A First Step:LGBTQ+ and the Frum Community
By Rabbi Yisrael Motzen
She hadn’t spoken to her parents in twenty-seven years. Her siblings had intervened, her uncles and aunts had tried to reason with them, but her parents were adamant, their daughter is not lesbian.
When a child sits her parents down on the couch and announces that she has something to tell them, the confusing mix of emotions are overwhelming. “What did we do wrong? What will our friends think? Does she even know what she’s talking about? Who can we speak to? And of course, shidduchim?!” As the child slowly ventures out of her dark closet, her parents crawl into theirs. Many parents eventually find a way, balancing their beliefs with love for their child. Some parents never do.
Despite a lifetime of ignoring her every attempt to reconcile, on his deathbed, her father whispered to those gathered around him, “I want Chani* at my funeral.” They could not believe their ears and he must have noticed. “Please! Please ask Chani to attend my funeral.”
Chani chose to attend. It was evident from speaking to her that she had worked on herself extensively in what was likely hundreds of hours of therapy. She tried to understand her parents and was sympathetic to their choices. At the same time, she did not trivialize the deep hurt their choices caused her daily. Throughout the funeral, she stood close to her mother, but not too close, attempting to convey her willingness to talk if her mother wanted. It was a graceful dance. Unfortunately, there was no dancing partner.
On my drive home from the cemetery, I wondered: What if Chani had married a man? What if instead of telling her parents she was lesbian, she had informed them that she had decided to stop keeping Shabbos – would they have ostracized her?
I knew the answer. We all know the answer. Is there any justifiable reason that many shuls do not hesitate before giving aliyos to people who are not Shomer Shabbos, but there is an uproar if a gay man is given the same honor? I cannot imagine Hashem loves such a person any less, and neither should we.
***
Later that week, I met with a young man and his mother*. I was told that the young man, a bright fifteen-year-old, had some questions he didn’t feel comfortable asking anyone else. He began our conversation by explaining to me that he was not a young man, but rather, a young woman. He watched me intently, looking for a flick of a muscle that would betray a sense of belittlement or disbelief. I nodded. “Thank you for letting me know. I appreciate it.”
Then the questions began: “How does the Torah view gender identity? What happens when someone’s identity is fluid, to the point that they identify as a woman today and a male tomorrow? How does that impact their Mitzvah obligation? Where do I sit in shul?” The questions were impersonal, and I tried my best to respect the deliberate distance placed between us by keeping the conversation academic.
We discussed the controversial p’sak of Rabbi Eliezer Waldenberg about a particular case of which he ruled that a person is defined by their anatomy, even if their anatomy is a result of surgery1. The implications of Rabbi Waldenberg’s ruling are up to debate, but all would agree that identification with a certain gender does not have a bearing on Halacha. In Kabbalistic literature2, we do find discussions of male souls in the body of a female. Though this would have no Halachic ramifications, it might indicate that a person’s characteristics may be atypical for their gender. To put it differently, it might indicate that one’s gender identity can be different than their anatomy. As I shared this last point, some of the tension in the room seemed to dissipate. I had a feeling this would not be our last conversation.
***
For reasons that are still not fully understood, the number of people identifying as part of the LGBTQ+ community seem to be growing3. Our frum communities are not immune to national statistics, though our closets may be darker and have better locks. A rabbi once commented that he thought there was no domestic violence in the frum community until one Shabbos when he decided to speak about it from his pulpit. Suddenly, the floodgates opened, and he heard from numerous women (and men) who were abused by their spouses. This topic is far more sensitive and Halachically-fraught, and not so easily discussed from a pulpit.
However, there are serious Halachic and Hashkafic questions that need to be addressed. For them to be addressed properly it is essential that members of the LBTQ+ community and their family members approach rabbanim and major poskim and pose to them their questions. Halacha is dynamic; a p’sak to a theoretical question is not the same as one addressing a real-life situation. This was made clear to me as a young rabbi training with a major poseik. Over the course of a single afternoon, this rav fielded the same question numerous times. Even more impressive than his patience, I was struck how the same question was almost always answered differently. The poseik explained to me how each person’s life circumstances will impact how a question is answered. The rav is not just a repository of Halachic knowledge, there is often a spectrum of what is allowed and what is not. His job is to holistically incorporate Halacha with the unique circumstances of the person asking the question. Not only is the backstory relevant but even the way the question is being asked in there here-and-now impacts the poseik’s response.
When a young man who is grappling with his sexual identity and the pressure to get married is standing before a poseik with tears in his eyes, when a young girl who is adamant that she is not actually a girl has a panic-attack in a rav’s office as she discusses how this impacts her daily, when a parent who has tried so hard to maintain a relationship with his daughter gets invited to her same-sex wedding poses the shaila to a the family’s rabbi, the dynamics of the shaila-p’sak start to shift. To be clear, this is not to say that a poseik’s compassion will compel him to allow what is forbidden, that would be Halachic malpractice. On the contrary, what I am suggesting is that the Halachic system is currently handicapped in that many questions are not being asked, preventing poskim from seeing and therefore addressing a full picture.
Many people in the LGBTQ+ community are hesitant to speak to a rabbi, and for obvious reasons. Responsibility lies with all rabbanim to convey a sense they can be approached to discuss any question and be sympathetic to any challenge. One does not need to discuss LGBTQ+ issues from their pulpit to give off this impression. Members of the LGBTQ+ do not owe it to anyone to sacrifice their dignity to pose such questions. Some, based on previous experiences, may have already decided that they are not interested in any answers or direction that they receive. However, if you are in this community and you can summon the courage to do so, please know that it will have an impact far beyond you and your particular question.
***
Recently, an Orthodox rabbi who is of a liberal persuasion penned a set of guidelines for same-sex couples in the Orthodox Jewish community4. Some of what he wrote is unacceptable to bearers of our tradition. Our guidelines will be written by our major poskim, who will be informed by real questions and experts in the field. Their rulings may not please everyone, but that is not their job. I am confident that they will undoubtedly balance conviction to the immutability of the Torah with the value of “d’racheha darchei noam, its ways are ways of pleasantness,” and will provide our communities with Torah guidance to these pressing questions.
As we wait, perhaps we can all take a very small first step on our own by acknowledging that members of our most heimishe shuls are struggling with these questions personally, and the way we speak can easily be in violation of onaas devarim (the prohibition against saying things that can embarrass or pain someone else). Perhaps we can treat members of the LGBTQ+ community no different than we treat people who are not Shomer Shabbos. (This analogy, for the record, is a terrible one. Being a member of the LGBTQ+ community does not necessarily mean that one is in violation of any prohibition! However, this analogy does provide a glaring example of our inconsistencies.)
Most importantly, perhaps we can just be a little bit more compassionate. The sense of confusion, fear, and isolation that an LGBTQ+ individual in a Jewish Orthodox space feels is impossible for those of us not in that community to understand. This is true not only for the individual but also for their parents. Being kind is not a concession or endorsement to beliefs that are not ours.
***
Occasionally, in my conversation with the teenager, the teen’s mother would ask her child to explain what different terms meant; words like novosexual and abrosexual were foreign to her. Thinking back to that conversation, I don’t think I said anything in our short time together that was helpful, but knowing that this teenager had such a mother, someone who was kind, considerate, and respectful, I was hopeful that this story would have a happy ending.
1. Shu”t Tzitz Eliezer, 11:78
2. Maggid Meisharim
3. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2021/02/24/lgbtq-gallup-poll-more-us-adults-identify-lgbtq/4532664001/
4. https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/guidelines-for-same-sex-couples-in-the-orthodox-jewish-community/
*Names and identifying information have been changed
Rabbi Yisrael Motzen, a musmach of Ner Yisroel and graduate of Johns Hopkins University, is the Rav of Ner Tamid, Baltimore, MD.
Wow, even here.
An essay of this sort—on an Orthodox Jewish website!—needs to explain why these issues of gender and sexual identity don’t seem to have been a problem until recent times. If this “first step” is such an important thing, why didn’t previous generations think of it?
Does the author believe that “members of our most heimishe shuls” have been “struggling with these questions personally” all throughout history, and that we were simply unaware of all the suffering until modern science came along to teach us that gay and transgendered people exist?
Or does the author accept that it’s only in recent generations that these conditions have emerged, as a result of a cultural environment that primes children to develop them?
If the latter is the case—it is, in fact—then any strategy to help people obviously needs to address what we can be doing differently so that they don’t develop these conditions in the first place.
The author has carefully avoided addressing any of this. Why? If really thinks that LGBTQ+ identities are something organic to the human condition, and that validating these constructions doesn’t just make them more common, why doesn’t he just come out and tell us?
Pashtus is that “members of our most heimishe shuls” have been “struggling with these questions personally” all throughout history, and that we were simply unaware of all the suffering” because until fairly recently it was tabboo to discuss out loud even in secular society until fairly recently… Once it became more public amongst the goyim it was bound to become more public amongst the Yidden. First in less heimishe shuls and eventually in more heimishe shuls.
