Remember that even moderatly reliable birth control was non-exisitiant before the 1960s–until then sex=babies pretty quickly. In a pre-industrial society single parents were a serious burden, and the comunity could only support a limited number of single women with children. This is why the bible is so concerned with widows and orphans–to be in that condition was to be destitute and misrable at best. Under thes circumstances a strong prohibition on having children without a public and binding contract from a man guarenteeing his support of those children was to the benefit of both the potential mothers and the community as a whole.
FTR, while I support the spirit of Keeve’s post, I am totally unfamiliar with the idea that Judaism proscribes relations between spouses that are angry at one another.
It’s buried down in the details, and an argument could be made that it’s merely discouraged rather than actually forbidden, but the idea is definitely there. It is mentioned as one example of several situations to be avoided precisely because of this idea that sex is intended to strengthen the marriage rather than weaken it. Other examples include when one (or both) spouses have decided to divorce, or when one (or both) is drunk or asleep. I chose to post the “angry” example first, because it can be viewed as akin to rape.
Two comments:
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I have forwarded your “parody” to the Destroying Angels Enforcement Committee for review. Please specify whether you would prefer to be destroyed by a) fire from heaven, b) pestilence, c) famine, or d) being talked to death by Mormon missionaries.
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When the anti-polygamy laws were passed to outlaw this practice, they specifically stated that it was only unlawful to “cohabit” with more than one woman if you were actually married to them both. The objection wasn’t the number of sexual partners you had (althought that was apparently the basis for the moral outrage), you just couldn’t legally bind yourself to more than one. So the Mormons were caught between a rock and a hard place – they couldn’t stay married (that was against the law), they couldn’t divorce and stay together (that was a sin).
Where? The Talmud? If so, where?
Try Shulchan Aruch Orach Chaim, chapter 240. (Just a guess, but most stuff on that subject is there.) From that page, you ought to have access to the earlier, Talmudic sources.
[JEWSPEAK]
Chaim,
Chapter 240? That’s ummm… Reish Mem, right? I’ve never been good at that! 
Thanks for the tip… now I have something to do during the Piyutim tomorrow.
[/JEWSPEAK]
Now back to your regular program…
[/QUOTE]
Two comments:
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I have forwarded your “parody” to the Destroying Angels Enforcement Committee for review. Please specify whether you would prefer to be destroyed by a) fire from heaven, b) pestilence, c) famine, or d) being talked to death by Mormon missionaries.
-
When the anti-polygamy laws were passed to outlaw this practice, they specifically stated that it was only unlawful to “cohabit” with more than one woman if you were actually married to them both. The objection wasn’t the number of sexual partners you had (althought that was apparently the basis for the moral outrage), you just couldn’t legally bind yourself to more than one. So the Mormons were caught between a rock and a hard place – they couldn’t stay married (that was against the law), they couldn’t divorce and stay together (that was a sin). **
[/QUOTE]Awww hell, I always have a tough time chosing between pestilence and famine. Can I have my people get back to you on that?
Okay, now for the Non-Smarmy portion. 2) raises a wretched problem. How was it resolved, Oh Outer Planet of Knowledge?
Cartooniverse
I don’t know if this is quite right, and it definitely isn’t the root of dehement anti-sex themes in the writings of the Church Fathers.
Firstly, birth control. It has always existed. Only recently, however, has it been considered a male’s responsibility. From crocodile dung in Ancient Egypt to squeezed lemon halves in the later middle ages, women have historical put an odd array of things into their vaginas to prevent pregnancy. While grotesque by our standards, these were definitely at least somewhat reliable. There were always lots of methods both before and after coitus. Don’t let a millenium of history and literature penned solely by monks fool you into thinking that no one had sex.
Secondly, the early Church was extremely anti-sex and anti-woman. This is well documented in the writings of the early Church Fathers. All of them considered chastity higher than marriage. (Chastity meaning abstinence, which I what I thought it always meant despite someone’s post here). Part of this, at least, can be explained by the fact that these people thought the end was near, St. Paul among others never expected to die. They were bracing themselves for the coming of God, and devoting their lives to it. You can imagine this epic tension in the air. Sex becomes kind of meaningless.
With love,
Little Mr. Wanna-Be Scholar
Remember kids, it’s only premarital sex if you’re planning on getting married.
