Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-hgkh8 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-28T21:40:02.073Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

“Try To Be A Man”: The Rabbinic Construction Of Masculinity*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 June 2011

Michael L. Satlow
Affiliation:
University of Virginia

Extract

What does it mean “to be a man”? Whereas in most societies at most times the determination of “maleness” is straightforward (does he have male genitalia? what is his chromosomal make-up?), locating the cultural constructions of “manhood” is far more difficult. Many anthropologists have noted that in contrast to models that postulate a common psychology for all men, everywhere, all the time, constructions of manhood are varied and culturally dependent. For example, the highly aggressive behavior necessary for retention of manhood for a male resident of Andalusian Spain can be contrasted to the sanctioned behavior of males of Tahiti. Unifying these diverse constructions of masculinity, however, is the common idea that manhood is an acquired state that males must fight both to attain and maintain. Because manhood is an achieved state, it can never be taken for granted: a male must be constantly proving that he is a man. “[T]he state of being a ‘real man’ or ‘true man’ [is] uncertain or precarious, a prize to be won or wrested through struggle.” Similar constructions of manhood are evident today throughout the circum-Mediterranean.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1996

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 For an example of the essentialist position that there is a common core to the male experience, see Gregor, Thomas, Anxious Pleasures: The Sexual Lives of an Amazonian People (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985) 9Google Scholar.

2 Gilmore, David D., Manhood in the Making: Cultural Concepts of Masculinity (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1990) 1Google Scholar.

3 See especially Pitt-Rivers, Julian, “Honour and Social Status,” in Peristiany, John G., ed., Honour and Shame: The Values of Mediterranean Society (1966; reprinted Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1974) 1977Google Scholar; Brandes, Stanley, Metaphors of Masculinity: Sex and Status in Andalusian Folklore (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1980)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Gilmore, David D., “Introduction: The Shame of Dishonor,” in Honor and Shame and the Unity of the Mediterranean (Washington, D.C.: American Anthropological Association, 1987) 221Google Scholar; Herzfeld, Michael, The Poetics of Manhood: Contest and Identity in a Cretan Mountain Village (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985)Google Scholar.

4 See Cohen, Shaye J. D., “The Place of the Rabbi in Jewish Society of the Second Century,” in Levine, Lee I., ed., The Galilee in Late Antiquity (New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1992) 157–73Google Scholar; and Levine, Lee I., The Rabbinic Class of Roman Palestine (New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America; Jerusalem: Yad Ben-Zvi, 1989)Google Scholar.

5 Aristotle Eth. Nic. 1150b 20.

6 Stowers, Stanley K., A Rereading of Romans: Justice, Jews, and Gentiles (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1994) 45Google Scholar. Stowers's entire survey of this theme is excellent (pp. 42–82). My thanks to Shaye Cohen for this reference. See also Brown, Peter, The Body and Society: Men, Women, and Sexual Renunciation in Early Christianity (New York: Columbia University Press, 1988) 912Google Scholar.

7 On the increasing tendency of all philosophies to emphasize male self-control, see Foucault, Michel, The History of Sexuality, vol. 3: Care of the Self (trans. Hurley, Robert; New York: Random House, 1988) 3968Google Scholar. The Stoics advocated sexual equality in the pursuit of philosophy, but for someone like Musonius Rufus this occured only when a woman abandoned those traits that were gendered as feminine. See Rufus, Musonius 3 (Lutz, Cora E., trans., Musonius Rufus: “The Roman Socrates” [reprint; New Haven: Yale University Press, 1947] 41)Google Scholar; 4 (ET 42–49, on educating daughters); 6 (ET 52–57, on training). Note that in fragment 1, Musonius disapproves of the man who allows his body to become “effeminate” (τεθηλυμμένον) (ET 34–35). On the Stoic attitude toward sexual equality, see Favez, Charles, “Une féministe romain: Musonius Rufus,” Bulletin de la Société des Études de Lettres 20 (1933) 18Google Scholar; Manning, C. E., “Seneca and the Stoics on the Equality of the Sexes,” Mnemosyne 26 (1973) 170–77CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Colish, Marcia L., The Stoic Tradition from Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages (2 vols.; Leiden: Brill, 1985) 1. 3638Google Scholar. On Roman medicine and self-control, see Soranus Gyn. 1.30. Note that he also recommends virginity for women, but that he appears to assume that this would be much harder for women who had had intercourse than those who had not. See Foucault, Care of the Self, 105–23. On the idea of women being unable to control themselves, see Dixon, Suzanne, “Infirmitas Sexus: Womanly Weakness in Roman Law,” Tijdschrift Voor Rechtsgeschiedenis 52 (1984) 343–71CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

