Ultra-orthodox Jews in Israel have come up with an acceptable form of gay marriage: gay men marry lesbians.
Rabbis from the religious Zionist community have launched an initiative to marry gay men to lesbian women – with some surprising successes.
So far, 11 marriages have been performed. Haaretz conducted an email interview with one such couple, Etti and Roni (not their real names ).
Etti and Roni, both religious, were married five years ago. Though they were honest with each other about their sexual orientations from their first meeting, to the outside world, they portray themselves as a normal heterosexual couple. Today, they have two children, and are thrilled with the results.
“It’s incredible,” they wrote. “Six years ago, we didn’t think we would ever be this happy. We thought everything was black, that we’d lost our chance of a normal life. But today, things are good for us. There are gaps, but that’s true in every case. And we fill them with the great love we give to and receive from our children, and also enjoy the simple human love we give each other, such as any two people can give and receive.”
(Via: Gene Veith)
March 14th, 2011 | 12:22 pm
Is it bad that I first thought this was an article from The Onion?
March 14th, 2011 | 1:08 pm
If I knew more Yiddish I’d be able to come up with the word to define the level of pragmatism so evident in this mindset…
March 14th, 2011 | 1:41 pm
Well, it’s one of the options I would seriously consider, if I were gay.
Sex is important enough that one should not lie to one’s partner about it, but not important enough to deprive one’s child of a mother or father relationship over.
March 14th, 2011 | 4:58 pm
I’m not sure this is naked pragmatism, at least in the bad sense of “pragmatism.” Granted if it were a wholehearted “open marriage” kind of thing, that would be pretty bad. But it seems like sexual unfaithfulness is still understood to be an actual infraction, just one that is rather gently approached. I’m thinking our flamingly heterosexual and self-consciously Christian medieval forbears weren’t too different at that point.
One thing I do appreciate about it is the way in which it distinguishes romantic passion from the kind of love that it takes to make a marriage, and a family work. They aren’t identical. Romantic passion is an important and desirable element of conjugal love, but it is not, as moderns would have it, the sine qua non. I found it interesting that many of the commenters on the original article immediately glommed onto “how bad it is for the kids to grow up in a loveless marriage,” when the people involved affirmed that the marriages do in fact involve genuine love.
I’m not saying this is a really good thing, but it’s probably not a bad thing for the reasons the people most likely to get upset about it, think it is.
March 14th, 2011 | 5:26 pm
One thing I do appreciate about it is the way in which it distinguishes romantic passion from the kind of love that it takes to make a marriage, and a family work. They aren’t identical. Romantic passion is an important and desirable element of conjugal love, but it is not, as moderns would have it, the sine qua non. I found it interesting that many of the commenters on the original article immediately glommed onto “how bad it is for the kids to grow up in a loveless marriage,” when the people involved affirmed that the marriages do in fact involve genuine love.
And there you may very well have the difference between gay marriage vs. real marriage.
The recognition that love and lust are not the same thing.
March 14th, 2011 | 6:14 pm
This reminds me of Newshour panel in late 2003 where Jerry Falwell was teamed with an orthodox rabbi against 2 SSM supporters. Falwell’s jaw dropped when his rabbinical partner said that gay men make ideal fathers and husbands in terms of Jewish ideals of fatherhood and husbandhood.
That said, having known people in this situation, it’s rife with huge problems for the couple, and not something I would recommend, even abstractly.
March 14th, 2011 | 7:09 pm
FYI, “religious Zionists” are by definition not ultra-Orthodox. They are modern Orthodox (i.e., go to college, work as professionals, wear modern clothing).
March 14th, 2011 | 9:20 pm
“The recognition that love and lust are not the same thing.”
So long as one does not assume that non-gay=love and gay=lust….
Because I have witnessed firsthand heroically self-sacrificial love in gay couples, from them for their families and others. And that love is not neatly segregated from the romantic love that formed those relationships in the first place. And I am hardly alone. To say otherwise is a gross offense against truth.
March 15th, 2011 | 5:29 am
“The recognition that love and lust are not the same thing.”
So long as one does not assume that non-gay=love and gay=lust….
Because I have witnessed firsthand heroically self-sacrificial love in gay couples, from them for their families and others.
I do not believe that your sexual desires have any bearing on what sort of person you are.
But there is nothing loving about gay marriage. Having a committed relationship with another person is great, but forcing people to lie so that you can pass yourself off as what you’re not isn’t.
Especially when one of the people whom you are pressuring to lie is your own child, who is expected to be happy about being deprived of the chance to have a mother or father, on the assumption that a little kid can and should be mature enough to understand that daddy’s crotch has needs that are just more important.
March 15th, 2011 | 11:32 am
Blake, I don’t really disagree, but I’m not quite on board with your equating my “romantic passion” (an appropriate emotion within the context of married love or love leading to marriage) and “lust” (a sin.) I would say that gay marriage advocates do frequently confuse “romantic passion” and “love” in their arguments, as in the oft-repeated meme “you want people to live a life without love.” Lust doesn’t even have to enter into my point.
March 15th, 2011 | 2:32 pm
Blake, I don’t really disagree, but I’m not quite on board with your equating my “romantic passion” (an appropriate emotion within the context of married love or love leading to marriage) and “lust” (a sin.)
A lot of times, sin is just something normal, used the wrong way, or in the wrong place, or elevated to a pedestal for worship.
You won’t get far in this world without eating any food at all, but if the word “lust” doesn’t actually cover food addictions, it at least describes the same sort of idea.
Some people are born with nice healthy “normal” desires, while others have desires that are not acceptable. They didn’t ask for this. Yet we expect them to withhold their desires. Gays are right at the border: not categorized with the people whose desires are not in conflict with anything, but not in the same category as the destructive desires we have good reason to fear.
