Weekend thought

Male sexuality is something that men don't feel comfortable talking about and women don't want to hear. But the truth of the matter is that all men battle their sexual natures day to day, just as women battle aspects of their emotional nature. All men are recovering adulterers, even if they haven't committed adultery. Our own nature tells us to horde women; monogamy is not something that comes naturally.

When Judaism demanded that all sexual activity be channeled into marriage, it changed the world. The Torah's prohibition of non-marital sex quite simply made the creation of Western civilization possible.

Among the consequences of the unchanneled sex drive is the sexualization of everything -- including religion. Unless the sex drive is appropriately harnessed (not squelched -- which leads to its own destructive consequences), higher religion could not have developed. Thus, the first thing Judaism did was to de-sexualize God: "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" by his will, not through any sexual behavior. This was an utterly radical break with all other religions, and it alone changed human history. The gods of virtually all civilizations engaged in sexual relations. In the Near East, the Babylonian god Ishtar seduced a man, Gilgamesh, the Babylonian hero. In Egyptian religion, the god Osiris had sexual relations with his sister, the goddess Isis, and she conceived the god Horus. In Canaan, El [or Ba'al], the chief god, had sex with Asherah. In Hindu belief, the god Krishna was sexually active, having had many wives and pursuing Radha; the god Samba, son of Krishna, seduced mortal women and men. In Greek beliefs, Zeus married Hera, chased women, abducted the beautiful young male, Ganymede, and masturbated at other times; Poseidon married Amphitrite, pursued Demeter, and raped Tantalus. In Rome, the gods sexually pursued both men and women.

Judaism placed controls on sexual activity. It could no longer dominate religion and social life. It was to be sanctified -- which in Hebrew means "separated" -- from the world and placed in the home, in the bed of husband and wife. Judaism's restricting of sexual behavior was one of the essential elements that enabled society to progress. Along with ethical monotheism, the revolution begun by the Torah when it declared war on the sexual practices of the world wrought the most far-reaching changes in history.

The Hebrew Bible, in particular the Torah (The Five Books of Moses), has done more to civilize the world than any other book or idea in history. It is the Hebrew Bible that gave humanity such ideas as a universal, moral, loving God; ethical obligations to this God; the need for history to move forward to moral and spiritual redemption; the belief that history has meaning; and the notion that human freedom and social justice are the divinely desired states for all people. It gave the world the Ten Commandments, ethical monotheism, and the concept of holiness (the goal of raising human beings from the animal-like to the God-like). Therefore, when this Bible makes strong moral proclamations, I listen with great respect. And regarding male homosexuality -- female homosexuality is not mentioned -- this Bible speaks in such clear and direct language that one does not have to be a religious fundamentalist in order to be influenced by its views. All that is necessary is to consider oneself a serious Jew or Christian.

To the ancient world which divided human sexuality between penetrator and penetrated, Judaism said, "You are wrong -- sexuality is to be divided between male and female." To a world which saw women as baby producers unworthy of romantic and sexual attention, Judaism said "You are wrong -- women must be the sole focus of men's erotic love." To a world which said that sensual feelings and physical beauty were life's supreme goods, Judaism said, "You are wrong -- ethics and holiness are the supreme goods." A thousand years before Roman emperors kept naked boys, Jewish kings were commanded to write and keep a sefer torah, a book of the Torah.

-Dennis Prager
Excerpts from radio show and Judaism's Sexual Revolution