Sex in full dimension

EUGENE KAELLIS

In Goethe’s poem “Prometheus,” the hero, who had disobeyed Zeus by stealing fire from the gods and giving it to humans, further challenges the chief deity by claiming that he too, is god-like, forming humans in his own image. That people have the ability to create other people, the crowning achievements of Creation, can, indeed, be seen as their possessing a god-like ability.

Procreation and embryonic development are so complex and exquisite in their details and coordination that they are still largely a mystery and will, unquestionably, remain one for a very long time. Sperm cells, easily accessible, have been known since Antonie van Leeuwenhoek (1632-1723) saw them with his first, simple, microscope, but it was not until 1827 that the human egg was discovered. Before then, women were seen as merely receptacles for the sperm, which allegedly contained homunculi – miniature, completely formed human babies. To account for succeeding generations, there were within them still smaller homunculi, and so on, encased in one another like Ukrainian dolls. Calculations were even made about when this store would run out and the species would end. Now it is known that the female genetic contribution, by dint of oval cytoplasmic DNA, actually exceeds that of the male.

On the subject of gender, although the language of the Bible has led some people to conclude that God behaves like a male chauvinist, there is no compelling evidence for that conclusion. Some months ago, I commented on God’s direct involvement in human affairs, viz., the “punishment” of Eve for having violated His warning regarding the Tree of Knowledge, by making her suffer travail in childbirth, while Adam got off relatively easy. But this was not punishment; it was God’s prognostication of an evolutionary development based on these two prototypical hominoids assuming an upright posture and the consequent (and obstetrically problematic) changes in human female pelvic anatomy.

The connection between sexual intercourse and pregnancy has been known by humans for a long time, and possibly among some of the higher primates. Observations have shown that even birds, assessing their environment for the availability of subsistence and shelter, will limit their sexual activity, the consequences of which they evidently understand, to conform to circumstances, avoiding over-producing in a meagre setting. Nonetheless, Genesis implies that before the Fall, Adam and Eve, may not have known of the connection between sex and procreation until they ate of the Tree of Knowledge. But immediately thereafter, they covered their nakedness, realizing that sex, while pleasurable, could result in important consequences, including the major responsibility of child-bearing.

Most people usually engage in sex not for procreation but for pleasure or to relieve sexual tension and, as human beings have evolved, to express love by achieving the ultimate in adult physical intimacy. But, in anything as complex as sexuality, nothing is one-dimensional. Other motivations in our competitive culture, including keeping up with the (alleged) national average, as determined by sex surveys, and even just to alleviate boredom. Hence, whenever there is a power outage (no TV), nine months later the local birth rate almost invariably blips.

Various methods of effective contraception have been devised and are used to safeguard this dissociation between sex and procreation. While Judaism permits contraception, the Catholic Church, in an effort to relate intercourse only to reproduction, does not. However, conceding that few communicants would adhere to that highly restrictive precept, some years ago the Church introduced the “rhythm method,” suggesting that non-reproductive intercourse (without resort to contraceptives) be confined to those days in the female monthly cycle before menstruation, but in which there were (presumably) no eggs available to be fertilized. This was far from a foolproof method because not only is the ovarian cycle only approximately regular, more to the point, it was recently discovered that women may ovulate more than once per cycle.

Increasingly, in our sex-obsessed culture, sexual activity is often on a nearly exclusive genital level. With the availability of effective contraception and, if that fails, early abortion, sex, especially for males, has become a significantly ego-associated activity, exemplified by such references as “scoring” or “making out.” Responsibility in sex may actually be more difficult to achieve whenever coitus becomes “fornication” and is consequently considered by some to be sinful. Forbidden pleasures, it turns out, are always more exciting, especially among already rebellious and hormone-driven youngsters.

The Jewish attitude toward sex has always differed significantly from the Christian. Lust, vice, rape, concubinage, polygamy, prostitution, incest, adultery and masturbation figure prominently and candidly in the Jewish Testament. Moreover, sexual appetite in the Jewish Testament is not confined to men. To cite the earliest of many examples, Eve’s desire for Adam is stronger than the risk and pain of childbirth about which she had already been warned.