I don’t buy that. There are many sheilos utshuvos Seforim dealing with all sorts of taboo questions, yet they weren’t discussing these issues all that much.
See Melamed Lehoil who deals extensively with questions that he got about affairs, premarital relations, etc but these issues weren’t front and center.
Mistreatment of gay people has been a problem for a long time. In the past gay people were viewed as perverts or rebels against God. Rav Moshe Feinstein famously wrote that no person could really desire gay sex so that the only explanation could be that they were rebelling against God. Today, even R Aharon Feldman who is no left winger or gay rights champion has recognized that gay people exist and they really do have the same sexual desires as straights, but directed towards the same sex: “I believe that the course you have taken is correct: you refuse to deny your nature a s a homosexual while at the same time refuse to deny your Jewishness.” So yes, Rabbinic attitudes have changed.
I saw Trembling with Fear, which was a piece of agit prop for acceptance pf the LGBT lifestyle within the Orthodox world when it was commercially released .From what I saw and read in reviews the comments of R Feldman and R Riskin were sliced and diced in the editorial process. We should never confuse and conflate understanding on an individual level with acceptance on a communal level which in the secular world means that those of us who are married Kdaas Chupah VKiddushin are oppressing the LGBT world,
The points you’re making are valid, but you are missing the point of the article. The article is about helping people who are suffering, who didn’t necessarily choose to be the way they are. A separate article addressing what we can do to protect our children from encountering or experiencing these issues (assuming you believe that is possible) might be needed. But they doesn’t mitigate the need to show compassion to those currently suffering.
I don’t understand. I thought the difference between giving aliyos to a mechalel shabbos and not to someone who identifies as homosexual was obvious. No one attending a frum minyan will walk around brandishing a flag saying that it is permitted and a human right to violate shabbos. People who identify as homosexual, not always but many times, make it into a whole lifestyle. This is “who they are”, and this is their life. Some say that this lifestyle should either should be permitted or IS permitted. There’s a VERY big difference between someone struggling with their same-sex attraction and who aren’t able to overcome this seemingly insurmountable challenge, and someone who has made this part of who they are. No one feels being mechalel shabbos is who they are. It should be very obvious why people who are mechalel shabbos and come to shul would be given an aliyah, unlike someone openly living a homosexual lifestyle.
It is not obvious why mechalelei Shabbos should be given aliyot contrary to the Shulchan Aruch. Please explain.
Also, yes, many mechalelei Shabbos who receive aliyot do say “this is just who I am,” conspicuosly driving on Shabbos to the very shuls where they are accorded honors.
Well-heeled shuls go out of their way not to make big donors not feel uncomfortable, even inviting them to sit on the shul’s leadership boards and committees.
You write: “The poseik explained to me how each person’s life circumstances will impact how a question is answered. The rav is not just a repository of Halachic knowledge, there is often a spectrum of what is allowed and what is not. His job is to holistically incorporate Halacha with the unique circumstances of the person asking the question. ”
If that is the case, why is it the role of the poseik to make the final determination? Presumably, the one asking the question understands their own unique circumstances even better. Shouldn’t the role of the poseik be, then, to present “spectrum of what is allowed and what is not” and leave it up to the one asking the question to decide what is best for them?
Nobody is impartial enough to be their own judge. The Torah directs us to make for ourselves a Rav. And so we do so.
The comparison to active members in the LGBT community to those that desecrate Shabbos is flawed. The author fails to make the distinction between behavior which is not according to Halacha and an ideology which is against the Torah. For example, if a group of Shabbos desecrators would proclaim that they proudly violate the Shabbos laws, belong to a chilul Shabbos society, and declare that they have no intent to change their behavior, would the author not reject them?
“Is there any justifiable reason that many shuls do not hesitate before giving aliyos to people who are not Shomer Shabbos, but there is an uproar if a gay man is given the same honor?”
Yes, there is a reason, due to the strong movement now to legitimize LGBTQXYZPAU….Do you not recall from your yeshiva days about the inyan of making גדרים? The great men of our people (Avos 1:1) taught us ועשו סייג לתורה.
“Being a member of the LGBTQ+ community does not necessarily mean that one is in violation of any prohibition!”
You may enjoy fantasizing, but we need to be more realistic than that.
I was quite surprised to see this piece here. This is like similar pieces that have emanated in the past from YCT/Open Orthodox circles, liberal Lubavitchers like Shmuley Boteach and longtime YCT lecturer Chaim Rapoport , and MO/YU people like David Bashevkin and Marc Penner. The difference in this case is that the author is a musmach of NIRC, so he is trying to show that a musmach of more RW Yeshivish place can also play that game.
Such things, however, are for senior gedolim to address, not junior rabbis. Even if they have an NIRC ordination, and a pulpit in a kiruv/MO congregation somewhere, they still lack the credentials to address such major issues.
Did the writer clear this with the RY of NIRC?
Unfortunately, the article in question is illustrative of Ain Chadash Tachas HaShemesh in its anecdotes and arguments. We should not be apologetic in celebrating and protecting the conventional family which HaShem chose as the primary means for transmitting Torah values and especially the view of marriage, emotional and physical intimacy and children that Chazal emphasize so often throughout Shas and built a superstructure around called Seder Nashim and their concomitant rejection of Greco Roman hedonism in all of its forms including same gender attraction as well as celibacy, monasticism and singlehood as “alternative life styles”
Rabbi Dovid Bashevkin is a Musmach of NIRC, and i wasn’t aware it was incumbent on every musmach to clear every opinion they had with their RY. It is an opinion, it is well reasoned and well written, and the editors felt it worthwhile to publish. It doesn’t mean they endorse all its conclusions. Further, it engendered a conversation, which people who you likely agree with more, articulated their objections in the very same medium. What exactly is the issue?
I suspect the reason is that it is now universally accepted that Orthodox Jews must keep Shabbos, so the broader war is finished. But with LGBT, there is an ongoing attempt to change halacha and legitimize a non-halachic lifestyle. Giving an aliya to someone who does so could be seen as showing willingness to compromise.
However, someone who is gay by orientation but not action should absolutely get an aliya. They are probably the biggest tzaddik in the shul, to be honest.
Nt,
I was having a similar conversation recently regarding individuals who cheat on their spouses, then leave them to marry their mistress. And I ask myself, what kind of rabbi marries a couple like that? A couple who blatantly breaks so many Jewish laws and actually hurts others (previous spouse, children, among others)? Being gay is not a choice, and even if u think it is it DOES NOT hurt anyone.
What about those among us who steal other peoples money? I could go on. IMO being a person with stellar midot and respect for others is the most important part of being a Jew. Or a person for that matter. HaShem will judge.
Moshe Rabbeinu broke both of the Luchos to demonstrate that the Mitzvos Bein Adam LChvarero were of equal weight to Mitzvos Bein Adam LaMakom because they were all commanded by HaShem
That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. So as long as they are denying themselves to the point of probably wanting to kill themselves then they can participate? You do realize this is why most queer Jews just stop practicing Judaism? Because you literally can’t not be whatever your gender or sexual orientation is
Take your logic and apply it to pedophiles. They can’t not be pedophiles, or they’ll kill themselves, apparently. Therefore, they are societal members in good standing. Either that, or your views of right and wrong matter, and the Bible’s don’t. People must conform to your opinions, but not the Bible’s. I wonder which you’ll pick.
Do any of us know what people do in the privacy of their own homes? Do we know if every person who gets an aliyah on Shabbos didn’t check their phone that morning to see who won last night’s game? We don’t, just like we don’t know what anyone does privately. It’s between them and God. And even if we did know, how long does that invalidate them from a kibud? 24 hours? A week? A year? We should just mind our own business and give people kibudim because they are members of the community. The inclusivity will go much further than any empty moralizing.
As the famous verse says, what is hidden is G-d’s province, and what is revealed is our responsibility. We can’t be responsible for what we don’t know. Society would completely fall apart if we started accusing everybody of being mechallel Shabbos in private to excuse people who sin in public.
We all commit Averos,. However, that does not mean that we legitimize such conduct as normal or RL view it as a mitzvah
What lifestyle exactly is ‘being gay’? What elements does a gay lifestyle incorporate, is there a heavy emphasis on exercise? Yoga? Reading and learning? Is it a very structured lifestyle, or a more loose free-form structure for completing one’s daily activities? Is this lifestyle centered around children? Work? Community? Chessed?
And one’s you’ve specified what a “gay lifestyle” entails, would you please explain what elements of this ‘gay lifestyle’ is non-halachic?
The big question is whether its a “lifestyle” or something genetic or biological. There was a time when left-handedness was cobsidered abberant or even evil, and such children were forced to use the right hand. We now know that isn’t healthy and can affect brain function. So nu, are we trying to force LGBTQ people to be what they are not?
