Friday, April 23, 2021

Does the Torah Actually Prohibit all Homosexual Intercourse?

I apologize for the time lapse between this post and my last one.  Honestly, I have been thinking about and reading about and studying this issue for quite some time.  Since we are about to read the portion of Leviticus this week  in synagogue that is the center of this discussion, I decided it was time to release this post.  I hope that all of my readers are willing to join me on this journey through a very challenging subject.  Those of you that have been following me for the last ten years have learned that this blog is not designed for those people who like to read a rant in which I express an opinion and throw around a few things to support my opinion.  You can go to FaceBook for that.  I will take the time necessary to take apart an issue from beginning to end, even if that takes several years and a lot of work.  More importantly, even if it means finding out that my preconceived ideas were completely wrong. 

We established in previous posts here that the prohibition in Leviticus 18 and 20 prohibits penetrative anal intercourse between two males.  We also wrote that this was how Chazal understood this prohibition, and how it was interpreted by Halachic authorities ever since.  Presumably, this would mean that if two adult men, both of whom are gay, had a consensual, loving, and committed long-term relationship, that sexual intercourse would be forbidden.

In chapter 13 of his book, Rabbi Steven Greenberg presents an analysis of the verses in Vayikra.  Many other scholars have made similar analyses over the years, and I cannot review all of them and their arguments.  I had to pick one, so I picked Rabbi Greenberg.  Very similar ideas were also presented in a famous (or infamous, depending on your perspective) speech given by Rabbi Joseph Dweck in May 2017.  He presented almost the same ideas but stopped short of claiming that we should apply these ideas in practical Halacha.  You can see his lecture hereI will present his basic argument, and then analyze if we can practically apply them and remain within the bounds of accepted Orthodox Halacha. 

I am aware that an exact definition of the term "accepted Orthodox Halacha" is not so easy to find. Please allow me to define it the way I understand it for the purposes of this blog.  Orthodox Halacha means that we interpret the Torah She'beKtav (the written Torah) according to the way that Chazal (the rabbis of the Mishna and Talmud) taught us in the Torah She'be'al Peh (the oral Torah) If Chazal tell us how to interpret a verse in the Torah and then teach us practical Halacha on that basis, Orthodoxy demands that we follow that interpretation While it is true that there are "Shivim Panim La'Torah" (seventy "faces" - potential interpretations) to the Torah, we cannot decide on our own that we can change practical Halacha if it means interpreting a verse in the Torah in a manner expressly different from the way it was interpreted by Chazal. 

I will present Rabbi Greenberg’s argument as a series of points rather than by developing his entire narrative. If you want to see his entire argument, please see his book. These points are meant to read as a progression of arguments and observations leading to a conclusion. The numbering is not random. Forgive me please if I am oversimplifying his ideas. I ask his forgiveness in advance if I misrepresent his ideas, though I do think I do a pretty decent job summarizing them.  My goal is to present what is necessary for the purposes of my halachic discussion on this blog.  

  1. In ancient societies, penetrative sex was perpetrated by the powerful against the weak. It was a demonstration of dominance over the weaker or younger party, and it was humiliating. (Such practices still exist of course, for a graphic and contemporary example, think of those prisoners who abuse other prisoners by sexually assaulting them. They are usually not homosexual predators; they are just predators)
  2. Sadly, women were considered inferior, and the fact that men penetrate women during intercourse was seen as a way of showing dominationThe domination of male over female was an integral part of the institution of marriage in much of the ancient world. 
  3. Men who were on the receiving end of such intercourse were looked upon as if they were like women, in the sense that they were inferior and somehow beneath the "dominant" penetrator. In many ways, they were seen as if they had made themselves "like women". This was like willingly accepting an inferior and degraded status.
  4. Homosexual relationships, in the sense of two men who were committed to each other in bonds of love and respect were just "not a thing" in those days. 
  5. The verses in Leviticus are written in the context of other prohibitions against incest. By its' very definition, incest is an act in which someone abuses the trust that one has in a family member. The vulnerability of someone dependent on his/her family while a family member dominates and degrades the victim, is well understood by modern psychologists. The victim is typically helpless and has nowhere to turn, as the people who are supposed to protect them are the perpetrators. 
  6. In this context, it makes sense that the Torah prohibits male/male intercourse as it is degrading to the victim, and even the willing victim is guilty of allowing himself to be degraded in a way unbecoming of God's creation.
  7. When the Torah writes that one may not "lie with a man" it was already obvious that the intent was to prohibit penetrative intercourse, as this is what it always means and what it meant in every other verse. 
  8. The only reason the Torah needed to add the term "as one lies with a woman" is to tell us that it is this type of denigrative and abusive penetrative sex that is prohibited between malesThis would not apply to a loving, consensual, long-term relationship between two homosexual males. 