I know that Hindus are very concerned with sexual purity for women. Non-virgin women are typically unable to marry. If a husband finds out his wife was not a virgin, murders are not uncommon. Then we have all those ideas about how a wife should commit suicide if her husband dies. And Hinduism is paganism!
I’m just trying to even the scales. Some people think that Christianity is somehow obsessed with sexual purity while other religions are reasonable and sane. Nope. There are many many many puritantical non-Christian religions.
To continue our intermittent hijack:
Some fled to Mexico, others went into hiding, but for the most part, once the government was convinced that the church was 1) no longer advocating polygamy and 2) not sanctioning any new polygamous unions, those who were already involved were allowed to quietly continue without interference. Those who had been jailed were released and the church’s property (which had been siezed by the federal government) was returned.
As you are no doubt aware, there are pockets of polygamists still extant in Utah and nearby states. Many of them believe that, because the church changed its policy due to pressure from the government, they are the ones who are obeying God’s law and that the “official” Mormon church is apostate. The feeling is, or course, mutual and the church vigorously defends itself against them, but there’s not much the church can do except to excommunicate them (which they don’t recognize anyway). Local law officials are usually unable to enforce the anti-polygamy laws because they don’t often actually legally marry more than one wife; the “marriages” are private religious ceremonies not sanctioned by the state.
The fact is, we have no idea if these techniques were reliable. Considering how dangerous and painful child birth was before the modern era, and how high birth rates remained, I think it is likely that they worked about as well as the home techniques used today by teenagers.
I have read literature on pre-modern birthcontrol techniques, and frankly, those that were not highly skeptical struck me as being more political pieces about the great 'ole days of the matriarchy than serious scholorly works.
Furthermore, I never meant to imply that people didn’t have sex; merely that when they did have sex there was a high degree of pressure on them to get married, and thus shuift the burden of caring for the child away from the community as a whole.
On the misogyny of church fathers: while they were certainly mysogynistic, you have to look at this in the wider context of the time. A commen element in Eastern religions, from Stoicim to the mystery religions, was that physical pleasure is highly suspect. Many groups went as far as the Manachiens, who held that fleash bad, spirit good. Sex is a phsysical pleasure, so it was on the bad, or at least the “necisary evil” list for many of these groups, but so was flaverful food, comfortable clothes, and in some exteme cases, anything that wasn’t living on a pillar in the desert.
Lastly, it is not enough to say “Church faters hated women because they were patriachial bastards.” People have reasons for what they do and believe.
Pagan vs Christian:
Allegedly, one of the reasons for the strong prohibition against sex outside of the marriage is that in patrilineal societies (where all inheritance is reckoned from the male side of the family), sex had to be inside the marriage in order to be certain of the lineage of the child. If I’m not mistaken, Hinduism is patrilineal?
By the way, neither Judaism nor Christianity teach that sex inside of marriage is just for pro-creation. Sex within the confines of marriage is a gift from God and for the pleasure of the couple.
Here are some verses:
Proverbs 5:18-19
Let your fountain be blessed, and rejoice in the wife of your youth. As a loving hind and a graceful doe, let her breasts satisfy you at all times; be exhilarated always with her love.
Song of Solomon 4:5-6
“Your two breasts are like two fawns, twins of a gazelle, which feed among the lilies. Until the cool of the day when the shadows flee away, I will go my way to the mountain of myrrh and to the hill of frankincense.”
How about a French kiss that outdated France by about 1700 years!
Song of Solomon 4:11
“Your lips, my bride, drip honey; honey and milk are under your tongue, and the fragrance of your garments is like the fragrance of Lebanon.”
Song of Solomon 4:15-16
“You are a garden spring, a well of fresh water, and streams flowing from Lebanon. Awake, O north wind, and come, wind of the south; make my garden breathe out fragrance, let its spices be wafted abroad. May my beloved come into his garden and eat its choice fruits!”
Song of Solomon 7:7-9
“Your stature is like a palm tree, and your breasts are like its clusters. I said, ‘I will climb the palm tree, I will take hold of its fruit stalks.’ Oh, may your breasts be like clusters of the vine, and the fragrance of your breath like apples, and your mouth like the best wine! It goes down smoothly for my beloved, flowing gently through the lips of those who fall asleep.”
I think the gist of what you’re saying is right, without going as far as saying the Church was “anti-sex and anti-woman”. Strictures against fornication are equally applied to men and women. You’re right that ideally men were to avoid marriage and devote themselves singlemindedly to following God, but if they were unduly tempted they should marry to avoid fornication.