Eshel is Celebrating the Anniversaries of three groundbreaking books this summer on the Queering of Traditional Judaism.
In this first session looking at Rabbi Steve Greenberg’s Wrestling with God and Men: Homosexuality in the Jewish Tradition was published in 2004, Greenberg will discuss how a great deal has changed since he penned his now 20 year old book. He will share his purposes in writing his book along with a discussion of what changed and what remains for us to do.
June 18 - Wrestling with God and Men (2004) by Steve Greenberg
July 18 - Queer Judaism (2023) by Orit Avishai
August 18 - Keep Your Wives Away From the Them (2011) by Miryam Kabakov
About the Books:
Wrestling with God and Men: Homosexuality in the Jewish Tradition Updated
Rabbi Steven Greenberg
For millennia, two biblical verses have been understood to condemn sex between men as an act so abominable that it is punishable by death. Traditionally Orthodox Jews, believing the scripture to be the word of God, have rejected homosexuality. In 1999, Rabbi Steven Greenberg challenged this tradition when he became the first Orthodox rabbi ever to openly declare his homosexuality.
Wrestling with God and Men is the product of Rabbi Greenberg’s ten-year struggle to reconcile his two warring identities. In this compelling and groundbreaking work, Greenberg challenges long-held assumptions of scriptural interpretation and religious identity as he marks a path that is both responsible to human realities and deeply committed to God and Torah. Employing traditional rabbinic resources, Greenberg presents readers with surprising biblical interpretations of the creation story, the love of David and Jonathan, the destruction of Sodom, and the condemning verses of Leviticus. But Greenberg goes beyond the question of whether homosexuality is biblically acceptable to ask how such relationships can be sacred. In so doing, he draws on a wide array of nonscriptural texts to introduce readers to occasions of same-sex love in Talmudic narratives, medieval Jewish poetry and prose, and traditional Jewish case law literature. Ultimately, Greenberg argues that Orthodox communities must open up debate, dialogue, and discussion—precisely the foundation upon which Jewish law rests—to truly deal with the issue of homosexual love.
Queer Judiasm: LGBT Activism and the Remaking of Jewish Orthodoxy in Israel
Orit Avishai
Until fairly recently, Orthodox people in Israel could not imagine embracing their LGBT sexual or gender identity and staying within the Orthodox fold. But within the span of about a decade and a half, Orthodox LGBT people have forged social circles and communities and become much more visible. This has been a remarkable shift in a relatively short time span. Queer Judaism offers the compelling story of how Jewish LGBT persons in Israel created an effective social movement.
Drawing on more than 120 interviews, Orit Avishai illustrates how LGBT Jews accomplished this radical change. She makes the case that it has taken multiple approaches to achieve recognition within the community, ranging from political activism to more personal interactions with religious leaders and community members, to simply creating spaces to go about their everyday lives. Orthodox LGBT Jews have drawn from their lived experiences as well as Jewish traditions, symbols, and mythologies to build this movement, motivated to embrace their sexual identity not in spite of, but rather because of, their commitment to Jewish scripture, tradition, and way of life. Unique and timely, Queer Judaism: LGBT Activism and the Remaking of Jewish Orthodoxy in Israel (NYU Press, 2023) challenges popular conceptions of how LGBT people interact and identify with conservative communities of faith.
Keep Your Wives Away from Them: Orthodox Women, Unorthodox Desires: An Anthology
Miryam Kabakov
Reconciling queerness with religion has always been an enormous challenge. When the religion is Orthodox Judaism, the task is even more daunting. This anthology takes on that challenge by giving voice to genderqueer Jewish women who were once silenced--and effectively rendered invisible--by their faith. Keep Your Wives Away from Them tells the story of those who have come out, who are still closeted, living double lives, or struggling to maintain an integrated "single life" in relationship to traditional Judaism--personal stories that are both enlightening and edifying. While a number of films and books have explored the lives of queer people in Orthodox and observant Judaism, only this one explores in depth what happens after the struggle, when the real work of building integrated lives begins. The candor of these insightful stories in Keep Your Wives Away from Them makes the book appealing to a general audience and students of women's, gender, and LGBTQ studies, as well as for anyone struggling personally with the same issue. Contributors include musician and writer Temim Fruchter, Professor Joy Ladin, writer Leah Lax, nurse Tamar Prager, and the pseudonymous Ex-Yeshiva Girl.
About the Authors:
Steve Greenberg is an Orthodox rabbi, ordained at Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary. Early in his career he served as a senior educator for the National Jewish Center for Learning and Leadership (CLAL), a think tank and training institute where he worked as an educator, curriculum writer, lecturer and consultant on wide variety of cutting edge projects on the ethics, environment, social justice and communal leadership. Steve is the first openly gay Orthodox rabbi and a founder of the Jerusalem Open House, the Holy City’s GLBT community center. In 2001 Steve appeared in the documentary, Trembling Before G-d, and joined with the film maker to create a worldwide outreach project conducting over 500 post-screening community dialogues all over the world. In 2004 he finished a decade long project, a book entitled, Wrestling with God and Men: Homosexuality in the Jewish Tradition, which explores biblical, rabbinic, medieval and contemporary Jewish responses to same-sex relationships. (University of Wisconsin Press) for which he won the Koret Jewish Book Award for Philosophy and Thought. Rabbi Greenberg is presently the Founding Director of Eshel, a support, education and advocacy organization for LGBT+ Orthodox Jews and their families. He lives with his partner, Steven Goldstein, and their daughter, Amalia, in Boston.
Orit Avishai is a sociologist at Fordham University in New York, where she is affiliated with the Center for Jewish Studies. She has a PhD from the University of California at Berkeley and law degrees from the Yale Law School and Tel Aviv University. She teaches courses on religion, gender, sexuality, and American politics. Her book Queer Judaism: LGBT Activism and the Remaking of Jewish Orthodoxy in Israel addresses how traditional religious values and practice in Israel is being reshaped by the life choices of LGBTQ+ Orthodox Jews.
Miryam Kabakov is a national leader who has worked for more than three decades on the inclusion of LGTBQ+ individuals in the Orthodox world. Miryam is Executive Director and co-founder of Eshel, a national organization that supports LGBTQ+ Orthodox individuals and their families. Prior to being a leader at Eshel, Miryam was the New York and National Program Director of AVODAH: The Jewish Service Corps, Director of LGBT programming at the JCC Manhattan, Social Worker at West Side Federation for Senior and Supportive Housing, and was the first social worker at Footsteps. Miryam received her MSW from the Wurzweiler School of Social Work. She also received a certificate in fundraising from the University of St. Thomas and a certificate in program evaluation from the University of Washington, and has a background in informal Jewish education from Brandeis University. She founded the New York Orthodykes, a support group for lesbian, bisexual and transgender Orthodox women, and is the editor of Keep Your Wives Away From Them: Orthodox Women, Unorthodox Desires (North Atlantic Books, May 2010), a collection of writings about the challenges and joys of LBT Orthodox Jews and winner of the Golden Crown Literary Award.