The attractiveness of accepting this as the reading of the verse is obvious. It would end our conundrum with which I began this blog thread.  It would both leave the prohibition of Leviticus intact, while still allowing for sexual activity between two gay and committed men. But can this be acceptable halachically? Does this violate the rule that we cannot interpret a verse contrary to the interpretation of Chazal when it changes practical Halacha?

I will henceforth refer to the type of intercourse prohibited by the Torah according to rabbi Greenberg as "humiliative", and the type of intercourse that would be permitted as "relationship".

The truth is that this interpretation of the verse feels forced.  I have always read the verse my entire life the standard way and concluded that the Torah prohibits male/male penetrative intercourse, period.  Every time I have read the sugyot in Shas, I assumed that Chazal read it this way as well.  Clearly, the poskim throughout history understood it this way.  I asked myself to play a thought experiment.  What if I had been taught Rabbi Greenberg's interpretation of the verses from childhood, how would I have learned the sugyot in shas?  What if I lived in a society like the one I just described in ancient times?  What if I had always assumed that what God found abhorrent was humiliative intercourse between men? Is it possible that Chazal really also understood it this way, and that if I started with a different idea of the meaning of the verse, maybe I would have read the gemara differently too? 

I am virtually certain that this post will be misunderstood by some readers, so I am going to try to be very clear about what I am about to do in this post:

  1. The verses in Leviticus have been understood throughout the Halachic literature to be referring to all types of homosexual male/male penetrative intercourse
  2. The poskim read both the Torah and Chazal with the above assumption intact
  3. Rabbi Greenberg suggested that the Torah was only referring to humiliative, and not relationship intercourse (my terms, not his)
  4. If Chazal interpreted the verse to be referring to all types of male/male intercourse, then we cannot as Orthodox Jews accept Rabbi Greenberg's suggestion, no matter how much we may want to
  5. Is it possible that we have read Chazal incorrectly as well? Maybe Chazal also understood the verses to be referring only to humiliative intercourse?
  6. If we can demontstrate that the above assumption is even possible, then although Rabbi Greenberg's suggestion certainly goes against many centuries of Halachic understanding, but it isn't completely outside of the Orthodox range of possibilites
The rest of this post will be discussing this one problem only. That is the question of whether it is possible that we have been reading Chazal wrong for all these years.  I am only asking if it is possible, not if it is true or not. There are many other issues that will be dealt with in future posts. Please bear in mind that this will be an exceptionally long journey. I beg the reader to allow me the opportunity to go through this process before you think you know what my conclusions will be. Here goes: 

In our previous discussion, we brought two Talmudic sources, one from Yevamot and one from Sanhedrin, which established that Chazal understood the prohibition of leviticus to be referring to penetrative intercourse between males.  Chazal certainly do not point out this differentiation between two types of male/male intercourse (which I will now refer to as "humiliative" versus "relationship" intercourse).  However, let's assume for the moment that Chazal understood it as a given that the male/male intercourse being prohibited was humiliative, as we described above.

While this may seem surprising to many of us at first, let me present the following analysis of every known reference in the Talmud regarding homosexuality.  I want to see if it is possible that Chazal, when they wrote of this prohibition, only meant humiliative intercourse.  If it is plausible, then Rabbi Greenberg's theory might be able to remain within the bounds of Orthodox halacha.  If not, then no matter how nice his explanation sounds, it cannot be considered acceptable within Orthodoxy.