No, we aren’t expecting that. We’re not even expecting them not to struggle, and we’re probably not even expecting them not to stumble.
We’re advocating that they don’t use their struggle to cast doubt on the truth and validity of the Torah, and that they don’t flaunt their struggle. We’re advocating that they work with their rabbi, therapist, or whoever they can to deal with it.
And we don’t judge them, and are indeed not shocked if their struggles and the current cultural climate lead them to move away from Orthodox Judaism.
But we still can’t condone it, and can’t even accommodate an LGBT etc lifestyle.
I am confused as to why lefthandedness is being conflated with an issur deoraisa and toeiva, so as to advocate for the same approach to both.
To Sarah Elias:
Being gay is neither an issur deoraisa nor a to’eiva.
It’s obviously an enormous challenge for gay people to live halachic lives, and confusing proscribed acts and non-proscribed (for lack of a better term) identities makes that challenge all the more difficult.
I suspect that the comparison to how left-handedness was to compare the change from Rav Moshe’s understanding (namely, that the only reason people have same-sex relations is to be מורד בעול מלכות שמים) to Rav Aharon Feldman’s understanding that some people are actually born gay.
@Pookie Number 2: Being gay is of course not an issur or toeiva. But you referred to the gay lifestyle, which is both.
How does the gabai discern if someone is gay by orientation or by action? How does he discern what he assumes from what he actually knows?
Everybody has a chezkas kashrus, or assumption that they follow Jewish law (even if you know they are gay, if you don’t know that they are actively sinning.) If the gabbai KNOWS differently, then he has to react to that knowledge.
I recommend that people look at Rav Waldenberg’s teshuvah itself before drawing any conclusions about his position. He ruled that a baby whose genitalia clearly looked female was halachically a female on that basis. He permitted surgery to remove internal male characteristics. The teshuvah is available on hebrewbooks.org.
For breaking near-Engagement after the girl I was dating disclosed that she was Bi and wanted to act on both tendencies after marriage,
my young Liberal Elite neighbors told me that I was “an intolerant Biphobe who needs to be re-educated by YAFFED”.
Seriously? For not wanting an equivalent an Open Marriage? Are these the true colors of the illiberal Leftist LGBT Agenda?
Th LGBT agenda , aided and abetted by the feminist ideologues who oppose stay at home mothers ( Simone DeBeavoire( and view the family as a comfortable concentration camp ( Betty Friedan), has always been aiming at the destruction of the normal conventional family and replacing traditional moral values and especially Torah values with Marxist hedonistic values ( read Marcuse)
Like it or not, one does not get to ignore הלכות בין אדם לחברו simply because one has gullibly accepted paranoid internet ravings about the “LGBT agenda” that are no different – in tone or merit – from similarly paranoid internet ravings about the “Jewish lobby”.
I teach in a number of seminaries in Israel. Some are more right-wing than others, but this is an issue that I discuss more and more as the years progress. And I do not shy from it. So I have worked on trying to develop an approach that I would like to share.
I would like to echo and expand on the comment of “nt”.
No orthodox shul would give an Aliyah to someone who demands to use a loudspeaker to make the Bracha on Shabbos. (without going into electronics etc., but as an example). No shul would allow someone getting an Aliyah to hijack it, to speak public Lashon HaRa instead of reading the Torah.
But every one of us has our personal Nisyanos, some more public some less. But in that case, we are treated as members of the community and given respect and Kavod.
But when someone comes to try to undermine the community, by trying to agitate in a non-Halachic way to change the Torah, that is different. To demand that since the world has changed we demand Halacha change is difficult.
As Rabbi Motzen writes, These questions need to be discussed by major Poskim and not under the pressure of interest groups wanting to change the foundations of the community.
Individuals need to be loved and acknowledged and their halachic issues resolved in a loving way. But a change in our community is hard to acknowledge.
It could be that this comes from emotional distress, and even maybe said to be caused by a hatred that he/she feels that the community has towards their community. But that to me seems to be a line that is not easily crossed and to give someone like that legitimacy within the community is difficult.
oh boy. you opened a can of worms with this one. I’m very glad you are more open than most to discuss this however, Your analogy only holds enough water for you to make it fit your narrative. you jumped very VERY far when you assume someone who is gay is trying to “undermine” the community or “agitate” a change in halacha. they are not insisting on using a loudspeaker to make a brocha and they are not speaking lashon harah when they get up there. they intend to perform their aliyah in exactly the same way every other male in the shul does. you also assume that giving someone who is not hiding their sexual preference for men is “legitimizing” anything. you don’t know what goes on in the home or heart of anyone. if you WITNESS anything (meaning you see them having anal sex with another man) MAYBE you have something to talk about. until then, there is nothing in halacha prohibiting the shul from affording them a kibud.
I wouldn’t give an aliyah to a straight, cisgender person if I knew they were actively trying to change halacha on any issue, including LGBT rights. We have to break the progressive assumption that orientation is destiny. It is not. A gay by orientation Jew who keeps halacha goes to Gan Eden, a straight by orientation Jew who says to change halacha is an apikores.
The issue is the legitimization of a lifestyle. A Kohen who marries a Ger or a grusha loses all rights as a Chalal and his children cannot duchan .
If the article is saying that we have to be compassionate to people who are struggling, then it’s hard to argue. And why would we?
But there is often a difference between the guy who is a mechalel Shabbos and the guy who is gay in regard to giving an aliya.
The guy who is mechalel Shabbos isn’t necessarily part of a mechalel Shabbos club at college, or a mechalel Shabbos Facebook group. He wants to do his thing, and leave him alone. The LGBTQ+ is often part of some organization advocating or promoting for frum yet alternative lifestyle people. Making an association out of it is a problem, and that’s often why they’re treated differently.
It seems to me the author is blurring issues. Imho, here is a difference between one who discretley violates halacha but still affirms he is bound by it, and one who publicly proclaims that his identity is bound up in the violation. Of course, it should be emphasized that all should be treated with dignity.
“For reasons that are still not fully understood, the number of people identifying as part of the LGBTQ+ community seem to be growing”
Public tolerance of their deviant activities and recruitment has to be a big factor. How an Orthodox Jew can endorse or tolerate anti-halachic patterns of activity is a question for our so-learned sophists to answer.
Another question is: why would someone identify as X and then not do X-like activities? For those who don’t go public, fear of discovery is one reason. Who are we to remove that fear?
The schools need to learn a better way of handling LGBTQIA students. My Child was turned away from an alternative school for being non binary and will now go to public school for high school.
Kids will continue to turn away from orthodoxy with this type of treatment. What else do you expect?
I dont think these people care. An entirely cishet community is their preference, they’re not trying to keep queer people in the community. If we leave they dont have to think about us and how our existence is going to turn Torah on its head, already is, because halacha is not build for queer people.
I wish you and your kid health and happiness and love.
Take a look at this we ek’s Parsha and the Parsha of Arayos in Acharei Mos.This is HaShem’s “preference” as to what keeps Am Yisrael from assimilating into the redolent secular culture
(apologies if double comment, browser went weird)
They expect queer kids to leave. They want that. Then they can go back to their peaceful cishet lives where they can pretend that we’re simultaneously mentally ill and not capable nor deserving of treatment according to modern medicine.
My theory is they’re scared, halacha isnt build for queer people and in order to move forward its going to have to turn on its head like it has many times before. And change is hard and scary and they’re prefer things to stay as they are, driving anyone different who threatens their small minded cruel lifestyle.
I hope your kid is doing ok, send them love from this non-binary Jew! Strength and love to you!
Thank you so much. You too!
I think that HaKadosh Baruch Hu defined a life of Kedusha as that of man and woman united by marriage, and rejected all other “alternative life styles” as wrong .Anyone who has learned Masectos Yevamos, Ksubos, Sota, Gittin and Kiddushin as well as many sugyos elsewhere should be able to realize that Chazal championed hetersexual phsyical intimacy in marriage even beyond the age of giving birth to childrem and clearly rejected Greco Roman hedonism which had a strong same gender element as well as Christian celibacy and monasticism.
From a purely scientific, evolutionary perspective, how is a paraphilia that makes you extremely unlikely to pass on your genes “healthy” and beneficial?
I take issue with labeling people who act and identify as the gender they were born as with a label. A label that is used by the alphabet soup group in a degrading fashion. Cishet? Why not just say people, because they are what they are and what they appear to be.
All people have challenges of different sorts and of differing levels. Throwing off mitzvos and laws because of those challenges, and not meeting those challenges, does not make you a tzadik.
Celebrating those who succumb to those challenges, because they succumb to those challenges is not a good thing. Today’s society has risen to the point that such people have preferred status. I would say that well over 50% of advertisements feature those without normal gender orientation or identity. Why?
How old is your child?
