The Third Path: On LGBTQ, “Lite” Religiosity, and Harmful Criticism (Column 728)

With God’s help

Today I was sent a post by Yael Mashali responding to a letter from the Council of Rabbis of Binyamin. The Binyamin Regional Council decided to invite the gay singer Eden Hason to perform. The Council of Rabbis of Binyamin subsequently published the following letter:

Right from the start I must say that I very much appreciated the unavoidable call for unity—meaning, to let the matter go from here on out so that there be no dispute. In other words, after their demands were met—“from now on, let’s coordinate the summer shows together”—we are all called to remain united and prevent controversy. How beautiful, and how typical. Truly like “Torah scholars who increase peace in the world” (much like Yasser Arafat, who could be considered the world champion in the number of peace agreements he signed).

On this painful issue, Yael Mashali published: Next responseI will not copy it here due to its length; I will only say that Mashali explains to them that they are irrelevant and calls on the public to ignore this benighted stance and to embrace their many LGBTQ children, as numerous as the sand on the seashore. Needless to say, I agree with the spirit of her words and with the assessment that this is a problematic rabbinic stance. Still, the response jarred me, and I think it does more harm than good. As I will explain, it exemplifies a broader and more general phenomenon, and thus it is worthwhile to analyze it

Inviting the Artist, or the Community’s Attitude Toward LGBTQ People

Mashali—without much noticing—moved from the specific question of inviting a gay artist to perform, which served as the trigger for her post, to the broader question of the appropriate communal and familial treatment of LGBTQ people. This shift is important for what I wish to say here.

The question of inviting such an artist seems to me much simpler, and it is far more reasonable to oppose the rabbis’ position on it. The rabbinic committee bases itself on slogans about harming the values and sanctity of the family in Israel. I fail to see how and in what way this causes harm. Will there be children in the audience who are not LGBTQ who, following the performance, will be convinced to become so? Or might there be those who are LGBTQ who, if such an artist is not invited, will be convinced and return to being straight? Perhaps a few boys and girls are in some intermediate situation, but I very much doubt the extent to which, in a religious society, someone who has a choice will choose to present as LGBTQ simply because they feel like it. Usually it is someone who is that way—not due to the influence of this or that artist. They simply have no choice. In my view, the opposite concern—that such calls push LGBTQ people into a corner and plunge them into severe distress—is far more serious.

Beyond that, do they think it is permissible to invite an artist who desecrates the Sabbath, or who eats non-kosher food? I assume such objections would not arise. In any case, I have not heard similar objections to such artists. Among the rabbis there is a taboo surrounding the LGBTQ phenomenon—perhaps in part a reaction to the struggle waged by LGBTQ activists themselves, at times with violent or silencing tactics. And yet I do not see substantive justification for this. On the contrary, the concern about influence and legitimization of Sabbath desecration—something that is subject to a teenager’s decision—exists much more than the concern of influencing someone to become LGBTQ, which, as noted, is usually not up to them. Even from the artist’s perspective, being LGBTQ does not depend on him, whereas desecrating the Sabbath certainly does. The LGBTQ artist simply is who he is and has little choice in the matter (he is anus—coerced, in halakhic terms), and therefore he is certainly less culpable and less wicked than the artist who desecrates the Sabbath.

In short, by every parameter I can think of, there seems to be far less logic in inviting a Sabbath-desecrating artist than in inviting a gay artist. So why is everyone fighting for the “sanctity of the family”? In my estimation, although lofty values and spiritual declarations are draped over the issue, at bottom this is merely a social taboo—one that naturally takes longer to change within a religious society. It is very convenient to clothe these primal feelings in halakhic garb. It seems to me that “Hardal” rabbis (ultra-conservative religious-Zionists) in general focus obsessively on LGBTQ phenomena and wage desperate and hopeless holy wars against them; this too, in my opinion, stems from taboo and psychological fixation rather than from ethical or spiritual deliberation.

Mashali's response

If one truly chooses to focus on the relationship to LGBTQ people rather than on the question of inviting the artist, I would expect at least a few words to be devoted to the halakhic prohibition. The elephant in the room is not mentioned at all in her remarks, and I get the impression that it does not interest her. She treats the phenomenon as if it were some hobby of children, and the rabbis’ stance as a random craze—on the part of rabbis, parents, and the religious community at large. Hello! There is a severe biblical prohibition—arayot (forbidden sexual relations), one of the cardinal sins for which one must be killed rather than transgress (yehareg ve’al ya’avor)—namely, mishkav zachar (male–male intercourse). I would expect that, before preaching to the rabbis, Mashali would open with something like: “Granted, this is a severe halakhic prohibition,” and then add a description of the realities and hardships, and of the need—and duty—to address the phenomenon and its people in an inclusive manner.