Berachot 43b

Six things are disgraceful for a Torah scholar: He may not go out perfumed into the marketplace; he may not go out of his house alone at night; he may not go out wearing patched shoes; he may not converse with a woman in the marketplace; he may not recline and participate in a meal in the company of ignoramuses; and he may not be the last to enter the study hall. And some say that he may not take long strides and he may not walk with an upright posture. The Gemara elaborates on the statements of the baraita. He may not go out perfumed into the marketplace; Rabbi Abba, son of Rabbi Ḥiyya bar Abba, said that Rabbi Yoḥanan said: This prohibition only applies in a place where they are suspected of homosexuality. One who goes out into the marketplace perfumed, will arouse suspicion. Rav Sheshet said: We only said this with regard to his clothing that was perfumed, but with regard to his body, it is permitted, as his sweat causes the fragrance to dissipate. Rav Pappa said: In this regard, his hair is considered like his clothing. And some say: His hair is considered like his body.

Based on the context, the reason for the prohibition against a Torah Scholar going out perfumed in the marketplace, is that people may suspect that his intent is to engage in homosexual acts.  One wonders why Chazal were not concerned that he may be suspected of illicit heterosexual acts?  The next prohibition, going out alone at night, is prohibited due to this very same reason. The perfume, however, is by nature meant to attract others.  One might explain, that for someone about to engage in an exploitative activity, such as to hire a prostitute (and presumably to penetrate her sexually and exploit her vulnerability and need for money), which is what one is suspect of going out alone at night, he need not attract attention to himself.  However, if one wants to be receptive and allow another to penetrate him, he will want to make himself attractive by perfuming himself. 

 

This is by no means a definitive proof, but making oneself receptive to intercourse and allowing oneself to be humiliated in such a way (remember that this is how receptive male/male intercourse was viewed in the contemporary society) would be exactly the type of intercourse forbidden by the Torah.  The type of intercourse one attracts by wandering around the marketplace is not the type of loving, consensual intercourse that we are calling relationship intercourse.  So is it at least possible so far that Chazal understood the prohibition against male/male intercourse to be referring only to humiliative intercourse? Yes, so far it is at least possible. 

Kiddushin 82a

21 comments:

  1. One could also challenge the historical veracity of the claim that all male penetration at that time was "humilitative", and especially differentiate by different chachamim and the norm in their surrounding environments.

    While ancient greek's "Pederasty" was not a modern loving relatinoship, it is viewed by many scholars as closer to a mentoring relationship then to what you call "humilitative" (though maybe chazal could have viewed it as such?) (alternatively, one could replace "humilitative" with "social/age gap")

    Greek sources report that the persians had their ownversin of pederasty and were very tolerant towards h0mosexulity until the rise of zoroastrianism which forbade it, and clashed over it (around the time of the bavli...)

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    1. Yes, certainly in order to make this claim. I agree that a very substantial historical analysis would have to be done in order to determine if indeed this claim is reasonably plausible. To be fair, Rabbi Greenberg and other scholars have written about the histpry much more extensively than I have. I am not a histrian, and I only quoted what I thought was necessary fpr our discussion.

      Regarding the Greek version, I think Chazal would likely have viewed it as humiliative. This mentoring idea doesn't really sound plausible to me. Admittedly I am standing very far removed from anciant Greece, but it sounds to me like just another way for an adult to take advantage of a child and attempt to put a positive spin on it.

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  2. Is Sanhedrin 9B (פלוני רבעו לרצונו) relevant here? Is it not clearly a case is of consensual homosexual intercourse? It seems forced to me, to say that it is still a case of humuliative intercourse if it was according to the רצון of both parties. (If one wanted to claim that the "victim" wanted to be humiliated, this seems strange and how would such a case be differentiated from non-humiliative intercourse?)

    The debate here seems to be whether such testimony renders the claimant a רשע and thus unable to testify against the רובע or whether one can't testify against oneself and the part of the testimony against the רובע holds. If Chazal held according to R. Greenbergs thesis shouldn't the halacha should be that the case is מותר (or at least permitted if such and such conditions are met showing that the relationship is loving)?

    P.S. Does R. Greenberg also hold that loving incest is permitted (say in the case of a long lost brother and sister that meet and fall in love)?

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    1. First of all, thank you so much for bringing this Gemara to my attention, as I missed it. I was hoping that people would bring other sources to my attention, and I really appreciate it.

