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Jewish Sex Manuals and Jacob Emden's Mitat Kesef Master's The Invisible Partner: Jewish Sex Manuals and Jacob Emden's Mitat Kesef Master’s Thesis Presented to The Faculty of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Brandeis University Department of Near Eastern and Judaic Studies ChaeRan Freeze, Advisor In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts in Near Eastern and Judaic Studies by Ariel Pardo May 2017 Copyright by Ariel Pardo © 2017 Acknowledgments כִּ י ה' יִתֵּ ן חָכְמָ ה מִפִּ יו דַּﬠַת וּתְ בוּנָה: (משלי ב:ו) Because God gives wisdom, from His mouth [come] knowledge and discernment. (Proverbs 2:6) This thesis is the culmination of many hours in the library, early mornings, and late nights. And while I have worked harder on this academic project than any other, I would be remiss if I did not thank everyone else who took time from their busy schedules to help and advise me on this endeavor. First and foremost, I would like to thank God for giving me the strength to complete my master’s while being a mother, wife, and working full-time. God has allowed me to succeed despite the lack of sleep that accompanies motherhood, missed classes for unforeseeable family- related issues, and job duties. Second, I would like to thank my professors and staff who inspired me and encouraged me to do my very best. I would like to thank Jean Mannion and Joanne Arnish of the NEJS office who put up with my hectic schedule and life. I would like to thank Professor Sylvia Barack Fishman and Professor Jon Levisohn whose classes made me think about the world of Judaism in different and enlightening ways. I would like to thank Professor Reuven Kimelman for helping with my thesis and whose classes were always enjoyable and illuminating. I would like to thank Professor Brooten for being the second reader of my thesis and whose invaluable critique and comments have further piqued my interest in the topic. And finally, I would especially like to thank Professor ChaeRan Freeze whose Early Modern Jewish History class made me passionate about the subject of women in Judaism; who spent many hours advising me and taking personal interest in my passions and goals; and who is one of the people I admire most. Third, I would like to thank my parents for their unending support and guidance. They helped shape the person I am today and are always available to help guide me. There are really no words of gratitude that properly express how much I owe them. Finally, I would like to thank my family-- my three daughters, Haviva, Tiferet, and Ora whose sweetness and cuteness could get me through anything. Haviva and Tiferet, I will never forget you wishing me good luck on every one of my exams by telling me to “win the test.” And Ora, your adorable smile and cuddliness is the reason I love being a mother. And my husband, David. Thank you for having fun with the girls on Sundays when I had to go to the library; thank you for putting up with my late nights and early mornings; and thank you for all the wonderful adventures we have together. iii ABSTRACT Jewish Sex Manuals: Jacob Emden's Mitat Kesef and His Approach Toward Women A thesis presented to the Near Eastern and JewishJudaic Studies Department Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Brandeis University Waltham, Massachusetts By Ariel Pardo In the mid-eighteenth century, Jacob Emden wrote the idur eit aakov, a prayer book which not only contained prayers, but legal material pertaining to prayer, Jewish holidays, and the Sabbath. At the end of the Sabbath prayers, he inserted a treatise regarding proper sexual behavior between husband and wife. He called this treatise “Mitat Kesef. This thesis explores the treatise at length by examining earlier Jewish sexual ideals by looking at Biblical, Talmudic and Kabbalistic sources, many of which are quoted in Mitat Kesef. It also deals with the text through a Foucaultian lens, dealing with issues such as male power and female subservience. Finally, this paper attempts to understand Mitat Kesef by looking at the sociohistorical conditions of Altona in the eighteenth century. This thesis addresses questions such as what prompted Emden to write this in a Siddur? Why does Emden quote certain texts and not others? What sociohistorical conditions led to his desire to author such a work? How are women viewed in the document? Does Emden add any innovation to mainstream Jewish sexual discourse of the time? How does Jewish sexual discourse shape Judaism’s view of sex within marriage? iv Table of Contents INTRODUCTION…………………………………………………………………………...........1 Methodology………………………………………………………………………………5 The Authors of the Sex Manuals: Rabbi Abraham Ben David of Posquières and Jacob Emden..……… ……………………………………….………………………………......5 Sex, Power, and the Body: A Foucaultian Analysis…………………………………........7 CHAPTER ONE: Predecessors to Mitat Kesef……………………………………………………..