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PERSON‐SHAPED HOLES
Author(s) -
EpsteinLevi Rebecca J.
Publication year - 2021
Publication title -
journal of religious ethics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.306
H-Index - 20
eISSN - 1467-9795
pISSN - 0384-9694
DOI - 10.1111/jore.12349
Subject(s) - talmud , judaism , neglect , narrative , human sexuality , sociology , notice , reproduction , value (mathematics) , sacrifice , gender studies , social psychology , psychology , law , philosophy , political science , theology , literature , computer science , art , ecology , machine learning , psychiatry , biology
While much Jewish thought, culture, and professional ethics increasingly accommodate a range of gender roles and expressions, sexualities, and family structures, they also remain deeply pronatalist. This overwhelmingly frames reproduction as a core Jewish value and the choice not to bear or raise children as contrary to Jewish values. I argue that Jewish pronatalism masks the true extent to which the whole community must support the care and formation of all its generations. Through a counter‐reading of a passage from the Babylonian Talmud in which three sages neglect their wives and children in various ways that allow a careful reader to notice “person‐shaped holes”—narrative features whose presence implies various people’s nonparental labor—I argue that multiple people in multiple roles within a community make it possible to sustain its continuity in a robust and all‐encompassing way.