8 On these themes in the early church, see Clark, Elizabeth A., “Sex, Shame, and Rhetoric: En-Gendering Early Christian Ethics,” JAAR 59 (1991) 221–45Google Scholar; Rousselle, Aline, Porneia: On Desire and the Body in Antiquity (trans. Pheasant, Felicia; Oxford/New York: Blackwell, 1988) 129–40Google Scholar; and Meyer, Marvin W., “Making Mary Male: The Categories ‘Male’ and ‘Female’ in the Gospel of Thomas,” NTS 31 (1985) 554–70CrossRefGoogle Scholar. On Stoic influence on the church, see Spanneut, Michel, Le Stoicisme des pères de l'Église de Clément de Rome à Clément d'Alexandrie (2d ed.; Paris: Seuil, 1969)Google Scholar; Colish, The Stoic Tradition, 2. Colish argues that early Christian Latin thought was far more influenced by Stoicism than has heretofore been thought.

9 Stowers, A Rereading of Romans, 58.

10 T. Reub. 5.1–7. See also T. Judah 13; T. Joseph 6.7, 10.2–3; Ep. Arist. 250. See further Hultgȧrd, Anders, “God and Image of Woman in Early Jewish Religion,” in Børresen, Kari Elisabeth, ed., Image of God and Gender Models in Judaeo-Christian Tradition (Oslo: Solum Forlag, 1991) 4647Google Scholar.

11 See Garrett, Susan R., “The ‘Weaker Sex’ in the Testament of Job,” JBL 112 (1993) 5570Google Scholar. See also van der Horst, Pieter W., “Images of Women in the Testament of Job,” in Knibb, Michael A. and van der Horst, Pieter W., eds., Studies in the Testament of Job (SNTSMS 66; Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989) 99113Google Scholar.

12 Philo Sob. 5; see also Mos. 2.68. For ascetic tendencies in Philo, see Fraade, Steven D., “Ascetical Aspects of Ancient Judaism,” in Green, Arthur, ed., Jewish Spirituality: From the Bible through the Middle Ages (London: Routledge, 1986) 253–88Google Scholar, esp. 263–66; Horsley, Richard A., “Spiritual Marriage with Sophia,” VC 33 (1979) 3840Google Scholar.

13 Philo Abr. 253 (Abraham); Sob. 65 (Jacob); Jos. 42–48 (Joseph); Mos. 2.68 (Moses). On Philo's description of women, see Sly, Dorothy, Philo's Perception of Women (Atlanta; Scholars Press, 1990)Google Scholar.

14 Philo Jos. 42–48; 54–57.

15 For the purposes of this paper, it is irrelevant whether or not his description is historically reliable.

16 Philo, Cont. 68–69 (trans. Colson, F. H. et al. ; LCL; 10 vols.; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1984) 9. 155Google Scholar. See further Kraemer, Ross S., “Monastic Jewish Women in Greco-Roman Egypt: Philo Judaeus on the Therapeutrides,” Signs 14 (1989) 342–70CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

17 Josephus Bell. 2.120–61; Philo Hypothetica 11.1–12. The identification of the Essenes with the Dead Sea Community is likely, but not certain. See the review of positions in Grabbe, Lester L., Judaism from Cyrus to Hadrian (2 vols.; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1992) 2. 494–99Google Scholar. Note that Josephus's description of the Essenes conforms even more exactly than the Dead Sea scrolls with the traits discussed here.