I have deep skepticism as to terms such as “non-binary” which show the influence of secular culture and politics on science. The Torah created man and woman as the means of raising a family Al Pi Chupah vKiddushin and all of us must work at creating an atmosphere where that is expected and not subjected to the attacks of fake science.
When I walk into a Satmar shul wearing my kipah srugah, I’m as welcome as any stranger. At the same time, I am making a public statement of my ideology and it’s difference from theirs. I’d be a fool to be offended by being accused of being a mizrachi/zionist.
By adding a rainbow flag to my kipah or doing anything else to publicly identify as part of the queer lifestyle a person is making a public statement of defiance to the Torah. They should not be given any kibudim in a Shul.
Whereas the mechalel Shabbos and the person hiding in the closet, both deserve kibudim in shul. Right now, they are in Shul, participating in Judaism’s practices. They deserve Dan lekaf zechus for keeping the Torah at this moment. That’s all that matters right now. It’s not our place to judge what people do in private. A mechalel Shabbos drives to shul, can do teshuvah in one instant and be a shomer Shabbos on the way out.
A person struggling with any Aveiros is still one of us, amisecha. Openly identifying as LGBT, signifies the struggle has been surrendered to the yetzer horah.
See this statement signed by Rav Dovid Feinstein zt”l on this matter.
This is the second such article by a mainstream orthodox Jew – the first was a lecture by Rabbi Efrem Goldberg – advocating a position which would have been unthinkable just ten years ago. Unthinkable not only to the frum community, but, not that long ago, unthinkable for a good part of the non-Jewish community too.
Sexual deviance has been recognised throughout all recorded history as a thoroughly repulsive and abhorrent form of behaviour – sexual deviance being defined as anything other than a committed relationship between a biological man and a biological woman. Homosexuality, cross-dressing, transgenderism, prostitution, and other similar behaviours are always, without exception, the precursor of the collapse of society. Promiscuity was the direct reason for the flood and for the destruction of Sodom. Wherever there is sexual deviance, there is always, invariably and inevitably, exploitation and cruelty. The Torah defines deviance as an ‘abomination’ and there is ample reason for that term. Space and decency do not allow for references and sources for these, what should be, only too obvious statements.
Let us not be fooled by the glitz, gloss and distortions of the popular media; cross-dressing and transgenderism are, in the main, expressions of sexual deviance, leaving aside for the moment, the question of teenage girls who feel they are boys, which is a completely different, but no less profoundly unhealthy form of aberrance. Anyone who has any doubts about this statement, need only attend one ‘pride’ parade.
So now we are faced with a situation where this particularly reprehensible form of secular behaviour has filtered down into frum society, and so some sort of response is required. The ‘Jewish’ response to such behaviour would be to condemn it in no uncertain terms, not just any practical expressions of these tendencies, but even the dispositions would need to be absolutely vilified. Just as we are quick to condemn those who lust after children, even if they do not act upon their preferences, so too we should ask some searching questions of someone who has admitted to having deviant desires. By way of example, what would our response be to a frum Jew who admits to lusting after his neighbour’s wife? We would undoubtedly say, that he needs to uproot that desire from his heart, and would certainly not praise him to high heavens for not actually getting together with her to sin.
Comparing deviance to, let’s say, chilul Shabbos, is being foolish at best and disingenuous at worst. Chilul Shabbos is not something wrong per se, it is wrong only because Hashem said so. However, deviance speaks to our very core, and if we are not repelled by deviance, there is something profoundly wrong with ourselves, and by extension the society within which we function.
The spirit of the article above conveys the impression that deviance is a matter between man and God, and that someone who is struggling with deviance, is no better and no worse, than someone struggling with any other challenging mitzvah, say not using a smart phone on Shabbos. However, that is not how Judaism views deviance, and the way this article is written, is unfortunately, a terrible disservice to Judaism. To mention Ona’as devarim in connection with deviance, is the same as arguing for ona’as devarim when talking of child abuse. Deviance is deviance, no matter where society has decided to draw the nebulous line. It is a sad day indeed when a website dedicated to the propagation of orthodox Jewish values, should parrot the current liberal mindset albeit in more reserved terms.
An excellent and well thought out post -It fully illustrates the impact of woke thinking even on our communities
The severe objections to this article are many. Some of them are as follows:
Calling them by their chosen (and everchanging and expanding) moniker of lgbt etc. is inappropriately legitimating. So is referring to them as a “community”. We appropriately do not refer to mechalleli Shabbos collectively as the Mechalel Shabbos “community”. Or to an adulterous community. Then the article opens with a story entirely framed to make the parents the bad guys with the homosexual identifying daughter as the heroine slash victim. Twenty seven year ago? 27 years ago even the secular gentile society (let alone the Torah adhering Jewish world) viewed homosexuality with same lenses as it viewed adultery. And not inappropriately so.
The story, as framed, then goes on to chide the parents for the deep hurt they caused the daughter. Yet what about the deep hurt she caused her family by publicly identifying herself with an attribute of severe sin? The article doesn’t directly clarify whether she publicized her orientation, but if she hadn’t come out of the closet (as the author termed it) then it wouldn’t have been an issue for the parents being concerned about the perception of the public (as Rabbi Motzen acknowledged they were.) And why was the onus placed on the mother to initiate a conversation with her daughter rather than the daughter to initiate it with her mother?
The comparison to Chillul Shabbos was a bad one, but not for the reason the rabbi identified. There’s no “community” of mechalleli Shabbos who take “pride” in organizing and promoting themselves as Shabbos violators. Yet the “community” being discussed is very much organized along those lines. Why organize and identify by a halachicly illegal attribute?
The idea that those identifying with this “community” might not be engaging in its sinful activity is a red herring. We don’t call those who are oriented or strongly pulled in the direction of either pedophilia or adultery as pedophiles or adulterous, unless they actually engage in such reprehensible activity. Here, too, there’s no reason to consider anyone oriented towards homosexuality as a homosexual, unless they engage in it. If they do not, then they are a normal healthy observant Jew who is a Shomer Torah U’Mitzvos. Nothing more or less.
And, although, I cannot speak for Rabbi Motzen’s synagogue, no shul I’ve ever attended knowingly gave an aliya to an open Mechalel Shabbos.
While there are too many highly objectionable points in the article to list in this brief comment, the implied toleration (not even legitimization) of same sex “marriage”, an idea that is literally only a mere few years old even in secular gentile society and was controversially imposed on said society by judicial fiat without even the elected legislators of the people enacting it — and with huge segments of general society strongly objecting to it, is quite repulsive. Those who have said that the legitimization of homosexuality is only one or two steps ahead of the forthcoming effort to legitimize adultery, bestiality and polygamy, are exhibiting the same foresight those who warned us in decades past of the slowly creeping legitimation of homosexuality.
It would be interesting to hear a Psak on whether people with these issues are considered mentally ill and therefore not responsible for their actions. Up until a few years ago (from a history perspective), these people were considered so and it is just todays normalization of the abnormal that has changed the way people view the situation. If this is so, they may be considered a Shotah and Patur from Mitzvos.
Unfortunately, it is hard to imagine that this is the case and it is more likely that a person who acts on their twisted [the Torah does call it a Toevah] desires is on the same level as a Mechalel Shabbos [or possibly even worse because of the people they associate themselves with and the Hashkafos they hold].
If queer people are mentally ill, then halacha would say to follow the recommendations of medicine and science. The recommendations of medicine and science is for trans people to transition, and for people to not be ashamed of their identity or try force themselves to be something they are not.
Except you dont actually believe its a mental illness, youre just using that as a useful stigma to disregard a whole group of people. If you believed it was a mental illness then you would care about people’s mental health, you would support them into having the best lives possible. Instead you label them with words that make them want to kill themselves. But I guess human life doesnt matter if its just those mentally ill gays.
Growing up out of town, the shul I davend in regularly had ponytail clad young men coming to daven during Yom Tov. Some of them were definitely gay, as I discovered when I got older. Other than long hair, in shul they conformed to whatever was going on. They never displayed or discussed their private business. The rov, who was as chareidi as can be, welcomed them warmly and treated them like any other guests. He certainly knew about their orientation, but it wasn’t worn on their sleeve, so it was ok to ignore it.
What frum shul will give an Aliya to a Mechalel Shabbos befarhesya?
The comparison between active members in the LGBT community to those that desecrate Shabbos is flawed. The author fails to make the distinction between behavior which is not according to Halacha and an ideology which is against the Torah. For example, if a group of Shabbos desecrators would proclaim that they proudly violate the Shabbos laws, belong to a chilul Shabbos society, and declare that they have no intent to change their behavior, would the author not reject them?
Being gay is not an ideology. Not wishing to be shamed is an ideology.
Being anti-gay is an ideology. One that is against the Torah since being gay is not a sin under any interpretation of the Torah.
We need a new book “Anti-gay Orthodoxy is not Orthodox”.
