Some years ago, in a lecture that he gave in the School of Theology of the Catholic University of Leuven (Belgium) where I was teaching, the late David Flusser, professor of early Christianity and Judaism of the Second Temple Period at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, remarked that the parables of Jesus are a very important source for understanding the life and times of people living in first-century Palestine. In the absence of much other information, Jesus’ little stories allude to many of the ways in which people in his society lived their daily lives.
Jesus spoke about the lamp on the lampstand that “gives light to all in the house” (Matt 5:14), preserving for us the memory of the people who lived in one-room houses in Jesus’ day. From the triple tradition in which Jesus is quoted as saying, “Those who belong to this age marry and are given in marriage but those who are considered worthy of a place in that age and in the resurrection from the dead neither marry nor are given in marriage” (Luke 20:34–351), we learn that in first-century Palestine, Jewish men married and Jewish women were married. Other people, their parents or their clan, took the initiative in seeing that women were married.
There was, indeed, a remarkable amount of truth in Flusser’s observation. History is generally written from above and deals with institutions and their instruments. It contains very little history from below. This must be put together from occasional remarks and reconstituted on the basis of archeological evidence.
We are fortunate to still possess three multivolume works of the first-century CE Jewish historian Flavius Josephus (37–ca. 100 CE). These are his Jewish Antiquities (Antiquitates judaicae), Jewish War (Bellum judaicum), and Against Apion (Contra Apionem), to which can be added his autobiography, The Life (Vita). All of these works were written in Greek. All of them reflect Josephus’ personal biases, including his desire to please Roman authorities, a bias especially evident in Jewish War. Josephus’ writings, as valuable as they are, represent history from above. They have little to say about ordinary life in first-century Palestine.
Another valuable source of information about first-century Judaism is the multiple works of Philo of Alexandria, an early contemporary of Josephus, but, as the geographic designation suggests, he was not a Palestinian. Moreover, most of his works are not historical. Probably more valuable are the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Qumran texts, the first of which were discovered in a cave near the western coast of the Dead Sea in 1947. These provide some information, but the Judaism that they reflect is of a sectarian nature. They shed light on life in first-century Palestine from a point of view on the fringes.
Yet another source for understanding the situation in first-century Judaism are rabbinic writings. Since rabbinism attempts to faithfully pass along the established tradition, the Mishnah and other rabbinic texts are valuable sources for knowing about life in first-century Palestine. The interpreter who uses the Mishnah and other rabbinic works to know about life in Palestine at the time of Jesus works, however, under a double caveat. First of all, the rabbinic writings are late. They were written some decades, even centuries, after the time in which Jesus and his Jewish contemporaries lived. So, the question necessarily arises as to how faithful to previous times are the traditions that have been handed down. Secondly, the Mishnah, written about 200 CE and probably the oldest of the rabbinic texts, contains halakah, norms of conduct. It is a text that concerns the Law and its interpretation. So, the question arises as to how faithfully people lived according to these norms. Were they a kind of ideal for good behavior rather than a reflection on how people actually lived?
Nevertheless, within the parameters set out by the pair of caveats, the discussion between the disciples of Shammai and the disciples of Hillel is often cited as a witness to the background of the question about divorce posed by some Pharisees to the Matthean Jesus: “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any cause?” (Matt 19:3).2 The question pertains to the interpretation of Deuteronomy 24:1–2, “Suppose a man enters into marriage with a woman, but she does not please him because he finds something objectionable about her, and so he writes her a certification of divorce, puts it in her hand, and sends her out of his house; she then leaves his house and goes off to become another man’s wife.”
In regard to the interpretation of this classic biblical text on divorce, the Mishnaic tractate Giṭṭin (“Bills of Divorce”) 9:10, reports:
The School of Shammai say: “A man may not divorce his wife unless he has found unchastity in her, for it is written, Because he hath found in her indecency in anything.” And the School of Hillel say: “[He may divorce her] even if she spilled a dish for him, for it is written, Because he has found in her indecency in anything. R. Akiva says: “Even if he found another fairer than she, for it is written, And it shall be if she find no favor in his eyes.”3
This report reveals that the disciples of Shammai were more rigorous in their interpretation of the Law than were the disciples of Hillel, among whom Rabbi Akiva was perhaps the most prominent. Akiva (ca. 15–135 CE) was active during the second-century CE Bar Kokhba rebellion. His mentor, Hillel, was born in Babylon (ca. 110 BCE) and died in Jerusalem (ca. 10 CE). His most famous halakic opponent was his younger contemporary Shammai (ca. 50 BCE–ca. 30 CE). Modern rabbinism derives from the School of Hillel. Disputes between the two rabbinic schools were legendary in early Judaism, as were rabbinic disputations between the two rabbis themselves. Many of them are recorded in the Mishnah.