18 Sir 9:1–9; 19:2–3; 25:16–26; 36:21–25; 42:9–14. See further Trenchard, Warren C., Ben Sira's View of Women: A Literary Analysis (Chico: Scholars Press, 1982) 95128Google Scholar; Camp, Claudia V., “Understanding a Patriarch: Women in Second Century Jerusalem through the Eyes of Ben Sira,” in Levine, Amy-Jill, ed., “Women Like This”: New Perspectives on Jewish Women in the Greco-Roman World (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1991) 139Google Scholar.

19 See also Marböck, Johann, Weisheit im Wandel: Untersuchungen zur Weisheitstheologie bei Ben Sira (Bonn: Hanstein, 1971) 34133Google Scholar.

20 See Camp, Claudia V., Wisdom and the Feminine in the Book of Proverbs (Sheffield: JSOT, 1985) esp. 79–147Google Scholar.

21 David Winston dates the Wisdom of Solomon to the reign of Gaius Caligula, 37–41 ce (The Wisdom of Solomon [AB 43; Garden City: Doubleday, 1979] 20–25).

22 Philo Cher. 50 (ET 2. 39).

23 Baer, Richard A. Jr., Philo's Use of the Categories Male and Female (Leiden: Brill, 1970) 6566Google Scholar.

24 Philo Fug. 51–52 (ET Supp. 2. 15–16). See also Abr. 99–102.

25 Philo Quaest. in Ex. 1.8 (ET 5. 37–79; modified). Judith Romney Wegner talks of Philo's “inextricable nexus between rationality and masculinity” (“Philo's Portrayal of Women—Hebraic or Hellenistic,” in Levine, “Women Like This,” 47; see also 48–49).

26 The emphasis on the penis as defining who is a man, which is of no small import in a legal system that assigns different liabilities to males and females, is most clearly seen in rabbinic discussions on those who have either male and female genitalia (סונגוררנא) or no genitals at all (םוטמוט). A male can lack testicles and remain a male; he is simply a eunuch. On rabbinic definitions of the male see m. Yebamot 8.6; t. Yebamot 10.2; b. Yebamot 82b, 83b; y. Yebamot 8.6, 9d.

27 On the רצי, see nn. 31–35 below. It is important here to differentiate between rabbinic constructions and reality. Rabbinic sources do mention in passing that some women could indeed control themselves, but this observation never penetrated to the level of gender construction. Shame, it appears, was one societal institution that promoted female chastity among Jews in late antiquity. See Satlow, Michael L., “Sex and Shame in Late-Antique Judaism,” in Wimbush, Vincent L. and Valantasis, Richard, eds., Asceticism (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995) 535–43Google Scholar.

28 For examples of רובג in the Hebrew Bible see Gen 10:8; 2 Sam 17:10; Jer 46:12; and Amos 2:14. God too is described as רובג in Jer 32:18.

29 m. ʾAbot 4.1 (ET The Mishna [ed. Chanoch Albeck; 6 vols.; Tel Aviv: Mosed Bialik, 1988] 4. 368–69). All translations of rabbinic texts are my own. I have indicated the original texts on which the translations are based throughout. Translations of citations from the Hebrew Bible are from Tanakh (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1985).