Seriously? So the gabbaim of the shul should sit down before davening starts and try to figure out which gay people are having sexual intercourse at home and which ones are probably celibate to determine who should get an aliya? Really?
no, they should not. they should make the assumption that there is no reason to deny them an aliya. much the same as if they don’t sit down with anyone else to ask what acts they performed in private that may exclude them from the kavod.
One key point that is reinforced by Rabbi Motzen’s piece is that the discussion really needs to be taken to the individual rather than “wholesale” level of analysis. Circumstances are always individually specific. To me, one of the issues that confounds the entire discussion is that the LGBTQ+ population is treated as a monolithic group. That is partially a function of the variations with LGBTQ+ having come together and broadbanding itself. This is probably the case for two reasons. First, there is strength in numbers for a voice to be heard. Secondly, it provides a collective safe space for its members and their families. However, doing this is a disservice since it deindividualizes those who are going through their struggles. While there might be some common themes, the contextual nuances are in fact different.
Those who are faithful to Halacha and Mesorah are no doubt waiting for a Gadol with broad shoulders to address this topic in a holistic way, with all of its components. They include the Shulchan Aruch/Poskim, understanding the Psychology/science and consultation with its experts, public policy, and empathy. Given that this is one of the hottest-button themes in our community today with all of the strong rhetoric that has been thrown around in the media and social media, this will take someone–not only with credibility but courage. Of course, poskim have been dealing with these scenarios for individuals for many years now.
If we are all honest about things, this is a topic which is a community one, it needs to be treated as such by even those who are not going through the struggles directly. To maintain a posture of wearing blinders and “not-my-problem” must be replaced by empathy and sensitivity.
I’d like the author to address the question of those who are attracted to children.
A young man comes to the rabbi and says he’s attracted only to children. Do you advise him to get psychological help? Is it okay for him to go public with his orientation?
Also, what about incest? A young man has feelings for his sisters. What advice should he be given?
Another young man is interested only in sexual experiences with himself (autosexual). Is it ok if he joins a community of like minded individuals and wears Tshirts announcing it as he does not want to be in the closet in the frum community?
None of these scenarios involve homosexuality…
Pedophiles never have been and never will be part of the queer/LGBT+ community. Neither is incest or bestiality or whatever other things you might come up with. Maybe we should ban heterosexual sex, because what next, first you have sex with a human then you have sex with a horse! Thats the exact logic youre using.
Let’s be real and not deny the existence of “grooming” as a phenomenon that has a long and clearly sordid past and present in the LGBT world.
That is factually incorrect. There are books being used as curricula in public schools that I won’t link to here that describe “grooming” between adults and teens in same gender relationships as part and parcel of same gender relationships
Sure, lets have the rabbis talk about people attracted to animals too, and while we’re at it people who make giant leaps without any logical steps in between in order to malign people they dont understand!
We start with heterosexual human sex, what next, sex with apes? sex with horses? sea lions? Cant let these heterosexual have kids, next thing they’re gonna be mating with animals and having half human hybrids! We wont know if we can count them in a minyan!
See how you sound?
Exactly right. You never hear any Rabbis talking about reaching out to people with politically incorrect desires- there’s no push to accept Ganavim (Kleptomaniacs) or violent people (Intermittent Explosive Disorder) into the community, just people that the secular media have put on a pedestal.
Agav, there is already a push to start getting pedophiles accepted in society- according to certain left wing media outlets, you’re not supposed to call them pedophiles, you’re supposed to call them “Minor Attracted Persons”, or MAPs. (Helps get rid of the stigma associated with the word “pedophile”).
There seems to be a plague of Orthodox rabbis, even ostensibly charedi ones, who are either too compliant (if they’re more left-wing MO) or too unknowledgeable or too uninterested (if they’re more yeshivish) to do actual research, buying into every single gay Orthodoxy they’re fed. It was pretty obvious with Rabbi Goldberg accepting uncritically his sixty-year old straight member’s assertion that he’s a woman, and it’s pretty obvious with this author, with his repeated used of the “LGBTQ+” mantra*, his tossing out (or having fed to him) the Waldenberg trope, and the kicker at the end, where he thinks it’s just grand that normal adults be interested in finding out the “real meaning” behind such nonsense as “novosexual” and “abrosexual.”
No. Absolutely not. The only response of normal people, Orthodox Jewish or not, even atheists, to that, especially that last, should definitely not be, “Oh, what a precocious young tortured lad to know such new things!” It should rather be, “Lady, your son is spending way too much time on the internet. Cut him off now, immediately and totally, before he starts demanding to be castrated.”
*For the millionth time: “L” and “G” are two totally different things, not that either is at all acceptable. There are multiple forms of “T”, all of which are different forms of mental illness. “Q” is a meaningless term (as is every other letter added, as well as, of course, that “+”) that allows anyone to include themselves and, say, sue Yeshiva University even if they’re straight. And “B” presents no problem halakhically at all. “Attracted to both? Great. So like every other straight person, just ignore half.”
I am so glad that someone has finally come out and discuss the Ariza”l’s statement that, as a result of sexual sins in a past life, a soul can be born into the body of the opposite sex. As was stated, this doesn’t affect halachic issues for this person but it does for other people. It should affect the way others view this person; that they are not “crazy”. They are sanely adjusting to a painful situation, which I can’t imagine.
So often, these people are seen as crazy. They are not. They feel their reality, but often can’t put it into words. How would you respond if your body and mind told you different things about who you are, at a most essential level? I can’t imagine how I would react. But seeing Jews with eyes that show sympathy and the love of another Jew in pain, instead of “those crazy….” makes all the difference, especially when standing before HKBH, asking for his mercy upon us.
The cishet people on this thread thinking they have an inkling of what it means to be queer or any say whatsoever on queer Jewry are really pathetic. Every worn out old talking point in the book that they can trot out, next they’ll be talking about attack helicopters like its a bright bold idea that has any sway on a reality they dont understand.
cis het Jews: You dont have the faintest clue what it is to be queer, to be LGBT+, its another dimension you simply cant experience, and Id be sad for you about that except that your hate and dismissiveness towards those you dont understand loses all my sympathy. I’d say you’re driving people to suicide but its obvious that you dont actually care. You call identities expansive beyond your imagination ‘mental illness’ without an ounce of understanding of what mental illness is either, its just a word meaning lesser people to you, those who dont matter. And you can stay in your small world and hurt people over and over and that’s on you after your 120. We’re not even out of the Yamim Noraim and you already have so much pain to atone for. You can always open your mind to compassion, to ahava, and dare imagine a world bigger than you previously knew. Or you can continue your sinas chinam its entirely your choice.
Queer Jews: You’re not alone. You’re not lost, you’re not wrong, you’re not sinners. You are beautiful and whole and made directly in G-d’s image. You have community, you have hope. If you’re a kid, if you’re stuck in a bad community, you wont be there forever, I promise it gets better. Also, mental illness has no morality attached, if you think you need help find therapy that isnt from within the community, that isnt conversion therapy. Find someone reputable. You are so loved by so many people you have yet to meet. If you need to stay in the closet for your safety then stay there, we’ll be waiting to catch you when you’re ready to come out. You are loved and capable of love, just hang on until it’s safe.
The Torah and Chazal define what is normal behavior and relationships, as opposed to “another dimension you simply cant experience.” This is what the LGBT movement is aiming at-not just tolerance and acceptance, but deeming their llfestyles as legitimate as anyone who is happily married Kdas Chupah vKiddushin
HaShem created men and women not Facebook categories of so called sexual fluidity
Hey, mods, what the hell? Why even post such an article in the first place if the only comments you’ll allow are full hate, bigotry and ignorance? Did you just post it for a hate fest on queer people? I thought I couldnt be more disappointed than the comments you are letting through, but here I am proven wrong. People will die but you dont care. wow.
Queer Jews reading this, you are loved and whole and Btzelem Elokim.
Wow so many ignorant hateful views expressed in the comments. Wow. Brutal.
Everyone, regardless of their background and prior transgressions, can do teshuvah and change-only the individual who denies himself or herself that ability to change ( and in a more contemporary sense, or views change as impossible for whatever reason,. views society as inherently incapable of change) prevents that from happening.
Wow, this post really attracted the gaslighting deviants, and their sockpuppets.
Let’s pick an aveirah at random; how about Chilul HaShem? If some group of Jews felt impelled to create a group identity around this aveirah, and become a “community” to identify with it, wouldn’t your average Orthodox rabbi see that as strange and a betrayal of Yiddishkeit? Ah, but what if this group could find some spiritually warped doctors and scientists to attest that this tendency is inborn? We would say, “Everybody has a particular Yetzer Hara and the duty to resist it, and everybody else should try to reinforce the resistance and not the wicked tendency.”
So what is going on here? Just as woke ideology has infiltrated corporate America, so, too, is it making inroads among religious Jews. Not exactly a cause for celebration. More like Chilul HaShem.
