Why I Identify as Male (the prequel)

            I thought that my initial post would clear away some issues and clarify the nature of my male gender identity, enabling me to write the second half of this series. Not a chance. Gender is indeed a curious (and curiouser) thing. So I thought instead it may be helpful to write out a brief gender history, which will explain how I came to my (expanded, limited) notion of masculinity, and why I have not asked this gender question until today.

            As a child and teenager, I had a love for reading, writing poetry, running, talking, music, comedy, and philosophy. I felt supported in these endeavors by my parents. They supported and challenged me, and continue to, so that I become more of a mensch and less of a nudnik. However, at no point have I ever felt like they were policing my gender, or that the state of my masculinity was something to be praised, questioned, or discussed. I was never told to “be a man.” Even when I “became a man,” at my Bar Mitzvah, it always felt like the pressure was to be more mature, to be more adult—not to be more manly.
            I have an older brother who shared some of my interests, but who also may be considered more masculine since he is taller, was never a vegetarian (unlike me, 2002-2008) and more into sports spectating (My fandom ended in 1994 when my favorite player was traded to the Jets, and I didn’t understand if loyalty dictated that I root for the Jets or the Redskins). But I was never made to feel that he was more of a ‘guy’ than I was—I think in my head I simply figured that we were different kinds of people, different kinds of guys.
            I was clearly not a jock, but I do think that my love (and former talent!) for running shielded me from feeling called to prove my masculinity. As a varsity runner in high school, I could express and demonstrate physical prowess, and thus not feel totally alienated from the competitive physicality often associated with maleness. But since running teams always have girls’ and boys’ sides, my athleticism never really felt gendered.
            Moreover, being a Jew meant that I had available diverse images of masculinity: I could be intellectual (like Maimonides), zany (like the Marx Brothers), serious (like Moses), confident (like my brother), and insecure (like Woody Allen), all without ever feeling like I was stepping outside of masculinity.
            Finally, I was in a Jewish high school fraternity, and while I was certainly exposed to (and perpetuated) a fair amount of misogyny and homophobia, my experience there allowed for enough male gender diversity that there was no thought given to what made us men.

            Do you see how all of these factors converged, such that I never once needed to wonder what “masculinity” meant? Without gender as a problem or a challenge, it never came up as a question. That’s a unique privilege that even cismales in more conservative (or religious, or other more hyper-masculine) regions of the world don’t have. But since gender has been so invisible in my life until now, it renders me particularly tone-deaf to many of the identity and political issues surrounding gender.

            Ok, I think I can get away with one more preparatory post before having to write part two. Next up: Why am I asking this question now?

Why I Identify as Male, part one*

I’m writing this post because I’m struggling with understanding gender from my own position as a straight, white, cisgender male… so there’s a lot of blindness I’m working through.

            The fact that I am male-bodied seems like a solid way to begin my explanation, and yet the fact that there are people born male-bodied who do not identify as male means that this explanation is not sufficient. My male genitals, testosterone levels, and secondary sex characteristics—a person could have all of these things and yet not identify as male. So, why do I identify as male?

           

For those readers who feel personally comfortable with the gender binary, I put it to you: Isn’t it weird that something can be so utterly socially conditioned AND simultaneously feel completely natural? My gender identity resides so close to my overall identity that it feels too obvious to explain. It’s instinctual; it’s gut-level. And yet, every time I try to explain why I feel like a male, I end up spouting off a bunch of socially-conditioned descriptors, like:

• I look terrible in a dress.
• I’m not entirely in touch with my emotions.
• I’m not too concerned with my appearance (yes, I see how this contradicts my first bullet-point).

These reasons are pathetic, especially since there are women for whom they hold true, and men for whom they are inaccurate.

           

I can also supply a bunch of reasons that conflate maleness with heterosexuality, cisgender identity, whiteness, American-ness or even just privilege in general:

• I’m attracted to women.
• I feel like society is weighted towards my advantage.
• I enjoy much of what’s considered “male humor.”

