraham, Chapter 26, pages 134-136.) This Egyptian practice is a SUBSTITUTION of the male body for a female body in male to male sexual activity. It is not homosexuality. The practices being referred to are those of cultic ritual promiscuous sexual behavior.
The passage in Genesis 19 that is used to give the nomenclature of sodomy to homosexual sex (from the 17th or 18th century BCE account), actually does not refer to an act of consensual sex or to homosexual sex at all, but to an act of sexual violence and degradation and male rape, as also does the passage in Judges 19: 22. These are acts of VIOLENCE that are committed by parties seeking, by sexual brutality, to show their hatred for those they are degrading. It is not an act of love or of caring nor is it based upon sexual orientation.
The Hebrew Prophet, Ezekiel, actually addresses the question of what the sin of Sodom was. In Ezekiel 16: 49, Behold, this was the INIQUITY of your sister Sodom; PRIDE, FULNESS OF BREAD (gluttony), AND ABUNDANCE OF IDLENESS was in her and in her daughters, NEITHER DID SHE STRENGTHEN THE HAND OF THE POOR AND NEEDY. (Social injustice, waste, overindulgence, and insolence were the crimes of Sodom, not homosexuality).
The male prostitutes of I Kings 14: 24, 15: 12, II Kings 23:7 (proscribed in Deuteronomy 23: 18) are described in the Talmud (BT Sanhedrin 54b) as providing homosexual sex. Yet, Targum Onkelos (2nd century CE Babylonian Aramaic Jewish translation of the Hebrew texts) reads the text to show that they provided sex to the FEMALE visitors to the Idolatrous temples. If this is the case, there is some question if these male prostitutes were providing homosexual sex to men or if they were providing heterosexual sex to women.
In any case, the male rapes of Genesis and Judges, and the promiscuous male sexual activity of I & II Kings does not describe monogamous, loving and caring homosexual relationships anymore than the case of Lot’s daughters incest describes monogamous, loving and caring heterosexual relationships.
Thus, a look at the internal evidence shows that the words (toeyvah hee), which are translated as "an abomination" or "a disgusting perversion," means much more than that.
The word TOEYVAH is used to describe three CATEGORIES of actions in the Torah as abominations or disgusting perversions. These are laws around IDOLATRY (as in Deuteronomy 17: 4), laws around the eating of forbidden animal species or bodily fluids (as in Deuteronomy 14: 3), and laws around the male sexual prohibitions, (as in Leviticus 18 & 20), which include incestuous relationships, bestiality, and same sex substitution. The word TOEYVAH (or a form of the word), is a CATEGORY of idolatrous forbidden action, and is used over 100 times in the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh).
TOEYVAH is used only 26 times in the Torah; 2 times in Genesis; 1 time in Exodus; 6 times in Leviticus; 0 times in Numbers; and 17 times in Deuteronomy. In all these cases it refers to a form of substitution. The one time it is used in Exodus (8: 22), it refers to the concept that what Israelites sacrifice is an ABOMINATION to the Egyptians.
We thus learn that TOEYVAH refers to a concept akin to adultery against God, by substituting the idolatrous behaviour of another religion as a method of worshipping the Israelite concept of God.
TOEYVAH is in the Major Prophets 57 times. 5 times in 1 & 11 Kings, 3 times in Isaiah, 8 times in Jeremiah, 1 time in Malachi and 41 times in Ezekiel. It is not found at all in the Minor Twelve Prophets.
In the Writings, TOEYVAH is found once in Psalms and 25 times in Proverbs. In every case that toeyvah is found, it is referring to prohibitted activity centered around IDOLATRY.
Now, as to the laws around idolatry, considered a TOEYVAH in Torah, there are many in the Jewish community that see in the depiction of the Christian doctrine of the Trinity idolatrous views, but they represent a very small minority opinion. Most traditional Rabbinical halakhists do not see the Christian concept of Trinity as idolatrous, but rather accept that Judaism, Christianity and Islam all worship the SAME GOD by different Names and concepts of understanding the nature of God.