      Regarding the Gemara you mention, I must emphasize that when one gives himself over for receptive intercourse, that is very much not the same thing as what I have been calling "Relationship intercourse". I pointed out in the blog that receptive intercourse was considered humiliating in those cultures, and that the Torah specifically prohibited things like being a "Kadesh" which most Rishonim understand is someone who is "meyuchad L'Mishkav zachar". Thjese were done either for cultic reasons or for money, or some other gain. This was humiliating, even though it was also "beratzon". A person engaged in this activity is Halachically liable for his actions and would be considered a "rasha".

      Your question regarding loving incest is an interesting one as well. It is true that one may find a scenario where it would not be abusive (such as the "long lost brother" case which you mentioned. However, the Torah did not qualify the prohibition of incest with any "explanatory" notes. Here though, when discussing Mishkav Zachar, the Torah added an unnecessary phrase of "Mishkevey Isha". The argument Rabbi Greenberg is making is that we would've already known from the words וְאֶ֨ת־זָכָ֔ר לֹ֥א תִשְׁכַּ֖ב that penetrative intercourse is prohibited. The phrase Mishkevey Isha, according to this argument, was specifically inserted to include humiliative and exclude relationship intercourse.

      Although we are treading on shaky ground whenever we give reasons for the Torah's commandments, if the Torah itself does so, that changes things. The Torah itself did not state the reason for incest. However, the context of the entire parsha is one that is very consistent with abuse, as incest is almost always abusive. There are certainly medical reasons to prohibit even "loving" incest, though I am not claiming to know with certainty what God's reasons are.

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  3. Re: slaves and sexual practices. See MB 139:14
    Also, proper translation would be servants

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    1. Thanks for the reference and comment. Does MB stand for Mishna Berurah? I checked MB 139:14 and not sure how it is relevent. Can you tell me the reference you are reffering to? Thanks!

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    2. i'm guessing its a typo for siman 199

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    3. Thank you "cc" for the clarification. It does appear that MeMidinat Hayam had this in mind. The idea that Slaves/servants are suspected of impropriety and promiscuity appears in many places, which we discussed in the blog. I am OK with either translation of the term "avadim"

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  4. You skipped Niddah 13b (obviously fits with humiliative, note carefully that תינוקות is the proper plural of male תינוק and the first two rejected explanations of תינוקות are about young *males* as evident in Rashi etc.) but that source brings us to the simple answer of why the Torah specified משכבי אשה nothing to do with humiliation. It's obviously to exclude דרך איברים. It isn't obvious a priori that anal sex is a relevant category distinct from other non-vaginal-penetrative sex (or as ancients probably called it: non-sex) or even penetration in other orifices. We forget that it's a big chiddush that anal sex is a relevant halachic category. Many gay men don't even engage in anal sex that often https://www.jsm.jsexmed.org/article/S1743-6095(15)33334-8/abstract The Torah had to specify it meant to prohibit a specific physical kind of sex. In that light Rabbi Greenberg's question from the extra phrase משכבי אשה doesn't even start.

    (Also Horyot 13a, also humiliation.)

    If we're establishing two qualitatively different categories of intercourse, we also need to see how they apply across the board.

    You have argued that since chazal only knew about one kind of male-male intercourse, they always assumed it tacitly. But did they know of two kinds of male-female intercourse? If they did, which is plausible, it's quite surprising they never mentioned it even in passing even in a hava amina. They should have asked if relationship intercourse can effect kiddushin. Seemingly it's just the domineering kind of intercourse which "conquers" the woman like acquiring land with chazaka. They should have asked about concerns for relationship incest for long lost siblings. They should have asked about relationship adultery such as a woman who gets remarried thinking her husband died and turns out he's alive: is that the kind of adultery that's prohibited? I'm sure someone creative enough can come up with some nafka mina in yevamos cases too, etnan, yiud, etc.. Even if the answer is for all those rules both types of intercourse happen to be the same, they should have asked and derived it from verses or something. It seems much more plausible that either they didn't know about two kinds of male-female intercourse, in which case we have to reevaluate all those rules too, or that they knew that all intercourse is formally equivalent in all matters.

    So on your read did chazal know of two kinds of male-female intercourse or not?

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    1. Thank you so much for bringing these sources to my attention. I knew that I must've missed some sources, and I hoped that my readership would help me, and you and others of course have. I will probably add these sources into the main text oif the last post. I deeply appreciate your interest in my blog and your comments.

      Allow me to respond to your points.