The present study does not intend to pursue the investigation of divorce in first-century Palestine. The Mishnah’s account of the rabbinic debate between the disciples of Shammai and Hillel has been introduced only to make the point that if the Mishnah’s account of the divorce debate is a legitimate source for the interpretation of one New Testament text, it is likewise legitimate to use the Mishnah as a source of light for other situations addressed in the New Testament.
The passage in m. Giṭṭin 9:10 nonetheless calls for three further reflections. First of all, the quotation is in the form of a sugya, a kind of debate between rabbinic authorities. The debate is a literary creation rather than a report of an actual debate between members of the two schools. The dialectic form of presentation leaves the discussion open-ended. It does not resolve the issue one way or the other.4 Second, the rabbis referenced in this passage are tannaim, that is, Palestinian rabbis who lived until the early third century CE. The two most important of the early Palestinian rabbis were Hillel, who died in Jerusalem in 10 CE, and Shammai, who founded his own school and died in 30 CE. Third, the Mishna can be tendentious. Its compiler, Rabbi Yehudah ha Nasi, redacted the text in the early third century CE in order to preserve for posterity the oral tradition of his people. Not only had some of the material been modified in the course of transmission but the redactor preserved the tradition in accord with his own concerns and interests.5
Apropos the interpretation of the first mitzvah recorded in the Torah, “Be fruitful and multiply” (Gen 1:28),6 the Mishnaic tractate Yebamoth (“Sisters-in-Law”7) 6:6, for instance, says:
No man may abstain from keeping the law, Be fruitful and multiply, unless he already had children: according to the School of Shammai, two sons; according to the School of Hillel, a son and a daughter, for it is written, Male and female created he them.
Given the influence of the School of Hillel on later rabbinic tradition, it is not surprising that the Babylonian Talmud’s commentary on the tractate Yebamot interprets Genesis 1:28 as being fulfilled if a Jewish man fathers a son and a daughter.8
The Babylonian Talmud, the Bavli, is one of two versions of the Talmud. The other is the Jerusalem Talmud, the Yerushalmi. As the canonical gospels, each of the compilations was redacted in the light of then-contemporary concerns and the redactor’s own interests. Both Talmuds were written from a male perspective and for the upper- and educated classes.
Of the two, the Yerushalmi is the older, having been compiled in Galilee around 425 CE. The Yerushalmi is a partial commentary on the Mishnah redacted on the basis of interpretive tradition of sages, the Palestinian amoraim—rabbis who lived and taught between the redaction of the Mishnah and the composition of the Talmud. These traditions, the Gemara, had been compiled into books a few decades before the Yerushalmi was redacted. The redactor of the Jerusalem Talmud combined the Gemara with passages from the Mishnah. For purposes of this study, it is important to note that the Yerushalmi was more influenced by Hellenistic thought, especially Jewish Hellenistic thought, than was the Babylonian Talmud.
The Gamara incorporated into the Yerushalmi were traditions that originated in the land of Israel. There were, however, other interpretive traditions, especially those that were developed and handed down in the Jewish academies in the Babylonian cities of Sura and Pumbedita. These were compiled around 500 CE. The combination of these Western traditions, derived from the Babylonian amoraim, with passages from the Mishnah resulted in the redaction of the Babylonian Talmud sometime between 500 and 700 CE.9 It too is only an incomplete commentary on the Mishnah.
Since the Bavli was considered by medieval rabbinic Jewish authorities to be the authoritative interpretation of the Mishnah, it is more widely quoted than is the Yerushalmi and is often simply referred to as the Talmud. For purposes of this study, it can be noted that with regard to family law and sexual relationships, the Bavli was more concerned with sexual propriety10 whereas the Yerushalmi was more focused on the establishment of households.