Even the Mormon–Christian anthropomorphic view of God as having a body of flesh and bone does not qualify them as idolators in the eyes of most Jewish halakhic authorities. There are certainly no authorities within mainline Judaism that would consider any of the variants of Christian or Moslem faiths as “a disgusting perversion or abomination,” with the exception of those groups that advocate violence or hatred based upon race, religious differences, ethnicity, or sexual orientation.
The eating of forbidden animal, bird and fish species, as well as eating a kid cooked in it's mother's milk is considered toeyvah in Deuteronomy 14: 4, as well as the eating of blood (forbidden even in the early Jewish–Christian community, see Acts 15: 20 & 29. It was changed in the early Christian community by virtue of a “revelation” from the leadership of the group, though Seventh Day Adventists and many other biblically food observant groups would disagree that the Vision of Peter was intended to annul the laws prohibiting the eating of certain meat and fish species. Their opinion is considered the MINORITY OPINION.)
However, we Jews do not obligate any other religion to the observance of the Torah laws, which were given specifically to the Jewish people and their descendants, including converts. This is with the possible exception of the seven Noahide Laws, and there is dispute among the halakhic authorities as to which seven laws non-Jews need observe IF they are indeed required to observe any Torah laws at all.
Among us who are practicing religious Jews, none in the Reform, Renewal or Reconstructionist communities would say of those who do not observe the Biblical kosher laws, that they were doing an act that was a disgusting perversion, even if it was an act of eating pork or shellfish. (At least, they would not say it publicly.)
More of the Jews in the above movements would be likely to refer to the eating of any animal, even a kosher animal as a disgusting perversion, due to their misplaced missionary zeal for vegetarianism.
Anthropological studies and modern genetic and social science has shown that homosexuality is the natural state of being for some human beings and other animal species. If that is truly the case, and I believe that it is, then it is God who is responsible for the condition of homosexuality just as it is God who is responsible for the condition of heterosexuality. To say that homosexuality is a deviant behavior is to say that God made a mistake.
Rabbi Ted Alexander (Conservative) of San Francisco, California's Jewish community has stated that; This is the way God has created them (homosexuals), and if God has created them this way, I'm willing to give them the blessings (of marriage). Furthermore, anyone who has any hesitation to give blessings to same-sex people should not say the Sabbath Psalm, 'How great are Your works, oh God,' because that includes everybody.
In March 2000, the 111th Convention of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, representing The Union of American Hebrew Congregations, (Reform), passed a Resolution On Same Gender Officiation whereby they resolved to support a Reform Rabbi that would perform same gender marriage rituals. They also supported the right of Rabbis to choose not to perform same gender marriage rituals.
As a Jewish Flexodox Rebbe, I commend the Reform Rabbis for taking this important step towards full Jewish religious equality in our communities. I pray for the day when the other communities of Jewish thought; Conservative, and Orthodox, also follow suit.
In the San Francisco area, and, I suppose, other areas of intellectual progressive thinking, some Rabbis belonging to the Conservative movement have begun performing same-sex marriages. Rabbis of the Renewal and Flexodox areas of Jewish thought are also performing same-sex unions.
It is of utmost importance for us Jews who are students of the Torah to reclaim our texts that have been kidnapped by the Fundamentalists among us, the Moslems, and the Christians and used to hurt and make afraid. We must follow the example of our blessed Rabbis of Talmudic times and retranslate the Torah in EVERY generation so that we might live in it and not die by it. The Torah is our life and length of days. It is Eternal! It is TRUE!
The Hebrew Torah is the CONSTITUTION of the Jewish people, but it is the Rabbis who, like the Supreme Court, tell us how the Torah directs us in our current generation. The INTERPRETATION of the Torah is a New and Everlasting Continuing Revelation (kabbalah).
In fact, Rabbi Hayyim Palachi writes that: ...the Torah gave permission to each person to express his opinion according to his understanding.... It is not good for a sage to withhold his words out of deference to the sages who preceded him if he finds in their words a clear contradiction.... A sage who wishes to write his proofs against the kings and giants of Torah should not withhold his words nor suppress his prophecy, but should give his analysis as he has been guided by Heaven.