30 The word used in this tradition for “conquer” (שבוכ) also appears in Gen 1:28, in which God exhorts both Adam and Eve to procreate, “fill the earth, and conquer it.” One midrash expresses surprise that Eve too is commanded to “conquer”: “A man restrains (שבוכ) his wife so that she not go to the market, for every woman who goes out to the market is destined to fall (לשכהל), as it is written, ‘Now Dinah… went out [to visit the daughters of the land]’ [Gen 34:1]” (Gen. R. 8.12 [Midrash Bereshit Rabbah (eds. J. Theodor and H. Albeck; 2d ed.; Jerusalem: Wahrmann, 1965) 66]; note the manuscript problems with this tradition). This tradition subverts both Gen 1:28 and 34:1, while relying on a complex web of assumptions. Use of the word לשכהל implies some kind of sexual transgression. Thus, “conquering” is understood as something that only a man can do, and should do to keep his wife (who lacks self-restraint) from wandering out and succumbing to sexual temptation (not rape, as in Genesis 34). The more common expression that denotes a man overcoming his רצי is רבנחמ (“to become master [or man] over”), which contains the same root as רובג. See, for example, b. Meg. 15b.

31 b. Sanh. 75a (with some variants at y. Šabbat 14.4, 14d and y. ʿAboda Zar. 2.2, 40d).

32 b. Qidd. 80b.

33 Sifre Deut. 33 (ed. Finkelstein, L., Sifre on Deuteronomy [1939; reprinted New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1969] 60)Google Scholar.

34 See b. Ber. 17a, 60b; b. Qidd. 81b; y. Ber. 4:2, 7d.

35 b. ʿAboda Zar. 19a.

36 According to Rashi's exploration of this passage, both traditions contrast a man in his youth to an older man, who no longer has the power he once had. I assume that this interpretation is occasioned by the odd syntax of Rav's tradition.

37 m. Soṭ. 3.4 (ET Mishna, ed. Albeck, 3. 240–41). See further Judith Romney Wegner, Chattel or Person: The Status of Women in the Mishna (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988) 153–62.

38 b. Ketub. 65a.

39 b. Ketub. 51b, 54a; b. Qidd. 81b.

40 See, for examples, m. ʾAbot 1.5; m. Soṭ. 1.5; t. Soṭ. 1.7; Sifre Num. 139; y. Soṭ. 3.4, 19a; b. Šabbat 62b (par. b. Yoma 9b); y. Šabbat 14.4, 14d (par. y. ʿAboda Zar. 2.2, 40d; b. Sanh. 75a). For a discussion of these passages, see Satlow, Michael L., “Tasting the Dish”: Rabbinic Rhetorics of Sexuality (Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1995) 158–67Google Scholar.

41 See t. Qidd. 5.9–10, 14; y. Soṭ. 1.3, 16d; b. Qidd. 80b–81b. See further Epstein, Louis M., Sex Laws and Customs in Judaism (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1948) 6875Google Scholar.

42 m. Qidd. 4.12 (ET Mishna, ed. Albeck, 4. 328–29).

43 b. Qidd. 80b. See also b. Šabbat 33b (women cannot be trusted with information); b. Soṭ. 32b; Tanḥuma.vayikraʿ 22 on Gen 22:1.

44 On male modesty during sexual intercourse see the discussion in Satlow, “Tasting the Dish,” 298–303.

45 b. Nid. 31a–b.

46 b. Ber. 60a (R Yitzḥak b. Ami); b. Nid. 25b (R. Yitzḥak b. Ami), 28a (R. Yitzḥak), 71a (R. Ḥama b. R. Ḥaninah).

47 See also b. ʿErubin 100b.

48 See Galen, , De usu pertium 14.6 (trans. Tallmade, Margaret May; 2 vols.; Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1968) 2. 628–30Google Scholar. This approach continues throughout the Middle Ages. See Bullough, Vern L., “On Being a Male in the Middle Ages,” in Lees, Clare A., ed., Medieval Masculinities: Regarding Men in the Middle Ages (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1994) 3145Google Scholar.

49 MS Munich 95 reads, “prince” (רש).

50 b. Ned. 20a–b.

51 See, for another example, the story of R. Yoḥanan whose sexual self-control is so strong, that women who merely look upon him conceive after his likeness (b. Ber. 20a). See the discussion on rabbinic eugenics in Satlow, “Tasting the Dish,” 303–13.