The article in question like its predecessors and like Trembling in Fear is an example of the woke ideology having inroads in our communities.
The commenters above are doing a wonderful job of providing the reason why LGTBQ orthodox need to form organizations and create a group identity. They need to protect themselves against the type of invective being thrown around here. They are not celebrating sin; they protecting themselves against the types of Orthodox character that they encounter here who desire to call them sinners for who they are. This attitude is a stain on Orthodoxy.
Would you, David Ohsie, hold that their type of BEHAVIOR, that they organize around and try to legitimate and promote, is not wrong according to Torah law?
I don’t understand the assumption that when one comes out of the closet, then he or she is ‘organizing’ around anything at all. In many cases, they’re simply acknowledging something very difficult and trying to figure out what that means for their future lives. The assertion that they thereby “identify” with people looking to overthrow Halacha is just false. Such people exist, of course, but saying that all gay people are automatically and necessarily in that group (which I think is Rabbi Gordimer’s basis for encouraging discretion, although I’m happy to be corrected) is a baseless logical leap.
I do agree with the point that you made earlier, namely that we have an obligation to help people minimize their (halachic) capital crimes. Unfortunately, as several comments here demonstrate, there’s still a lot of enthusiasm for בני תורה to act exactly the same as people motivated only by non-Torah-based prejudice. That response (along with all of the unhelpful name-calling; Rabbi Motzen’s calls for compassion may not be new, but they’re clearly still necessary) only serves to push gay people further away from Torah observance, translating into more of the acts that you and I agree should be minimized.
Being gay is not a behavior. The gay kids in frum middle schools and day schools who are shamed and forced into the closet are not promoting anything, but are sent to be sexually abused at JONAH and JIFGA. Unfortunately, attitudes like yours push them out of Orthodoxy.
Not all deviations from an ideal personality is the same. A hungry boy stealing a penny candy is not in the same league as terrorism. Talking on one cell phone on Shabbat in shul is not on the same scale as being on the extreme end of sexual deviancy. Our sexuality goes very far in defining our most essential core as to who we are as human beings. To violate such basic laws of nature is no light matter.
Male homosexual behavior, transsexualism, etc should be taken for what it really is, namely mental illness. Like any mental illness, one does not label such deviancy as evil, nor incarcerate such people, but at the same time, it is simply morally wrong to treat such behavior as acceptable, healthy alternatives to the heterosexual norm. Should a parent attend his lesbian daughter’s wedding? Certainly not, for to do so is to sanction such a lifestyle. But that does not mean that the parent should disown his child, any more than would having any other kind of mental illness.
The Torah is quite clear about which sexual behavior crosses the line of acceptability. The secular world has lost its moral compass on this and so many other subjects, but that doesn’t mean that we who know better, should follow suit.
“Male homosexual behavior, transsexualism, etc should be taken for what it really is, namely mental illness.” By what definition of mental illness?
out of touch with reality
When people object to homosexual behavior and identities, they are immediately accused of hate, bigotry, and causing suicides…kind of shuts down the conversation and allows the gay crowd an easy out not to engage in education and argument. Pathetic… and proves that they don’t really seek understanding, they just want to set up a straw man to battle with.
So: YES, frum people care about gay people and kids. YES they can try to imagine how difficult it is to feel a certain way and be told it’s sinful/forbidden/wrong/crazy/something they can change. YES they want to be compassionate and kind to everyone.
HOWEVER, we believe as Jews that gay sex is wrong. God said so in the Bible. WE are not wrong or sinful for that. If we are wrong, then the Torah is wrong, and Hashem is wrong. So let’s start the conversation there
Hashem gives people situations and urges that are challenging and heartbreaking. Being in wheelchairs, mental illness, pedophilia etc. People suffer because of that and need our kindness. BUT, as sorry as we feel for the man who is attracted to children, YES, we expect him to suffer and not act the way he feels is natural to him. Gay people NEVER want to engage that point, because to admit that they think the pedophile has to suffer because his sexuality conflicts with morality is to admit that yes it is possible, with struggle and sacrifice, to repress your sexual desires. So the minute anyone asks about pedophiles, they respond by screaming, Hater! Bigot! Shut up!
Pretty pathetic and shows they know they have weak arguments… I have tried so many times to ask gay people what their solution is for pedophiles (conversion therapy? Act on their desires? Repress their sexuality? Try to channel their sexuality towards young looking adults?) but they won’t respond. If they could explain what someone with what they deem “unacceptable” sexuality should do, then perhaps we could begin an honest discussion about frum gay people…
“YES, frum people care about gay people and kids.”
Then why are there zero out gay kids in any of the frum high schools in Baltimore (and I suspect elsewhere). They are committing no sins. Rabbi Gordimer indicates that they need to stay in the closet. That is not very caring.
Also, why do Frum people keep shunting kids to conversion therapy which has not evidence of efficacy and which in the US has been run by closeted gay men seeking to sexually abuse the kids that get sent to them (see JONAH and JIFGA).
And let’s face it. Gay slurs are tolerated in Frum society.
We seek not to shame people in wheelchairs or with mental illness. Unfortunately people with mental illness are still shamed in and out of Frum circles, but this is a huge negative that we seek to stop.
With respect to abstinence: No, no one thinks that a pedophile can simply control themselves. They are considered a huge risk to children and no one would let a known pedophile near children. (And of course there is no relationship between being gay and being a pedophile. Child sex is non-consensual and causes great mental harm to children. Gay couples have normal happy lives).
The Torah itself basically rules out abstinence as a possibility and requires marriage at a fairly young age (18 is the recommendation) precisely because otherwise sin is not avoidable.
Finally, you make a lot of ad hominem arguments here. I you want an honest discussion, maybe try rewriting your post without them?
Shani wrote in relevant part:
“Hashem gives people situations and urges that are challenging and heartbreaking. Being in wheelchairs, mental illness, pedophilia etc. People suffer because of that and need our kindness. BUT, as sorry as we feel for the man who is attracted to children, YES, we expect him to suffer and not act the way he feels is natural to him. Gay people NEVER want to engage that point, because to admit that they think the pedophile has to suffer because his sexuality conflicts with morality is to admit that yes it is possible, with struggle and sacrifice, to repress your sexual desires. So the minute anyone asks about pedophiles, they respond by screaming, Hater! Bigot! Shut up!
Pretty pathetic and shows they know they have weak arguments… I have tried so many times to ask gay people what their solution is for pedophiles (conversion therapy? Act on their desires? Repress their sexuality? Try to channel their sexuality towards young looking adults?) but they won’t respond”
IMO, no amount of litigation, legislation and cries for tolerance and acceptance can change the above facts, for which there is no response other than obfuscation of the facts and evidence on the ground
Punting it to the poskim. Waiting for guidelines.
Man, how about opening a Chumash!
Holiness. Not doing what was done in Egypt.
You don’t need a posek for that; you need courage.
“I DO know what it is like to live a life where halacha tells me I cannot fulfill my sexual self as I might have wished to.”
That statement is true for every observant Jewish man and woman, regardless of sexual orientation. And please don’t tell me that straights at least have the potential for some measure of sexual satisfaction. I have seen too many individuals who have spent their entire lives in wholly unsatisfying Halachically-permitted sexual relationships to give that idea much credence, not to mention the significant numbers of individuals in the frum world who have never found a life partner – a reality that has always been with us. It is a tragic loss for anyone in that circumstance, much like childlessness – something that those who have not experienced it cannot fully comprehend.
The sexual self is one part of who we are. Is it the most important part? I believe we choose and prioritize the parts of our identity that are most meaningful. Sometimes those parts are in conflict. Our obligation as observant Jews is to resolve those conflicts as the Torah directs us to behave and live. We have great admiration for people who are able to do that. Individuals who choose to act contrary to Torah are not going to be viewed with the same deference. That hardly seems controversial.
As Robert pointed out, there are so many instances where sexual behavior is prohibited where there is NO potentially permitted sexual behavior, and it affects no small percentage of the community.
The singles population is one of the most obvious, and indeed, if you talk to many older singles who are honest, they will tell you that many of their peers, and perhaps they themselves, are engaging in sexual activity.
Many of them, feeling guilty and dirty as a result, slip away from observance, or feel like they are living a lie. Talk to any rabbi who deals with older singles and he’ll tell you this is a reality. So what should we do-should we open the mikvaos for single girls? Should we promote acceptance of people who want to have sexual relations outside of marriage?
And as for whether any of this is deviant- I remember the multi page article in the NYT magazine, of all places, several years ago that was struggling to explain why homosexual men seem to be so much more promiscuous.
You might make the argument that it is because it is (or was) taboo, but עליך להביא ראייה.
Now all of this really does sound somewhat discriminatory, but only if the assumption is that we have to accommodate the lifestyle at all.
