“Texts of Terror”: Rabbinic Texts, Speech Acts, and the Control of Mores

AJS Review

Volumn 21, Issue 2, 1996, Pages 273-298

  Satlow, Michael L ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA   (United States)

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EID: 85012520542     PISSN: 03640094     EISSN: 14754541     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/S0364009400008539     Document Type: Article

References (68)

1. J. L. Austin, How to Do Things with Words (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1962).
2. How to Do Things with Words., pp. 4-11,94-107.
3. How to Do Things with Words., pp. 5-6.
4. I return below to this issue in greater detail. The scholarly controversy over the limits of the application of speech act theory is beyond the scope of this paper, but see especially John R. Searle, Speech Acts: An Essay in the Philosophy of Language (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1969). Throughout this paper I follow the conclusions of Petrey, who argues that all language, including textual language (for which Austin did not allow), is “performative,” that is, has illocutionary force (Sandy Petrey, Speech Acts and Literary Theory [New York: Routledge, 1990], pp. 22-41).
5. One notable exception is Steven D. Fraade, From Tradition to Commentary: Torah and Its Interpretation in the Midrash Sijre to Deuteronomy (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1991). Fraade argues that Sifre Deuteronomy had an illocutionary effect on its audience, helping rabbis to establish group identification and solidarity: “In a sense, as they work through the commentary the commentary works throught [sic] them,” (p. 19). I argue here that disparate traditions, like a fixed text, can also have a transformative force.
6. See Emily Martin, “The Egg and the Sperm: How Science has Constructed a Romance Based on Stereotypical Male-Female Roles,” Signs 16 (1991): 485-501.
7. Rabbinic social organization is poorly understood. Lee Levine postulates that in Palestine in the mid-late third century the rabbis formed a “class,” although his use of the term is somewhat vague (Lee Levine, The Rabbinic Class of Roman Palestine [New York: Jewish Theological Seminary and Yad Izhak Ben-Zvi, 1989], pp. 13-14). Goodblatt and Gafhi have debated whether rabbis in Babylonia were organized in disciple circles or larger learning academies. See David Goodblatt, Rabbinic Instruction in Sassanian Babylonia (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1975); and idem, “New Developments in the Study of the Babylonian Yeshivot,” lion 46 (1981): 14-38 (in Hebrew); Isaiah Gafni, “Yeshiva and Metivta,” Zion 43 (1978): 12-37 (in Hebrew). Both of these alternatives share the assumption that these groups were organized expressly for the purpose of study and learning of texts. The intended reader of rabbinic texts, especially the Talmudim, is also not well understood. For some preliminary comments, see David Kraemer, “The Intended Reader and the Bavli,” Prooftexts 13 (1993): 125-140, esp. 132-133.
8. Rabbinic jurisdiction over the punishment of offenders who did not voluntarily submit to the rabbinic courts is not well understood. It appears, however, that only in exceptional cases did the rabbis administer punishments other than flogging, and even then they were said to have acted illegally. See Origen, Ep. adAfricanus 14 (Patrologia Graeca, 11:41); b. Git. 67b; b. B. Qam. 59a-b. See further Isaiah M. Gafhi, The Jews of Babylonia in the Talmudic Era (Jerusalem: Zalman Shazar Center 1990), pp. 99-100 (in Hebrew); Jacob Neusner, A History of the Jews in Babylonia (5 vols.; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1965-70), 2:282-287, 3:220-29; Martin Goodman, State and Society in Roman Galilee, A.D. 132-212, (Totowa, N.J.: Rowman & Allanheld, 1983), p. 123.
9. I make no argument throughout this paper on the thorny issue of whether, and when, these “texts” circulated in oral or written form. While my argument is neater if we assume assume that they circulated in written form at a fairly early stage of their genesis, it is not invalidated if we assume an oral circulation (whether in a public context via sermons or a narrower context in individual rabbinic schools or academies). Although it strikes me as unlikely that the texts considered here, many of which are highly stylized, circulated orally, it is likely that the attitudes expressed in them were part of public discourse. I thank a referee for raising this issue.
10. For a statement on how these strategies of control, among others, were manipulated and deployed, see Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality, vol. 1, An Introduction, trans. Robert Hurley (New York: Random House, 1980).
11. See Teresa de Lauretis, Technologies of Gender (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1987), pp. 1-30.
12. What this passage means in its biblical context-especially its similarity or dissimilarity to trials by ordeal-is not our concern. In this article I deal only with the rabbinic use of this passage. For some comments on its biblical context, see Tikvah Frymer-Kensky, “The Strange Case of the Suspected Sotah (Numbers V 11-31),” Vetus Testamentum 34 (1984): 11-26.
