The Shalom Center - Covenanting: Marriage and Commitment

Emerging Torah of Same-Sex Marriage

Sun, 27 Jul 2008 06:46:07 -0400

Rabbi Arthur Waskow

Twice in the Torah portion of "Acharei mot" we are told, "You shall not lie with a man as in lying with a woman." (Lev. 18: 22 and 20: 13). Today this has become perhaps the world's most contentious Torah teaching, far beyond the Jewish people.

Some have argued it prohibits all male-male sexuality. Others have argued that the verse must mean something else, for this "lying with" seems anatomically impossible. Is it only about casual or ritual homosexuality, not committed relationships? How did some of the greatest rabbis of the "Golden Age" in Spain write glowing erotic poems about male-male sex?

Responding in Prayer & Practice to Same-Sex Marriages

Tue, 29 Jul 2008 12:19:23 -0400

Rabbi Phyllis Berman & Rabbi Arthur Waskow, 8/5/2003

The two of us, sometimes separately and sometimes together, officiate at a very few marriages each year — some of them same-sex marriages. We have worked out a number of practices we recommend or to or require of the couples, and for same-sex marriages these need some special emendations. (Some different-sex couples prefer some aspects of these as well.)

The three most important are:"tennai kiddushin," conditions especially regarding possible divorce, etc; a "real-life ketubah," commitments about the everyday aspects of a marriage -- money, sex, children, etc; the "sheva brachot," seven blessings that celebrate the marriage. Our notes on each are below.

A. For all marriages, we require tennai kedushin ["conditions" or addenda to the ketubah, the wedding contract] that contractually commit the couple to giving & receiving gittin (Jewish divorce agreements] if the marriage ends. (We have these signed on the wedding day just before the other part of the ketubah they have worked out.) For hetero couples, the tennaiim specify this be done within 30 days of a civil divorce. But for gay couples, this is so far mostly unworkable. So —

This is the text of the addendum [tennaim] to the Ketubah that we have worked out to act as nearly as possible in analogy to the language we use for tennaim providing for a gett after a civil divorce.

THE SONG OF SONGS AS A SACRED RECIPE: LOVE, "CHAROSET" & THE LIBERATION OF THE WORLD

Sat, 18 Aug 2007 07:14:51 -0400

By Rabbi Arthur Waskow *

We are going to approach this subject –- sacred food –- the way you approach a sacred temple: first the outskirts, where you may know the structure already, from afar; then some unexpected beauties in an anteroom; finally, an inner Mystery revealed not to your eyes but to your lips and tongue.

The inner mystery is the dish called charoset. Keep seeking till you find her!

In Jewish tradition, eating food is a sacred act – and there are a series of concentric circles in which the intensity of the attention paid to food and the sacredness felt in food increases.

Reb Zalman's Tennai Kiddushin (Conditions before Marriage)

Thu, 29 Jun 2006 07:27:22 -0400

By Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi

T'nai Kiddushin.
Conditions of Kiddushin and Nissu'in

[This document, intended to be adopted in both Hebrew and English at an impending wedding before acceptance of the ketubah, is an attempt in the context of traditional rabbinic halacha to prevent the danger that even though a marriage has in fact and ethics ended, one of the couple might remain unable under traditional Jewish law to be freed from the marriage so as to be able to remarry. It does this by providing that under certain conditions, the marriage will be deemed null and void from the start. (This has no effect on the status of children. -- AW]

"The Light of the Moon and the Sun": A Wedding Poem

Fri, 24 Jun 2005 01:00:00 -0400

Joel Rosenberg, 6/24/2005

This wedding poem was written by Joel Rosenberg for the wedding of Arthur Waskow and Phyllis Berman in 1986. They were married on a day that was both the summer solstice (June 22) and a full moon (15 Sivan) and so in a mome

Broken Glass

Wed, 14 Apr 2004 01:00:00 -0400

Rabbi Arthur Waskow, 4/14/2004

Dear Chevra,

I've got a "practice report" and then a question.

When Phyllis and/or I act as m'sadrim kiddushin for any couple, hetero or same-sex, we take the opportunity of the traditional breaking-of-the-glass at t

Light Old & New on Same-Sex Marriage

Mon, 17 Oct 2005 23:18:42 -0400

Rabbi Arthur Waskow 2/12/2004

Dear friends,

As the issue of same-sex marriage heats up, you may find you can bring more light into the discussion by drawing on old and new Jewish approaches to the theology and practice of sexual ethics.

A Covenant of Same-Sex Nisu'in and Kidushin