Q&A: Confusion. Simply confusion.
Confusion. Simply confusion.
Question
Hello Rabbi Michi,
When the month of Av begins, joy really is diminished. And not only because of the Ninth of Av, but also because it’s my birthday and the day of passing of Rabbi Adin, of blessed memory.
This Sabbath I had a pretty long discussion with the fanatical side of my family about gender transition and transgenderism. They of course said that normalizing this is forbidden, and that my supporting it is helping Satan and the forces of impurity. And that it’s forbidden to normalize LGBT people at all because it affects little children, and that LGBT people should be beaten up, and that every transgender person is the greatest corrupter of the public because they show children that this is possible. And if someone like that were in the family, they’d excommunicate them—along with more violent remarks. And of course religion is perfect, and all the Sages and figures of the Hebrew Bible were ministering angels who never sinned, etc.
I said: Wait, this is God? This is the God I serve? This?
No way. There’s no way in the world that people justify violence in His name.
In short, after they found out that I’m trans, and even on hormones, they decided to stop seeing me.
My question is: is there any way to reach a compromise with them? Something to persuade them? Maybe on the halakhic side?
Or should I simply continue in what I believe is the right path.
This is a hard question, so sorry for asking it.
The questioner.
Answer
I don’t see a way to persuade them about this. On the substance of the matter, I myself am not sure there is no prohibition involved here (so the phrase “the rightness of my path” is not necessarily one I accept). There are indeed various arguments on this topic, and I discussed them in columns that dealt with it, but physical sex reassignment in a way that prevents a man from having children is, simply speaking, problematic on the halakhic level.
In any case, even if there are arguments, usually religious people do not listen to them. You can of course ask them why they don’t also beat up Sabbath desecrators and people who eat non-kosher food—in other words, what is so special דווקא about this prohibition? Perhaps they’ll answer you that really all offenders should be beaten up, but that might at least reassure you that in their eyes your situation is not unique.
Discussion on Answer
I don’t think freezing sperm solves the prohibition of castration. But I’m not sure. It’s an interesting question that requires thought.
Sorry for jumping in, but in my opinion this is simply a matter of medicine—gender dysphoria is a medical condition that is highly likely to lead to danger to life (high suicide rates, etc.), and if the way to cure this life-threatening illness is through castration, how is that different from castration in order to treat cancer, for example.
If that is the case, then perhaps you are right.
Hello Rabbi Michi!
It’s me again. Regarding preventing the birth of children—I could have children from my sperm (I froze it). True, that’s only for about a decade, but still it’s better than nothing. I don’t know how that would affect things on the halakhic level. When I tried to talk with them about which prohibition those poor souls, driven by the evil inclination, are supposedly violating, I was answered with “a man shall not wear a woman’s garment.” I think you addressed that in your column, and maybe I saw something about it from Rabbi Katz too. But I don’t see any discussion with them going anywhere. For example, when I tried to talk about the sins of King David (where in the Hebrew Bible it explicitly says that he did what was evil in the eyes of the Lord, and some commentators say so too), I was immediately told that King David is the Holy of Holies, and of course he revives the dead, sits with the cherubs, is the fourth leg of the divine chariot, and drives a Merkava tank.
So basically my question is whether freezing sperm changes anything halakhically, and as for the rest, it doesn’t seem to me that there’s anything to be done. Thank you very much, Rabbi Michi, truly.