52 Sifre Deut. 46 (ET Sifre Deut., ed. Finkelstein, 104). See also b. Qidd. 29b; y. Ber. 1.3, 4c; y. ʿErubin 10.1, 26a.

53 For example, the commandment for a son to honor his parents is interpreted as referring to both children. See b. Qidd. 29b.

54 m. ʾAbot 3.1.

55 םייח םסל הרוח ירבר ולשמנ; following some manuscripts. Apparently, this is a wordplay on םתמשו (“and you shall place”), which is read as םח םס (“an unfailing medicine”).

56 Sifre Deut. 45 (ET Sifre Deut., ed. Finkelstein, 103–4). For other rabbinic comments on the efficacy of Torah study, see b. Ber. 5a; b. Sukk. 52a–b; b. Qidd. 30b; b. Sanh. 107a.

57 See m. ʾAbot 6.4.

58 Boyarin, Daniel, Carnal Israel: Reading Sex in Talmudic Culture (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993) 134–66Google Scholar. Several passages in the Babylonian Talmud juxtapose male sexual impropriety and Torah knowledge. See b. ˓Erubin 64a; b. Sot. 4b.

59 m. ʿAbot 2.6 (ET Mishna, ed. Albeck 4. 359).

60 t. Ber. 6(7).24. There is a close parallel in Aramaic at v. Ber. 9.8, 14d. See further Lieberman, Saul, Tosefta ki-Fshuta: A Comprehensive Commentary on the Tosefta (10 vols.; New York: JTSA, 1955) 1. 125 [Hebrew]Google Scholar.

61 b. Ber. 63a. A close parallel, attributed to Hillel himself, can be found at Sifre Zuta, Pinhas.

62 See also the commentary of the Tosafot, b. Sot. 23b, s.v., וירש.

63 Lev. R. 23.4.

64 Some versions do not have this clause, which most likely migrated into the mishna from the talmudic discussion on b. Sot. 21b.

65 m. Sot. 3.4 (ET Mishna, ed. Albeck, 3. 240).

66 y. Sot. 3.4, 19a.

67 t. Kel. B. Qamma 4.17; t. Kel. B. Mes. 1.6; Sifre Deut. 307; b. Ber. 10a (2); b. ʿErubin 53b–54a (2); b. Pesah. 62b; b. ʿAboda Zar. 18a–b (2).

68 On the tendency to approach these stories positivistically, see the sophisticated study of Goodblatt, David, “The Beruriah Traditions,” JJS 26 (1975) 6886CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Boyarin (Carnal Israel, 167–96, esp. 181–96) takes seriously the heuristic function of these stories as evidence for rabbinic ambivalence over female Torah study.

69 b. Pesah. 62b.

70 b. Ber. 10a; b. ʿErubin 53b–54a.

71 b. ʿErubin 53b. If Boyarin, following Rashi, is substantively correct that the enigmatic “incident of Beruriah” mentioned at b. ʿAboda Zar. 18a–b refers to her being seduced by a disciple of her husband's, that may be another example of this function. Although Rashi sees her Torah knowledge as making her the target of the seduction, it is easy to imagine her Torah knowledge as leading to her own seduction of a man.

72 See the recent study of Ilan, Tal, “Matrona and Rabbi Jose: An Alternative Interpretation,” JSJ 25 (1994) 1851Google Scholar. Ilan also offers a positivistic interpretation of these stories.

73 y. Sot. 3.4, 19a (par. Num. R. Naso 9.48). The version of this story recorded at b. Yoma 66b appears to have been tacked on to a tradition cited from t. Yebamot 3.

74 For a similar literary device (woman goes to rabbi who mocks her), see b. Ned. 20b. On these traditions, see further Michael L. Satlow, “‘Texts of Terror’: Rabbinic Texts, Speech Acts, and the Control of Mores,” AJS Review [forthcoming].

