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31. Fear Factor: Lesbian Sex and Gay Men: Parashat Emor (Leviticus 21:1–24:23)
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170 thirty-one Fear Factor: Lesbian Sex and Gay Men Parashat Emor (Leviticus 21:1–24:23) Joshua Lesser There was an audible buzz of excitement in the room when I entered bearing homemade brownies. There were nearly a dozen of us in Kirsta’s humble New Orleans apartment for the screening, and I was the only man allowed in. I knew some of these women from engaging in LGBT and AIDS activism together. Most of them were lesbians or bisexual women. As I passed my plate of brownies around, I checked to see if the women were comfortable with my presence as the sole male. Even Justin, Kirsta’s boyfriend, had been banished, since absolutely no straight men were permitted . They agreed it was because they were comfortable with me, though one woman asked, “You’re gay, and you’re not grossed out?” “Not at all. I am curious.” With the lights dark, we all began to watch an instructional video on female ejaculation. The woman’s assumption about gay men’s “vaginophobia” highlights an all-toocommon sexism among gay men. I never understood the discomfort, particularly from a community that is often at ease speaking about sex. My sexual orientation is not determined because I am repulsed by the opposite sex but, rather, because I am more attracted to my own. I think it is important to have knowledge about sexuality and human bodies in general. I remember one afternoon at summer camp when I sat around with a group of women who all shared about the trials and tribulations of their periods, especially the discoveries of their first one. They debated the pros and cons of tampons and pads and even described laughable mishaps. At fifteen, I felt honored and privileged to be let into a conversation that felt treasured and reserved for the rarest of men. Conversations like these have continued and have made me a better ally to women. When Eve Ensler’s Vagina Monologues first came to the stage, I went to see it immediately—one of only three men in the whole theater—because I was interested in what vaginas and the women who have them have to say. As a queer Jew, I feel it is important for queers of all genders to understand Judaism’s stance on lesbian sexuality, and that by extension dictates an openness to women’s bodies and sexuality. There is some irony that Emor, a portion so hyperfocused on the male body, with its description of the physical perfection needed to become a cohen, priest,1 is also one of only two portions that has any halachic connection to lesbian women’s sexuality . The connection in the portion is minor because lesbian sex raises a profound Parashat Emor 171 challenge. In the Torah all of women’s sexuality is seen as an extension of men, which precludes lesbian sexuality. For instance, adultery is defined as a man sleeping with another man’s wife. Since polygamy is clearly permitted, men could be married to women and still have sex with other women. Because sexuality is so male-oriented in the Torah, lesbian sexuality is not mentioned at all, causing many scholars to wonder if lesbian sex even existed in the minds of the authors of the Torah. Rabbi Steven Greenberg asserts that “only sexual acts that involve penile penetration were under legislative scrutiny in the Torah.”2 Thus, we find only later generations of rabbis reading lesbian sex and its prohibitions into the Torah—and it revolves around men. Lesbian sex, due to this sexist privileging of male power, escapes the focus placed on male-male sex. The basis of prohibitions for lesbian sex is found in the Talmud’s reading of verses from Parashat Emor, “They shall not marry a woman defiled by harlotry, nor shall they marry one divorced from her husband. For they are holy to God. . . . When the daughter of a priest defiles herself through harlotry, it is her father she defiles; she shall be put to the fire” (Lev. 21:7, 9). In the Talmud,3 there is a connection drawn between the word “harlotry” (liznot or zonah) and the term mesolelot, which in contemporary translations is also rendered as “harlotry” or “sexual lewdness .” Rashi, in his 12th-century commentary, more specifically defined mesolelot as women rubbing their vaginas together, based on his reading of the Talmud Yebamot 76a. This elucidation becomes legally significant, because there is rabbinic panic that two women playing...