The Mishah’s account of the dispute between the schools of Shammai and Hillel recounted in Yebamoth 6:6 pertains to how the commandment can be fulfilled; there is neither dispute between them concerning the commandment itself nor a dispute about its obligatory force. The obligation of the Law that a Jewish man marry and have at least two children derives from the fact that the two verbs in the biblical commandment “be fruitful” (perû) and “multiply” (rebû), are in the Qal plural imperative forms of the respective Hebrew verbs (pârâh and râbab). That the verbs are in the plural number suggests that a man must be “fruitful and multiply” more than once. The question is whether a man’s fathering a female counts toward the total of at least two children. The command was repeated in the Genesis account of the restoration of humanity after the flood.11 “God blessed Noah and his sons,” recounts Genesis 9:1, “and said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply.’”
The dispute as to the number of children that a man must have was not the only rabbinic disputation apropos the fulfillment of the commandment found in Genesis 1:28. What if, for example, a man’s children should die? On this issue there was disagreement, as the Babylonian Talmud reports: “If a man had children and they died, he has fulfilled, said R. Huna, the duty of propagation. R. Johanan said: He has not fulfilled it” (b. Yebam. 62d).12
Another issue was that of a man remarrying in his old age. With regard to this question, the Bavli, the Babylonian Talmud, says: “If a man married in his youth, he should marry again in his old age; if he had children in his youth, he should also have children in his old age; for it is said, In the morning sow thy seed and in the evening withhold not thy hand …”13 (b. Yebam. 62b).
And what about a man who had children before he became a Jewish proselyte? Had he fulfilled the obligation to be fruitful and multiply? Rabbis were not in agreement on the issue:
It was stated: If a man had children while he was an idolater and then he became a proselyte, he has fulfilled, R. Johanan said, the duty of propagation of the race; and Resh Kakish said: He has not fulfilled the duty of the propagation of the race. R. Johanan said: He has fulfilled the duty of propagation since he had children. And Resh Lakish said: He has not fulfilled the duty of propagation because one who became a proselyte is like a child newly born. (b. Yebam. 62a)
The commandment “increase and multiply” was considered to be universally binding. Boyarin observes that “there was an absolute demand on everyone to marry and procreate.”14 There was, however, a dispute as to the gender of those on whom it was incumbent, as the text of Genesis 9:1 might intimate. A record of this dispute is recorded in the conclusion to the Mishnah’s Yebamot 6:6:
The duty to be fruitful and multiply falls on the man but not on the woman. R. Johanan b. Baroka says: Of them both it is written, And God blessed them and God said unto them, Be fruitful and multiply.
The prevailing opinion, that of an unnamed teacher whose view was accepted as Jewish Law, to which Johanan ben Baroka, an early second-century rabbi, a tanna, offered a demurer, was that males were required to observe the mitzvah but females were not. Jewish men were under the obligation to “be fruitful and multiply” but Jewish women were not so obligated.15 This is in keeping with the view that the precepts of the Torah were addressed to Jewish males—an opinion that may have been inferred from a strict reading of Genesis 9:1. An incident recounted in the Babylonian Talmud confirms the prevailing opinion:
Judith, the wife of R. Hiyya,16 having suffered in consequence agonizing pains of childbirth, changed her clothes [on recovery] and appeared in her disguise before R. Hiyya. “Is a woman,” she asked, “commanded to propagate the race?” “No,” he replied. (b. Yebam. 65b)17
The idea that a man should marry and have children in order to fulfill the divine commandment continued to be emphasized in rabbinic tradition. For example, Joseph B. Ephraim Caro writes in the sixteenth-century Shulhan Arukh that “every man is obliged to marry in order to fulfill the duty of procreation, and whoever is not engaged in propagating the race is as if he shed blood, diminishing the Divine image and causing His presence [the Shekinah] to depart from Israel” (Evan ha-Ezer 1:1). This harsh judgment on the man who does not marry and have children is based on the Babylonian Talmud’s commentary on the Mishnaic tractate Yebamot (b. Yebam. 63b–64a).