No reason listed so far is unique to identifying as male.

            So… why do I identify as male??? If I say “because I don’t feel like a woman,” I’m (A) reiterating all my crappy reasons from above; (B) taking the gender binary as absolute. Still, I don’t feel like a woman, and I also don’t feel gender queer. (Well, I guess if my family/social environment were more hyper-gendered, then I would feel gender queer. My white, liberal, Jewish, middle-class, east coast upbringing allowed me to have a somewhat broader sense of masculinity than if I were from other regions.)

            Do I identify as male? I mean, I pass as male, and I feel fine being treated as male (except when male is equated with some hyper-gender stereotype). I’m comfortable in my own skin (from within, and how others treat me). In general, I feel too privileged to call myself “queer”—the best I can aim for is “ally.”

            Sometimes I prefer simply to identify as a “dude.” For me, “dude” means I’m chill (of course, I’m not always chill), friendly, playful… and whatever else positive you associate with dudes. At the same time, “dude” is usually posed opposite to “chick,” and I have no aversion to many things usually labeled “chick stuff” (for example, quiche or romantic comedies).

            Ok, I’m getting nowhere, but I’ll end with my real complaint: Being a white, straight, cisgender (etc., etc.) person means that I’ve never had to defend or explain my identity as a male. And yet, I am currently trying to understand what a transman might mean when he identifies as male. That’s patently unfair—I can’t explain myself, yet I demand an explanation from him.

But I’m seeking this out because I want to understand in order to be an ally. It’s one thing to say “OK, you call yourself a male, so I’ll call you a male,” and it’s another thing to expand my notion of male identity when faced by a person who violates my learned ideas. I want to expand my understanding of masculinity, and yet my entire experience and understanding of masculinity is ingrained and (so it seems) irrational. If I don’t understand my own act of identifying as male, how do I go about understanding anyone else’s?

*I’ll write part two if I ever figure out Why I Identify as Male.

Sam Harris on using the word "Spiritual" in a Secular Context

Sam Harris digs it!!

I define spirit in a secular context here, and struggle with its secular use here.

YOU ARE A LIMITED PERSON

            Did you know that you are very limited? I’m not saying this to get you down. I’m sure you are aware, even more than I am, of your limitations. I want to talk about the wisdom of owning your limitations. The best way to do this is to point out a number of mine, and hopefully you will find some of my confessions true for yourself, or they will inspire you to own your unique limitations.

            I’m only one person. I have one body, one mind, one location, and one life. That means that I can try to have an effect on the world as a whole, but I can’t save it alone. That means I can try to serve my life-partner, but I can’t be their only person. It’s hard to be only one person, but since that’s not going to change, I need to re-shape my hopes and plans in order to work with this ‘solo’ reality.

            I have a particular perspective. Given my particular class, gender, race, orientation, religious heritage, ethnicities, geographical origin, parental upbringing, opportunities, experiences, and interests, I have a unique perspective—but I lack every other perspective. With the exception of my narrow outlook, I am surrounded by blind spots, and all of my worldly observations and values are shaped by these blind spots. If I am to gain any wider perspective on human life on earth, I have to learn to listen, and to put my perspective aside occasionally (not permanently though!).

            I have particular strengths and weaknesses. Many of these strengths I developed at the expense of the weaknesses. Other weaknesses played a key role in my strengths. A few examples: When I was studying philosophy and theology, I was failing to make a lawyer, doctor, businessman, or handyman of myself. I think that being short played a formative role in my desire to be intelligent/witty. The mistakes I made, including the ones that hurt myself and others extensively—even those have strengthened me as a person, cultivating my sense of selfhood, relationship, responsibility, and a myriad of other existential themes.

            I’m in process. Due to my own bad habits and reluctance to face my limitations, I feel like I got a slow start to seeking enlightenment/maturity. And due to my persistent blind spots and prejudices, it continues to be slow-going. It’s hard to grow, and there are so many forms of health to pursue, all at the same time: physical, intellectual, emotional, interpersonal, cultural, professional, social, societal, political, and ecological, to name a few. I can try each day to improve, but for the most part I will continue to lag in a number of dimensions. And I will even take steps backwards at points. My growth as a person is slow, uneven, and often ambiguous. I will continue to make mistakes.

