Abstract:
Karin Hügel, "Surviving Instead of Dying – Rabbinic Exceptions: Queer Readings of the Babylonian Talmud Sanhedrin 74 and Its Parallels".
From Rabbi Ishmael ben Elisha's saying in the Babylonian Talmud Sanhedrin 74a and from Simeon ben Yehoṣadaq's opinion in the tractates Sanhedrin of the Babylonian and the Palestinian Talmud (b.Sanh. 74a and p.Sanh. 3:6,21b), it can be deduced that certain biblical interdictions have been subordinated to the principle of surviving. This happened in a rabbinic context, when the Jewish population has been persecuted and oppressed. Thus, the prohibition of sexual activities between males in Lev. 18:22, among others, may have been abrogated for Jews in life-threatening predicaments. In the Babylonian Talmud Sanhedrin 74a Rabbi Ishmael ben Elisha builds on the biblical verse Lev. 18:5 ("Whoever complies with them [that is, the divine statutes and ordinances], will live by them"), saying with particular emphasis, "[…] and shall not die because of them". The application of the Jewish Law shall lead to life and not to its loss.
Karin Hügel, "Surviving Instead of Dying – Rabbinic Exceptions: Queer Readings of the Babylonian Talmud Sanhedrin 74 and Its Parallels", in: Martina Bär/Teresa Toldy/Mireia Vidal Quintero/Marita Wagner (eds.), Imperial Powers and Women: Trauma, Resistance, and Resilience, Journal of the European Society of Women in Theological Research/Revista de la asociación europea de mujeres en la investigación teológica/Jahrbuch der Europäischen Gesellschaft für theologische Forschung von Frauen, Volume 32, Peeters, Leuven 2024, 171-195.
ISSN: 1783-2454,
eISSN: 1783-2446,
Peeters Online Journals
This article has been presented at the 9th Enoch Graduate Seminar on June 21, 2024 at the McGill University/Concordia University in Montreal in Canada, at the International Conference of the European Society of Women in Theological Research "Imperial Powers and Women: Trauma, Resistance, and Resilience" on September 2, 2023 at the Ukrainian Catholic University in Lviv in Ukraine, and at the Annual Conference of the European Association of Biblical Studies on July 13, 2023 at the Istituto Superiore di Scienze Religiose San Metodio in Siracusa in Italy.
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