Rabbi Palachi notes that even though Rambam wrote with Divine inspiration, many great sages of his generation criticized his work. There are numerous examples of students refuting their teachers: Rabbi Yehudah ha–Nassi disagreed with his father; Rashba disagreed with Ramban; The Tosafists disagreed with Rashi. Respect for the authorities of the past does not mean that one cannot arrive at an opposing opinion. (See Hikekei Lev, vol. 1, O. H. 6 and Y. D. 42.)
Rabbi Marc Angel (an New York Orthodox Sephardi Rabbi, and past President of the Union of Sephardi Congregations, and past President of the Modern Orthodox Rabbinical Council of America) writes: Diversity of opinion is a reality well recognized in Jewish tradition.
The Talmud (Berakhot 58a) records the ruling that one is required to make a blessing upon seeing a huge crowd of Jews, praising God who is Hakham ha–razim, who understands the root and inner thoughts of each individual. Their thoughts are not alike and their appearances are not alike. God created each individual to be unique; He expected and wanted diversity of thought. (Seeking Good, Speaking Peace.)
Rabbi Hayyim David Halevi, and Rabbi Yaakov Emden both gave their opinions that; a student should question their rabbis’ teachings as best they can. In this way, truth is clarified. (See Aseh Lekha Rav, 2: 61 and She’elot Ya’avetz, 1: 5)
Rabbi Halevi further quotes Rambam (Hilkhot Sanhedrin 23: 9), who states the principle that En le–dayan ella mah she–enav ro’ot – (A judge has only what his eyes see). In other words, a judge must base his opinion solely on his own understanding of the case he is considering. No legal precedent obligates him, even if it is a decision of courts greater than he, even of his own teachers.
In Judaism, we teach that ALL the Torah was given to Moses at Mount Sinai, and that even the most future Responsa of a future Rabbi was included in that Revelation.
We do not change the past teachings arbitrarily, but examine the present needs, look at all the past teachings on the subject, closely inspect the inner–meanings of any textual materials that are relevant to determine if we can deduce a new and “the true” meaning of the texts, and with a prayer towards the concept of unifying the Jewish people so that they last on into the coming generations, we do what needs to be done.
WHY DOES THIS MATTER TO ME, A HETEROSEXUAL RABBI?
In the early 1990s, the legislature of the State of Idaho was presented with a bill that would deny civil rights to gays and lesbians.
As the Lay-Rabbi of Boise's single Jewish community, I was presented with a conflicting internal wrestling match. On the one hand, no segment of any population ought to be denied their civil rights based solely upon their sexual orientation, and on the other hand, I had been taught that homosexual acts were expressly prohibited by the teachings of the Torah as being not just sinful acts but acts that were abhorrent to God.
I resolved my own inner conflict by deciding to follow the Torah dictate of "tzadakah v'chesed" (justice tempered with mercy), and support the gay-lesbian desire to obtain and keep the civil rights that were rightfully theirs as citizens of the United States of America and of the State of Idaho.
The Torah stipulates 32 times that one shall not oppress the "stranger" that dwells among you. To deny any person, or group of persons, their civil rights was definitely a form of oppressive behavior.
Having resolved my quandary, I then began to actively support in public the gay-lesbian rights movement as a friend of the gay-lesbian community and as a representative of Boise's Jewish community.
This public action on my part led to a speaking engagement at a retreat that was being held by one of Boise's more gay-friendly churches. It was my intention to address the Torah concept of the oppressive nature that any legislation passed by the State against any segment of its population represented. I did not intend to address the issue of my own personal beliefs as to the rightness or wrongness of homosexuality within Judaism.
However, evidently God had other ideas. That evening I retired to my room to study and sleep. I recited my evening and bedtime prayers and began to read a new book that I had received just that day (Paradigm Shift, by Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi) while I lay on my bed.
In the course of the night, I began to dream about the Kabbalistic Tree of Jacob's Ladder and how EVERY person possessed within themselves the energies of this Tree, which is an inner psychological Tree. This Tree was represented in my dream by a visual "Shiviti" ( a mandala) that was pictured in "Paradigm Shift."
I dreamed that in bringing the individual's inner energies through the various energy centers within this inner Tree; through the masculine oriented places and through the feminine oriented places; to the central balancing places, from the "Heavenly realm" to the "Earthly realm," one unified the Sacred Name of God; Yod, Heh with the Vav, Heh.
