Unkosher Sex and Acharei-Kedoshim

Parshat Acharei-Kedoshim


Unkosher Sex and Acharei-Kedoshim

This parshat talks about all kinds of different laws from not cheating your workers to not eating blood and a whole lot of talk about...well...sex

And that's where things get really interesting

It's a no-brainer that the Torah is written for men. Men were the only ones educated in early Middle Eastern cultures. And since it's written for men, it has many biases and prejudices against women.

It's obvious when you look at the sexual laws. All sexual laws, with the exception of one, are written with the prefix "If a man" or some other reference to the male as the one committing the offensive act. The only exception to this is Lev 20:16 which talks about women having sex with animals.

This parshat assumes that a woman's role in sexuality is really passive...like she's too dumb to be spoken to directly. The man is the leader but since both man and woman are sinning, they both get the ax...literally.

And that's the next weird thing about this parshat. The death penalty is applied in lots of areas...cursing your father...death....sorcery...death. But for some reason, screwing your aunt or sister isn't as bad as getting frisky with a barn yard animal. It just means you'll be childless.

It's things like this that keep Jews, especially counter cultural Jews, from practicing their Faith. And I don't blame them.

A lot of times, people giving Torah lessons will create a midrash or some Rambam inspired contemporary understanding of obscure laws. The idea is to make you more comfortable with shockingly weird, antiquated ideas...to make them more worldly and open. I think that this is dishonest. Remember, these laws were developed by nomadic, tribal people in the dessert thousands of years ago. Jewish laws were a reaction against the values of the Pagans: an idolatrous death culture, worshiping mortals as gods and delighting in excess.

Judaism is not about reform. It's not about being conservative, either...and its especially not Orthodox. Judaism is Reactionary...and it's that reactionary, hell, Revolutionary, way of looking at the world that puts Judaism and the DIY rock and roll scene right next to each other.

So let's look at our values as a society, and let's apply that Reactionary Judaism to it. Who knows what we'll discover about ourselves.

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