            Nu, so I’m limited. It happens. By owning these limitations, I can accept them humbly, and try to flourish despite them strategically. 

Grace for Humanists

            As a formerly religious person, I still have a great romance with religious language and tropes, and am often tempted to try to reclaim religious language for secular purposes. In previous posts, I have explored the secular potential for words like spirit and sacred. In this post, I want to make the case for a secular engagement with grace and gratitude.

            As much as I find him to be a smug so-and-so, I think it was C.S. Lewis in Mere Christianity who turned me on to the concept of grace. In my understanding, “grace” signifies the fact that the incarnation and sacrificial death of God-in-Christ was a “free gift” from God—something that humans could never have earned or effected for themselves. One who truly appreciates the freeness of God’s gift cannot but respond with love and reverence.

            Of course, the general concept of gratitude is evident throughout Jewish prayer and ritual life. The practice of saying berachot (blessings) in daily prayer and life (eating food, using the bathroom, seeing beautiful sights) reflects the Jewish awareness that God, not people, is the ultimate Creator.

            Unfortunately, when God is removed from the picture (leaving an empty throne), secular/humanist folk often lose any structured relationship with grace and gratitude. OK, there are still secular holidays like Thanksgiving that could conceivably be used for reflection and literal thanks-giving. We can thank our family, our friends, our government (if you’re into that), our industries (if you’re into that), etc. But in general I’d guess that a secular individual is unlikely to think much about grace or gratitude in a ‘cosmic’ sense.

            So here’s my case: This world, and this life, are gifts, even if there is no giver. Even if there is no God as Creator, that does not make us self-made people. We cannot take credit for the fact of human life, or any of its blessings. We are recipients of something beyond us. And, if we see our lives as good things, then it seems like we should be grateful. We should be thankful.

            But whom to thank? Yes, you can and should still thank the various people that may be more immediately responsible for the goodness in your life. And, on an ecological level, I think we can and should show gratitude towards the Earth (not like it intended to create or dole out blessings or anything), especially since we may need to reciprocate that goodness for our own sakes/survival. Gratitude towards the Earth could be shown through words, although without caring actions/policies those words are empty/pointless.

            On a cosmic level, there is no one to thank; yet, I think cultivating the feeling of grace and gratitude makes us more sensitive—to the joy in life, to our luck, and to a sense of obligation to pass on the blessings. For myself, feeling grateful makes me feel good, and makes me feel magnanimous.

            So, humanists, you don’t need to thank God. But still, be thankful.

I know the title of this post is misleading, since I didn’t actually write a liturgical “Grace for Humanists.” Feel free to write one yourself in the comments section.

In Honor of the Month of Tammuz (and the Jewish anniversary of my wedding)

(**Today being the beginning of the month of the Jewish/Babylonian month Tammuz, I am posting the speech I gave before my wedding last year, which also took place on the first of Tammuz. Sorry it's such a long post-- if you get more than two screen-lengths down, you'll have done better than I did at the wedding, as many people were rudely interrupting me with singing, l'chaims, and other interjections. ;) 

            Besides being the day I get married, today is also the first day of the Jewish month of Tammuz, also known as Rosh Chodesh Tammuz. While we chose this day because it was the Sunday of a three-day weekend, I have a few reasons to be pleased that it is also Rosh Chodesh Tammuz. First of all, while it is traditional for the bride and groom to fast on their wedding day, it is forbidden to fast on Rosh Chodesh. So I’ll drink to that. Secondly, Tammuz is traditionally considered a month of mourning, as it contains the 17^th of Tammuz, a day commemorating the breaching of the walls of Jerusalem before the destruction of the second Temple, which is three weeks before Tisha B’av, the day commemorating the destruction of both Jerusalem Temples. During the three weeks between the 17^th of Tammuz and Tisha B’av, Jews are not allowed to hold weddings. So, by having my wedding on the first of Tammuz, I get to eat, and I get to have a summer wedding that doesn’t violate the three-week mourning period.

