“Sensual Semites”
April 16th, 2008 by Menachem Wecker
My review of “JEWS & SEX,” edited by Nathan Abrams, is on Jbooks.com. Here’s the lede:
A judge, who gets an erection when a defendant accidentally exposes her arm, sprints home to have sex with his wife, lest he sinfully spill his seed on the ground. The judge’s wife, after demanding to learn her rival’s identity, tracks the woman down, beats her with an iron lock, and runs her out of town. A different man solicits sex from his daughter-in-law, whom he mistakes for a prostitute. He is also a judge, and when she later becomes pregnant he almost orders her execution for adultery until she reveals herself to him. A third man offers his two virgin daughters to appease rioters trying to kick his door in. Those same daughters later get him intoxicated and rape him while he sleeps.
These stories might sound like the sort one would expect to find in X-rated magazines, but they come from much holier sources. The first derives from the Babylonian Talmud, Tractate Ketubot 65a, while the other two can be found in Genesis chapters 38 and 19.