In regard to the individual, there is no posek or Rov today I know that doesn’t advocate sympathy and compassion for people who struggle with SSA.
Does anyone have a link to R’ Efrem Goldberg’s talk about this issue that was referenced here?
Seehttps://www.tabletmag.com/sections/community/articles/living-single It is no mitzvah to be the first married or the first divorced in your chevra but extended singlehood is also not a viable option for reasons Our communities should not accept the behavior described in the linked article or among those engaged in or attracted to SSA as normal.
Uh, the answer to your question is obviously yes. Adult unmarried couples will 100% be invited to Shabbos tables despite the fact that they likely not celibate and probably be given Aliyot in shul. They are not asked to pretend they are asexual creatures.
Also, yes, there are poskim who tell the less observant/orthodox sexually active women to go to the Mikveh, since they understand that not going is no real barrier to them. It won’t be done among the more observant because they know that this opens the door to behavior they might otherwise refrain from or at least minimize.
Telling people to stay in the closet or sending them to abusive conversion therapy is not sympathy or compassion.
Addressing and realizing that extended singlehood is deleterious to religious committment and thinking about marriage as an important priority is an issue that needs to be addressed YU Connects does an excellent job in this regard
I don’t know who wrote this comment:
““I DO know what it is like to live a life where halacha tells me I cannot fulfill my sexual self as I might have wished to.”
We just went through the Yamim Noraim where Mesiras Nefesh is a major theme. I think that it is fair to say that Mesiras Nefesh for our acceptance of Torah and Mitzvos even and especially those that are difficult and at first glance irrational began at the Akedah which planted the seeds for Kabalas HaTorah and our committments to Halacha. We are commanded to be selfless, not selfish in our desires and attitudes-Rejecting what the Torah commands in any area of life is an act of narcissitic selfishness
https://rabbis.org/2016-resolution-principled-and-pastoral-reflections-on-sanctity-and-sexuality/ Is the view of the membership of the Rabbinical Council of America regarding these matters.
I am pleased to have been a principal author of the text.
https://kavvanah.blog/2018/06/04/rabbi-barry-kornblau-on-the-rcas-on-sanctity-and-sexuality/ further fleshes out the RCA’s position, and adds additional reflections of my own.
Dear R Kornblau, I find it hard to take the RCA statement very seriously when it came out in 2016 while the JONAH lawsuit concluded in 2015. At that point, it was well understood that the RCA had endorsed an organization that sexually abused the gay orthodox kid sent to them by RCA Rabbis. Yet not a word of apology or even disavaowel of conversion therapy in the document. So then what can compassion really mean other than lip service?
Mea culpa, the title of the film is “Trembling Before God.”
I don’t know who wrote this comment:
““I DO know what it is like to live a life where halacha tells me I cannot fulfill my sexual self as I might have wished to.”
We just went through the Yamim Noraim where Mesiras Nefesh is a major theme. I think that it is fair to say that Mesiras Nefesh for our acceptance of Torah and Mitzvos even and especially those that are difficult and at first glance irrational began at the Akedah which planted the seeds for Kabalas HaTorah and our committments to Halacha. We are commanded to be selfless, not selfish in our desires and attitudes-Rejecting what the Torah commands in any area of life is an act of narcissitic selfishness
Take a good look at an article about extended singlehood by R E Schwartz at Tablet . Extended singlehood has a very deleterious impact on the level of one’s religious observance
2 questions—
1- to the ‘non binary’ people — is your goal anything less than demanding the O community allow gay coupling , in a non-celibate living arrangement , with equivalent forms of coupling ceremonies and outward display of affection?
2– to the binary people — if the answer to 1 is no [ ie demanding the equivalent of O gay marriage ] , can anyone see any O community sanction such behaviour?
I’m not non-binary, but I would suggest that for the gay people I know, the ideal would be for as much הקפדה on the actual דאורייתא of ואהבת לרעך כמוך as there is on the made-up rules that drive delegitimizing all gay people because some of them disrespect הלכה.
conveniently bypassing the question. for, “non-celibate living arrangement , with equivalent forms of coupling ceremonies and outward display of affection ” , are not “made up rules ” ….
To lacosta – I wasn’t actually trying to bypass your question. No, I’m not advocating that explicit עבירות be tolerated, whether that’s non-celibate same-sex living arrangements or the eager demonization of all gay people become some of them dismiss Halacha.
Compassion and understanding should never confused with tolerance and acceptance of a religiously deviant lifestyle The Torah observant world should always be on guard in this respect as it is evident from those who support and defend such behavior RL on this thread that their goal is the eradication of Torah values and Issurei Torah on such issues as they seek to normalize the deviant (which is on display in so called pride parades and public school curricula )as do all elements of the woke world
Literally no-one on this thread has supported or defended anything remotely problematic. Some people have suggested that demonizing all gay people and pushing them out of Torah observance is a bad idea. The inability to recognize the difference is exactly where Rabbi Motzen’s critics miss the boat.
The so called “pride parades” and curricula in public schools speak volumes Do you support or identify with what was on visible and on display in the parades and what is being report as curricula in the public schools and defended as “normal” which includes celebration of abnormal sexual behavior and pedofilia as normal? It is a simple yes or no question which can be answered without obfuscation
Does it bother anyone here that we were subjected to the riots last year and the deviance depicted in “pride parades”but that the Salute to Israel Parade remained cancelled in NYC due to the Covid restrictions? This is Orwellian logic in practice
To Steve Brizel – the answer to both of your questions is no.
I also need to point out that your question is as baseless and offensive as asking every yeshivish person whether they identify with the few rotten מחנכים that abuse their students.
Yes, there are some gay people that neither obey nor respect Halacha. The assumption that every Orthodox gay person is like that is tremendously incorrect, and leads to vast unwarranted and unnecessary suffering.
You also wrote:
“I also need to point out that your question is as baseless and offensive as asking every yeshivish person whether they identify with the few rotten מחנכים that abuse their students.
Yes, there are some gay people that neither obey nor respect Halacha. The assumption that every Orthodox gay person is like that is tremendously incorrect, and leads to vast unwarranted and unnecessary suffering”
There you go again-evading the issue by changing the subject . The coverage of the pride parades and discussions about public school curricula demonstrate that these are major aspects of the LGBT agenda that are being shoved down the throats of Americans who have traditional moral values , including the Orthodox community.
This is where we differ-Noone is demonizing gay people and pushing them out of Torah observance. What we have stated and reiterated are absolutely normative views of marriage and physical intimacy as defined by the Torah and Chazal. It is fairly remarkable after a detailed discussion that it took this long for anyone to say that they do not support pride parades or pornography being taught in public schools. Look at it this way-No child in any yeshiva, regardless of the hashkafa of the yeshiva, should be taught or forced to read or hear under penalty of federal or state law that Yakov has two Abbas or two Immas or that a same gender relationship or marriage is normal or can be sanctified by Halacha. This became an issue in the UK and it threatens to become one in the US as well.
This is 100% wrong. When you say to someone that they have to stay in the closet, you are pushing them out. The kid in high school doesn’t know from any LGBT political agenda. He knows he is sexually attracted to males in the way that almost all his peers are attracted to females. He is gay.
The so called Equality Act seems to abolish any objection to LGBT communities and behavior on religious grounds Those who talk the talk of tolerance are really using the same as an anti religious Trojan horse
Steve wrote: “ This is where we differ-Noone is demonizing gay people and pushing them out of Torah observance.”
You are 100% wrong in that statement. That’s not surprising; your repeated concerns about the “LGBT agenda” indicate absolutely no familiarity with what actual gay Orthodox Jews and their families experience, think, or feel. That’s not uncommon, but it leads to very false beliefs.
If you actually care about what is true, and if you care more about doing the רצון ה׳ than about getting whipped up into a righteous furor, then all you need to do is actually ask a few frum gay Jews what their lives are like.
Agree 100%. My wife is a high level administrator at an Orthodox day school (and not a particularly ‘left wing’ one, either). With each passing year, there are more and more kids (and they are KIDS, for goodness) who are ‘coming out ‘ in different ways.
They are not ‘rebels’. They do not have an ‘agenda’. They are not part of some alleged ‘community’. They are, rather, human beings who are coming to terms with who they actually are, after for far too long living a lie. And they want to remain in the fold (the observant Jewish one).
Do you support the Equality Act ?Do you support gay Shmutz brr we’re g used as curricula in public schools at the expense of classics like To Kill A Mockingbird? Please answer yes or no without claiming that this not happening
To be honest, I have been a bit taken aback by the plethora of similar reactions to Rabbi Motzen’s post. After all, this type of attitude is something I have come to expect on other frum blogs. In addition, being personally familiar with Rabbi (yes, “Rabbi” for those who feel entitled to more informality with him) Motzen, his personal character, and shul, makes seeing all of the rhetoric and attacks all the more disturbing.