            But the most important reason I am glad to get married on Rosh Chodesh Tammuz is that it gives me a chance to give a d’var Torah about Tammuz. And by that I mean not the month, but the god. What’s that you say, you didn’t know that Tammuz is a name for God? Well it’s not a name for God—it’s a name for a god. A Sumerian-Babylonian god, to be precise.

            Now, believe me, I was as confused as you are. Why is there a Hebrew month named after a Babylonian god? But the fact is, all of the names of the months in the Jewish calendar were borrowed from the Babylonian calendar. The names we use were brought back to Judea by exiles returning from Babylon. You might wonder, were there original Hebrew names for these months? For example, what did the Hebrews call the first month? Well, what is the first number? That’s right—in the Tanakh, we find that months are simply given ordinal names. You might find it strange that the Jews used Babylonian names—but hey, cultural mixing happens. Even ‘Jesus’ used to be a Jewish name.

            Anyhow, each Babylonian month had a presiding deity, but only the month of Tammuz is named after its presiding deity. So, while all of the Hebrew month names are borrowed from the Babylonian, Tammuz is the only Hebrew month named after a Babylonian deity. And let’s face it, that is weird. So who was Tammuz, and can we make any Torah out of the fact that we Hebrews are entering the month bearing his name?

            Tammuz has two sets of literary traditions, one very happy and one very sad. In the earlier, happier tradition, Tammuz was invoked by Babylonian kings who were getting married, in a ritual known as “hieros gammos” or literally “holy sex.” I’m a little iffy on the details, but it sounds like these kings would get married, or at least have sex with a cult priestess, and they would do a bit of role-playing, that is, the king would declare himself to be Tammuz, and his partner to be Inanna, Tammuz’s wife. The idea was that, by taking the place of Tammuz and Inanna, the king was drawing down divine power which would bless their partnership, specifically making the queen more fertile, and most likely ensuring agricultural success too. Since Tammuz was a god of fertility, this ritual made a lot of sense. In fact, the majority of the early literature on Tammuz is explicit love poetry, similar to the biblical Song of Songs. In this poetry, Inanna offers herself and her various body parts, and invites herself to be plowed. We see here how this euphemism for sex as plowing really has some important pagan roots, as the fertility of women was linked with the fertility of the earth. This also follows the long-standing patriarchal tradition of identifying women with inert matter. Tammuz himself makes a connection between human and agricultural fertility by being a shepherd-king—his power to breed sheep is one more piece of his power over all fertility. Clearly there are some very patriarchal views of gender being promulgated by the myths of Tammuz. But I don’t think we should expect much else from the ancient near east.

            So can we make any Torah out of this sexually explicit material? None that I can see. The use of the god Tammuz for fertility, especially the part in which his role is re-enacted by a human king, is incredibly pagan. Furthermore, the story of his love with Inanna is explicitly connected with fertility, so, it’s not really love, it’s just breeding. If anything, their story reinforces the stereotype of straight people as “breeders,” one which I find offensive. While some societies may attach meaning to marriage only in its ability to produce children, I must insist that I’m only in it for love. If there are to be kids, that’s fine, but it seems rude to spoil a wedding by bringing them up.