75 They could equally have been attributed to a Gentile. This could have been the heuristic function of Antonius in a cycle of rabbinic stories in which he plays a role.

76 See, for examples, b. Yebamot 103a–b (par. b. Hor. 10b; b. Nazir 23b); b. Qidd. 49b; b. Sanh. 39b, 95b. For a discussion of this phenomenon, see Satlow, “Tasting the Dish” 146–53. The underlying link between women and non-Jews may account for the three things for which a man should thank God each morning: that he was not created a non-Jew, an ignoramus (רוכ), or a woman. See t. Ber. 6(7). 18. It is interesting to note that according to the Bible, it is Adam who is created from the earth, implying a more natural state. The rabbis deal with this by revaluing earth in their treatment of these accounts. See Gen. R. 17.8; b. Nid. 31b.

77 m. ʿAboda Zar. 2.1. See also t. ʿAboda Zar. 3.1.

78 b. ʿAboda Zar. 22b (par. b. Ŝabbat 145b–146a; b. Yebamot 103b); (a) and (b) are paralleled at y. ʿAboda Zar. 2.1, 40c, and (c) at b. Git. 38a. My thanks to Shaye Cohen for this reference.

79 b. Ber. 61a. See also b. ʳErubin 18b.

80 Gen. R. 22.4 (Mishna Bereshit Rabba, eds. Theodor and Albeck, 210). See also b. Sukk. 52a; b. Sanh. 99b.

81 See m. ʼAbot 1.5; b. Ŝabbat 62b (par. b. Yoma 9b);b. Ketub. 51b, 54a, 62b; b. Qidd. 81b; v. Ketub. 1:8, 25d, 1:9, 25a; y. Sanh. 2:3, 20b.

82 m. ʼAbot 3.8 (ET Mishna, ed. Albeck, 6. 365). See also m. ʼAbot 3.7; b. Menah. 99b; b. Ber. 8b; b. B. Qam. 14b.

83 b. Pesah. 49b (partial par. b. Sanh. 90b). The tradition is placed in a series of baraitot that condemn ץדאה ימע (“people of the land,” “common folk”).

84 For what appears to be a modified ontological interpretation of these sources, see Eilberg-Schwartz, Howard, God's Phallus and Other Problems for Men and Monotheism (Boston: Beacon, 1994) 163–74Google Scholar. Eilberg-Schwartz cites examples of rabbinic traditions that feminize Adam, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, and David. Nearly all of his examples are either directly from Song of Songs Rabbah or are exegeses of verses from Song of Songs.

85 Even rabbinic representations of the Shekina do not contain feminine elements, despite the gender of the term. See Urbach, Ephraim E., The Sages: Their Concepts and Beliefs (trans. Abrahams, Israel; Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1975) 65Google Scholar.

86 Daniel Boyarin discussed rabbinic texts that feminize students in “Dis/Owning the Phallus: Male Sexuality and Power in Early Christianity and Judaism,” a paper presented at AAR/ SBL Annual Meeting, 1994. Boyarin's conclusions are different from the one presented here. Use of the term “humility” in rabbinic literature also conforms to the model I argue for here: students should be humble before their social superiors (teachers), and all should be humble before God. My thanks to Jeffrey Rubenstein for bringing this to my attention.

87 Rabbinic Judaism, unlike many peoples, appears to show no knowledge of initiation rites. The bar mitzva does not appear to have been any kind of male initiation, and circumcision is performed when the child is so young that this too would not qualify as such a rite. To my knowledge, there is only a single text that might suggest a male initiation rite. In Tanhuma vayikraʿ 22 on Gen 22:1, in which Abraham is trying to trick Sara into letting him take Isaac to be sacrificed, he says that he is going to take Isaac to a place where they איכנחמ (“educate”) youths. Elsewhere in rabbinic literature the term means to initiate through a process of teaching, a definition that would make little sense here (see b. Nazir 29a; m. Yoma 8:4).

