Book Excerpts: 1

Excerpts: Carnal Israel, by Daniel Boyarin

Below are excerpts from the book that I found particularly fascinating. There is a pro-sex bias in my selection.

The rabbis said: Since it is a time of God's favor, let us pray regarding desire for sexual sin. They prayed and he was committed into their hands. God said to them. "Be careful, for if you kill him, the world will end." They imprisoned him for three days, and then they looked for a fresh egg in all the Land of Israel, and did not find one. They said, "What shall we do? If we kill him, the world will end. If we pray for half* in heaven they do not answer halfway prayers. Blind him and let him go." At least, a man does not become aroused by his female relatives." (Babylonian Talmud Yoma 69b), pg. 61. Boyarin, pg. 62: "The crucial part of the story is that halfway prayers are not answered. It is this that gives us the crucial clue to the rabbinic psychology and their concepts of the Evil Desire. In order for there to be desire and thus the possibility for sexuality at all, they are saying, there must also be the possibility for illicit desire. Desire is one, and killing off desire for illicit sex will also kill off desire for licit sex, which is necessary for the continuation of life...the desire for sex it itself productive and vital, but it has destructive and negative concomitants. These concomitants need to be controlled, and can be, but only with difficulty."

Pg. 65: Boyarin brings the story of Abbaye, who seeing a man and a woman (not married to each other) about to embark on a journey together, is convinced they will wind up having sex, and is saddened when he is proven wrong. "Said Abaye, if that had been me, I would not have been able to control myself." He went...and was miserable. A certain old man...taught him, "Everyone who is greater than his fellow, his Desire is greater also." (Babylonian Talmud Sukkah 52a) Boyarin explains: "The very passion that drives Abbaye to study Torah and become a "great man"...one learned in and devoted to Torah, is the same one that would have prevented him from simply saying goodbye to the woman and parting from her without sex. ...The same desire that will lead man in the study house to study Torah will in bed lead him to have intercourse with his wife, and this is the very same drive that will lead him into sin when he is alone with a woman to whom he is not married. The passion is one."

* Rashi - ie that people will only desire licit sex