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GENESIS — 38:9 waste

GEN1474 Although this story is about interrupted coitus and not masturbation, its negative view of “spilling semen” is considered the basis for the prohibition against male masturbation (hence the term “onanism”). The Mishnah and Gemara elaborate on this prohibition Mishnah Niddah 2:1, Niddah 13a-b, as does later Jewish law. Shulchan Aruch, Even HaEzer 23:2. Female masturbation is almost never mentioned, though the Talmud does describe one woman’s practice of having intercourse with a phallus-like object in negative terms. Avodah Zarah 44a. Today more people describe masturbation as a positive, healthy part of human sexuality. Elliot Dorff suggests that masturbation should be permitted on the grounds that its physiological ill effects, as described by doctor and important legal authority Maimonides, have since proven to be untrue. “A Jewish Perspective on Birth Control and Procreation,” in Ruttenberg, Ed., The Passionate Torah, pp. 158-9. See also Elliot N. Dorff, Matters of Life and Death: A Jewish Approach to Modern Medical Ethics, pp. 116-20. Rebecca Alpert points out that the connection between the story of Onan and masturbation is not necessarily one to be taken for granted. She writes, “What was Onan’s crime? The most obvious conclusion is that it was his refusal to comply with the task his father set for him, which was to impregnate Tamar. So although the term ‘onanism’ should refer to a refusal to follow orders to take a stance against the custom of levirate marriage, it refers instead to the method Onan used to accomplish this act, namely, ‘letting his seed go to waste.’” She suggests that masturbation should be reframed in Jewish life based on Jewish values, including those of self-care, self-knowledge, preparation for connection with others, and privacy. Rebecca Alpert, “Reconsidering Solitary Sex from a Jewish Perspective,” in Ruttenberg, Ed., The Passionate Torah, p. 182, 187-9. OXFORD 391

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GENESIS — 48:15 shepherd

GEN1588 The dominant image of God in the Bible is as a shepherd of God’s human flock generally and of Israel in particular [this verse; Isaiah 40:11; Psalms 23:1] --an image that uses the relationship between humans and farmed animals to describe the ideal human-divine relationship. (By Aaron S. Gross, "Jewish Animal Ethics") OXFORD 420

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EXODUS — 2:3 Nile

EXOD29 In his Commentary on [this verse], [Rabbi Abraham ibn Ezra (1089-1164)] remarks on the significance of Moses' having grown up in freedom in the house of Pharaoh and not as a slave in the house of bondage: owing to the education he received in the palace and the habits he acquired there, his soul was "on the highest rank" and not "lowly" as are the souls of slaves. Moses' noble morality is already exemplified at a young age, when on two occasions (Exod 2:11-12, 15-17) he physically interceded against those who were acting with violence [hamas]. Similarly, Ibn Ezra remarks, Moses' verbal intervention in the fight between the two Hebrews [this verse] was motivated by his desire to prevent violence. These comments about Moses' "high soul" and bold actions bring to mind Nietzsche's views on master morality versus slave morality in his Genealogy of Morals. However, while Nietzsche's master acts egocentrically on the basis of values he has created by his own will, Ibn Ezra's Moses acts altruistically in order to prevent oppressors from doing violence to others. It is Moses' determination to save victims from the violence of their oppressors that, according to Ibn Ezra, qualified him to liberate the people of Israel from slavery in Egypt. (By Warren Zev Harvey, “Ethical Theories among Medieval Jewish Philosophers”)

