Community Building and Sexual Morality

Years ago, I wrote about sexual morality from a Kantian perspective, arguing that sex outside of a relationship such as marriage violated the categorical imperative to see others as ends and not as means. I have also written about community building in the contexts of the Ender series and the Twilight series. More recently, I have written about the musical Rent and its depiction of community being built out of individuals whose very morality renders them incapable of being part of a community in a meaningful sense. In my most recent post, I wrote about Calvin existing in his own head without the moral sense that he is obligated to parents and future generations. In this post, I would like to explore sexual morality from a community perspective.

For a community to meaningfully exist it cannot simply be a collection of individuals cooperating together at a given moment but must also operate within time. A community that does not produce a next generation will not survive. As such, how this next generation comes into being is a central concern to the community to such an extent that each individual’s attitude toward this question serves as a useful means to measure their commitment to the community as a whole. Since sexual intercourse is the primary means by which human beings come into this world, there can be no community that can survive in the long run that does not take some interest as to who people are sleeping with. To be clear, a healthy community is likely to recognize that, considering the fact that reality is messy, there is often a need to play ignorant and not go kicking down the doors of people violating the sexual norms of the community.

There are many plausible strategies for trying to ensure a future generation for the community. If you are the Shakers, you forgo physically reproducing children and rely completely on outreach. This has proven to not be an effective strategy for the Shakers and they have just about all died out. To their credit, the Shakers were a victim of their success at getting their adherents to actually follow the tenets of the faith. If only the Shakers were a little more “accepting of human weakness,” they might have survived.

If you are the Catholic priesthood, your celibacy is one of the main things that tie you to the wider Catholic community and stops you from breaking away from those “sinful” lay Catholics and creating a “purified” Catholic Church. You are relying on all the non-celibate Catholics to be fruitful and multiply so there can be a next generation of priests.

On the other extreme, cults will often allow for a surface sexual liberation. This is something that makes them attractive to potential believers. The irony of such sexual liberation is it comes to serve as one of the primary means of cutting people off from any sort of traditional morality that lies outside of the cult. This opens the door for the cult leader to become a tyrant as there is no outside standard by which to judge him. Furthermore, even the supposed free love turns out to be illusory. Instead, what you get is a hierarchy where those at the top are liberated to prey on others and those at the bottom will find sexual norms enforced upon them. It is precisely this ability to brazenly abuse others and get away with it that becomes the mark of their place in the hierarchy. As such, they are incentivized to become sexual predators and everyone else must “humbly” accept this.

Traditionally most societies have operated on a system of polygamy and slavery founded upon male covetousness. One has the male lord with his property such as cattle. This creates a political system where people submit themselves to the lord of the household as his bondsmen in order to eat the food he provides. This logic of lordship extends to women and the lord is able to have relations with those women under his domain. This allows the lord to produce lots of sons to continue his line, with the favored son becoming the next lord and his brothers serving under him. Daughters can be sent to neighboring households to cement alliances with other lords.

This order is further reproduced through the servants. They do not have access to the lord’s harem so they do not have women of their own. This is solved through warfare. The lord leads his servants against neighboring households. Upon victory, the servants take male members of the defeated household to be their slaves and help themselves to the women as well. Thus, the servants become minor lords themselves under their lord. The most successful practitioner of this sort of politics was Genghis Khan and a significant percentage of the world’s population are his descendants.   

We can see this sort of thinking in the Bible with Abraham even as Abraham was, perhaps, a less evil practitioner of these norms. He owned herds of animals and with that came servants. When he was unable to produce a son with Sarai, she agreed to allow him to take up with Hagar. This produced Ishmael. When Isaac was finally born, this created a problem as it was not obvious which son was going to inherit the leadership role from Abraham. Abraham made war upon the four kings after they took Lot and the people of Sodom into captivity. Clearly, it would have been Abraham’s right to take all of these people as his slaves, but he returned them to the king of Sodom without accepting any gifts in return. (Note that taking a gift from the king of Sodom would have indicated that Abraham was submitting to the king of Sodom as his lord.)

Later in the Bible, we are introduced to the concept of the Captive Woman (Yifat Toar). The Bible places limits on what can be done to her, but one cannot ignore the brutal reality that this law underscores. One of the purposes of going to war in the ancient world was to gain captives, including female captives. Similarly, in Judges, we have the Song of Deborah where she imagines Sisrah’s mother wondering why he has not come home and assuming that he has been delayed because he is dividing up the female captives. When one hears of the horrors of what was done to women on October 7^th, it is important to recognize that, historically, such behavior has been the norm in war.

I would argue that the destruction of the First Temple and the Babylonian exile radically changed Judaism. Among other things, it may have given rise to the beginning of what we might think of as the Judeo-Christian sexual ethic. In a world in which Jews did not have power, being the lord of a household and spreading one’s seed through slavery and warfare stopped being practical. As members of a minority religion faced with the twin threats of extermination and assimilation, Jewish survival depended on a father’s willingness to not only have lots of offspring but to invest in raising them as Jews. This meant that Jewish men were going to need to be made to settle down and marry Jewish women. Note that it is precisely when we get to Ezra that we see Jewish men being denounced for taking non-Jewish wives not as a matter of this leading to idolatry but because intermarriage itself suddenly became a problem.  

Women leaving Judaism were not nearly as serious a threat. A man might want to leave Judaism in order to move up in society and become someone with power. This did not apply to women as we are still dealing with patriarchal societies. A woman who left Judaism would simply be exchanging the relatively mild Jewish patriarchy for a gentile patriarchy enforced through explicit violence. 

Since it was primarily men who needed to be kept in line, the key feature of the Judeo-Christian sexual ethic became the regulation of male sexuality. In Judaism, this has manifested itself in taboos against looking at women dressed in a manner deemed immodest or listening to women singing. This has the practical purpose of setting up no-go spaces for men. This serves as a useful proxy for avoiding places and the sort of people who are not practicing a similar sexual ethic.  

Furthermore, the rabbis cleverly made use of the ban on sexual relations with a menstruating woman to render all sex outside of marriage to be sinful. Unmarried women are kept from using the mikvah. As such, all unmarried girls above the age of puberty are legally in the state of niddah and men cannot touch them let alone sleep with them. As strange as this sounds, it has been worth it for Judaism to allow its members to fall into grievous sin by engaging in pre-marital sex without immersing in the mikvah rather than allow unmarried girls to use the mikvah. If unmarried girls were allowed to use the mikvah, rabbis would no longer have a coherent argument as to why pre-marital sex should be regarded as a sin.

To be clear, the main problem with sex outside of marriage is not that it harms individuals but that it harms the community. As such, the community needs to greatly limit such behavior and inculcate in its members a deep loathing for such behavior. The problem is that people are not likely to think in terms of the needs of the community and sacrifice for it. As such, the solution is to simply label pre-marital sex as sinful by the legalist workaround of making unmarried girls ritually impure.

Admittedly, the main tool for regulating male sexuality has been regulating female sexuality. If women face a stigma for sex outside of marriage they will insist on marriage. As more women take themselves out of play men will conclude that their only hope is to get married.  As long as men are not supposed to be looking at women dressed in a certain fashion, it becomes the implicit obligation of women to dress in a manner that will allow men to look at them. To be clear, this still requires the Jewish community to come after men who sleep with gentile women. 

At first glance, the lord of the household and the Judeo-Christian sexual ethics will appear similar. Somewhat counterintuitively, the former will usually enforce stricter modesty codes on women. The reason for this is that the consequences of female infidelity are greater. A woman who is unfaithful calls into question the paternity of her children and their future claim to rule, thus undermining the entire system. From this perspective, honor killings of women on the mere suspicion of infidelity become a reasonable response. This demonstrates that the men are in charge and can guarantee the parentage of their children. By contrast, Jewish survival is far more threatened by male indiscretions than female ones as this would create a situation where men stopped being committed to raising their kids as Jews.   