Suffice it to say that along with the visual representation seen in the dream, I also received audio explanation. This "Voice" told me that it was God who determined the sexual orientation of every person on earth who is created in the Divine Image as a physical-spiritual representative of the Divine on earth, as represented by their head being associated with the Yod of God's Sacred Name, their shoulders and arms with the Heh, their spine and torso with the Vav, and their hips and legs with the final Heh.
So impactful was this dream on my consciousness that upon awakening I jumped out of my bed and ran to the Art Cabin where I drew the representation of the dream on the back of the sweat shirt that I was using as a pajama top due to the extreme cold night Fall temperatures of 4:00 A.M. in McCall, Idaho.
That morning, at my lecture, I threw away my notes and instead I used the pajama top as a visual aid representation to describe the dream of the previous night and its meaning for me. That dream had taught me to be totally accepting of homosexuality as a God based and God ordained sexuality and not as an "abomination." Several of those who attended my lecture told me that my explanation cleared up for them why they knew that homosexual orientation was the way that they had been born and not a learned behavior.
Kol brakhot tobot (all good blessings)
Copyright 2000 by Segan Rabbi Gershon Caudill, (the Ecokosher Rebbe)
A HETEROSEXUAL JEWISH REBBE LOOKS AT PAUL'S VIEWS
THE APOSTLE PAUL ON MALE SEX IN ROMANS 1: 26-2: 1
I have been asked, how do I as a Jew who is not a Christian, understand what the Christian Apostle Paul wrote in Romans 1.
I find that what it seems to me that Paul is discussing is NOT homosexuality, as I understand homosexuality to mean, but sexual promiscuity and lust. He is NOT referring to two men in a positive homosexual "marriage," but to men who (verse 26) God gave up to their own vile affections, i. e. even their women (thus it is speaking of heterosexual perversion) did change the natural (heterosexual) use into that which is against nature (substitution of a similar sexual partner for that of an other sexual partner in a lustful relationship.)
(Verse 27), And so also the men, they leave the natural (heterosexual) use of the woman, and burn in their LUST towards each other, (heterosexual) men with (heterosexual) men doing that which is an abomination ( toeyvah-substitution); they take to themselves wages of mischief that are envisioned in their fleshly bodies. (They are practicing hedonistic sexual license.)
The further evidence is found in verses 29-32, followed by the clincher in chapter 2: verse 1; "Therefore, do not free up (get caught up) yourself, son of man, in judgments of who you should be as one that judges another; in doing so, you condemn yourself, for one that judges is doing a similar thing (as the one he judges.)
The way this reads to me further backs up what I am saying: It is not HOMOSEXUALITY per se, that Paul is in opposition to, but men SUBSTITUTING men's bodies for women's bodies. A true homosexual man is not substituting another man's body as a vehicle for sexual perversion. He is deeply in "love" with his companion, just as a heterosexual man is deeply in "love" with his companion.
The Levitical laws against male to male SUBSTITUTION cannot be viewed as a prohibition against what we know today as HOMOSEXUALITY anymore than the Levitical prohibition against incest can be viewed as an, across the board, laws against heterosexual sexual practices, although every case cited in the text (Leviticus 18: 6-17) is between sexual partners of opposite sexes. The sexual practice itself, neither heterosexual nor homosexual, is not what is in question either in the text of Leviticus nor in your Book of Romans, rather it is the EMOTION of LUST, without LOVE, that creates the sin. When LUST reigns unbridled, it can quickly turn into hatred and rape, as at Sodom. This practice is also condemned by myself.
I do not support sexual license between couples, either heterosexual or homosexual, unless they are in a committed relationship with each other. And then it is none of my business what they do behind closed doors.
Most of what is being condemned as "homosexual" behavior in the Bible is also mirrored in heterosexual behavior by couples engaging in group-sex or switching partners sex. This is not a committed relationship, either in a homosexual or a heterosexual relationship. AND, it is this sexual license that both the Hebrew Torah AND the Christian's Greek New Testament texts seem to find abhorant (in the Hebrew category of "toeyvah"), on a par with idolatry, and eating unconsecrated meat (see Isaiah 66: 17.)
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