Why is this important? Because my concern here is not Yael Mashali or her response per se. It is symptomatic of a style of debate that gravely harms the just struggle for the proper treatment of LGBTQ people. Responses like Mashali’s present the picture exactly as the rabbis wish to present it: on one side stand the rabbis—the God-fearing, uncompromisingly committed to Halakhah and Torah—who bravely and firmly fight for the values of Torah and holiness against the winds of the time; and against them stand a few “lite” types, shouting liberal and progressive slogans as though these were Torah values. The truly religious versus the “lites.” Note that this is precisely how those Hardal rabbis would like to frame the struggle, and in this sense Mashali plays into their hands.

How was it appropriate to respond?

So what should she have done? As stated, one cannot argue about the fact of the prohibition or its severity. It is present, as it were, in black fire upon white fire, in the Written and Oral Torah and throughout the poskim. I noted above that, in my view, one should begin by stating that this is an extremely severe prohibition, agreed upon by all decisors, and that “there is no counsel against the Lord.” After that preface, it is very important to explain that fear of Heaven does not mean callousness, nor does it mean ignoring reality and its complexities. Despite the prohibition, a person endowed with these tendencies cannot overcome them; in halakhic terms, he is anus—coerced. I do not think there is a greater coercion than this. In this context I usually cite the Talmud (Ketubot 33a–b), which discusses whether flogging is more severe than death:

As the Talmud (Ketubot 33a–b) suggests: death may be more severe than flogging, yet unending flogging that breaks a person’s resolve can be harder to withstand than a one-time threat of death; ordinary people cannot endure limitless suffering with no light at the end of the tunnel.

Note: while death is certainly more severe and more painful than flogging, unending flogging—continuing throughout life until one capitulates—can be more severe and painful than the threat of death. Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, who sacrificed their lives and entered the fire in order not to worship idols—had they been flogged in such a fashion, they would presumably have yielded. Why? Because a reasonable person (and even an unreasonable one) cannot endure continual suffering with no light at the end of the tunnel. In the end, one breaks. By the same token, a person can be required to refrain from sexual relations for a period (for example, during his wife’s niddah), but a person cannot avoid sexual relations for his entire life. Here he will surely break; this is genuine compulsion. Therefore, even though there is no halakhic way out—no permission—for this severe prohibition, the appropriate halakhic-Torah treatment of such people is to regard them as fully coerced (anusim). Certainly more coerced than Sabbath desecrators, men who have relations during niddah, or those who eat pork. And yet, on the conservative side, for some reason, all these are treated with wondrous inclusion and outreach, while LGBTQ people are targeted by a resolute and uncompromising crusade.

Such a response would cast the disagreement in a completely different light from the one I described above: we are all committed to Torah and fear of Heaven; we all value the sanctity of the family and the values of Halakhah; and yet there remains a debate about how to proceed. This is not “lite-ness” versus piety, as conservatives and Hardalim delight in portraying it (and as Mashali’s response suggests), but rather a debate about what fear of Heaven and commitment to Torah and Halakhah actually demand. The claim is that Torah and Halakhah themselves oblige us to accommodate the phenomenon and to give these people a place in the community like any other person. That is an entirely different statement, and it offers a real alternative to the conservative approach expressed in the letter cited above. Such an argument also stands a chance of being accepted (in my estimation, they too will eventually tire of the “jihad” against LGBTQ people and will understand what the whole world has already understood. It takes them time to adjust, since rabbis and religious people in general tend to conservatism and to clinging to social taboos and fixations. Among them—among us—change always takes longer; but it is already here, and I am fairly certain it will continue to advance).

Theological and Meta-Halakhic Comment

One can of course wonder: if this is indeed the situation, why does the Torah prohibit it? If one truly cannot withstand this prohibition, what is the point of prohibiting it? Take, for example, the prohibition of theft. Some suffer from kleptomania (a tendency to steal). The prohibition applies to them as well, of course, though they likely cannot withstand it, and therefore, if they violate it, they will likely be considered coerced. So what is the point of prohibiting it? Here the answer is simpler: it was indeed prohibited because of ordinary people who can withstand it. If we were all kleptomaniacs, the Torah would presumably not have prohibited it. Hence the prohibition exists; once established, it applies to everyone—including kleptomaniacs—though they will be regarded as coerced regarding it. What about homosexuality? There, the situation appears different, since, unlike kleptomania, everyone for whom this prohibition is relevant is a person with such a tendency, and therefore cannot withstand it. So what is the point of prohibiting it?