The practical distinction between the two models is what they mean for male sexuality. In the lord of the household model, restrictions on female dress or their ability to leave the house do not mean restrictions on men. On the contrary, restrictions on women are meant to demonstrate that they are the property of a man. This divides women into those within the community. They are the property of a husband lord and are not to be touched by bondsmen. Then there are outside women who are fair game. By simultaneously being willing to kill women within the community for walking in the street dressed immodestly and assaulting women who are not part of the community simply for walking in the street, one demonstrates that the community is powerful and that everyone should submit themselves to it. (On the implications of this sort of thinking for Muslim men in Europe, see Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s Prey.)

By contrast, the primary purpose of the Judeo-Christian ethic is to restrict men. Men are the ones who are easily tempted and need to be kept in line. As Jews lacked power, they did not need to demonstrate that they had power over their women. On the contrary, Jewish survival has relied on keeping men within the community and not assimilating into the wider society despite Jewish lack of power.  

 

Does the YMCA Objectify Women?

The sign at my local YMCA features a woman in a tank top and a bra with the caption: "free motivation with every membership."

Let me start by being charitable to the Y. I assume the intention of this ad is that the Y offers professional trainers to help you reach your fitness goals. Of course, I am enough of a heterosexual man to consider an alternative explanation. Come to the Y where you can find motivation by staring at beautiful women who are just slightly underdressed so you do not have to feel guilty about it. (Unless you are of a prudish disposition. In which case, the sight of such a picture bothers you enough that you feel motivated to write a short blog post.)

The problem here is that I have a hard time believing that no one at the Y involved in this promotion considered the latter interpretation. If this were really about the first interpretation, the point could have been made with a sweating fat guy. So the Y cannot play innocent here. I am not so naive as to believe that, in the 21st century, the Young Men's Christian Association cares whether young men have sinful thoughts. I would have thought, though, that they cared about objectifying women.

Attention All Thinking Women! Agudath Israel Wants You (For What I am Not Certain)

Someone at Agudath Israel's public relations department seems to have decided that inclusiveness and critical inquiry are useful concepts that play well in public opinion. What I find interesting here is the contrast between the caption and the picture. Where are the thinking women in the picture? All I see are men. As to whether any thinking is going on, I would point readers to the structure of the picture in which gedolim sit on a dais with everyone else down below. This is an inherently authoritarian system that makes it impossible to engage in any meaningful education or critical inquiry. If there are some people who are elevated to the status of having the "right answers" as opposed to everyone else then what is the point of there even being any sort of give and take? All that can be expected is for the elevated few to command and for everyone else to hear and obey.

It is important to understand why it is important that women be physically present and in a position to present and even be photographed. What is at stake is not merely a public policy of not photographing women as a matter of keeping to modesty guidelines. How can women be a meaningful part of a conversation if they are not physically present and allowed to speak (and even photographed) as the equals of men? Men should also be paying attention here because if the claim of women being able to participate is nothing more than a sham, then members of the other half of the human race need to ask themselves whether their participation is a sham as well. The very act of looking up at a dais means that this question is hardly academic.

I am reminded of an incident a few years ago when several Haredi leaders spoke at a Modern Orthodox synagogue in Teaneck, NJ in what was billed as an opportunity for an open discussion. What took place was merely these rabbis fielding a few pre-screened questions and lecturing the audience. The point here is that without a deep-seated commitment to a host of liberal values (classical, not modern) such notions as inclusiveness, critical inquiry, and open discussion quickly lose all meaning. Instead, they become pieces in an Orwellian game as they are pushed around by public relations people to mean their exact opposite.

In Search of Serious Modern Orthodox Biblical Scholarship

One of the things that I find fascinating about the present day Haredi world is that, despite its claims as to the brilliance of its leadership, with the exception of the Sefardi R. Ovadiah Yosef, I cannot think of a single Haredi leader today who gained his post by virtue of his published scholarly work. Instead, we have Hasidic rebbes, who inherited their posts, and Litvish Rosh Yeshivas, who gained their post through teaching and administrative work. This is particularly odd from an academic point of view because in academia publishing is everything. For example, I am in middle of writing my history dissertation, which is now at over 500 pages. When I finish writing, defending and finally publish it, I will become a credible historian, whose opinions should be taken seriously. Until then I am absolutely nobody, just a graduate student with a blog, and intelligent people have every right to simply dismiss me before I even open my mouth. The lesson I take from this is that the entire system of Haredi gedolim is a fraud populated by senior citizen celebrities and those who control them. This belief has only been strengthened by years of hearing preposterous statements made in their name regarding science, politics and society. (If any Haredi reader believes that their particular gadol should be viewed as an exception, they should point me to a book of theirs so I may read it and decide for myself.)

This failure on the part of Haredim offers an opportunity for Modern Orthodoxy to step into the breach with its own scholarship and gain the respect of both secular academia and the Haredi world. (Scholars like Haym Soloveitchik and Shalom Carmy are certainly a good start.) Unfortunately, Modern Orthodoxy in practice has proven so far unable to produce much in the way of a written culture, whether at a popular or scholarly level.

I was recently reading Torah MiEtzion: New Readings in Tanach – Devarim, a collection of short essays on different topics in the book of Deuteronomy produced by the esteemed Modern Orthodox Yeshivat Har Etzion. These essays were written by various people associated with the school as an attempt to offer a tangible demonstration of the quality of its scholarship. The intent may demonstrate the awareness of the need for a written culture of scholarship. The fact that this book recognizes the need for serious scholarship in fields other than Talmud is another plus. The way it has been carried through, though, demonstrates a failure to truly comprehend what is required. These essays are essentially summaries of select rabbinic commentaries such as Ibn Ezra, Maimonides, Nachmonides and Isaac Abarbanel. Nothing wrong with that and this book may prove useful as a basic introduction to the sources regarding the various topics in question. That being said the book fails to offer any larger arguments regarding the topics in question. Such arguments could become the basis for a larger view of the Bible and eventually even a Jewish theology.

A good example of this is Mordechai Sabato’s essay “The Female Captive – What is the Torah Teaching Us?” on the laws regarding the Yifat Toar, a captive gentile woman whom the Israelite soldier can take as long as certain restrictions are adhered to. It summarizes different opinions on the matter from the Talmud, Midrash, and medieval commentators on the precise rules regarding the treatment of this woman. The only time Sabato’s voice as a reader of the Bible comes to the fore is his conclusion where he states:

In effect, two ideals clash in the parasha; one is the moral concern for the woman captive; the other is the aversion to marriage to a non-Jewish woman which may, as we know, lead to moral decay. Halakha comes to establish the proper balance between these two ideals. (pg. 252)

One gets the sense that the author understands that in the twenty-first century educated readers are likely to object to the legalized rape of women even in times of war. That being said, this is not something that particularly affects the writer beyond making the nod so that people will think he cares, allowing him to prove his "modernity." Thus, he never bothers to actually develop a theory as to how precisely the Bible protects women. He does not struggle with the fact that the Bible is willing to allow something so morally wrong. Furthermore, he is able to so casually place this issue as something to be balanced against an opposition to intermarriage.

I would love to read some sophisticated commentary on the Bible that takes modern ethics seriously if only Yeshivat Har Etzion could offer it. I am certainly not waiting on the Haredim to provide it.                      

On Board the Queen Mary with Jewlicious and Mayim Bialik

When I first contacted Miriam a year ago, her first email to me was that she could not talk to me for the next few weeks because the Limmud LA conference and Jewlicious festival were just around the corner. So I was pleased to join Miriam in attending this year's Jewlicious 8.0 festival as her lawfully bagged, captured and tamed husband.

The event was hosted on the Queen Mary liner, which is permanently parked in Long Beach, CA and operates as a museum and hotel. Stepping on board was enough to send me into libertarian seasteading fantasies of a privately owned miniature city floating out in international waters. Unfortunately, I later found out that, after it was retired, the Queen Mary was bought by the city of Long Beach, which was kind enough to add on a tourism tax on our room bill. So much for escaping big government. For those of you planning a kosher cruise for Passover, the Queen Mary was the first ship designed with a kosher kitchen; it even had its own line of specially designed kosher dishes.

