It turns out that the laws governing various aspects of life for Jews has for millennia also extended to such intimate aspects of existence as sex, according to an article published by Haaretz.
According to Elon Gilad, the article’s author, due to the constant evolution of Jewish rules related to sex and the fact that different rabbinical authorities often differed in opinions on certain matters, one could not speak of “The Jewish Laws of Sex” – “only rules at different stages of history, which often overlap, but sometimes contradict one another”.
Prostitution
The Bible, Gilad notes, not only permits men to take multiple wives but allows them to engage in relations with unmarried women and even with prostitutes, refraining from dispensing criticism on biblical characters who had sex with whores.
This acceptance is apparently reserved for men only, as an example in Deuteronomy 22 shows that “if a man has sex with his bride and suspects that she was not a virgin, and her family cannot prove that she was (presumably by presenting blood-stained sheets from the wedding night) she is to be stoned to death at the door of her father’s house”.
Choice of Partners
Not all women are fair game, however, as the scripture states that sex with one’s parents, step-parents, siblings, grandchildren, aunts and uncles, daughters-in-law and sisters-in-law, is forbidden. Also, sex with a mother and her daughter or with two sisters is taboo as well.
Obviously, sex with another man’s wife was prohibited, just like homosexuality and bestiality, while even touching (let alone having sex with) menstruating women was banned because they were considered ritually impure.
Marital Sex
As engaging in regular sexual relations with his wife was considered a man’s duty to her, the question of how often such sex should occur did not elude the inquisitive minds of rabbis.
For example, the author points out, a 2nd century rabbi postulated that an idle man – should lay with his wife every day, a laborer – should have intercourse with his wife twice a week, a donkey driver — once a week, a camel driver — once every 30 days, and seamen — every six months.
Gilad also observed that Medieval Jewish authorities “recommended that men have sex with their wives once a week, on Saturday”.
It should be noted, however, that the article was published by the newspaper on 1 April, commonly known as April Fool’s Day.