            Now, I told you that there was a second half to the story of Tammuz, and I’m gonna spoil it by letting you know now that it is not a good piece of Torah either. Here it is: So Inanna, Tammuz’s wife, is apparently the lord of some world or another, but she is not the lord of the underworld. So she decides to take a trip to the underworld in order to seize power. As she descends, she can only cross through certain gates by removing bits of jewelry. By the time she reaches the underworld, she is naked and therefore, powerless. The present lord of the underworld promptly kills her and hangs her on a nail. Weak. However, it appears that Inanna expected something like this to happen, and cuts a deal that she can go free—if she finds someone to replace her on that nail. So she leaves the underworld with two demons at her side, and travels, searching for someone to replace her. Finally she finds her husband, Tammuz. He is wearing fine robes and sitting on her throne. Clearly, he is pretty pleased that his wife is dead. Inanna, in a fit of rage, chooses him to replace her in the underworld. On this account, most of the later texts about Tammuz are ones of mourning. Some of the stories have an epilogue, in which Tammuz cuts a deal in which he only spends half of the year in the underworld, being replaced by his sister for the other half. The story sounds a lot like the one of Persephone in Greek mythology.

            Pretty gruesome stuff, right? Certainly nothing to look up to in these stories. Tammuz and Inanna’s love is entirely focused on power and fertility, and Tammuz later dies after his wife gets mad that he has been celebrating her death. Clearly there are no good feminist role models in this story.

At least at this point, I can bring up the only biblical reference to Tammuz. The 8^th chapter of Ezekiel opens with God lifting Ezekiel up by his hair, and bringing him to the temple in Jerusalem. God proceeds to show Ezekiel all of the various abominations that the Israelites are involved with. At verse 14, God tells Ezekiel to take a look at “the women, weeping for Tammuz.” We know now, of course, that they are weeping for Tammuz because he has been taken to the underworld. Why is this worth crying about? Well, if Tammuz, the god of fertility, is dead, good luck with any breeding or farming you need to do!

            At this point, I can take a step back and point out there is some overlap between Babylonian and Jewish traditions about Tammuz the month. Before the month of Tammuz was a month of mourning for the Jews, it was already a month of mourning for the Babylonians. Tammuz is a good month for farmers to mourn, as it always follows the summer solstice—it’s a time of the year in which the days get shorter, as well as hotter and dryer. If you are hoping for things to grow, the month of Tammuz will be a very sad month for you.

            The translation of mourning for Tammuz the god to mourning the destruction of the Temple is a pretty simple one. On an agricultural level, Tammuz served the same function as the Temple—both were necessary connections to the divine power to make things grow. The Yahwist cult in the Temple spent much of its lifespan insisting on itself as the sole connection to divine growing power. As we can see from this passage in Ezekiel, they did not always win this competition. That is the sad irony of the image of women crying in the temple over Tammuz—they are crying because they have lost their connection to the god of fertility, even while they stand in the Temple of Yahweh. No wonder, then, that God ends the chapter by promising pitiless fury—what is the point of having a Temple to share His presence and blessing, if people are using it to mourn the passing of strange gods?

            There is also an interesting disconnect between the Babylonian and Jewish traditions of mourning in Tammuz. If we are to take Tammuz’s epilogue seriously, then the women who mourn for Tammuz know that he will be resurrected. Pagan mythology follows nature, meaning, it’s cyclical. If a god of fertility dies because the summer becomes too intense, no doubt this same god will be reborn… probably around the winter solstice, if you had to place a bet on it. While Tammuz’s resurrection is good news, let’s not forget that his death will always come again, right around the summer solstice. The women mourning are just performing an exercise in agricultural magic. Contrast this, then, with the meaning of the destruction of the Temple. While a second Temple was built again after the first Temple, by no means could we say that the Temple is destroyed and rebuilt in cycles. Unlike Tammuz, who is just a story, the Temple is a historical reality. The traditional Jewish hope for a third Temple is not something that comes and goes with the seasons. Any Jew today who waits for the Third temple is also waiting for Moshiach, the messiah, and a subsequent end to history. Unlike the pagan, Jewish mythology is linear and historical. In mourning the Temple, Jews mourn their exile from the promised land, and the exile of God from the focal point of His presence on earth.