In addition to great food at Jewlicious 8.0, there was a parade of comic and musical performances Saturday night and Sunday. At the Sunday concert, I was privileged to finally hear a live performance by Seth Glass. I was familiar with Seth's work from a CD, "Question of Faith," I found at my father's house years ago. I listened to that CD to death, but unfortunately I never ran into anything else by Seth. When he started performing it all of a sudden struck me who he was and I surprised him by asking for "The King is in the Field," my favorite song from the CD. He is an extremely talented musician who never got the attention and fans he deserves. (Perhaps not unlike a certain blogger, but I digress.)

Jewlicious is a non-denominational Jewish organization for young professionals in Los Angeles under the leadership of Rabbi Yonah Bookstein. In many respects, it represents where left-wing Orthodoxy and traditionalist Judaism, which make up the majority of Jewlicious' audience, may be heading. Jewlicious is nominally under Orthodox auspices, is strictly kosher and focuses on the study of texts as a vehicle for increased observance. Thus it could easily be tagged as an Orthodox outreach program. That being said, the primary ideology preached at Jewlicious seems to be one of Judaism as expressed through activism, mainly of a left-wing variety. For example, Rabbi Yonah spoke about his experiences with Occupy LA. (Unfortunately, I was not able to make it to this presentation as it conflicted with my talk about messianism.) There was also a panel of Jewish activists whose fields ranged from using Talmudic style dialectics to confront contemporary issues to saving the redwood trees and helping the homeless. There were a number of things conspicuously absent that would have certainly been present if this program were being run by traditional Orthodox outreach programs like Chabad or Aish. While Israel and Zionism were represented as an integral part of Jewish culture, there was little about Israeli politics and the Palestinian conflict. There was no Jewish theology in the sense of Maimonides' principles of faith that one must believe in. Also, there was no sense of halacha as something mandated by God. Instead, discussions of Jewish law were framed as something people choose to do as a means of leading a more meaningful and spiritual life.

This particular brand of Judaism (call it neo-traditionalism or "modern frumkeit" if you like) was exemplified in the event's guest of honor, Mayim Bialik. For those of you not familiar with her, Mayim Bialik plays Amy Farrah Fowler on The Big Bang Theory, probably the most consistently modestly dressed character in the history of modern television. Before I say anything else, let me add that I found Mayim to be an exceptionally down to Earth and friendly person as well as a terrific speaker. What struck me about hearing her speak is that she came across as a very "frum" person with her discussion of her commitment to tzniut dress and learning. Forget about Modern Orthodoxy, Mayim, if she wanted to, could easily fit in with a Haredi community. Yet she referred to herself as "observantish," acknowledging that not everything in her life fits with Orthodoxy as traditionally defined. Her theology, to the extent that she spoke of it between her two public presentations, seems to rest on a strong belief in God as a creator and moral guide and a commitment to Jewish law as an ongoing process in which one strives to increase observance but is not an all or nothing deal.

I found it particularly interesting that Mayim made use of the categories of observant and non-observant while seeming to acknowledge how poorly they applied to her. These categories were the creation of Orthodoxy to take Reform and Conservative Judaism out of the picture. Instead of different denominations, there are observant Jews who keep halacha and there are those non-observant Jews ensnared by assimilation, who need to be brought back into the fold through shabbos dinners and outreach programs. Of course, these categories could also be used to take the "dox" out of Orthodoxy and since no one is perfect even the most Orthodox is really only "observantish."

The Orthodoxy in which I was raised would not have known what to do with Mayim. For that matter, I am not sure how well Orthodoxy is prepared for even the Orthodox members of Jewlicious. They seem comfortable in operating as Jews in a non-Orthodox environment, thus breaking down the lines between observant and non-observant and even Orthodox and Conservative. Such a Judaism, while formally halachic, effectively eliminates any need for an Orthodox community. On a practical level, these people do not live in a world of separated sexes so traditional taboos against touching a member of the opposite sex or for men to listen to women singing are non-existent. There is also little ingrained opposition to homosexuality.

People in their 20s, particularly in this generation, are naturally in flux and in search of identity. However these participants evolve, it would seem that traditional Orthodoxy loses. Our Orthodox members of Jewlicious could follow the path toward non-observance, which according to the Orthodox narrative is the inevitable result of stepping outside the Orthodox social structure or they could evolve their own variation of traditional observance, which would be markedly different than common Orthodoxy and may even present a greater challenge to it. Due to its narrative, Orthodoxy is not equipped to respond to educated and committed Jews, who fall outside the Orthodox system.
       
Arguably this model of neo-traditionalism I am outlining, with its non-interest in theology and commitment to a Jewish community that includes a range of observance levels, is more in tune with Judaism as it has historically existed than Orthodoxy. That could prove a powerful rhetorical weapon in the battle to define Orthodoxy in the next generation. Can Orthodoxy step in and provide a Judaism to accommodate members of the Jewlicious community? By this, I mean even those who identify as Orthodox. The choice may be between taking the initiative for making changes now while it still might be possible to maintain some say or sit back, pat oneself on the back for holding the line against change and surrendering all say in the Judaism that comes out of events like Jewlicious.

Rampant Obesity and Celebrating Ten Years of Idolatry: Ami at a Crossroads (Part I)

In this month's edition of Ami magazine, Rabbi Yitzchok Adlerstein has an article, "Modern Orthodoxy at a Crossroads," on the challenge posed to Orthodoxy by Rabbi Avi Weiss and his attempt to ordain women. I respect Rabbi Adlerstein as a usually thoughtful Haredi perspective and he deserves credit for presenting Modern Orthodox Jews as human beings and serious Jews. That being said, this article is an exercise in the sort of self-congratulatory sanctimoniousness whose only purpose is to pat the author, and by extension the reader who agrees with him, on the back, while completely ignoring the issues at hand and inhibiting any actual discussion.

In Rabbi Adlerstein's narrative, a small click of supposedly "Orthodox" rabbis have conspired to undermine elements of Jewish tradition, such as having a solely male clergy and not calling women up to the Torah. These "extreme radical leftists" present themselves to the secular media as Orthodox mavericks challenging the status quo, putting pressure on more "moderate" Orthodox rabbis to go along.

As I have written previously, I am not interested in debating the issue of how Orthodoxy should respond to the social and political changes in the status women over the past century. I do not have a set solution to the problem. My concern is not over whether or not women will be ordained (I assume though that it will happen whether I like it or not) or what title they will be given. I only insist that whoever makes these decisions does so based both on traditional sources and an awareness of the social realities on the ground that brought these issues to the table. For example, it is a non-option to tell women to stick to children, kitchen and synagogue (behind the mechitza).

What concerns me about Rabbi Adlerstein is that he is someone involved in making these decisions yet he clearly does not grasp the social realities behind the issues. Just an example of how out of touch with reality he is. He dismisses the Los Angeles Jewish Journal as being "read almost exclusively by the non-Orthodox." I read it and know other Orthodox Jews who do. It should be axiomatic to him that the Jewish Journal's readers are precisely the people that Orthodoxy needs to reach out to; those Jews who care enough about Judaism to read a Jewish magazine, but for "some strange reason" are not reading Ami.  Nowhere in the article does Rabbi Adlerstein consider the possibility that his opponents, instead of "plotting" to hoist "politically correct" values on an unsuspecting Jewish community, are on the front lines of trying to save Orthodox Judaism and are having to make some hard decisions. The fact that Rabbi Adlerstein's community does not yet have to deal with these issues, should be cause for thanks to be expressed by thoughtful planning for the moment the crisis comes to have acceptable options. (I imagine that a Haredi leadership that spends the next twenty years convincing its own members that it honestly cares about women might be able to hold off on women rabbis when Haredi women decide they might want to be rabbis.) It should not be an opening for sanctimonious judgment as to who is "Orthodox."

Rabbi Adlerstein de facto eliminates any consideration of social issues by specifically knocking Modern Orthodox rabbis for their lack of source skills, while saying nothing about whether Haredi rabbis are qualified to comment about an issue regarding liberalism, without a deep understanding of liberalism and actual liberals. Education is a zero-sum game. You cannot talk about rabbis needing to be more knowledgeable about Jewish texts without also implicitly saying that they do not also need an understanding of political theory, history and a little bit about the sort of actual real life people they are going to be offering spiritual guidance to.