13. Milgrom argues that (2) and (3) may be inherent in the biblical text. See Jacob Milgrom, Numbers, TheJPS Torah Commentary (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1989), p. 303, nn. 55, 64.
14. See t. Sot. 14:2 (ed. S. Lieberman, The Tosefta [4 vols.; New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1955-88], 3.2:235-236).
15. m. Sota 1:4, 6 (ed. H. Albeck, The Mishnah [rpt. 6 vols.; Tel Aviv: Dvir, 1988], 3:234, 235). All translations of rabbinic texts are my own. All translations of biblical texts are from Tanakh: A New Translation of the Holy Scriptures according to the Traditional Hebrew Text (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1985). Some translations have been slightly modified.
16. For another example on the link between the suspected adulteress and public humiliation, see Sipre Deut. 26 (ed. L. Finkelstein, Sipre on Deuteronomy [rpt New York: Jewish Theological Seminary, 1969], 36-37); Sipre Num. 137 (ed. H. S. Horovitz, Sipre Numbers [rpt. Jerusalem: Shalem, 1992], 183); b. Yoma 76b. On this tradition, see Saul Lieberman, Greek in Jewish Palestine (New York: Jewish Theological Seminary, 1942), pp. 162-164; Steven D. Fraade, “Sipre Deuteronomy 26 (ad Deut. 3:23): How Conscious the Composition?” Hebrew Union College Annual 54 (1983): 245-301. The role that honor and shame played in Jewish societies in late antiquity is obscure.
17. fe. Sofa 8b, my emphasis.
18. m. Sofa 1:5-6 (ed. Albeck, 3:234-235). See also. Sofa 1:7, 17a.
19. On this phrase, see m. Sofa 2:1 (ed. Albeck, 3:237); 6. Sofa 14a; y. Sofa 2:1, 17d. On the meal offering, see Adriana Destro, TTte Law of Jealousy: Anthropology ofSotah (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1989), pp. 89-106.
20. m. Sofa 3:3 (ed. Albeck, 3:240).
21. t. Sofa 2:3 (ed. Lieberman, 3.2:159). The same phrase is used in m. Sanh. 7:2 (ed. Albeck, 4:189-190), to describe how execution by burning is carried out.
22. m. Sofa 1:7 (ed. Albeck, 3:235), cited below.
23. This follows Lieberman's suggestion (Saul Lieberman, Tosefta Ki-fshutah: A Comprehensive Commentary on the Tosefta [10 vols.; New York: Jewish Theological Seminary, 1955-88], 8:637 [in Hebrew]. Hereafter abbreviated Tos. Kip.). The force of this action-a woman putting on a head-covering for her lover-is obscure, but seems to imply that this is a form of dressing up for her lover.
24. Following Lieberman, This follows Lieberman's suggestion.
25. t. Sota 3:2-4 (ed. Lieberman, 3.2:159).
26. See also t. Sota 4:10 (ed. Lieberman, 3.2:174).
27. t. Sota 4:16 (ed. Lieberman, 3.2:175-176).
28. SipreNum. 21 (ed. Horovitz, 25).
29. y. Sota 3:5, 19a. See alsoy Sota 1:5, 17a; 4:1, 19c.
30. For examples of types of intercourse that render a woman a zonah, see m. Yebam. 8:5 (ed. Albeck, 3:43) (levir and his levirate wife when one of them is sterile); m. Ketub. 5:1 (ed. Albeck, 3:103-104) (man and a “wife” to whom he pledged less than the minimum marriage settlement); Sipre Deut. 213 (ed. Finkelstein, 247).
31. Sipra Emor 1:7 (ed. J. H. Weiss, Sipra [Vienna: Jacob Schlossberg, 1862], 94b). See also, Sipra Kod. 7 (ed. Weiss, 90d). The statement is cited three times in the Palestinian Talmud, and in each is considered authoritative: y. Yebam. 6:5, 7c; 7:5, 8b; 13:1, 13b. Its citation in the Babylonian Talmud is always counter-normative: b. Yebam. 59b, 61b, 76a; b. Sank. 51a; b. Tern. 29b, 30a. On this, see further, Michael L. Satlow, Talking about Sex: Rabbinic Rhetorics of Sexuality (Brown Judaic Studies; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1995]), pp. 121-23.