      Niddah 13b: I did analyze this Gemara in depth during my discussion of the laws of masturbation. There I determined thaty according to the Rambam and many other Rishonim, Derech Eyvarim is prohibitted only because it is a promiscuous activity that leads to all sorts of other actual sexual sins. However, derech eivarim within the context of a marriage would not be assur, see http://rationalistmedicalhalacha.blogspot.com/2020/09/rambams-opinion-and-mysterious-new.html
      therefore, since derech eivarim per se is never an Issur on its own in the Torah, one would still assume that lo tishkav alone would be assumed to mean penetrative intercourse, which could only be anal, (remember that the gemara in Yevamot 54b and many other places) equates Biah shlo kedarka - anal intercourse - with vaginal intercourse and it is included in all of the prohibitions. It would be logiical therefore to assume that by a zachar it is referring to anal intercourse.

      Niddah 13b is therefore another gemara that can clearly be interpreted as discussing humiliative intercourse between males.

      I have a few points to make regarding your second paragraph:

      "You have argued that since chazal only knew about one kind of male-male intercourse, they always assumed it tacitly"

      Number one, I am playing a thought experiment here, trying to see if Rabbi Greenberg's hypothesis is necessarily against Chazal's interpretation of the pasuk. I don';t know yet what my own conclusion is or will be. However, for argum,ents sake, I am OK with temporarily taking this up as if it is my position, just so that you and I can continue a scholarly debate. Also, I did say that it is clear that Chazal knew that loving relationships can exist between men, it is just that given the circumstances of the times, it would've been obvious to them that the type of intercourse prohibitted was humiliative, as this was the debased kind common in the gentile culture around them, and that long term relationships that were loving between men were not recogniozed and were not a part of their culture. Humiliative homosexual intercourse was very much a part of that culture though. Regarding Kiddushin, I think it was understood that Kiddushin cannot be effected between two males, but I will discuss this in later posts in much more detail.

      Regarding relationship intercourse between males and females, I amswered to another commenter earlier that the "chiluk" between these two categories is only relevant to male/male homosexual intercourse because the pasuk introduced that idea when it said "mishkevey Isha" (obviously according to Rabbi Greeberg's reading of this pasuk). For the other arayot, the pasuk did not qualify the type of intercourse prohibited by saying that only humiliative intercourse was prohibited. See what I answered Ariel regarding "loving incest" above in the comments.

      Why the Torah did not differentiate between two types of male/female incest and it did (at least according to R' Greenberg) is not really for us to know Ta'amey HaMitzvot, but it is easy to conjecture as to why it might be different.

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  5. ״penetrative intercourse, which could only be anal" Is oral sex not penetrative?? I don't understand.

    "(remember that the gemara in Yevamot 54b and many other places) equates Biah shlo kedarka - anal intercourse - with vaginal intercourse and it is included in all of the prohibitions" That gemara does so precisely based on our verse משכבי אשה!! See too Sanhedrin 54. This just proves my point that we wouldn't have known otherwise. You were assuming the conclusion. We'd expect a priori a prohibition on homosexual sex or incest to include all forms of relevant intimacy or vaginal sex only. That's why we need something to teach us that anal sex is, quite surprisingly, formally equivalent to vaginal sex for all purposes. There is no reason to read anything about humiliation into the phrase משכבי אשה nor any reason to think chazal did since they readily use the phrase for other important things.

    "See what I answered Ariel regarding 'loving incest' above in the comments." I didn't ask what the answer is to why male-female prohibitions may not have this detail. I asked why chazal didn't deal with it. If we want to see if this theory is consistent with chazal, we have to check if it is consistent with both what they wrote and what they chose not to write.

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  6. 1) I am actually not sure why, but i don't believe that oral sex would be considered penetrative. It would be "Biah Derech eyvarim" though. But that is not assur min HaTorah (other then from Lo Tikrevu according to the Rambam - we will be discussing that in later posts. Maybe I am wrong. I would have to think more about that one, but I am not sure I want to. Maybe because the mouth naturally opens and closes and similar to the din of Hara'uy le'bilah eyn bilah me'akeves which we say by tevillah and other places? maybe that shows that the ,mouth is halachically not considered internal? This is WAY farther than I wanted to go down this road.