(To be continued ...)

I am Engaged to a Wonderful Jewish Asperger Girl (Part II)

(Part I)

So how did I propose to my one and only dream Jewish Asperger girl? Well, like in most relationships I suspect, she really proposed to me while allowing me the pretense of going through the motions of asking her to maintain the facade of my manly control in this relationship. So a few weeks ago Miriam announced to me that she intended to have an engagement party in August. Naturally, I was curious as to who would play the role of the groom at this engagement party and decided to volunteer my services before some other guy tried out for the part. This past Sunday, I took Miriam to the Aquarium of the Pacific. In the last post, I mentioned that Miriam's special interest is the South Pacific. It is actually much more specific than that; it is in Palau. In case you have never heard of Palau they are a group of islands several hundred miles to the east of the Philippines. (Lionel Spiegel had heard of them because of some of the tropical life off its coasts.)

(Here I passed her test to find Palau on a map, thus making myself a suitable partner for marriage. Naturally, any person with designs on world conquest has to know something about geography.)


The aquarium possesses an entire section on coral reefs based on the ones off Palau. Thus making it the perfect set piece to stand in for Miriam's favorite place in the universe.

How to make it a surprise? The disadvantage of being an Asperger is that it makes you a really bad liar. The advantage of dating an Asperger is that they are very easy to lie to. So I simply told Miriam that I was taking her out on a simple date to the aquarium with a picnic dinner. She believed me. To confirm her belief she checked on a bottle of wine we had just bought to see if it was still in its place. It was. I simply grabbed it afterward when she was not looking and stuck it in my knapsack.

So we headed to the aquarium. As a good boyfriend, I obviously let Miriam take the lead and she took me straight to the Palau exhibit. That finished we went through the rest of the museum. (For some strange reason the people who run the aquarium think that people want to do things that have no connection to Palau like pet sharks.) Heading out of the aquarium, I suggested that we go back one more time through Palau. I then told her to find the most magical place in the exhibit. She parked herself right in front of the red snapper fish. (Miriam, like me, tends to associate love with eating even as she fails to apply this philosophy to its logical conclusion of kitty and human.) While having her stare into the fish tank, I stood behind her and said: "I know nothing of the customs of Palau, how they ask certain questions, but as a western imperialist, I feel entitled to simply make up whatever Palauan customs I wish. So I going to do it this way. Miriam, would you turn around?" She turned around and I asked her the question that was burning on my mind at the moment. "Would you have dinner with me by the shore?"

So we walked to the shore and had a sunset picnic dinner with leechee fruit, which grows in Palau, for dessert. Afterward, we walked along the shore toward the setting sun. I then had Miriam look out to over the water to the sun and once again spoke to her: "This is the closest we can get to Palau without a boat or plane, but I promise we will go there eventually."

She then turned around, and I had pulled out the bottle of wine. She then went into gasps of "oh my god" a bunch of times, before eventually kindly allowing me to ask her an embarrassing question that did not involve food.

I already know where we are going for our honeymoon. I hear some of the islands near the Philippines are quite magnificent. The natives do not particularly care for nuclear weapons so I guess I will have to give up on conquest.

   

I am Engaged to a Wonderful Jewish Asperger Girl (Part I)

For starters, I would like to apologize for the lack of posts this past month. Things have been happening in my life that I could not talk about with my readers. Now that things are official I am very pleased to share everything you.

This past February I received a call from my aunt. She had been telling people about me and someone had contacted her about a girl in South Pasadena named Miriam Albin.

My aunt informed me that Miriam was really smart, into anthropology, had Asperger syndrome and was quite pretty. At which point I stopped my aunt to tell her that I was already looking at a picture of this girl. As soon as I heard the name I Googled her and found her Facebook page. (Life in the twenty-first century.) Soon afterward, I received an email from Miriam. Apparently, she had Googled me in turn, found this blog and failed to be offended by its contents. So we started talking, largely through Skype. (Long distance dating in the twenty-first century.)

There was something absolutely refreshing about dating an Asperger. While we do have our differences (she likes the South Pacific and is all bubbly and friendly, while I like European history am usually found lurking in a corner contemplating taking over the world), it is amazing how similar our learned defense mechanisms are. We both fear accidentally giving offense to people over things beyond our understanding so constantly ask people whether we are bothering them or what they would like. Applying this method to another Asperger leads to some good comic exchanges:

"Is it socially appropriate for me to say this?"    
"I have no idea."
"Do you care if it is socially appropriate?"
"No."
"Oh good."

And then there are the back and forth monologues to be mediated the following way:

"Sorry for going on a random side tangent. I can stop now if you are not interested."
"Is this one of your special interests and does monologuing about this topic make you happy?"
"Yes."
"Ok as long as you do the dishes while you monologue."

Being informed that there are aspects to building a relationship that cannot be conducted over Skype, I flew out to Los Angeles in April for a weekend. I met her parents and they found me to be an Asperger, who is also responsible. Following quid pro quo logic naturally, she flew out in June to meet my family and they found Miriam to be an Asperger, who is also lovable.

The next step was for me to make this a short distance relationship so I moved out to South Pasadena. Miriam's parents liked me so much that they agreed to put me up. Miriam lives nearby in a different house. Admittedly this was an unconventional living arrangement, but I think we both gained a lot from it. We have been doing all the day to day things that a married couple does besides actually sharing a house and sleeping together. Things like preparing dinner, cleaning the dishes and figuring out whose turn it is to monologue.   

(To be continued ...)

Orthodox Feminism or Back to the 1950s

I was just shown a brochure for a women's baalat tshuvah (newly religious) yeshiva called Shirat Devorah. I have never been to the place, I am not affiliated with it nor do I even know anyone who is. Perhaps it is a wonderful program, but some things in the brochure struck me as troubling.

For example:

Shirat Devorah engages each student's intellect, heart, body, and soul in her education. We honor the intelligence of all these aspects and use them as tools for integration. For example, the laws of Kashrut [kosher] and Shabbat can be learned from a book, but are best absorbed and understood through hands on application. In our Kitchen Laboratory, students apply these laws by cooking nutritious meals to experience what it means to live Jewishly. 

I am certainly not opposed to hands on education, but this suspiciously sounds like good old fashioned home economics. If you are making this the center of your school system as opposed to "mere book learning" then forgive me if I suspect you of simply training girls to pull in a man, one of few tasks in life in which being able to cook as opposed to being able to produce an independent thought and argue for it can be an advantage.

The school's non-interest in book learning show up again.

At Shirat Devorah, we use women's connection to intuition, creativity, community, and processing to create a holistic environment. During hikes, Lab, and workshops students practice the Jewish women's tradition of imparting meaning through focused intention. We thus create tangible memories that students can draw upon in the future.

How do you run a lab with a "women's intuition?" I guess the same way you gain an education through hiking. It is a mystical sort of learning beyond the understanding of non-intuitive people like me.

For a school claiming to be about using Judaism to empower women, there is surprisingly nothing about sitting down and critically interpreting texts. Instead what I hear is that women are special; since they have this intuition they do not need a solid background in in critical thinking honed through reading books and analyzing texts. I would accuse them of being sexist except that historically I know the real conclusion of this sort of thinking; women are little more than children, beautiful to behold (as well as do other things to) and can be trained to do useful tasks around the house like cooking and cleaning, but never to be taken seriously as a social and intellectual equal.  

A Romantic Dish of Graduate Cooking

I am now in a dating relationship. For those of my readers who are Aspergers or members of an alien species, dating is a process in which the man, in this case yours truly, engages a certain female of interest in a ritual of semi-rational negotiation to convince said female that not only is he not an ax murderer, but that he is also intelligent, sane and useful. If all goes well the female will allow the male to get within a close proximity of her personal space at a level that would otherwise be not considered socially acceptable.

