I've just read from the Torah, the holy scroll of the Jewish people. The Torah is composed of five books. It is read over the course of one Jewish year. The Torah handwritten and flawless. It is the teachings of God revealed to the people at Sinai. When we interpret Torah we receive it as if we ourselves were at Sinai.
My portion is found in Leviticus (called V'yekra in Hebrew) This week's reading includes chapter 16 through 18, is called Achare Mot, and deals with ritual laws.
Chapter 16 is about the Ritual of Yom Kippur and how the high priest conducts himself during that time. Chapter 17 concerns ritual animal sacrifice, food and blood. Then comes my portion, Chapter 18, the laws of Sexual Offenses. This portion covers many aspects of sexual behavior. It begins with the people being told not to practice the ways of Egypt and Canaan. Egypt and Canaan had pagan rituals such as having temple prostitutes. God told the people that if they wanted to live long and be strong together they must not repeat the practices of where they had just been.
I believe that my portion is an extremely important one because standards are important in dealing with sex. In modern society there are so many mixed messages about sexuality. In Judaism sex is thought of as such a wonderful and special gift but the beauty of a sexual relationship is lost when it is used in advertising for products or misusing the whole idea of sex for other reasons . Judaism is based on being a family, togetherness, and respecting other members of one's family. This Torah portion says do not practice incest and adultery, these were the ways of the tribes around you and shouldn't be your ways. The Torah says you don't have to be a part of what's going on around you, you can do what you know is right.
This portion is also controversial and not everyone agrees on one interpretation of the passage referring to homosexuality. To understand this controversy I had to learn how to interpret Torah because there is deeper meaning than what is just written down. Tzvi Marx, an orthodox rabbi said "No matter how categorical scripture seems to be, though, one never assumes a subject is closed." meaning nothing in the Torah is ever absolutely fixed.
I spoke to different members of the Jewish Community about how they interpreted Torah and what they thought about the passage referring to homosexuality. One person said he believed that the Torah and laws were written by people who reached so deep inside themselves that they touched a place where they met with the divine.
This concept of divinely inspired people writing the Torah came up in almost all of my discussions. As someone else put it, It is given to people by God because it comes from the part of us that is searching for an ethical way to live. But because the Torah came through imperfect human beings all the written words might not have been God's exact intent. Also the Torah cannot speak to all humans' experiences with God because women's voices are not yet included to the same degree as men's.
Several members of the community spoke of interpreting Torah through a historical perspective, remembering that the laws spoke directly to the ways of the tribal people wandering in the desert before becoming a nation. During that time for the Jews to survive, reproduction was vital. Even the patriarchs had several wives. Homosexuality, at that time, could take away the energy from reproduction and that could account for the severe prohibition against it.
Another point that was frequently brought up was that you can be a good Jew without agreeing with all the historical interpretation of Torah. You can search deeply to find a new interpretation for today. But looking back on a different time period it is important not to criticize the standards of the people living then. Like us today they were trying so hard to live life the right way
While reading from the Torah, regardless of our interpretation of the Torah today, a single word should never be changed, but while trying to make the Torah meaningful, we can look beyond the literal word so the Torah can speak to us.
A level of reading Torah beyond the literal is to search for universal truth. In my portion this universal truth might be that it's very important who you get sexually involved with and you can't just go by your first impulse. It is not just important for you, but for the family, tribe, and society as a whole.
An even deeper level is to let the words sit long enough within you so you might actually experience the divine meaning and get in touch with the right way for YOU to live. A community member I talked with had a lot of contact with gay men and said that through his work he has seen a lot of suffering and found that love is love and that all people go through the same things. For him the meaning of the 'Do not lie with a male as one lies with a woman' passage might be saying, don't substitute the love of a man for the love of a woman, but that isn't what happens in homosexual relationships. Another person heard the portion applying more to ritual life than to the everyday since this Torah portion begins and ends with the message to have different practices than those around you.
It was suggested to me that it takes generations to experience the whole Torah. That throughout one's life you should put your heart into different parts of the Torah and live that particular moment to it's fullest rather than trying to live it all and never really get the wholeness of the experience. Parts go deep and you have to run them through your heart; you'll mature into different parts during different parts of your life. It is a blueprint for the long term survival of the Jewish people. Generations always emphasize or de-emphasize different parts. It is a lasting gift and teaching, almost too much for one lifetime.
Who we are is part of God and God is inside all of us. Now there is evidence that our sexuality is genetic and in the very core of our being. Not just a choice that someone makes. During one of my first meetings with Margaret she told me about when she worked in a temple where many gays and lesbians came to pray. She told me of many times seeing people so sad and distraught because they knew the passage about homosexuals and couldn't understand why their holy book condemned them. They were created by God but were excluded from the example of what is good and holy.
Some people today use this portion to condemn the actions of homosexuals. It is painful to me to know that our holy book is interpreted to stigmatize people's loving relationships toward each other. In being used this way the beauty and wholeness of the Torah's light is dimmed. I wish everyone would try as hard as the people I talked to, to find meaning that brings people together rather than sets them apart.
I would like to thank the people who contributed to my speech by taking the time to think about my portion and gave me some really interesting ideas. Binah Polay, Ceril Lisbon, Ella Russell, Ellen Saxe, Ira Rosenberg, Mina Cohen, Miriam Grosman, and Margaret Holub
Copyright 1995, 2000 Jenais Zarlin
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Updated 02/21/2000 (rge)