Some thoughts on gender and Judaism

Feministe.us – Posted by: Sam

Following up on my most recent post about some different Jewish theoretical approaches to the issue of homosexuality, I would like to offer one or two thoughts on how Judaism approaches gender. Can we devise a modern Jewish theoretical framework for understanding and resolving issues posed to traditional Jewish thought and law by people who bend or break the gender boundaries?

The Torah itself doesn’t have very much to say directly about the issue of gender; the issue was taken up by the rabbis of the Talmud and the later commentators. However, the world of the Bible seems to have been one in which there was a rigid separation between the masculine and feminine worlds…