In my work as a rabbi, I encounter many people suffering from what I have come to think of as an Abusive God Concept. Folks who have been raised with a theology that God is angry, and will punish those who do not strictly adhere to the rules. Unfortunately, this God concept arises specifically from Torah in what many outside of Judaism think of as the “Old Testament God.” This is the God who exiled the first humans from Eden as punishment for curiosity, the God with whom Abraham pleaded with not to destroy an entire city (which God went ahead and did anyway), the God who keeps Moses from entering the Promised Land after a lifetime of service, and, in this week’s parsha, the God deems certain sexual acts as “abominations.” Parshat Acharei Mot/Kedoshim is such a complex bit of Torah. In it we find the Holiness Code, the most powerful declaration of human capacity for holiness, but woven throughout this code are verses that have been used to do great harm.
Leviticus 18:22, “And at a man you shall not lie the lyings of a woman; it is an abomination,” has been thrown in the faces of homosexual Jews and Christians for centuries. In his treatise, “How Can You Be Gay and Jewish?” Dr. Jay Michaelson, ordained rabbi and prolific author on the topics of Judaism, spirituality and sexuality, writes:
The Bible does not forbid homosexuality. ‘Homosexuality’ is a modern term, a pseudo-scientific category created in 1869. It refers not only to sexual acts, but to a sexual orientation, an identity, and is today used (imprecisely) to describe a range of sexual behaviors, attractions, and ideas about the self. This way of looking at sex acts was unknown both to the Bible and to the Talmud. Where the Torah does speak of sexual acts… it has no conception that these acts relate to personal identity, or to love. It expresses no belief that such acts are indicative of an inborn proclivity, and no conception that acts “make you gay,” or even that one type of sex act is necessarily related to another. Those who say that the Bible (or Torah, or Talmud, or halacha) forbids homosexuality are simply wrong. There is no such thing as Biblical homosexuality*
Many progressive communities have omitted it from their communal readings of the Holiness Code; but we who insist upon inclusive community must wrestle with this verse. Otherwise, we surrender it to the religious traditions that use it as a weapon and a means of justifying an Abusive God Concept. Join us in Torah Study this Shabbat as we delve deeper into Michaelson’s excavation of this verse and how we might shine new light on it in ways that defuse its pernicious power.