            Just to be clear, I am not waiting for the Third temple. As a former vegetarian, I find ritual sacrifice to be a ghastly way to connect to God, and as a secular Jew, I can only imagine what political effect the coming of the Messiah would have on my liberal and secular Jewish brethren in Israel. Personally, my entire existence as a person and as a Jew would not be what it is without the exile and the diaspora, so I find it hard to mourn the events which set them in motion. Similarly, I am not mourning for Tammuz. If your wife descends to seize power in the underworld and doesn’t return, it is neither smart nor sensitive to celebrate her death, especially by sitting on her throne. Also, Tammuz is a fictional character.

            So is there any meaning in this? I’m beginning to understand why no one has ever given a d’var on Tammuz before, especially on their wedding day.  I’ll try one more time to make some sense.

            At the end of the ceremony today, my bride and I will break a glass underneath our feet. No one really knows why Jews do this—some say we are scaring away demons who might come to get us during this transitional state between wedding and consummation. Others say that it’s a symbol—just as the glass cannot be put back together, we should not be undone as a couple. Does anyone realize that the symbol is the opposite of the reality here? The glass is broken up, so we shouldn’t be? It makes no sense. Anyhow, there is one reason for breaking the glass that is relevant to my talk—some say that we break the glass to temper our joy, in memory of the destruction of the Temple. While today we celebrate a wholeness that my bride and I are achieving, there is still brokenness in the world.

            Do you see what I did just there? I started out talking about the destruction of the Temple, but by the next sentence I had generalized it to “brokenness in the world.” This is a common liberal Jewish move—to take Jewish particularism, especially whatever is associated with intense religiosity, and extract from it a universalistic sentiment, one that even non-Jews can appreciate. The question is, when we break the glass today, what will it represent? Will it represent our mourning of the Temple? Our mourning the broken state of the world? Will we be mourning for Tammuz?

            Ok, definitely not the last one. At the very least, I take solace in the paradox that I am celebrating my wedding in a month traditionally associated with mourning. Because it is good and healthy to remember that life is mixed up with death, and death mixed up with life. The women mourning for Tammuz have a confident hope that he will return. Jews mourning the destruction of the Temple have a confident hope that it will be rebuilt. We all know that joy and mourning go hand in hand, if not immediately, then eventually. Our decision then, is to make sure that we celebrate and mourn appropriate things. There is a tradition that Tisha B’av, the day both Temples were destroyed, also marks the day that the Israelites were condemned to wander the desert for 40 years. This happened after they were convinced that they could never conquer Canaan, and they all cried. The version I’ve been told is that God saw them crying and found it inappropriate, giving them this punishment saying “I’ll give you something to cry about!” We see a parallel with the story in Ezekiel 8—after God sees the women weeping for Tammuz, he assures destruction, so that they will have something real to weep about. The lesson, if there is one, is to choose what we celebrate and mourn wisely.

            Well, now it’s time for me to go get married. If you’re looking for me, I’ll be near the front. To summarize, what have we learned today? We learned that Babylonian gods make great names for Jewish months, but poor Torah for Jewish weddings, especially feminist ones. We learned that “breeder” is an insulting term for straight people, and that neither marriage nor women should be thought of as synonymous with fertility. We learned that it’s silly to cry for a god who will return in six months only to die again six months later, but similarly silly to mourn for a temple that you are not in a rush to see return. And we learned that, if you don’t connect to a Jewish ritual, just universalize the theme and blur the back-story. Oh and if your wife descends to the underworld, don’t sit on her throne, because she very might well come back. L’chaim l’chaim.

God as Everything or Nothing

**Wrote this recently in response to a student's final assignment at Prozdor:


"Ein Sof," which literally means "without end" is used differently in different Jewish contexts. 


In Kabbalah (Jewish mysticism), Ein Sof signifies God's utter infinitude, but within this infinitiude is the more traditional (Creator, Revealer, Redeemer) image of God in Judaism. 


In Richard Rubinstein "death-of-God" theology, he uses Ein Sof somewhat in the way you describe-- that we live in an infinite space/void that provides the stage for all reality, while not participating or directing the course of anything.

So, for some Ein Sof means "God is everything, and then some" and for others Ein Sof means "God is the void."