Rabbi Speaks About Sex

Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg, editor of “The Passionate Torah: Sex and Judaism,” arrived at the Harvard Book Store last night for an event co-organized with Harvard Hillel, reading from the new book and looking to address some of the mysteries of Jewish sexuality.

“This is meant to be a playground for new thinking on Jewish sex,” Ruttenberg said of her book. “I just sort of convened the conversation.”

The book, a compendium of essays from leading Jewish and non-Jewish academics on topics ranging from masturbation to modesty, was published in June by New York University Press. Yet despite the academic credentials of the authors who penned most of the book’s essays, Ruttenberg said that she designed The Passionate Torah with “the intelligent lay reader in mind.”

“The whole idea is that smart people are capable of dealing with big questions,” she said. “I wanted to take them seriously.”

A graduate of both Brown and Los Angeles’s Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies, Ruttenberg has written several other books, including “Yentl’s Revenge: The Next Wave of Jewish Feminism,” and currently serves on the editorial board at Jewschool.com. She said that the idea for The Passionate Torah came to her after she had an idea for an essay related to the topic.

“Sex is Torah,” she said in her address to the audience of around 30, mostly composed of older Cambridge locals and a few students. “It’s part of our spirituality and part of our connection to the divine.”

Ruttenberg summarized some of the issues in her book at yesterday’s talk, working her way easily from the presence of homoeroticism in sexually segregated communities to the role of female masturbation in Jewish sacred texts.

“Sex toys are mentioned in the Talmud, but female masturbation is not,” she said.

After reading a steamy passage from the thirteenth century about the sexual effects of circumcision, Ruttenberg looked up from her notes, asking the audience, “See how great it is to be a Jew?”

Michael Simon, associate director of Harvard Hillel, said that his organization often works with the Harvard Bookstore to bring in speakers Hillel could not necessarily attract alone. In the past, the team has co-hosted events for such speakers as writer Michael Chabon and diplomat Dennis Ross.

“We have an opportunity to bring in writers who are grappling with the questions of what it means to be Jewish and what it means to be human,” Simon said. “Asking these questions about sexuality is particularly important for our students.”

Ruttenberg admitted some might find the contents of her book too controversial.

“Frankly, there are lots and lots of Jews who don’t take me seriously at all,” she said.

But the crowd lined up to buy copies of The Passionate Torah.

“I would say it’s controversial but not taboo,” said Reyzl R. Geselowitz ’10.

—Staff writer James K. McAuley can be reached at mcauley@fas.harvard.edu.