88 See Satlow, Michael L., “‘They Abused Him Like a Woman’: Homoeroticism, Gender Blurring, and the Rabbis in Late Antiquity,” Journal of the History of Sexuality 5 (1994) 125Google Scholar.

89 L'Hoir, F. E. Santoro, The Rhetoric of Gender Terms: “Man”, “Woman,” and the Portrayal of Character in Latin Prose (Mnemosyne Suppl. 118; Leiden: Brill, 1992) 15Google Scholar.

90 On taking the toga virilis, see Marrou, H. I., A History of Education in Antiquity (trans. Lamb, George; London: Sheed & Ward, 1956) 233Google Scholar; Bonner, Stanley F., Education in Ancient Rome: From the Elder Cato to the Younger Pliny (London: Methuen, 1977) 8485Google Scholar.

91 See Musonius Rufus 12.3; Juvenal 2.54–56. See further Richlin, , Garden of Priapus (rev. ed.; New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992) xii-xxxiii, 81143, 287–90Google Scholar, and the sources indicated on 246 n. 35; idem, “Not Before Homosexuality: The Materiality of the Cinaedus and the Roman Law Against Love Between Men,” Journal of the History of Sexuality 3 (1993) 569–71; and MacMullen, Ramsay, “Roman Attitudes to Greek Love,” Historia 31 (1982) 484502Google Scholar.

92 Gleason, Maud W., “The Semiotics of Gender: Physiognomy and Self-Fashioning in the Second Century C.E.,” in Halperin, David M., Winkler, John J., Zeitlin, Froma I., eds., Before Sexuality: The Construction of Erotic Experience in the Ancient Greek World (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990) 389415Google Scholar.

93 See the LXX Deut 31:6, 7, 23; Josh 1:6,7,9, 18, 10:25; 2 Sam 10:12, 13:28; Micah 4:10; Ps 26:14, 31:25 (=30:25); 1 Chr 19:13, 22:13, 28:20; 2 Chr 32:7. See further 1 Mace 2:64 and Sir 31:25.

94 See Feldman, Louis H., “Use, Authority and Exegesis of Mikra in the Writings of Josephus,” in Mulder, Martin Jan, ed., Mikra (CRINT 2.1; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1988) 485–94Google Scholar. Because Antiquities was written for a Roman audience, it is hard to know to what extent Josephus subscribed to this construction of masculinity in contrast to the one that emerges from the wisdom tradition.

95 For collections of primarily dedicatory inscriptions from Palestinian synagogues, see Naveh, Joseph, On Stone and Mosaic: The Aramaic and Hebrew Inscriptions from Ancient Synagogues (Tel-Aviv: Maariv, 1977) [Hebrew]Google Scholar; Roth-Gerson, Lea, The Greek Inscriptions from the Synagogues in Eretz-Israel (Jerusalem: Yad Ben-Zvi, 1987) [Hebrew]Google Scholar. For expressions of piety in Jewish inscriptions from the Land of Israel, see C1J 1045, 1056, 1161. For Jewish inscriptions from Palestine that record an office or occupation, see C1J 883, 902, 931, 945, 949. Curiously, terms that denote Torah study, commonly found in Jewish inscriptions from the Diaspora, are not to my knowledge attested in Palestinian Jewish inscriptions. See van der Horst, P. W., Ancient Jewish Epitaphs (Kampen: Pharos, 1991) 6567Google Scholar.

96 Rabbi Shimon b. Lakish: b. B. Meṣ. 84a-b; see Boyarin, Daniel, “The Great Fat Massacre: Sex, Death, and the Grotesque Body in the Talmud,” in Eilberg-Schwartz, Howard, ed., People of the Body: Jews and Judaism from an Embodied Perspective (Albany: SUNY Press, 1992) 69100Google Scholar. David: b. Moʿed Qaṭ. 16b.