The Talmud was harsh on men who did not marry, who violated the first commandment in the Law. With regard to a man who had not married, a Talmudic commentary on the tractate Yebamot recounts that: “R. Eleazar18 said, Any man who has no wife is no proper man; for it is said, Male and female created He them and called their name Adam”19 (b. Yebam. 63a). And “R. Tanhum20 stated in the name of R. Hanilai: Any man who has no wife lives without joy, without blessing, and without goodness”21 (b. Yebam. 62b). The man who is still an unmarried man by the age of twenty is one who “spends all his days in sinful thoughts” and is deemed to be a sinner (b. Qidd. 29b).22
The Mishnah reports that Rabbi Judah ben Tema, a late second-century tanna, taught that a man is fit for marriage at the age of eighteen,23 but the age of twenty is considered to be the crucial age by which a man must marry.24 Otherwise, he is cursed by God. In this regard the Talmud reports, “Raba25 said, and the School of R. Ishmael taught likewise: Until the age of twenty, the Holy One, blessed be He, sits and waits. ‘When will he take a wife?’ As soon as one attains twenty and has not married, He exclaims, ‘Blasted be his bones!’” (b. Qidd. 29b).26
It is a man’s responsibility to respond faithfully to the first mitzvah in the Torah. This requires not only that he marry but also that he have sex with his wife. Without sexual intercourse, the commandment would not be fulfilled. Hence, the Babylonian Talmud also addresses the matter of sex within marriage. Recalling rabbinic tradition, the tractate Yebamot says:
R. Joshua b. Levi27 said: Whosoever knows his wife to be a God-fearing woman and does not duly visit her is called a sinner; for it is said, And thou shalt know that thy tent is in peace,28 etc.
R. Joshua b. Levi further stated: It is a man’s duty to pay a visit to his wife when he starts on a journey. (b. Yebam. 62b)
The frequency of sexual intercourse within marriage was also a subject for rabbinic discussion.29 Thus the Mishnaic tractate Ketubbot says:
If a man vowed to have no intercourse with his wife, the School of Shammai say: [She may consent] for two weeks. And the School of Hillel say: for one week [only]. Disciples [of the Sages] may continue absent for thirty days against the will [of their wives] while they occupy themselves in the study of the law; and laborers for one week. The duty of marriage enjoined in the Law is: every day for them that are unoccupied;30 twice a week for laborers; once a week for ass-drivers; once every thirty days for camel drivers; and once every six months for sailors. So R. Eliezer. (m. Ketub. 5:631)
The prescribed frequency clearly depends on the husband’s occupation. Sailors are assumed to be away from their wives during longer journeys than are camel drivers. And the journeys of camel drivers are thought to be generally longer than the journey of those who drive donkeys. In respect to scholars, the Talmud asks, “How often are scholars to perform the marital duties?” The answer: “Rav Judah in the name of Samuel replied, Every Friday night” (b. Ketub. 62b).32
The onus of fulfilling the commandment set out in Genesis 1:28 falls on Jewish men who were obliged to marry but it falls on Jewish men in yet another way—namely, in their fulfillment of their paternal duties. This obligation is to be seen within the context of a society in which clans or individual parents arranged for the marriage of their offspring. An oft-quoted passage in the Babylonian Talmud cites the traditional rabbinic teaching of a father’s responsibilities in regard to his son:
We thus learnt [here] what our Rabbis taught: The father is bound in respect of his son, to circumcise, redeem, teach him Torah, take a wife for him, and teach him a craft. Some say, to teach him to swim too. (b. Qidd. 29a)
Commenting on the obligation “to take a wife for him,” the Talmud asks, “How do we know it?” and answers “Because it is written, ‘Take ye wives, and beget sons and daughters; and take wives for your sons, and give your daughters to husbands’”33 (b. Qidd. 30b).
