jewish and gay. gay and jewish

I have asked for requests what people want me to write about... I haven’t received many responses. But i did receive one earlier this week so that's what i'm writing about. It was in reference to a post I made earlier on, way back in april. I talked about being jewish and gay and can they coexist. Of course i probably didn't delve much into it then. I will talk about it from a couple of different viewpoints. Feel free to comment, argue, put forth your own views. So AJK this is for you :).

There are many different types of jews, and I hope I don’t offend anyone with what I’m about to write (but I probably will). Everything I write is my opinion only. Surely there are more knowledgeable people out there, but this is my blog ;) Some are more religious and some less so, some keep the commandments in the torah, some don’t, some keep some of them. I’m not going to start saying there’s a right way and a wrong way. There are different ways and people can do as much or as little as they like.

Marriage is a hot topic in Judaism. Everyone’s mother wants them to grow up, settle down, get married and give them grandkids. Espcially a jewish mother. And they’ll push push push until they get it. Yeah jewish mothers are pushy. It’s funny to me at least, ok it’s not funny, it’s interesting how some people with pick and choose what they do. For example, some people could be the most irreligious, non believers, whatever, don’t keep anything, they’ll happily eat ham sandwiches on yom kippur, but god forbid their wonderful jewish son should marry a non jewish girl.

The gay thing then throws a spanner in the works. Some people will take it ok, some people won’t. Some people will sit ‘shiva’ which is the traditional 7 day mourning period after the someone’s death. I guess it will be hard for everyone. Both the person coming out and their family.

From a religious perspective there are other things to consider. There’s nothing wrong with being gay itself. It’s all the sex that you’re gonna have that is the issue. Gay sex is a no-no. Of course so is breaking the Sabbath, eating non kosher and all that stuff. So as far as I’m concerned, if you don’t keep one law, why should u care about keeping another law. I’ve started to pick and choose things, which I guess is a slippery slide. I don’t keep a lot of things, at least in private. I just don’t really care about them to be honest, and the same goes for sex. I’m a good person, and that’s all that matters to me. And if I broke a few rules, well I don’t care.

Now dealing with the technicalities of it all, the prohibition is against anal sex between males. Not oral sex, and not sex between two women. At least not directly. This leads us to the cardinal sins of Judaism. Technically, there are 3 sins that one is supposed to allow themselves to be killed rather than violate. Murder, idolatry, and sexual immorality. One might think aha! This is bad! Well I guess it is. But then think about what comes under the category of sexual immorality – homosexual anal sex, adultery with a married woman, sex with a woman while she is a ‘niddah’ – menstruating. Now how many people actually keep that last one? Not that many I’d think. So me having gay sex is no worse in my mind than a person who doesn’t wait the specified amount of time after menstruating before sleeping with his wife.

I’ll try to summarize what I’m trying to say because I know I’m not coming across so clearly. I don’t see anything wrong with being jewish and gay. Just as you can be jewish and not keep the Sabbath or kosher, why can’t you be jewish and gay. If you come from a religious background then things get more difficult. You would be doing your best to keep the other laws but then what about the gay thing. Do you ignore it? Do you not have sex with other men? Do you remain celibate? Only the person actually going through that can answer that question. Some will argue god made me gay, how can it be wrong, which is certainly another valid point. As far as I’m concerned, I am gay, I didn’t choose to be gay, and there’s nothing I can do about it. So I live with it. I’m gay. And I will do gay things, I will have gay sex, and I won’t feel bad about it. That’s all one can do. The emotional part will be harder to deal with. I know my family will take it hard when I do come out. My friends too. How will they react? I have no idea. Who will still want to be my friend? What about my family? Siblings? Cousins? Will most of it end up in the scrapheap? Who knows. And that’s what worries me the most.

j