Revealingly, in order to endow Jesus with his “perfection” as the son of God, he had to be the issue of an immaculate conception and a virgin birth. The Gospel of Matthew specifically mentions at least four brothers of Jesus and an unstated number of possible sisters. It is assumed that they were conceived and born in the usual way, which would limit the virginity of Mary to only until after the conception and birth of Jesus, her firstborn, yet she purportedly ascended to Heaven as a perpetual virgin. Evidently, this bestows a premium on virginity, later reinforced by convent existence, thereby casting a penumbra of shame over “ordinary,” that is, sexually active, women.

While clearly implicit in the Christian Testament that sex is a necessary “evil,” the Jewish Testament deals with sex and sexual transgressions in acknowledgement and complete candor. Lot’s daughters commit incest (Genesis 19:32). Masturbation, sometimes described as “the sin of Onan,” was actually coitus interruptus after he disobeyed God’s request that he impregnate his brother’s widow (38:9). In another event, Tamar is raped. David conspires to eliminate Bathsheba’s husband so he can possess her. When he becomes an old and dying man, David, no longer sexually capable, lies with a young maiden, not for sex, but simply to warm his body. Solomon had a huge harem and probably engaged the visiting Queen of Sheba as a paramour. There are other candidly described sexual adventures and transgressions.

In contrast, Paul, the most prolific and successful proselytizer for early Christianity, perhaps believing that the “End of Days” was near, at first counseled total abstinence: “It is well for a man not to touch a woman.” (1 Corinthians 7:7) A short time later, bowing to an insistent reality, including the realization that the world was not about to end and no sex would, in one generation, mean no Christians, he compromised: “It is better to marry than to be aflame with passion.” (7:9)

The early women’s liberation movement, casting aside the old pretensions of innocence and false virtue, openly acknowledged the sexuality of women and adolescent girls. With the widespread availability of contraception and abortion, as surveys have repeatedly demonstrated, contemporary young women often begin sexual activity at early ages. While this may be “liberating” for females, it provides what men, particularly younger men, have always wanted – a community of sexually available females not insisting on commitment. That by itself doesn’t make sexual practices wrong, but it does introduce a note of a frequently ignored historical (i.e., Cui bono?) reality.

This dissociation between what we can, albeit with prejudice, call lust and true love, is nothing new. It is repeatedly acknowledged in the Jewish Testament, which deals with both, more or less inevitable, aspects of the human psyche. On the other hand, the Christian Testament avoids “carnal love” almost entirely. Perhaps its most interesting comment on sexuality is about the women taken in adultery (John 8) whom Jesus defends, although his defence is of the “least common denominator” variety, i.e., who among the would-be stoners was not guilty of sin?

In spite of a flurry of recent (secular) speculation about Jesus and Mary Magdalene, in the Gospels, Jesus demonstrates no sexual impulses, nor does Paul, Christianity’s major proselytizer.

The Tenth Commandment forbids coveting one’s neighbor’s wife, “neighbor” being considered as other men. Although it is evidently male-oriented (women can also lust after men not their husbands) this is, nevertheless, a practical position. Coveting an unmarried woman would naturally precede courtship and marriage. While almost all the other commandments deal with behavior, this one specifically deals with emotion. Jimmy Carter, in a famous Playboy interview of some years ago, stated that he had been an adulterer, not in his behavior but in his mind, because he had lusted after women other than his wife.

This raises a major problem: can people avoid thinking forbidden thoughts? I don’t know if Carter was familiar with a famous story about Leo Tolstoy. When Tolstoy was a boy and had already established a reputation for honesty, he wanted to join a club of his fellows, who didn’t want him (perhaps because they considered him something of a prig). In any case, as an evidently ad hoc membership requirement, he was asked to not think of a white bear for one minute. Of course, after a few seconds, he admitted his failure and was disqualified.

Try not having a lascivious thought. Be at ease if you (almost certainly) failed. In Judaism, in spite of the commandment, ultimately it is behavior that counts, not (irrepressible) fantasy.

Eugene Kaellis has written Making Jews on the theme of the current basic problem of Diaspora Jewry, which is available from lulu.com.

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