So when we argue about gay sexuality, what we’re really arguing about is, where should the limits be and why?
To me, the limits of my tolerance have to do with selfish behavior. If you’re gay, that doesn’t bother me. What upsets me is when being gay becomes a justification.
And this is about “prioritizing lust” – it is not a specifically gay thing, because it applies to heteros as well – if a person is prioritizing their own bodily and/or emotional pleasures so highly that they’re throwing off the balance of rights and responsibilities, that’s what I think needs to be opposed.
Vigorously.
What should gays do about their problem(s)? I don’t have an answer to that. But I do know that passing it forward onto their children is not an acceptable solution, for reasons that would be obvious if we recognized that children have rights too.
March 15th, 2011 | 6:43 pm
Blake, all I’m saying is that taking my “romantic passion is not the same as love” and recasting it as “lust is not the same as love” as though that’s what I’d said, is a misunderstanding of my point. I’m not taking issue with anything else you said.
March 16th, 2011 | 2:17 am
Blake: In certain cases, it may be true that a sin is just an abnormal (excessive) desire. But in other cases, at least, the New Testament seems to insist on a radical asceticism (cf. Christ on what constitutes adultery).
March 16th, 2011 | 1:22 pm
When I said pragmatism, I meant it in the nicest way possible…
That being said – it takes a Jewish mindset to make this work. If the homosexual couple were Catholic attempting to live according to their Catholic beliefs, it would be a sacramentally invalid marriage. Consummation of the marriage by way of the marital act would be essential, and without it there would be no true marriage.
I’d be interested in hearing from the Protestants among us whether consummation is also essential to a Christian marriage in their view.
March 16th, 2011 | 2:30 pm
Fresh Iced Tea, it seems like consummation is happening. They’re having kids. They’re just not seeking sexual/romantic satisfaction in the consummation…or something.
As a Protestant, I’ll respond to your other question, leaving aside the temptation to point out that if you ask three of us, you’ll get at least four answers.
My view would be that asking the question is like asking whether I should refuse to take communion if I refuse to repent. The only answr to that question is, “repent,” not advice on how to properly conduct yourself while remaining unrepentant, because there’s no way to be “proper” doing that. The parallel is not exact, but it’s the same kind of thing.
A Christian marriage that does not at least attempt consummation is a wrong thing, so I don’t see the point of asking whether it’s a “possible” thing. I mean, I see the point from a theological/theoretical perspective, but it’s sort of like “if you have to ask, you’re already wrong, so start doing it right, and then ask what you should do after that.”
March 16th, 2011 | 4:49 pm
Blake, all I’m saying is that taking my “romantic passion is not the same as love” and recasting it as “lust is not the same as love”
What makes your romantic passion different from a pedophile’s romantic passion?
March 16th, 2011 | 11:02 pm
So I take it that no one here have an issue if they had been thrust into an arranged heterosexual marriage with someone they had no particular physical bond or personal connection with, correct?
Did you all marry to fulfill some particular societal or religious “obligation” without any regard to one’s personal satisfaction? Just curious. Answer honestly.
Blake asks: “What makes your romantic passion different from a pedophile’s romantic passion?”
Do you really need this explained to you? A pedophile’s actions are more analogous to rape than anything else. Since when does a pre-teen (or really, even a young teenager) or sexually undeveloped person consent to the sexual advances of someone much older? The relationship is, in almost all cases, primarily one of abuse.
March 16th, 2011 | 11:33 pm
Because it’s not perverted?
Blake, I don’t know how many different ways I can try it. Let’s try it this way: “I agree that there are different issues involved in gay relationships versus biblically sanctioned ones, but my point was narrower than the one you’re making, and addressing a different issue, so please don’t use my exact words to make a point I was not making. That does not mean I disagree with your point.”
March 16th, 2011 | 11:38 pm
Or rather, please don’t use words slightly different from mine as though they were mine, to make a different point.
@James:
“So I take it that no one here have an issue if they had been thrust into an arranged heterosexual marriage with someone they had no particular physical bond or personal connection with, correct? ”
1. Given the upbringing of probably everyone here, we would not be content with that. However, millions of people throughout history have managed to have pretty successful marriages on those terms, largely due to different expectations of and beliefs about marriage. Some have been happy; some have been unhappy. Strangely, this happens with modern romantically chose marriages as well. I believe the much-touted statistic is that it’s about 50-50.
2. In the cases under discussion here, the people applied to have this kind of marriage arranged. It was not “thrust upon them.”
3. I don’t think anyone here has said that they would not have an issue with a marriage like this themselves, or that they do not have any issues with these marriages as they are. So why would you “take it that” such is the case?
March 17th, 2011 | 5:00 am
Because it’s not perverted?
Blake, I don’t know how many different ways I can try it. Let’s try it this way: “I agree that there are different issues involved in gay relationships versus biblically sanctioned ones, but my point was narrower than the one you’re making, and addressing a different issue, so please don’t use my exact words to make a point I was not making. That does not mean I disagree with your point.”
I’m not trying to attack your romantic passion, either.
But it’s a serious question.
How come one person’s passion is noble while another person’s passion is “bad”?
If we can’t answer that question, then we can’t say gays should or shouldn’t have rights. The idea that gays have rights is based on certain assumptions about sexual pleasure. They are asserting that it is so important that everyone should have a right, protected by law, to experience sexual pleasure in the way their bodies tell them to. This has huge ramifications.
Think about what would happen if you took this to its logical if extreme conclusion. You could still say pedophilia is off limits – but the pedophile could reasonably argue that if everyone else has a right to sexual pleasure, the burden should be shifted to society to figure out what the pedophile should do to safely satisfy his urges. That would become a plausible argument, if sexual pleasure became a basic human right, and it would be a huge burden to transfer.
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