The Talmud reports that Rav Judah was criticized because he had not found a wife for his grown son. He claimed that he had not done so because he was concerned about the genealogical purity of his family but his interlocutor countered the argument by saying that in the light of Lamentations 5:1, no one could be sure of the purity of his family’s lineage.34
There was, however, a discussion as to whether an obligation to find a wife for one’s son was also incumbent upon the son’s mother. To this question, the Talmud responds with a clear “no.”35 Another discussion bears on the sequence of the faithful son’s response to the father who both teaches him Torah and finds a wife for him, to wit:
Our Rabbis taught: If one has to study Torah and to marry a wife, he should first study and then marry. But if he cannot [live] without a wife, he should first marry and then study. Rab Judah said in Samuel’s name, “The halachah is, [A man] first marries and then studies.” R. Johanan36 said, “[With] a millstone around the neck, shall one study Torah!” Yet they do not differ: the one refers to ourselves [Babylonians]; the other to them [Palestinians]. (b. Qidd. 30b)
The sugya indicates that the contradictory demands of marriage and study of the Torah was one of the great unresolved dilemmas of rabbinism.37
As far as a girl is concerned, the Babylonian Talmud says that a father’s responsibility is to “Let her be dowered, clothed and adorned, that men should eagerly desire her” (b. Qidd. 30b). If her father has not found her a husband while she is still relatively young,38 twelve or so years old, she may become unchaste and he will have violated the mitzvah found in Leviticus 19:29, “Do not profane your daughter by making her a prostitute.”39
This rapid overview of the developing rabbinic tradition40 shows that the tradition spawned a series of halakoth as well as a number of halakic disputes with regard to the observance of the first mitzvah in the Torah, “Increase and multiply.” The obligation to fulfill the commandment fell primarily on Jewish men and secondarily on their fathers who were expected to obtain wives for their sons. Eventually the age of twenty was seen to be the age by which a Jewish man should be married.41 Those who were not married by that age were deemed to be sinners and were looked on with scorn.
The practice of celibacy was alien to this tradition.42 A well-known exception was R. Simeon ben Azzai43 who responded to Eleazar ben Azariah’s criticism that there was a contradiction between what he said and what he did, that he preached well but did not act well because he had not married, by saying, “What shall I do, seeing that my soul is in love with the Torah; the world can be carried on by others” (b. Yebam. 63b).44 It may be that Ben Azzai married afterward.45 The tractate Ketubbot in the Bavli suggests that he married the daughter of Rabbi Akiva.46 Celibacy seems to have been considered incompatible with personal and ethnic holiness. The Bible stipulated that the High Priest be married (Lev 21:13) and the rabbis used the term Qiddušin,47 holiness, to describe marriage.48
The rabbinic interpretive tradition of Genesis 1:28—among other things, the failure to marry and procreate was often seen as a diminishment of the image of God or as if the celibate had spilled blood49—developed under the influence of the great rabbi Hillel but the Mishnah reports that there had been a dispute between the earliest generations of his disciples and the disciples of his successor, Shammai, as to the minimal observance of the commandment. The disciples of Hillel claimed that the commandment was essentially satisfied if a man fathered a son and a daughter; the disciples of Shammai held that the commandment required a man to beget two sons in order to satisfy the mitzvah. That the commandment could be satisfied in this fashion allowed at least one exegetical tradition, at least as old as Philo, to hold that Moses, God’s great prophet, eventually forsook the conjugal life in order to speak regularly with God and therefore be able to lead God’s people.50
The Mishnah’s retrospective view of the debates among authorities as to how and by whom the first mitzvah was to be obeyed suggests that the observance of the commandment was considered to be obligatory in first-century Judaism despite the disputes as to the precise nature of the obligation. To put the rabbinic tradition in its proper light, one must not overlook the fact that the rabbis did not base the obligation to marry solely on obedience to the first commandment in the Torah. Anthropological considerations and respect for God’s creation also came into play.
Rabbi Tanhum,51 for instance, said that the unmarried man was someone “without joy, without blessing, and without goodness”52 (b. Yebam. 62b). That the unmarried man is without goodness is based on the Scripture, “It is not good that the man should be alone” (Gen 2:18). Rabbi ben ‘Ulla53 said concerning the man who is not married that he is “without peace, for it is written, And thou shalt know that thy tent is in peace; and thou shalt visit thy habitation and shalt miss nothing”54 (b. Yebam. 62b). And, basing himself on scriptural description of the creation of humankind, the oft-quoted Eleazar55 said that the unmarried man is not a complete man for it is said, “Male and female created He them56” (b. Yebam. 63a). As for a man who is childless, “R. Joshua b. Levi said, A man who is childless is accounted as dead, for it is written, Give me children or else I am dead” (b. Ned. 64b).57
All things considered, there appears to be remarkable consistency in the rabbinic treatment of marriage and sexuality during the Tannaitic and Amoraic periods.
