Q&A: Masturbation and Wasting Semen Nowadays
Masturbation and Wasting Semen Nowadays
Question
Hello Rabbi,
I’ve heard about studies claiming that ejaculation protects against prostate cancer. I also saw that Maimonides writes as follows:
And likewise, when he has intercourse, he should not do so except in order to keep his body healthy and to preserve the semen. Therefore, he should not have intercourse whenever he feels desire, but only at a time when he knows that he needs to emit semen as a medical treatment, or to preserve the semen.
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The physician-sages said: one in a thousand dies from other illnesses, but the thousandth dies from excessive intercourse. Therefore, a person must be careful about this matter if he wishes to remain well. He should have intercourse only when his body is healthy and especially strong, and he has a strong erection even without intent, and he distracts himself to something else yet the erection remains; and he feels heaviness from his loins downward, and as though the cords of the testicles are being drawn, and his flesh is warm. Such a person needs to have intercourse, and it is a remedy for him to do so.
If so, it seems that even according to Maimonides there is a need to emit semen. If so, why shouldn’t there be grounds to permit an unmarried man to emit semen from time to time (since this would not be semen emitted in vain, but for some purpose)? Something along the lines of what you wrote in this responsum here. Especially nowadays, when there is a phenomenon of delayed marriage and a person can find himself in a state of the prohibition against emitting semen for many years. Also, it may be that not emitting semen causes more sexual thoughts.
Best regards,
Answer
Quite apart from the question of how much weight should be given to Maimonides’ medical claims, on the principled level there is a prohibition against wasting semen, which according to most opinions is Torah-level. To permit a prohibition, a clear and direct life-threatening consideration is required, and that is not what we have here. If some action might help or harm one’s health, that does not create a life-threatening situation; otherwise there would be a Torah prohibition against eating something unhealthy, going out onto the road, or not sleeping six hours every night.
The consideration of difficulty is indeed significant and not simple, but I have no way to use it to permit this. At most, one can say that if someone does this, he is close to acting under compulsion.
The consideration of preventing sexual thoughts likewise does not justify violating a prohibition. At most, this too is an argument for compulsion.
Discussion on Answer
Well? That’s exactly what I argued here too. When you emit semen for the sake of having a child, that is the purpose of the semen, and therefore it is permitted even where there is no compulsion. That is a full permission. When you emit semen for some other purpose, compulsion is needed to allow it, and even there it is not a permission ab initio, but only an exemption from liability.
But in the responsum I linked to, which discusses masturbation for the sake of sex therapy, it’s not a case of life-threatening danger, and still you said that there it is permitted.