It is my understanding that, in this modern world, if one wishes to convince a female of one's intelligence and sanity one cannot merely offer free lectures on medieval apocalypticism no matter how objectively fascinating a topic it is. Women these days want a man who can show a softer side through the writing of poetry. (This must be because modern women have read G. K. Chesterton and support his argument that poets are much less prone to insanity than mathematicians and chess players.) This should be easy with all of my humanities training; I should certainly be capable of writing poems about medieval apocalypticism. (I am informed by certain sources that said romantic poems should be about the female in question. No, this is not narcissism on the part of women. Also, under no circumstances will I be allowed to write medieval apocalyptic poetry even if it features one's girlfriend as the Virgin Mary battling an evil ex-girlfriend as the dragon beast merged, through dark Japanese anime arts, with the Whore of Babylon.)

As for being useful, it is not enough to tell your girlfriend that within a few years you will finish your dissertation, become a doctor and that all doctors make loads of money. Women want a man who can clean and cook. So after moving everything presently on the floor to some other place on the floor and providing generous helpings of a natural saliva-based polish all around, I set to work proving my love by making my girlfriend a traditional graduate student dish, ramen noodles. I used a secret recipe known only to graduate students and written on the package. So not only do I demonstrate my basic cooking skills, heating water, placing a carbohydrate-laden product inside and not burning it, but also my knowledge of all the three Rs of education, reading, righting and rithmatic. My girlfriend already knows that I can write from all the time I spend on my dissertation that I will one day finish even though she has never seen it. (She is a pious girl with a lot of faith.) Now she knows that I can also read the instructions on a package as well as apply higher mathematics, taking the instructions and multiplying the ingredients by two.

Graduate student romance, reading, and applied mathematics coming together to make ramen noodles for two.

(Readers should feel free to offer their suggestions for graduate student romance that might apply to the non-deconstructed structures of the fantasy outside world and not just in the reasonable and rational ramen based world of academia.)

Mary E. Brayton

Bryn Mawr College, where I spent the weekend, is one of the leading women's colleges in the country and has been so since its founding at the end of the nineteenth century. While examining my room I found a column of small plaques listing the various girls who had apparently dormed in the room. My historical interest aroused, I began examining the names. At the bottom was one Mary E. Brayton of '01. (That is 1901, not 2001.)

Who was this woman who first lived in the room that I briefly occupied? From a quick internet search, here is what I have discovered so far. Mary Elizabeth Brayton was born in 1880 to Thomas Edward and Martha Brayton in Fall River Mass. She was tutored as a child and attended the B. M. C. Durfee high school to prepare for Bryn Mawr, suggesting a privileged background. Mary graduated from Bryn Mawr in 1901 with a focus in French and Latin. After graduating, she eventually returned to Fall River where she married Edward Ira Marvell in 1912. The fact that Mary, as woman living in early twentieth century America did not marry until her thirties may be explained by the fact that she traveled abroad five times and was active in Episcopalian missionary activity. Mary and Edward lived on 338 Locust St. in Fall River. On a local front, Mary was active in the women's suffrage and labor movements, serving on the Bureau of Women's Educational and Industrial Union of Boston and as the treasurer of the Fall River's Working Girl's Club. She was also into theater and golf. As of 1917, Mary had a son and a daughter.

There is an Abby Slade Brayton Durfee and Mary Brayton Durfee Brown Scholarship Fund at Bryn Mawr for students of English or American descent (was this meant to exclude blacks?) and descendants of the class of 1894, which was established in 1924. Though I am not sure if there is any connection.

If have not been able so far to follow Mary's story past 1917. If any of her descendants find this blog post and wish to fill in the blanks I would be grateful.    

Why Nobody Wants to be a Feminist: My Response to Clarissa

Clarissa did an excellent post a few days ago, Why Nobody Wants to be a Feminist where she challenges women to accept the full consequences of being liberated from patriarchy.

Feminism has given women a lot in the last several decades. However, new rights always come accompanied with new responsibilities and obligations. While feminism was in the process of granting women rights, they were happy to accept it. As soon as the time came to “pay the bills” and assume new obligations that came with being accepted as fully human, women abandoned the movement in droves. Unless we accept this very unpleasant truth and start doing something about it, it is my profound conviction that no amount of ethnic-specific feminisms and happy bondings between second, third and fourth generations of feminists will help attract more women to feminism. The problem does not lie within the movement. It is located outside, in people who don’t want to belong to it, who cringe when they hear the word “feminism”, or who have abandoned it.


Unless we accept that the patriarchy victimizes and rewards both women and men, we will never move on from this stalemate. Many women are standing in the way of feminism today because they are unwilling to let go of the benefits the patriarchy offered them, even as they keep enjoying the removal of constraints it used to place on their lives. In my culture, we call this “sitting on two chairs.” And that, my friends, is always a dangerous activity to engage in.


I agree with Clarissa, though I would take it a step further. At its heart, feminism has never been about a principled defense of equal rights, but simply a grab for arbitrary special privileges. If feminism was actually about equal rights then the very term "women's rights" would be dropped and everything would be framed in terms of human rights. For example, abortion would have nothing to do with a woman's "right to choose" or "control her own body;" it would simply be a plausible extension of the premise that individual human beings are the ones best suited for evaluating their own good and must be left as the sole arbitrators of matters relating to their own bodies. This leads to the conclusion that individuals should be allowed to use drugs, sell themselves as prostitutes, their own organs and possibly to have abortions. (See "The Libertarian Case Against Abortion.")
   
Closer to Clarissa's point, feminists themselves have proven unwilling to abandon distinctions of gender when such distinctions are beneficial to women. We see this when it comes to sports and acting awards, but more importantly the draft, which women are still protected from. (It would be worth bringing the draft back just to see men in mass refusing to serve unless women did so as well or agreed to give up the equal right to vote and hold down a job.) Either gender is rendered politically or socially meaningless like race and religion across the board or we admit that it is meaningful and negotiate where and how on the assumption that any special privilege will be paid for by accepting a form of discrimination on a different front. For example, it may be that if women desire special protection in terms of maternal leave they may have to pay for it by surrendering reproductive freedoms. The logic being that if the bearing of children is of some value to society at large so that companies should make special allowances for it then women, in turn, should submit themselves to the needs of society and fashion their reproductive lives in a way that best serves those needs.

Naturally, if the privilege is merely social then the discrimination, in turn, should also only be social. To make my own position clear. I oppose political distinctions based on gender (including women being exempted from the draft). That being said, and this is the Burkean conservative in me, I accept that, at a social level, there will for the foreseeable future continue to be social distinctions based on gender. It is my hope that, as a society, we can figure out a way to negotiate through these distinctions, men and women talking as equals.

There are consequences for this feminist unwillingness to take a principled stand on equal rights. If feminists are seen as trying to sit on two chairs with one rear end, then non-ideologically committed women can naturally only be expected to follow suit and not ask themselves the hard questions about being courted in marriage and becoming stay at home moms. Furthermore, this opens feminists to attack from different sides. Minority group feminists will attack establishment feminism as "white" feminism. If women are simply an arbitrary group grabbing for arbitrary special privileges then other arbitrary groups can arise within this already arbitrary group accuse others of wanting arbitrary special privileges and demand arbitrary special privileges of their own.

The greatest concern to any honest liberal should be how this plays into the hands of conservatives. If the people who claim to be liberals and supporters of equal rights behave like conservatives, creating arbitrary groups and handing out privileges and discriminating against at will, then we can only expect the true conservatives out there to throw away any pretext of supporting equal rights now that they no longer need to feel ashamed in the face of an honest principled liberalism.

Seeing the Big Picture

I remember seeing False Messiah’s post on the doctored photograph in Der Tzitung, a Yiddish newspaper, removing Secretary of State Hillary Clinton a week ago and not thinking twice about it; this is the sort of thing I expect from a Haredi paper. Amusing and worth a chuckle at yes; making a big deal about it no. So it was to my surprise that the story exploded from the Jewish blogosphere into the mainstream news, finding its way to the Huffington Post. Clarissa went on a tear on the subject.