The canonical gospels tell us nothing about the Essenes, whose “philosophy” the historian Josephus describes as the third form of Jewish philosophy.58 According to Josephus, the first form of Jewish philosophy is that of the Pharisees, a group that is often mentioned in the gospels. The second form is that of the Sadducees, cited eight times in Matthew, just once in Mark and Luke, and not at all in the Fourth Gospel.59 The Essenes represented a third form of the Jewish tradition.
Prior to the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in 1947, little was known about the Essenes apart from what Flavius Josephus (ca. 37–100 CE) wrote about them in book two of the Jewish War60 (J. W. 2:120–161). Briefer but earlier mentions of the Essenes appear in the writings of the Roman historian Pliny the Elder (23–79 CE) and the Hellenistic Jewish philosopher, Philo of Alexandria (ca. 15 BCE–ca. 45 CE).
Pliny’s short account in the Natural History 5.73, is based on the work of Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa, who wrote about 15 BCE. As his predecessor, Pliny locates the Essenes at Ein Gedi, a site on the western shore of the Dead Sea. He says that the Essenes, who had existed for thousands of generations, have no wives, renounce venal pleasure, have no money, and live in the company of palm trees.
Josephus claims to have had first-hand experience of the Essenes.61 The experience was apparently a rather brief one since the historian chose to be a Pharisee rather than an Essene. Nevertheless, the experience, as brief as it might have been, allowed Josephus him to have first-hand knowledge of the Essenes. Strikingly, he begins his description of this “sect” with a description of their views on marriage, so much different from those of the dominant Pharisees and Sadducees:
The Essenes have a reputation for cultivating peculiar sanctity.62 Of Jewish birth, they show a greater attachment to each other than do the other sects. They shun pleasures as a vice and regard temperance and the control of the passions as a special virtue. Marriage they disdain, but they adopt other men’s children, while yet pliable and docile, and regard them as their kin and mold them in accordance with their own principles. They do not, indeed, on principle condemn wedlock and the propagation thereby of the race, but they wish to protect themselves against women’s wantonness, being persuaded that none of the sex keeps her plighted troth to one man. (J. W. 2:120–121)63
William Loader comments, “the grounds for their [the Essenes64] espousing celibacy are … not ascetic nor any hesitation about engaging in sexual intercourse for procreation, nor any taboo about sacred space and time, such as might apply to prophets (a role for which only some of them trained), or the especially holy, but rather their fear of women’s infidelity.”65 According to Josephus, the Essenes have a very negative view of women. They are an ascetic and tightly disciplined group,66 as Josephus continues to tell his readers. The Essenes were, nonetheless, not entirely uniform in their thinking, especially in their views on marriage, as Josephus shares with his readers:
There is yet another order of Essenes, which, while at one with the rest in its mode of life, customs, and regulations, differs from them in their view on marriage. They think that those who decline to marry cut off the chief function of life, the propagation of the race, and, what is more, that, were all to adopt the same view, the whole race would quickly die out. They give their wives, however, a three years’ probation, and only marry them after they have by three67 periods of purification given proof of fecundity. They have no intercourse with them during pregnancy, thus showing that their motive in marrying is not self-indulgence but the procreation of children. In the bath the women wear a dress, the men a loin-cloth. Such are the usages of this order. (J.W. 2.160–161)
These are the final words in the Jewish War’s description of the Essenes, thus highlighting by means of a literary inclusio Josephus’ view that what is really remarkable about the sect is their view of marriage and their sexual practices. Nevertheless, Josephus’s mention of individual Essenes, such as Judas (J. W. 1.78–80), Simon (J. W. 2.113), John (J. W. 2.567; 3.11), and Manaemus (Ant. 15.373–379), all of whom engaged in prophecy, makes no reference to their marital status. Those Essenes who lived in community were not or no longer married in Josephus’s view.
