Carnal Israel - Reading Sex in Talmudic Culture (Paperback, Revised)

Beginning with a startling endorsement of the patristic view of Judaism--that it was a "carnal" religion, in contrast to the spiritual vision of the Church--Daniel Boyarin argues that rabbinic Judaism was based on a set of assumptions about the human body that were profoundly different from those of Christianity. The body--specifically, the sexualized body--could not be renounced, for the Rabbis believed as a religious principle in the generation of offspring and hence in intercourse sanctioned by marriage.
This belief bound men and women together and made impossible the various modes of gender separation practiced by early Christians. The commitment to coupling did not imply a resolution of the unequal distribution of power that characterized relations between the sexes in all late-antique societies. But Boyarin argues strenuously that the male construction and treatment of women in rabbinic Judaism did not rest on a loathing of the female body. Thus, without ignoring the currents of sexual domination that course through the Talmudic texts, Boyarin insists that the rabbinic account of human sexuality, different from that of the Hellenistic Judaisms and Pauline Christianity, has something important and empowering to teach us today.

General

Imprint:	University of California Press
Country of origin:	United States
Series:	The New Historicism: Studies in Cultural Poetics, 25
Release date:	August 1995
First published:	1993
Authors:	Daniel Boyarin
Dimensions:	229 x 152 x 18mm (L x W x T)
Format:	Paperback - Trade
Pages:	272
Edition:	Revised
ISBN-13:	978-0-520-20336-5
Categories:	Books > Social sciences > Sociology, social studies > Ethnic studies > Jewish studies Books > Humanities > Religion & beliefs > Non-Christian religions > Judaism > General Books > Religion & Spirituality > Non-Christian religions > Judaism > General
LSN:	0-520-20336-4
Barcode:	9780520203365

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