I don't want to hear anybody come here to screech about the so-called religious sensibilities of the nasty freakazoids who insulted women in this way. If they find the photo hurtful to their fanatical feelings, they could have avoided publishing it altogether. However, in our Western Civilization women now play an important role in all areas of existence. It is extremely insulting to have our reality that we worked hard to create being manipulated in this way to satisfy a bunch of miserable woman-haters.

Even my non-Jewish friend, whose desk is across from mine in the office, asked me about the photo. So I will throw in my own two cents on the matter, particularly as I think the wrong lesson is being learned. The focus of the story has been about women; was this disrespectful to women to censure out the most powerful woman in the country from what will likely be a historic photograph? I see this as a story of bureaucracy following its own particular kind of logic down the path into absurdity.

The feature of the bureaucratic mind on display in this story is the top-down attempt to establish a specific set of rules to cover a wide variety of people and situations. Particular emphasis is placed on satisfying those who are loudest and most extreme; the sort of people likely to take action over even, what may seem to others as, minor issues. If the proposed solution may seem to some as surrender to blackmail, without a doubt the solution will display an elegant pragmatism to lull reasonable men with the siren call of “let us get along.” For it is a reasonable man who most desires to get along with others. This leads to the empowerment of extremists along all fronts as they see they can blackmail the system and get away with it. Another problem comes when, due to the law of unforeseen consequences, a situation arises that the bureaucrat failed to see. Of course, the bureaucratic mind still follows its procedures, leading to disaster or if we are fortunate just absurdity. This applies to all bureaucracies, religious or otherwise.

People have all sorts of ideas about what sorts of things are appropriate to be shown in public and should be considered “obscene.” This is a difficult arena of human activity to set rules for because there is little to no logic as to what positions people take; it is just a reality that people have lines. (To anyone who thinks they are exempt, I suggest they consider what their reaction would be to pictures of little girls being raped and murdered.) For better or worse and for various historical and cultural reasons, people’s ideas about obscenity tend to focus on women and the amount of clothing they are wearing. Even the mainstream media does not show women topless, a situation that often leads to absurdity. (See "Defending the King's F-Word Speech.") Even feminists take moral positions regarding the depiction of women.

A Haredi newspaper has to deal with this same problem of what rules to set about the depiction of women as any other media outlet. To make things more difficult, a Haredi newspaper caters to an audience with a significantly lower tolerance for how women are depicted. The label Haredi, like any group, covers many different kinds of people with different temperaments, some of whom are willing to give more leeway for how women may be depicted and some less. Regardless of their actual numbers, those with a more restrictive view wield more power. They hold the moral high ground as the ones who represent “true Jewish values.” Armed with this moral high ground they are all the more likely to speak out and even boycott the paper.

How does the bureaucratic mind solve this problem and offer something that could satisfy all? Simple, just have no pictures of women. It is not like there are readers who will strongly object to there not being pictures of women. With no pictures of women, the cause of all our problems will be removed and we can all read our Haredi newspaper in peace. That is, of course, until absurdity strikes in the form of a photograph of some of our leading public figures, including Hillary Clinton. Thankfully this time around the bureaucratic logic did not lead to bans that destroy people's lives.

George R. R. Martin on Fantasy and Historical Fiction

James Poniewozik of Time blog has a long interview with fantasy novelist George R. R. Martin, whose Game of Thrones is now being made into an HBO show. Martin discusses his view of J. R. R. Tolkien, balancing his respect for him with not slavishly imitating him. He makes the interesting point that when fantasy writers try imitating Tolkien what usually happens is that they simply pick up on the worst elements of his writing. Martin's favorite Tolkien character is Boromir so it is probably not a coincidence that they got Sean Bean, who played Boromir in the movie, for Game of Thrones.  

As a medieval historian I often struggle with political fantasy, finding it implausible. I can easily suspend disbelief when it comes to magic, but your political structure has to be coherent. The problem is that most writers do not understand the inner dynamics of a pre-modern society. Worse, coming to the issue loaded down with modern liberal biases, they either turn to polemics against the pre-modern society they are writing about or try to eliminate the most troublesome elements to the modern mind, without taking into consideration the logical underpinnings of the society.

An example that I often present to my students is that of women's rights. In a militarized society, where the primary issue on everyone's mind is not suffering sudden violent death, and in which women did not actively fight in the same numbers as men (in other words every pre-modern society that has ever existed) not only would women not have equal rights, but the very thought would be absurd. Any woman who complained about her second class position and demanded to be treated as an equal to men would rightfully be laughed at, told to pick up a sword and, until she could do that, to shut her mouth, get back to cooking, cleaning and children and be grateful for having a man to protect her. It would make no sense for a fantasy novel to both maintain a pre-modern militarized society and either equality of the sexes or plucky heroines giving proto-feminist speeches. (See "Toilet Training.")
        
I was glad therefore to see Martin confront this issue of plausible pre-modern societies

And then there are some things that are just don't square with history. In some sense I'm trying to respond to that. [For example] the arranged marriage, which you see constantly in the historical fiction and television show, almost always when there's an arranged marriage, the girl doesn't want it and rejects it and she runs off with the stable boy instead. This never fucking happened. It just didn't. There were thousands, tens of thousand, perhaps hundreds of thousands of arranged marriages in the nobility through the thousand years of Middle Ages and people went through with them. That's how you did it. It wasn't questioned. Yeah, occasionally you would want someone else, but you wouldn't run off with the stable boy.


And that's another of my pet peeves about fantasies. The bad authors adopt the class structures of the Middle Ages; where you had the royalty and then you had the nobility and you had the merchant class and then you have the peasants and so forth. But they don't' seem to realize what it actually meant. They have scenes where the spunky peasant girl tells off the pretty prince. The pretty prince would have raped the spunky peasant girl. He would have put her in the stocks and then had garbage thrown at her. You know.

I mean, the class structures in places like this had teeth. They had consequences. And people were brought up from their childhood to know their place and to know that duties of their class and the privileges of their class. It was always a source of friction when someone got outside of that thing. And I tried to reflect that.

Averroes on Women

Neither Plato nor medieval Islamic philosopher are particularly known for their feminism, though apparently in the case of Averroes (Ibn Rushd), the two seem to have combined to serve such a cause. This is pointed out by E. I. J. Rosenthal in his work on Averroes’s theory of politics:




Ibn Rushd's critical attitude to State and Society of his time is also shown in his outspoken pronouncement on women and their status in contemporary Islam. It is also an interesting application of Plato's ideas about the equality of women as far as civic duties are concerned. The relevant passages are found in the first treatise of the Commentary (xxv, 6-10). It is for our purpose sufficient to quote paragraphs 9 and 10-Averroes' application to his own time and place:


Yet, in these states the ability of women is not known, only because they are being taken for procreation alone therein. They are therefore placed at the service of their husbands and [relegated] to the position of procreation, for rearing and [breast] feeding. But this undoes their [other] activities. Because women in these states are not being fitted for any of the human virtues it often happens that they resemble plants. That they are a burden upon the men in these states is one of the reasons for the poverty of these states. For, they are found in them in twice the number of men while at the same time they do not support any (or: carry on most) of the necessary [essential] activities, except for a few, which they undertake mostly at a time when they are obliged to make up their want of funds, like spinning and weaving. All this is self-evident.



This pronouncement runs counter to Islamic teaching and practice and is the more remarkable since it is made by an orthodox member of the Muslim community which was ruled by the amir al-mu'minin, and moreover by a practising lawyer steeped in fiqh. He openly attacks their way of life as the result of the official attitude. It is clear that Plato's ideas must have drawn Averroes' attention to the wastage of human labour so detrimental to the State, and led him to advocate a reversal of orthodox Muslim policy. (“The Place of Politics in the Thought of Ibn Rushd” pg. 251-252)

I would add that this view of women is distinct from that of the Jewish thinker Maimonides with whom Averroes is often compared. Throughout Maimonides' work he used women as a term of derision and he is a major source in Jewish law for stringencies on the role of women in public life. To be fair to Maimonides he, as with most "misogynistic" philosophers, possessed a general all round contempt for human beings as a whole. For Maimonides, women had all the flaws of the rest of the human race without the redeeming quality of having produced a least a few great rationalist thinkers. Averroes shared Maimonides' contempt for human beings and like him distinguished between the exoteric claims which can be revealed to the masses and the esoteric truths which can only be understood by the philosophical elites. In this they were both following the political philosophy of Plato's Republic. Yet Averroes supported women taking on public roles and believed them capable or rational. 
 