I searched Rabbi Motzen’s post and I could not find him yielding any Halachic ground or advocating such. I also did not see him recommending any sort of flaunting of personal expression like rainbow logos on kippot in his shul or the like. The only thing of which he might be accused is compassion and rachmanut. I would highly doubt that any of the expert “poskim” who registered comments to his post hold the position of pulpit or community Rav. As such, they are either oblivious to facts-on-the-ground or need not be accountable to anyone with their opinions. So one could easily question these “poskim” or self-appointed Mesorah protectors being a bar-hachi here. And it’s a chutzpah to imply that Rabbi Motzen is somehow selling out. In addition, it’s wholly inappropriate to comment on the type of shul he leads or the Yeshiva from which his semicha is from (and somehow require that everything he writes in his lifetime must be vetted by its Rosh Yeshiva). It seems that most of the commenters see this sugya as “binary”, black-and-white, discarding the possibility of any nuance. You are either on one or the other side of the issue. And many feel that they are protecting the Mesorah by coming out on their side of the issue–and if they yield to nuance and it will somehow be a slippery slope to the other side.
It’s hard to read all of this, especially coming out of a season of self-reflection with each of us confronting our personal imperfections. The self-righteousness and thinking that “I know better” certainly goes against all of the Ashemnus and Al Chets which I said, and the sifrei mussar that I have learned. How about a little humility and not feeling that seeing such a post is a “mechayev” for having to register an authoritative opinion under the pretense of upholding the Torah and our tradition?
One need not get into any cheshbon of the permissibility of any behavior or what it’s analogous to, as if it’s reading a Rishon. That may or may not be a good comparison. That’s not the issue here. Rabbi Motzen is speaking about compassion, empathy, “nosei b’ol chaveiro”, tzelem Elokim, and helping not only the individuals, but also their parents and family members who are the concentric circles in this parsha. As with other trends in the community, considering on or two degrees of separation, no one is immune to challenges. What Rabbi Motzen did was just add another layer of compassion at the community level. To do so is not crossing any red lines.
Being Noseh Bol Chavero is very relevant and important on the individual level I question whether it is has much application when there are clear boundaries on a Halachic level that the Torah observant community cannot accept
When someone in your life has resolved to act in a forbidden way as a life principle, so much so that he joins a “community” promoting that, how would you react?
Rabbi Dovid Bashevkin is a Musmach of NIRC, and i wasn’t aware it was incumbent on every musmach to clear every opinion they had with their RY. It is an opinion, it is well reasoned and well written, and the editors felt it worthwhile to publish. It doesn’t mean they endorse all its conclusions. Further, it engendered a conversation, which people who you likely agree with more, articulated their objections in the very same medium. What exactly is the issue?
You also wrote:
“I also need to point out that your question is as baseless and offensive as asking every yeshivish person whether they identify with the few rotten מחנכים that abuse their students.
Yes, there are some gay people that neither obey nor respect Halacha. The assumption that every Orthodox gay person is like that is tremendously incorrect, and leads to vast unwarranted and unnecessary suffering”
There you go again-evading the issue by changing the subject . The coverage of the pride parades and discussions about public school curricula demonstrate that these are major aspects of the LGBT agenda that are being shoved down the throats of Americans who have traditional moral values , including the Orthodox community.
This is where we differ-Noone is demonizing gay people and pushing them out of Torah observance. What we have stated and reiterated are absolutely normative views of marriage and physical intimacy as defined by the Torah and Chazal. It is fairly remarkable after a detailed discussion that it took this long for anyone to say that they do not support pride parades or pornography being taught in public schools. Look at it this way-No child in any yeshiva, regardless of the hashkafa of the yeshiva, should be taught or forced to read or hear under penalty of federal or state law that Yakov has two Abbas or two Immas or that a same gender relationship or marriage is normal or can be sanctified by Halacha. This became an issue in the UK and it threatens to become one in the US as well.
“This is like similar pieces that have emanated in the past from…MO/YU people like David Bashevkin and Marc Penner”
It’s not just YU. The JHC Lights Chinese Auction in early 2018(video available online) had a discussion between Moshe Bane of the OU, R. Yaakov Horowitz and Eytan Kobre, who were trying to come up with a compassionate Orthodox approach to homosexuality. It’s not easy.
As far as R. Dovid Bashevkin(who also learned in NIRC), he seems to have rabbinical input or guidance regarding the 18Forty podcast. For example, after a controversial interview on Biblical Criticism last year which he took down for future editing, he apologized and said, “we are taking important steps to ensure that all future conversations, ideas, essays, and approaches provide the constructive ideas this site was designed to address.”(” Reflections Four Months After Launch”). R. Menachem Penner was quoted by R. Bashevkin in his 18Forty interview about a question relating to homosexuality in that R. Penner had “asked four different rabbis and got four different opinions about what you should do…”
In general, 18Forty’s purpose seems as filling a void for a population not served by existing educational and outreach institutions, as Mitchell Eichen, 18Forty’s sponsor, explained(“Our Story: Journey To 18forty”):
Mitchell Eichen had also said last September in a Jewish Standard interview about the 18forty website (“Preaching the Controversy”): “For some some issues we have no answers, we just have to say that we’ll continue the dialogue and maybe we can reach a higher level. Dialogue keeps people engaged, keeps people in the room.”
As these words are being typed the LGBT movement is seeking to brainwash public school children with gay Shmutz in place of classics such as To Kill a Mockingbird and those who question this at the school board and local levels are being branded as domestic terrorists Those who claim that this is not part of a cultural revolution and kulturkamph that is aimed at banning the teaching of Acharei Mos and Seder Nashim and mandating that our children be taught that Yaakov has two Abbas and who look for acceptance and legitimizing the illegitimate IMO and WADR remind me of those who argued against the abolition of slavery and supported the rise of Communism all of which was documented on the Sefarim Blog years ago and IMO are ignoring the facts on the ground We should not be fooled by being pushed from a position of empathy on the individual level into any kind of tolerance on the communal level
IMO it is always preferable to be intellectually honest as opposed to being a useful idiot and politically correct because Emes Yesh lo Raglauim
And Sheker Ain Lo raglayim
Perhaps Mitchell Eichen can join this thread-I would posit that the greatest threat of academic biblical studies is the studied detachment of Torah Shebicsav from TSBP and Chazal, as well as classical Mefarshim. Cultural climate change is clearly atributable to the long march of Marxist based radicalism in the universities of the US since the late 1960s. I would suggest that the woke left is not interested in dialogue, but rather in destruction of that which has made the growth of Torah Judaism flourish in the US, and that as R Yakov Emden ZL observed, the mere fact that Jews learn and observe Torah despite the varied external and internal threats to the existence of the Jewish People is a great miracle in its own right.
Steve,
You can read/listen to more about Mr. Eichen’s and R. Bashevkin’s thinking in the references I quoted. Basically, Mr. Eichen was raised originally as a secular Jew. He was surprised when his son, who went to Kushner Yeshiva High School, introduced him to the various issues raised by Biblical Criticism which he was taught at college.
The question of whether to expose MO college-bound students to Biblical Criticism is an old one. In this case, R. Eliezer Rubin of Kushner HS did not think the curriculum could accommodate Biblical Criticism, so Mr. Eichen then tried to convince R. Bashevkin to write a curriculum. Instead, R. Bashevkin convinced Mr. Eichen that these issues could be addressed with an online presence, targeting post-college young adults.
18Forty is not just focused on controversial issues; there are interviews with Rav Ahron Lopiansky and with Jonathan Rosenblum, for example.
As far as your point about classical mefarshim, I would add that many people don’t have an adequate background and grounding in them. R. Gil Student one wrote about using Mendelssohn’s Bi’ur , “if you can’t read a difficult Ibn Ezra, you probably shouldn’t be using the Bi’ur. Ask your rabbi or rosh yeshiva for guidance.” (“Rav Itzeleh Volozhiner and the Bi’ur”).
Similarly, I recall hearing a senior rosh yeshivah saying that he had examined the copies of R. Yitzchak Halevy’s Doros Harishonim on Jewish history owned by certain roshei yeshivah(either Rav Aharon Kotler, R. Reuvein Grozovsky, and/or R. Yaakov Kamenetsky) and they were well-read. He also said that Halevy refutes the arguments of the non-Orthodox historians, but that one would not appreciate Doros Harishonim unless one had a background in the sugyos of the Gemara.
Very interestingly, Prof. Joshua Berman of Bar Ilan has attracted interest in a small minority of the Charedi community. Prof. Berman mentions on a Koren Podcast interview which he did together with R. Jeremy Wieder(Minute 34) how “not a small number” of Lakewood students are struggling with questions and there is therefore an interest in his work there, and he also has two articles on his blog about visiting a secret chaburah of Satmar chasidim in Williamsburg! While this is still a very small percentage overall of the RW, Prof. Berman thinks it’s wonderful that the two worlds have come together in this small way.