The historian gives another, a later and much shorter description68 of the sect in Jewish Antiquities 18.18–22.69 This short description includes but a brief reference to the Essenes’ marital customs, to wit, “They neither bring wives into the community nor do they own slaves, since they believe that the latter practice contributes to injustice and that the former opens the way to a source of dissension” (Ant. 18.21).70
Josephus’ somewhat younger contemporary, Philo of Alexandria, also gives a description of the Essenes. It is found in Every Good Person Is Free, 75–91, but the passage has nothing to say about the Essenes’ marital customs except what might be inferred from his assertion that their love of virtue includes their freedom from love of pleasure (aphilēdonon)71 and the statement that “no one’s house is his own in the sense that it is not shared by all, for besides the fact that they dwell together in communities, the door is open to visitors from elsewhere who share their convictions.”72
In a work titled Hypothetica, an “Apology for the Jews,” two large extracts of which are preserved by Eusebius, Philo speaks explicitly and at greater length about the marital customs of the Essenes.73 His first observation is rather short but it is revelatory of their sexual asceticism:
No Essene is a mere child nor even a stripling or newly bearded, since the characters of such are unstable with a waywardness corresponding to the immaturity of their age, but full grown and already verging on old age, no longer carried under by the tide of the body nor led by the passions, but enjoying the veritable, the only real freedom. (Hypothetica 11.3)
A longer description of the Essenes by Philo talks about their avoidance of marriage and their exclusion of women. Their communal life demands that marriage be avoided. The importance of the virtue of self-control (enkrateia) comes into play.74 The reasons for the avoidance of marriage, as alleged by Philo, are quite misogynist75 and less than appreciative of children:
They eschew marriage because they clearly discern it to be the sole or the principal danger to the maintenance of the communal life, as well as because they continually practice continence (enkrateian). For no Essene takes a wife, because a wife is a selfish creature, excessively jealous and an adept at beguiling the morals of her husband and seducing him by her continued impostures. For by the fawning talk which she practices and the other ways in which she plays her part like an actress on the stage she first ensnares the sight and hearing, and when these subjects as it were have been duped she cajoles the sovereign mind. And if children [paides] come, filled with the spirit of arrogance and bold speaking she gives utterance with more audacious hardihood to things which before she hinted covertly and under disguise, and casting off all shame she compels him to commit actions which are all hostile to the life of fellowship. For he who is either fast bound in the love lures of his wife or under the stress of nature makes his children [teknōn] his first care ceases to be the same to others and unconsciously has become a different man and has passed from freedom into slavery. (Hypothetica 11.14–17)
Much more is known about the Essenes since the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in 1947. Although not all scholars agree, most observers hold that the documents come from a community of Essenes. Among the finds are about 215 “biblical” manuscripts, including several of the book of Genesis. All twenty-four of the Genesis manuscripts that have been found are fragmentary.76 These manuscripts include a fragmentary reading of Genesis 1:28. Texts from the book of Genesis are used in the same way the other books in the Torah are used.77 A striking exception to the general practice is the citation of Genesis 1:27 in the Damascus Document.78 The Genesis citation serves as an argument in favor of monogamy in what seems to be a polemic against the Pharisees who allowed polygamy. The Damascus Document says that these latter “are caught twice in fornication: by taking two wives in their lives even though the principle of creation is ‘male and female he created them.’”79
Around the time that the Dead Sea Scrolls were first unearthed at Qumran, a cemetery was discovered nearby. Initially the cemetery was thought to contain the bones of males only. Indeed, Satlow asserts that “the only evidence outside of the Greek sources that the Qumran community did not marry is archeological.”80 On further investigation some of the bones, admittedly relatively few, were judged to be those of females.81 A few beads, clearly the adornment of women, have also been been found in the cemetery.82
Hence, an important question arises. Did the Essenes really avoid marriage as Pliny, Josephus,83 and Philo contend? The texts found in the environs of Qumran reinforce the importance of the question.