….10 Biblical and Talmudic Treatments of Sex……………………………………………….11 Kabbalah and the Baalei HaNefesh…………………………………………………………….16 The Iggeret HaKodesh……………………………………………………………………………19 The Evolution of the Yetzer in Rabbinic Thought ………………………………………26 CHAPTER TWO: Mitat Kesef and its Treatment of Women……………………………………31 How the Text is Divided…………………………………………………………………31 Jacob Emden and Sexuality……………………………………………………………...32 The Yetzer in Mitat Kesef …………………………………………………………………38 Applying Foucault to Mitat Kesef………………………………………………………………43 CHAPTER THREE: Socio-Historical Factors in the Production of Mitat Kesef………………..48 Intended Audience……………………………………………………………………….51 CONCLUSIONS………………………………………………………………………………...53 BIBLIOGRAPHY………………………………………………………………………………..56 v INTRODUCTION Up to the end of the eighteenth century, three major explicit codes -- apart from the customary regularities and constraints of opinion -- governed sexual practices: canonical law, the Christian pastoral, and civil law. They determined each in its own way, the division between licit and illicit. They were all centered on matrimonial relations: the marital obligation, the ability to fulfill it, the manner in which one complied with it, the requirements and violences that accompanied it, the useless or unwarranted caresses for which it was a pretext . it was this domain that was especially saturated with prescriptions. The sex of husband and wife was beset by rules and recommendations. The marriage relation was the most intense focus of constraints; it was spoken of more than anything else; more than any other relation, it was required to give a detailed accounting of itself. It was under constant surveillance: if it was found to be lacking, it had to come forward and plead its case before a witness.1 There is a common misconception that once sex enters the confines of marriage it is unregulated and unmediated, subject only to the negotiation between man and wife. Yet within Kabbala-centered Judaism, there is a metaphysical component, as well - God becomes part and parcel of marital sex by way of restrictions and regulations. Kabbalah espouses the belief that rules serve to shape human behaviors which, in turn, influence the metaphysical world, ultimately rectifying earthly catastrophe. Thus, sex becomes not an endeavor to physically unite two people, but an act on which the welfare of the world depends. I begin my explication of Jewish sex manuals with the above quote, the purpose being twofold: to immediately call to attention the historical scrutiny of sexual relations between a husband and wife and to present an initial glimpse of the Foucaultian outlook through which I will examine these sex manuals. My goal is not to deride the texts, per se, but to acknowledge a 1 Foucault, Michel. The History of Sexuality. Vintage Books ed. New York: Vintage Books, 1990. Print, 37. 1 historical reality in which women became passive participants in their own sexual experiences. I will begin with a brief literature review in order to summarize traditional scholarly approaches and perspectives on the rabbinic view of sexuality. This will be followed by an explanation of my methodology and an overview of how I conducted my research. Finally, I will present some necessary biographical, historical and cultural information about the authors and the time periods during which they lived. Many scholars have argued that a general shift from a less restrictive matrimonial sexual ethic to a more restrictive one evolved in more recent history. This shift was preceded by the opposite-- an initial shift from more restriction toward more sexual freedom within marriage; both Daniel Boyarin2 and David Biale,3 for example, contend that the Palestinian Talmud (c. 350-400 CE) upholds ascetic values where the Babylonian Talmud (c. 500 CE) does not. But this shift reversed itself as the centuries passed and as a more rigid approach to sex between husband and wife dominated Jewish literature. With the rise of Kabbalah, the early rabbinic innovation which equated the significance of the body with that of the soul4 was replaced with the notion that the soul was superior. Scholars such as Judith R. Baskin, Charlotte Elisheva Fonrobert, Karen Guberman, Dalia Hoshen, and Judith Wegner, among many others, address the intense ambivalence Kabbalists exhibited toward women in their roles of sexual partners with their husbands.5 Thus, as Judith R. Baskin writes, “women, even the most pious, simply by virtue of 2 Boyarin, Daniel. Carnal Israel: Reading Sex in Talmudic Culture. Berkeley: U of California, 1993. Print. 3 Biale, David. Eros and the Jews: From Biblical Israel to Contemporary America. New York, NY: Basic, 1992. Print. 4 For more on this, see Kimelman, Reuven. “The Rabbinic Theology of the Physical: Blessings, Body and Soul, Resurrection, Covenant and Election.” The Cambridge History of Judaism, Volume 4: The Late Roman-Rabbinic Period, ed. Steven Katz. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006. 946-976. 5 For more on this, see the following articles: Baskin, Judith R. “Women and Sexual Ambivalence in Sefer Hasidim,” The Jewish Quarterly Review. 96:1 (2006), 1-8; Fonrobert, Charlotte Elisheva. Regulating the Human Body : Rabbinic Legal Discourse and the Making of Jewish Gender; Guberman, Karen.
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