Elsewhere I cited R. Moshe Feinstein (RMF), who argues that the Torah does not place a person in a test he cannot withstand. From this he concludes that homosexuality cannot be an innate, natural tendency; it must be a choice—people are capable of choosing otherwise. In his view, it is necessarily the counsel of the evil inclination; otherwise, the Torah would not prohibit it. Now consider the conclusions if one understands that he erred about the facts. In most cases it is an innate and natural tendency (I will not enter here the question of genetics; that is irrelevant to this discussion). If we reject RMF’s factual premise, then his meta-halakhic premise—that the Torah does not test a person with what he cannot withstand—necessarily leads to the opposite conclusion: the prohibition does not apply to those who have such a tendency. It was stated only regarding those who act from desire while having another option (straight people driven by desire, or bisexuals). This line of reasoning could lead to an actual halakhic heter (permission) for the act itself—at least for those whose inclination is such.

As for me, I do not know whence RMF derived his meta-halakhic premise. To me it seems entirely unfounded, and precisely because of this I cannot justify permitting the act even for those whose inclination is such. Therefore I wrote above that, in my view, the prohibition exists for them as well, only that they are coerced (anusim).

But even if one asks all the questions and finds no answers, good questions do not change reality. In our case, even if one adopts RMF’s meta-halakhic premise (that the Torah does not demand from us what we cannot withstand), I do not see how he can derive factual conclusions from it (that it is always a matter of desire and not an ingrained tendency). Reality owes us nothing. To understand and know it, one must make observations and examine it with open eyes, not perform pilpul based on theological assumptions. Questions—however good the theology—are not a sufficient basis for making factual determinations about reality, certainly when they contradict experience and what one sees. Therefore, even if one adopts RMF’s position, the conclusion that it necessarily always involves mere desire rather than an ingrained tendency is baseless, and there is no logical reason to accept it. At the same time, as noted, there is also no real justification for the approach that for those with such tendencies there is no prohibition at all.

General implications: The third path

I have tried to explain why “lite” arguments against the commonly accepted rabbinic approach toward LGBTQ people can greatly harm a justified struggle. I showed that there is a more correct and effective way to critique the conservative approach—namely, on the basis of halakhic and Torah arguments (and, of course, factual ones). This principle applies to debates about change in Halakhah more generally.

In many cases, critics and innovators advance “lite” arguments—explaining that this or that stance is immoral or unethical, or how it will be received in the broader world; pointing to problematic outcomes (see the series of columns 475 – 480 On Modern Orthodoxy, and in particular in the column 478where I explained the difference between it and Reform. The main difference concerns whether one relies on consequentialist considerations). In doing so, they play into conservative hands and shoot their own justified struggle in the foot. Conservatives are careful to portray their opponents as “lites,” and such criticism is indeed “lite.” Instead, arguments for change must be advanced in halakhic terminology and through halakhic thinking and considerations. Morality can motivate; the justification must be halakhic and Torah-based. The non-“lite” critic claims that the conservatives are halakhic transgressors, not merely that they are immoral. We must understand that identifying anyone who is not conservative/Hardal as “lite” is a manipulation by Hardalim and conservatives, and we must not cooperate with it. Mashali’s (otherwise justified) form of criticism is an excellent example of this matter; it serves as a parable for the general rule. One might almost say: with defenders like these, one does not need prosecutors

The Third Path raises the banner of a Torah- and Halakhah-based alternative, not the banner of “morality” against the halakhic banner. Our aim is to show that there is another Torah, not to attack the Torah and commitment to it in the name of morality and contemporary values. It is important to understand that this mistake runs so deep within all of us that many who do not identify with Haredi or Hardal approaches perceive themselves (!) as “lites,” and thus do not permit themselves to break free of the erroneous and deeply problematic models of Torah and Halakhah.

I have often said that, in the era of the Haskalah, young people were presented with an impossible dilemma: to be wise and wicked, or righteous and foolish. It is no wonder that most of the public chose to be wise and wicked, and thus secularism emerged. The flip side was those who chose to be righteous and foolish—thus conservatism and Haredi-ism were born: religious conceptions that are benighted, detached, and foolish. Framing the discussion and dilemma in this way causes double harm: we lost the wise who leave and exit, and those who remain hold to a dark Torah. This is also what is happening today—partly due to conservatives and their mode of debate, and partly due to these forms of criticism against them. The critics themselves cause Torah and Halakhah to remain on the dark side; anyone moral and logical is thereby non-religious or non-Jewish—or, at most, “lite.” In this way, by means of this problematic form of criticism, we ourselves lend a hand to the terrible hillul Hashem (desecration of God’s name) committed by conservatives and to the transformation of Judaism into a dark and repulsive Torah, as is happening today.

This is why the conceptualization of the Third Path is so important. Our point is to say that it is not a “lite” offshoot of one of the two existing paths, but an alternative path. Without such conceptualization, no genuine change in Torah and Judaism themselves is possible, and we are doomed to live within the dreadful dichotomy I described—where being Jewish means being stupid, disconnected from honest reasoning and from facts, and immoral.