32. For examples, see Sipre Num. 115 (ed. Horovitz, 128-129); y. Ta'an. 1:4, 64d; b. Ber. 23a; b. Sanh. 82a. See further, M. Jastrow, Dictionary of the Targumim, Talmud Babli, Yerushalmi and Midrashic Literature (2 vols.; London: Duckworth, 1886-1903), 1:388, s.v., IOT.
33. “Fields”: m. Ketub. 1:6 (ed. Albeck, 3:90-91); “Bread”: b.Sabb. 62b; b. Yoma 18b; “Fish”: b. Yoma 75a; “Cup”: t. Sofa 5:9 (ed. Lieberman, 3.2:178-79); b. Ketub. 75b. The rabbis regularly use euphemisms when discussing female sexuality. See J. Nacht, “Euphemismes sur la femme dans la litterature rabbinique,” Revues des Etudes Juives 59 (1910): 36-41; E. Z. Melamed, “Lashon Nikiyyah v'Kinuyim b'Mishnah,” Leshonenu 47 (1982-3): 3-17, esp. 7-10 (in Hebrew). See also Page duBois, Sowing the Body: Psychoanalysis and Ancient Representations of Women (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988
34. b. Nid. 45a.
35. m. Nid. 5:4 (ed. Albeck, 5:390); b. Nid. 45a. Alternatively, the mishnah might mean that there is no hymen.
36. My thanks to Judith Romney Wegner who brought this fact to my attention.
37. y. Sofa 4:5, 19d.
38. To the sources already discussed may be added several other texts of generally more legal flavor. Women are legally penalized, for example, for immodest behavior in m. Ketub. 7:6 (ed. Albeck, 3:112); they are, according to some authorities, forced to tend to those needs of their husbands that have sexual overtones even when they themselves are in mourning (b. Mo'ed Qat. 19b); and they are threatened with death in childbirth if they do not inform their husbands that they are menstruating (m. Sabb. 2:6 [ed. Albeck, 2:23], especially as interpreted in b. Sabb. 31b-32a). My thanks to Shaye Cohen, who directed me to some of these sources.
39. Most scholars who have written on rabbinic constructions of sexuality have confined themselves primarily to examinations of rabbinic legislation. See Louis Epstein, Sex Laws and Customs in Judaism (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1948). More sophisticated is David Biale, Eros and the Jews, pp. 33-59; Boyarin, Carnal Israel.
40. m. Sofa 1:7-8 (ed. Albeck, 3:235-236).
41. This shift is partly to be accounted for by the associative grouping of m. Sofa 1:7-9 (ed. Albeck, 3:235-236). All of these passages are linked by their discussion of “measure for measure.” Such associative groupings are common in the Mishnah. See H. L. Strack and G. Stemberger, Introduction to the Talmud and Midrash (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1992), pp. 137-138. Nevertheless, this particular grouping appears not to be coincidental, but to have been intentionally constructed in order to convey its point. It is interesting to note, although beyond the scope of this paper, that the next pericope, 1:9, shifts suddenly again. This passage not only applies the “measure for measure” principle to reward rather than punishment, but begins with Miriam. The purpose of beginning with Miriam might be to contrast the “bad” woman with the “good” woman.
42. According to 2 Sam 16:22, Absalom had intercourse with his father's concubines. The number of concubines is inferred from 2 Sam 15:16.
43. m. Sofa 9:9 (ed. Albeck, 3:258-259). See the interpretation of this passage offered in t. Sofa 14:2 (ed. Lieberman, 3.2:235-236).
44. Num 25:6-8.
45. SipreNum. 131 (ed. Horovitz, 172).
46. b. Sank. 81b-82b. See also b. ‘Abod. Tar. 36b.
47. See Michael L. Satlow, ‘“Wasted Seed’: The History of a Rabbinic Idea,” Hebrew Union College Annual, 65 (1994): 137-75.
48. Not surprisingly, the only passages in rabbinic literature where, to my knowledge, men are sexually objectified discuss pathic male homoeroticism, i.e., situations where men are thought to be behaving like women. See Michael L. Satlow, “‘They Abused Him Like a Woman’: Homoeroticism, Gender Blurring, and the Rabbis in Late Antiquity,” Journal of the History of Sexuality 5 (1994): 1-25.
49. Austin, How to Do Things, pp. 25-38.
50. Susanne Kappeler, The Pornography of Representation (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1986), esp. pp. 18-62. The androcentric nature of representation is also discussed by de Lauretis, Alice Doesn't pp. 12-36.
51. This position is most often identified with Catherine MacKinnon. See Catherine MacKinnon, Feminism Unmodified (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1987). See further Susan Gubar, “Representing Pornography: Feminism, Criticism, and Depictions of Female Violation,” in For Adult Users Only, ed. Susan Gubar and Joan Hoff (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1989), pp. 47-67.