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EXODUS — 10:7 know

EXOD129 Moses called upon Pharaoh to obey God's will and let the Hebrews go free from their forced labor, but Pharaoh refused. As Moses began to invoke God's pressure to make Pharaoh change his mind, the Torah says that Pharaoh--time after time--hardened his own heart against compassion for the Hebrews and against obedience to God's warnings. How do we understand this pressure from God, the ten smitings of the land of Egypt, Mitzrayyim, literally, the Tight and Narrow Space--what we conventionally call the Ten Plagues? Were the Plagues magic, "miracles" handed down by a Supernal King, a Super-Pharaoh in the sky? Or were they the emerging consequences of tyranny, the evidence that the Interbreathing of all life brings about torment and rebellion of the Earth when human beings are oppressed? In a generation that watches a profit-mad oil company ignore all warnings, safety standards, and precautions so as to maximize its profits from an oil well a mile deep undersea, and this attitude brings death upon its own workers, disaster to the ecosystem, and economic paralysis to the region--it is easier to see how YHWH, interconnecting all life, responds to unaccountable power with uncountable plagues. For arrogance is not only a moral and spiritual malady. It breeds stupidity. Those who are utterly convinced of their own absolute rightness cannot hear the warnings of others, cannot pay attention to the signals from the world around them, cannot learn from their own mistakes. How did this attitude work in the tale of ancient Egypt? First came the "plagues"--ecological disasters. The rivers became poisonous, undrinkable. Frogs swarmed everywhere and then died in stinking heaps. Vermin swarmed. Venomous bloodsucking flies followed. Mad cow disease descended. Airborne infections raised boils on everyone. Unprecedented hailstorms signaled radical climate change, shattering grass, green harvests, trees, animals. To the bafflement of Pharaoh and his advisers, Moses and Aaron had evidently become experts in ecological balance. Again and again, their warnings had been borne out. Now they warned that the ecosystem was so ruined that a monstrous plague of locusts was about to strike. And in this critical moment, Pharaoh's own advisers shrieked at him--"Do you not know that Egypt is destroyed?" [this verse]. But Pharaoh hardened his heart once more, and the locusts came. And after that, so darkened were the eyes of all the people that the land itself was darkened as a thick dust swallowed up all vision. And then came an illness that left no house untouched by death. How were Moses and Aaron able to foretell disaster? Why did Pharaoh fail? What glimmer of reality spoke through the king's advisers? For Pharaoh, the "plagues" were a startling series of singular accidents. "Stuff happens." That was all. Each one was scary, but it did not portend another -- or a broken system. Moses and Aaron saw a deeper truth. They saw and felt the interconnections that weave the world together. They understood that "YHWH" was the Interbreathing of all life. They may not have understood the details of how smashing a butterfly far up the Nile could bring down hailstorms on the country's farmland--but they knew that it could happen. They understood that oppressing and enslaving workers, forcing them to work the land beyond its limits, would leave the land defenseless against a hoard of locusts. That was their advantage over Pharaoh and over his advisers, who could through sleight of hand make a serpent appear where a staff had been--but could not cure tormented cattle from mad cow disease. Finally, the advisers admitted incapabilities, spoke aloud Reality--and were ignored. The morning after they told Pharaoh he was destroying Egypt, his hardness-addicted heart drove him to march forward on the road to ruin. This kind of response has not been limited to one millennium, one country, or one form of government. The dangers of top-down, unaccountable, irresponsible power transcend the borders and centuries. In the epoch when the excesses of modernity are bringing danger to the planet, what are we to learn as a Jewish ethic? Hearken to the warnings of those who focus on the Breath of Life that intertwines us all. Can we learn from this old story to look beyond specific issues--this war or that highway, this tax cut or that coal plant--to the issue of unaccountable power? Of power as pyramidal in its top-down shape as ancient pyramids? How do we resolve the apparent conflict between two quite different biblical teachings: one, that the Flood and its global ecological disaster came about from the wide-spread hamas [destructive] behavior of the human species as a whole, and the other, that the Plagues came about as a result of a ruler's arrogance and stubbornness? On the one hand, all are responsible: on the other, the powerful are especially guilty. The metaphor of "addiction" may help us. In regard to mass public addiction, some point to the over burning of fossil fuels as the deep problem. Others point to the oppressive power of Big Oil, Big Coal, and their governmental allies as the source of danger. If we agree that large publics are indeed addicted, we can also say that some great power centers act like "drug lords" and "drug pushers," just as Big Tobacco engendered and facilitated the nicotine addiction of millions. The spiritual-ethical responsibility of Jews and other religious communities to free people from personal addiction--one kind of idolatry--can be complemented by their spiritual-ethical responsibility to free people from oppressive power centers--another kind of idol. (By Arthur Waskow, "Jewish Environmental Ethics: Intertwining Adam with Adamah")

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