So what pushes a person to ideological misogyny?      

Jews and Art: Secret Transcripts

Today at the Jewish Community Center there was a day of learning featuring a variety of speakers on a range of topics for the community here in Columbus. Among the keynote presentations was Dr. Marc Michael Epstein’s “Jews and Art: Secret Transcripts.” Here are my notes. As always all mistakes are mine.




The title of this lecture includes the words “Jews” and “art.” This is a difficult task likely to prove dangerous to one’s health; much like a four day tour of seventeen countries. Furthermore, who is to say what “Jewish art” is? We have kitsch art and material goods. Art is notoriously problematic for Jews, not something for nice Jews to go into. Can you name one Jewish artist before Marc Chagall?

Every book about Jewish art begins be pointing to the second commandment. Jews are supposed to focus on the “word” as opposed to the image. So let us begin by looking at that infamous second commandment. Jews saw the Bible as a love letter from God. Traditional Jewish thought assumed that the prohibition was on making objects for oneself, but not for others, against three dimensional objects, but not against two-dimensional objects. Non Jews can make an image, even one intended for worship, and Jews can own it.

Jews in fact did make visual objects. We have actual fragments from the Second Temple. There were swastikas, an image of power in many ancient cultures. We see full narrative panels such as the Dura Europos, discovered in 1932. Dura Europos is special because even the walls survived, not just the floors. There was a downturn in Jewish art with the rise of Islam which tended to be hostile to images. Around the turn of the fourteenth century we see laminated manuscripts reaching out from monasteries to shops where anyone, with money, could purchase them.

The real problem surrounding Jewish art is not that it exists, but that it seems to mimic the art of the cultures around them. Angels in Judeo-Persian manuscripts look like Muslim angels. German Jewish angels look like Christian angels complete with ritual robes. Similar is not identical though. If Congress were to commission an eagle with an American flag for the capital and some kids in Spanish Harlem were to draw the same eagle with a flag would anyone think they were the same thing? One would symbolize the American dream, the other the American dream deferred.

The Golden Haggadah from fourteenth century Barcelona has often been described as being devoid of almost all but the most superficial Jewish elements. The pictures, mostly of scenes from Genesis and Exodus, look like Christian art. It very well might have been drawn by a Christian. The haggadah makes use of midrashic material. For example we see one giant frog spouting out smaller frogs from its posterior. It only makes sense that the work of any artist should reflect the wider culture. So yes Moses going to Egypt does look like the “holy family” of Joseph, Mary and Jesus traveling to Egypt. As is common in medieval art there is foreshadowing. Moses has a spear, foreshadowing the Israelites leaving Egypt armed.

Who commissioned this work? The Golden Haggadah depicts over forty women, including a depiction of Miriam leading a group of women in song. Women are often in the physical center of pictures. The midwives for example are in the center with Pharaoh and the baby to the side. Miriam leading the women is presented with no background thus with no context and rendered timeless. Women are placed in pictures were they are not needed. A woman is placed comforting Jacob even though no woman is placed here by the Bible.

A front page added several hundred years later says that the manuscript was owned by a Mistress Rosa. Perhaps this haggadah was passed down from mother to daughter. One might go further and say that the original woman for whom this haggadah was written was someone who had lost a child. We see depictions of the Midrash about babies being put into the bricks in Egypt. We see repeated depictions of women with babies. There is a woman with seven children, even more than the hyper fertility of six children per birth in Egypt.




Dr. Marc Michael Epstein is the author of the forthcoming book The Medieval Haggadah: Art, Narrative, and Religious Imagination.   

Feminists in Burqas: A Response to Clarissa

Clarissa has a post up about a Gender Studies series of lectures on "Liberating Potential of the Burqa." Clarissa laments the fact that this is not a sign of the feminist movement gaining a sense of humor, but is meant in full earnestness as a study of how the burqa might be used to "liberate women from being constantly victimized by the desire implicit in a male gaze." As to this notion of the male gaze, Clarissa notes:

I never got this whole drama about people being demeaned or "objectified" (what a silly word!) by another person's gaze. If somebody looks at you and finds you attractive, it isn't something they can control. Whether they act on their desire for you can be controlled, of course. But the feeling of desire cannot. Only a very puritanical world-view believes that desire is inherently evil and has to be feared. As for objectification, other people are always objects of our actions. That's implicit in the rules of grammar. "I see you, I like you, I help you, I respect you, I support you" - in all of these sentences "I" is the only subject, while "you" is always an object. Other people are always objects of our feelings, actions, thoughts, etc. Being an object of somebody else's actions can be both good and bad, depending on the content of the action.


Every day, as I walk around, people see me and form attitudes towards me on the basis of what they see. Even if these attitudes are negative, why should I care? Why should I hide myself behind a bulky piece of covering? Why should I grant others such a huge power over my life? Instead of spending our lives fearing the judgment we believe is present in the gaze of other people, shouldn't we concentrate on our own desires, thoughts, and experiences? Who cares what some unknown man who sees me on the bus thinks of me? If he thinks I'm attractive, that's his right. If he sits there thinking, "Oh, Jeez, what an ugly woman," that's his right too.


I suspect that I differ from Clarissa in that I have no deep-seated objection to the burqa, seeing it as something, in of itself, neutral in terms of women's empowerment. A burqa could mean a mean trying to gain control over a woman by making her ashamed of her body and to feel guilty for "leading men astray." A burqa could equally be a woman's way of empowering herself and engaging in a critic of a male-dominated culture which objectifies women. The fact that historically the burqa has tended to more often serve the former function does not mean it cannot be made to serve the latter. I would even argue that our best hope in defeating the patriarchal implications of the burqa is not by head-on eliminating the burqa, but in embracing the burqa while subverting it.

Ultimately my willingness to not oppose the burqa is rooted in my willingness to only recognize the validity of physical harm. Like Clarissa, I see nothing intrinsically wrong with the male gaze, but again only because it does not cause physical harm. A man might have all the patriarchal intentions in the world, but that has no effect on the person being observed, who is free to interpret the gaze and feel about as desired. Since the observed person is as such free it carries the full responsibility for how it reacts to being observed, an objectively neutral action.

If there is one thing that Clarissa and I agree on here, it is, I believe, a concern that the self-proclaimed liberal activism of those in Gender Studies departments might become an exercise in going far enough to the left and ending up on the right. Who is going to inherit the benefits of feminist attempts to liberate women from patriarchy? The historical law of unintended consequences leads one to wonder if it might not be patriarchal men armed with new academic jargon to back their biblical truths. As long as individuals can be subjected to the non-physical concerns of others there can be no secure rights for women or any men.   

Agora’s Two Acts

I finally got around to watching Agora. My friend Lionel Spiegel got a hold of a copy and so, armed with popcorn, we got ready to wage merciless Mystery Science Theater 3000 against the movie's Whig biases. Agora tells the story of the female pagan philosopher Hypatia, who was murdered by a Christian mob, and the burning of the Great Library of Alexandria at the hands of Christians. I therefore expected a highly simplistic movie with virtuous enlightened pagans living in paradise and vicious intolerant Christians ruining everything and bringing about the "Dark Ages." I must admit, though, that the movie turned out much better than the trailers had led me to expect, managing for the most part to be fair to the actual historical events. This is until the second act of the film.

First off, full credit has to be given to the set designers for their breathtaking reconstruction of late fourth century Alexandria. This has to go down as one of the best reconstructions of a pre-modern city in the history of film. I was not even so bothered by the lack of mud; this still being the Roman Empire. Next, you have Ashraf Barhom's film stealing supporting role as the Christian monk Ammonius. If I had seen this movie earlier I would have tried showing at least parts of it to my 111 class as part of our unit on Christianity. Barhom's portrayal of Ammonius fits precisely into the Rodney Stark model of religious outreach that I presented. Ammonius preaches on the streets of Alexandria to crowds, picks debates with pagans and performs "miracles" (in his case walking through fire), but what makes Ammonius effective is his charismatic charm, which allows him to form relationships with individual people. This allows him to attract, not massive crowds in single dramatic speeches, but to slowly win over individuals, in the case of the movie Hypatia's slave Davus. This is essentially how I imagine Paul preaching and winning converts. Whatever you might think of his actions, this is a man that you like and can understand why others might change their lives around to convert to his religion and follow him.