52. Rae Langton, “Speech Acts and Unspeakable Acts,” Philosophy & Public Affairs 22 (1993): 313.
53. See, for examples, Livy 3.44-58; Ovid, Ars Amatoria, 1.99-134. See also Amy Richlin, “Reading Ovid's Rapes,” in Pornography and Representation, pp. 158-179.
54. See, for example, Martial 3.85, 86; 6.23.
55. See Athenaeus 13.605f4-10. See further Henry, “The Edible Woman.”
56. See Amy Richlin, “Roman Oratory, Pornography, and the Silencing of Anita Hill,” Southern California Law Review 65 (1992): 1321-32.
57. Pornography and Representation, p. xviii.
58. See for examples Sir 23:22-26, 26:10-12, 41:22, 42:9-10. Camp sees 26:10-12 as “pornographic” (Claudia V. Camp, “Understanding a Patriarchy: Women in Second Century Jerusalem Through the Eyes of Ben Sira,” in Women Like This’: New Perspectives on Jewish Women in the Greco-Roman World, ed. Amy-Jill Levine [Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1991], pp. 1-39, esp. 22).
59. See Betsy Halpern-Amaru, “Portraits of Women in Pseud-Philo's Biblical Antiquities” in “Women Like This”, pp. 83-106.
60. Paul, especially in 1 Cor 7, also appears to objectify women. This is not to suggest that all Jewish literature from this time had these characteristics. Far from it: this literature, more than most contemporaneous bodies of literature, gives remarkable expression to female characters. See, for examples, Judith and Testament of Job. See further Richard I. Pervo, “Aseneth and Her Sisters: Women in Jewish Narrative and in Greek Novels,” in “Women Like This “, pp. 147-160, esp. 155-159; Pieter W. van der Horst, “Images of Women in the Testament of Job,” in Studies on the Testament of Job (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), pp. 93-116.
61. See Frances E. Mascia-Lees, Patricia Sharpe, and Colleen Ballerino Cohen, “The Post Modernist Turn in Anthropology: Cautions from a Feminist Perspective,” Signs 15 (1989): 11; Susan Gal, “Between Speech and Silence: The Problematics of Research on Language and Gender,” in Gender at the Crossroads of Knowledge: Feminist Anthropology in the Postmodern Era, ed. Micaela di Leonardo (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991), pp. 175-203. Bourdieu too notes that strategies of reproduction of cultural norms are intrinsically related to strategies of social domination. See Pierre Bourdieu, Outline of a Theory of Practice, trans. Richard Nice (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991), p. 70.
62. Christine Froula, “The Daughter's Seduction: Sexual Violence and Literary History,” Signs 11 (1986): 633. See also Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar, The Madwoman in the Attic: The Woman Writer and the Nineteenth-Century Literary Imagination (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1979), pp. 16-17.
63. Although in later times, different kinds of humiliating ceremonies do appear to have existed in Jewish communities. See Saul Lieberman, “Shaving of the Hair and Uncovering of the Face Among Jewish Women,” in his Texts and Studies, (New York: Ktav, 1974), pp. 52-56.
64. The relationship between pornography and actual violence against women is, of course, a still unanswered question. Other rabbinic dicta, however, are clear in prohibiting marital rape. See Boyarin, Carnal Israel, pp. 113-131; Nahum Rackover, “Coercive Marital Relations Between a Man and His Wife,” Shenaton Ha-Mishpat Ha-Ivri: Annual of the Institute for Research in Jewish Law 6-7 (1979-80): 295-317 (in Hebrew). We might also presume that women had recourse against abusive husbands in their own families, as appears to have been the case in ancient Rome. See Sarah B. Pomeroy, “The Relationship of the Married Woman to Her Blood Relatives in Rome,” Ancient Society 7 (1976): 215-27. The relationship between Jewish women and their families in late antiquity, however, requires further investigation.
65. Hence also the trouble that the rabbis, like other men in antiquity, had in legislating and regulating women who had no male guardians, such as widows. See Judith Romney Wegner, Chattel or Person? The Status of Women in the Mishnah (New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), esp. pp. 114-144.
66. My thanks to a referee for encouraging me to clarify my argument at this point.
67. This would coincide with the general Palestinian rabbinic emphasis on the reproductive function of sex, in contrast to the Babylonians. Cf. Satlow, Testing the Dish, pp. 317-20.
68. Phyllis Trible, Texts of Terror: Literary-Feminist Readings of Biblical Narratives (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984).