    2) The gemara I cited in Yevamot learns from the pasuk that "Ha'ara'ah" or incomplete intercourse is assur by males from the verse Mishkevey Isha. The assumption in the background is that vaginal and anal intercourse are equivalent when the person penetrated is a woman. The reason why the Chachamim don't discuss or deal with the difference between "loving" and "relationship" intercourse by male/female intercourse is because Halachically it makes no difference. So it is irrelevant. I am not sure that I agree that we can learn anything from the fact that they don't discuss this chiluk by a woman. I don;t agree that we would expect Chazal to discuss it a priori in a category where it has no practical relevance

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    1. And how do they know vaginal and anal intercourse are equivalent when the person penetrated is a woman? ת"ר איש פרט לקטן אשר ישכב את זכר בין גדול בין קטן משכבי אשה מגיד לך הכתוב ששני משכבות באשה Our source. The Torah tells us here that a woman has two, not just one, ways of lying.

      "The reason why the Chachamim don't discuss or deal with X is because Halachically it makes no difference. So it is irrelevant." That argument form is clearly fallacious, as seen in hundreds of places where chazal say "maybe X? no, because Y". If in one area of halacha humiliative intercourse is a relevant category, we should expect to have to deal with it elsewhere, just like when the gemara learns out that he'ara counts, or biah shelo kedarka counts, or oneis counts, or gemar biah counts, or whatever. Why, according to you, do they mention heara and gmar biah by yibbum if it makes no practical difference for yibbum? Clearly they were on board with specifying all the different things that count. Maybe it should have said ולא חילק בין ביאה לביאה comes as a general rule to include humiliative intercourse, but it didn't. Plenty of reasonable opportunities.

      You can always wiggle out an explanation, just like the sugya about self-penetration, but for a neutral presenter to completely ignore this suggestive data point is in my opinion irresponsible.

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  7. Your point regarding "Mishkevey" as the source that both types of male/female intercourse are equal is obviously correct. Clearly Chazal did not assume that any other form of "intercourse" was included, as they also assumed that Derech
    eyvarim and oral intercourse was not the same level as anal and vaginal.

    I understand your point that if there is indeed a distinction between "loving" and "humiliative" intercourse by male/male intercourse, then one might imagine that somewhere Chazal would have mentioned it. I do not believe though that the absence of such a disctinction in Chazal is a proof of anything. It is certainly not "fallacious" or "irresponsible"to state that the reason Chazal never mentioned it with regard to female/female intercourse could be because it wasn't relevant. I do agree that oftentimes Chazal do bring a potential chiluk and then state that it is not relevant because of a pasuk or a sevara etc... Therefore in theory I suppose there could have been a point somewhere in Shas that Chazal might have brought this up and then rejected it with regard to female/male intercourse. However, the absemce of such a discussion does not prove that this chiluk doesn't exist.

    In reference to male/male intercourse though, the argument I was making was that Chazal didn't mention it because it was obvious to them that this was the type of intercourse that was forbidden, and the "relationship" type was just not considered by them. I understand that this argument is on some shaky ground, but it is the argument I have been making.

    Regarding the self-penetration Gemara, I ceratinly applaud you for picking my weakest link. I cannot reveal my sources, but some of the most sympathetic poskim to my arguments have rejected my thesis because of this gemara. I have been discussing this topic with numerous poskim from a large spectrum of Orthodoxy, and this is my weakest link.

    That being said, the Gemara itself is strange on many levels, and if you do accept my explanation, then at least it sounds a little less strange to imagine that the prohibition is because this person is humiliating himself. Especially since there is almost certainly no hana'ah involved at all. This calls into question how it could even be assur at all if one dervies nothing from it, but if he is humiliating himself at another's expense, then there is hana'ah in having whatever it is he is getting from the others. I realize that this opens a large can of worms, but we can keep discussing urther if you'd like. Thanks for the shakla ve'taryah.

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    1. I don't understand your response.

      We all always agreed that anal and vaginal intercourse are different from oral intercourse and derech evarim LEHALACHA. That's not what we're discussing. We're discussing if the word "mishkevei" is a pleonasm that could be used to indicate that only a certain type of homosexual intercourse is prohibited. That is precisely argument point #8. It is clearly not correct since "mishkevei" is needed to teach us that anal and vaginal intercourse are different from oral intercourse and derech evarim. You and I know that conclusion but it wasn't obvious a priori until chazal learned it from this verse. The verse mishkevei isha is not in any way extra.