Anchored by Barhom's Ammonius, the film actually does manage to offer a nuanced portrayal of Christianity, where, even if Christians are still the villains of the story in the end, there is a recognition that the world of late antiquity was not completely black and white. If the Christian mob ends up sacking the Library, it is only after the pagans' started the fight. In keeping with the narrative of the slow, quite non-dramatic spread of Christianity, the pagans find the tables turned on them by the unexpected size of the Christian counter-attack, leading one of the pagan leaders to exclaim: "who knew that there were so many Christians?"

If the movie had ended after the first act, I would have been on my feet acclaiming this movie as one of the greatest historical films ever, one that could allow Christians to burn down the Great Library of Alexandria and maintain some sense of nuance. The second act, though, with Hypatia's conflict with Bishop Cyril, leading to her death, manages to fall into all the Whig anachronisms I feared. First, there is Hypatia's grappling with the problem of the elaborate system epicycles, circles on top of the planet's circular orbits, in the Ptolemaic geocentric solar system. Even this is well done and worthwhile as a portrayal of the necessary thought processes on the road to heliocentrism. The fact that Hypatia is made out to be a heliocentrist is also not a problem, even if we have no evidence that she was, as the belief was found among the ancient Greeks. The film though decides to go one better and has Hypatia preempt Kepler in the theory of elliptical orbits, necessary in order to avoid the problem of epicycles. If you are going to go that far then why not have her ask why planets move in elliptical orbits and come up with Newtonian mechanics or even Einstein's Theory of Relativity? Then there is the crude misogyny of Bishop Cyril as he quotes Paul's Epistle to Timothy about the role of women. (Anyone who sits in smug judgment of pre-modern patriarchy without considering the inevitable logic of a highly militarized society, in which women do not serve in the military, has failed to engage in due historical thinking unfit to comment on historical events.) In keeping with this theme of misogyny, Cyril levels the ultimate patriarchal accusation of witchcraft against Hypatia even though the charge of witchcraft did not come into common use until the fifteenth century. (Sorcery is a completely different issue.)

No, we have no reason to assume that Hypatia could have jump started the Scientific Revolution in late antiquity Alexandria only to be stopped by Church misogyny. The story of Hypatia and the downfall of Greco-Roman civilization is tragic enough without that. By all means, go watch this movie for the first act; if you feel so inclined, try to stomach the second.

Haveil Havalim #282

Founded by Soccer Dad, Haveil Havalim is a carnival of Jewish blogs -- a weekly collection of Jewish and Israeli blog highlights, tidbits and points of interest collected from blogs all around the world. It's hosted by different bloggers each week and coordinated by Jack. The term "Haveil Havalim," which means "Vanity of Vanities," is from Qoheleth, (Ecclesiastes) which was written by King Solomon. King Solomon built the Holy Temple in Jerusalem and later on got all bogged down in materialism and other "excesses" and realized that it was nothing but "hevel" (or in English, "vanity").








Welcome to the August 29, 2010 edition of Haveil Havalim. For those of you visiting for the first time, Izgad is a wide ranging blog dealing with issues from Judaism, Asperger syndrome, to medieval and early modern history with regular side trips to the world of science fiction and fantasy. The underlying theme behind all of this (beside for me being able talk about whatever interests me) is a desire to transcend the regular dead end debates between left and right, religious and secular, and seek out alternative frameworks. (See Introduction and a Word of Explanation.) With this in mind, as host, I have been somewhat selective in which submissions to accept for this carnival. I rejected pieces that I found to be simple tirades from either the left or right. If there is going to be a link to something on Izgad it should be because there is actually something, whether I agree with it or not, that is the product of some serious thought and adds to the conversation I am trying to have here and to which I invite all of you to take part in.



I would like to begin with the posts that really struck a chord with me personally, not to denigrate the other quality posts.


Elise/ Independent Patriot presents a Guide to the Perplexed for those struggling with raising children on the autism spectrum and talks about her experience with her atheist Asperger son. Posted at Raising Asperger's Kids.


As an Asperger, I was delighted to see a post about Asperger syndrome and Judaism. Elise's discussion of her son reminds me of C. S. Lewis talking about how when he was an atheist he spent a lot of time not believing in God and being angry at him for not existing. This post also talks about The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Hitchhiker, Maimonides and Asperger syndrome, what could be better!




 Rabbi Mordechai Torczyner reflects on the upcoming crop of rabbinical students and on the spiritual demands of blowing the Shofar. Posted at The Rebbetzin's Husband.

I found both pieces particularly touching. The former because, as someone heading toward thirty and who teaches high school and college students, I am beginning to realize that there is a generation gap between my students and me. God help me, I am one of the adults. As for the latter, I am the son of a rabbi, who always blew Shofar, but was never any good at it myself.




Getting Ready for the High Holidays


David Tzohar attempts to understand the inner meaning of Jewish prayer. Posted at Tzohar LaTeiva.


Rachel Barenblat writes about the concept of tikkun ha-sulam, Repairing the ladder, and its connection to the month of Elul. Posted at Velveteen Rabbi.


Minnesota Mamaleh gets ready for the High Holidays with the help of her family's new puppy. Posted at TC Jewfolk.


Elianah-Sharon talks about the song "Seasons of Love" from Rent in Things You Need To Know About Me - Jewels of Elul (The Thing That Changed My Life). Posted at Irresistably Me.


This post is not really connected to Judaism, but I love Rent. I cannot resist any story that is tragic, depressive, kills off main characters and has the humanism to transcend it all. My personal favorite song is "One Song Glory."


Rivster presents Thrilling Dissonance about singing the passage from Jeremiah "zacharti loch chesed niuriach," used in the High Holiday services. Posted at Frume Sarah's World.

I also have a thing for this passage. Unfortunately most people forget what comes two verses after it.


Culture

Avital Pinnick, in Henna by Sienna, talks about Noam Sienna and his efforts to preserve Jewish henna traditions. Posted at This and That. 

Harry talks about attending a production of Shakespeare's Twelfth Night in Jerusalem. Posted at Israelity.

Risa writes about her recent trip to Tel Aviv and offers pictures in Tel Aviv - Revisited and the Klezmer Music in The Abuhav Synagogue in Tzfat. Posted at Isramom.




Thought & Practice






Rabbi Josh Yuter responds to R. Broyde's recent post opposing women leading Kabbalat Shabbat. While not disagreeing with R. Broyde's decision as a matter of policy, R. Yuter addresses the question of communal confusion in the decision making process. Posted at YUTOPIA.


Hadassah Sabo Milner presents The Art of Beginning Again – Spiritual Waters | In the Pink about her experiences using the mikvah. Posted at In the Pink.


Chaviva presents Taking the (Hair) Plunge about her decision to start wearing a sheitel. Posted at Just call me Chaviva.


Susan Barnes has a pair of posts on being part of a Jewish burial society, Chevra Kadisha Seminar - The Experience and Chevra Kadisha Seminar - The Knowledge. Posted at To Kiss A Mezuzah.



Food


David Levy presents Roast Chicken Surprise, A Rosh Hashanah Recipe. Not that I recommend that anyone try this at home, but the post is funny. He also has Confessions of a Yom Kippur Slacker: I Never Fast. Posted at JewishBoston.com.




Batya presents f2f With A JBlogger about her recent dining experience. Posted at me-ander.


Mirjam Weiss presents You Say It's Your Birthday. Posted at Miriyummy.



Politics

 SnoopyTheGoon has an essay defending the theory of relativity from the charge that it promotes relativism. Posted at SimplyJews.




That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the next edition of Haveil Havalim using our carnival submission form. Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.


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