      Similarly, we both always agreed that the argument from silence in the male-female case can't be 100% conclusive proof. That's not the point. The point is if you are listing all the data from chazal and evaluating how it fits with or needs to be explained with the theory of humiliative intercourse being different, it behooves you to list this data point and address it too. It's real evidence too, even if there is no smoking gun to be found in the end. A responsible presentation presents *all* the evidence and addresses it as best it can. Just like someone who is thinking about this needs to grapple with a bizarre read of Sanhedrin 55a, so too they have to grapple with a surprising read of Yevamot 6:1 and all the sugyot of male-female intercourse that never bother to derive or even state the necessary rules. We must put the difficulties with this position on the table and not hide them.

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    3. Assuming that Rabbi Greenberg's reading is correct, it is the term of two words Mishkevei Isha that would exclude relationship intercourse and include humiliative intercourse. Not just the term Mishkevei alone. You are not correct that "mishkevey" is needed to exclude oral intercourse and derech eyvarim. The "hava aminah" of the gemara is that there is ONLY one type of intercourse that is assur, and that is vaginal intercourse. the word mishkevey INCLUDES another type which is anal, it does not exclude derech eyvarim or oral, as there never was such a hava aminah. furthermore, this inclusion is used to teach us regarding the laws of intercourse with a forbidden woman, i.e. that anal intercourse is assur as well. The gemara is not dealing with why this term is placed here in the pasuk discussing mishkav zachar. It is certainly possible that this pasuk is both teaching us what type of intercourse is assur between males, at the same time that it also teaches us that anal intercourse is assur with a forbidden woman. The pasuk could just as easily have said "mishkav isha" and we would've learned Rabbi Greenberg's idea, and now that it says mishkevey in plural, it also teaches us an additional lesson regarding anal intercourse with a woman.

      I also don't believe my suggested interpretation of Sanhedrin 55a is "bizarre". While i concede that it was not the way I read the gemara initially, It does offer an explanation to a Gemara that is otherwise very unusual and difficult to understand. Without my explanation one is left trying to figure out why in the world there would be an issur in self penetration, but with my explanation at least one understands that one can humiliate oneself. So it is not an easy gemara no matter how you look at it.

      And for your last point, now that we have discussed this topic several times in the comments, I don't think it is valid anymore to criticize me for not mentioning the fact that Chazal do not ever mention this "chiluk" between humiliative and relationship intercourse. As you said, we both agree that the lack of stating something is not proof. How much weight you put on the fact that Chazal do not mention it is a matter of opinion. You feel that it is a signifciant difficulty, and I, while I am trying to defend the viability of Rabbi Greenberg's assertion put less of a value on that ommision. But proof it is not. Besides, I did explain the reason why Chazal may not have mentioned it in regard to homosexual intercourse, because it was obvious to them that the type prohibited was humiliative, for historic and moral reasons it was obvious to them, and this was what I argued clearly in my posts. I honestly am not completely sure if it is correct or not, I was simply stating that if one were to make such an argument (which Rabbi Greenerg is making) then there is no proof from Chazal that it is wrong.

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  8. using the above type of logic, can one say one can strike a match on shabbos today, since now we have very easy ways to ignite, not like in biblical times when a much bigger process was required to ignite. (maybe this is not the best example to use).

    similarly can we apply the same logic to many other commandments as we see fit to fit in with this logic system? likely there are many of them that can be regarded as outdated and not applicable to todays standards.

    as i am not an expert, is the above logical deduction to possibly permit some forms of homosexual intercourse, fit within the standardized Thirteen Principles of Torah Exegesis of the Beraita of Rabbi Yishmael?

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  9. It is also prohibited b'cause it was the practice of the Egyptians and inhabitants of Canaan. Seems like an artificial distinction is being invented with the intent to legitimize an abomination (per Torah) and overturn long standing halacha.

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  10. this was the stupidest post i've ever seen in my life. stupid greenberg and stupid rationalist medical halacha blogger are making stuff up left and right. this is not torah, this is not ratzon Hashem yisborach. this is daas greenberg and is pure apikorsus omg

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  11. Actually, I am facing some difficulties to understand the meaning of the blog. If you have any short video film related to your blog, then I would request you to share here. It would be great help. Maximum Medicine Wellness Wheel

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