The Rule of the Congregation (1QSa) set forth some regulations on the education of children and on marriage, to wit:
And this is the rule of all the congregation of Israel in the final days, when they gather…. When they come, they shall assemble all those who come, including children and women, and they shall read into their ears all the precepts of the covenant, and shall instruct them in all their regulations, so that they do not stray in their errors…. And this is the rule for all the armies of the congregation, for all native Israelites. From his youth they shall educate him in the book of HAGY, and according to his age, instruct him in the precepts of the covenant, and he will receive his instructions in their regulations; during ten years he will be counted among the children. At the age of twenty years, he will transfer to those enrolled, to enter the lot among his family and join the holy community. He shall not approach a woman to know her through carnal intercourse until he is fully twenty years old, when he knows good and evil. (1QSa 1:1–11)84
Strikingly, this passage in the Rule of the Congregation continues with a reference to a wife being allowed to provide testimony with regard to her husband’s fulfillment of the laws of the Torah.85
Another Qumran text contains rules for a father giving his daughter in marriage as well as a man who would take a woman in marriage. Among other things this text says:
And if a man gives his daughter to someone else, he should recount all her blemishes to him, lest he bring upon himself the judgment of the curse which he said, “whoever leads a blind man astray from the path.”86 And he shall not give her to anyone who is not fit for her…. No one should bring a woman … the holy … who has experience in doing the act, who has either done the act in her father’s house, or as a widow who slept with someone after she was widowed. And every woman who has had a bad reputation during her maiden-hood in her father’s house, no one should take her … and if he takes her, he should proceed in accordance with the regulation. (4Q271, frg. 3, 7–15)87
Although there appears to have been minimal physical presence of women at Qumran, Moshe Bernstein observes that there is abundant textual presence of women at Qumran. The scrolls contain a significant number of texts that deal with marriage, sexual activity, women’s vows, and women’s witness, and purity issues concerning women.88 In addition to the texts from the Rule of the Congregation and from 4Q271, the Temple Scroll (11QTa) has a considerable amount of things to say about women and marriage.89 Moreover, 4Q502, termed a “Ritual of Marriage” by its original editor Maurice Baillet,90 describes a liturgy in which women are clearly involved.
The first of the Temple Scroll’s reference to things marital speaks of fathers accepting non-Jewish wives for their sons (11QTa 2:14–15). The danger of idol worship that might come from “your daughter or the woman who lies in your embrace” is addressed in 11QTa 54:19–21.91 Should it prove to be true that a woman (or a man) does evil in the sight of God, breaks the covenant, and engages in idol worship, the woman (or the man) shall be stoned with stones (11QTa 55:15–21). In a passage on sorcery and the like, men are warned against making their sons or daughters pass through fire (11QTa 60:17–18).
In war, enemy men are to be killed but women and children are to be captured (11QTa 62:9–10). It may be that a man sees “among the prisoners a woman of beautiful appearance” and, desiring her, marries her. In which case there are procedures to be followed (11QTa 63:10–15). The scrolls echo biblical directives92 in setting down the procedure that is to be followed in the case of a man who marries a woman, disliking her, and then accuses her of not being a virgin at the time of the marriage (11QTa 65:7–15).93
Royal marriages come in for particular scrutiny. The king “shall not multiply wives to himself, lest they turn his heart from me” (11QTa 56:18–19; cf. Deut 17:17). The king “shall not take a wife from among all the daughters of the nations, but instead take for himself a wife from his father’s house, from his father’s family.” He is to marry only once but if his wife should die, he is to take another wife from his father’s house (11QTa 57:15–19).
The scroll sets out purity regulations for men who have a nocturnal emission;94 these are followed by the regulations for “a man who lies with his wife, and has an ejaculation” (11QTa 45:7–12).95 Similarly, there are purity regulations for menstruating women and women who have given birth (11QTa 48:15–17). And there are extensive purity regulations for a woman whose child dies in utero (11QTa 50:10–18).96
In reference to the temple the scroll proscribes any woman or boy from entering one of the temple’s courtyards (11QTa 39:7–8).97 A third courtyard is to be made “for their daughters and for foreigners” (11QTa 40:5–6). Regulations are set down for vows made by women under a man’s authority, particularly with regard to the possibility of the annulment of vows by a father or husband (11QTa 53:16–20; 54:2–3)98 as well as for vows made by widows and divorcees (11QTa 54:4–5).
The text speaks about a man who is disobedient to his parents and does not accept their correction. In that case the man’s father and mother are to testify against him before the elders of the city and he is to be stoned.
The last column of the Temple Scroll (11QTa 66) is entirely devoted to things marital and sexual. It sets down regulations for punishing a man who rapes a woman, setting down different prescriptions for a rape that takes place in a city from those in force when a rape occurs in the country (11QTa 66:1–8).99 When a man seduces an unmarried woman, on payment of the stipulated bride price of fifty silver shekels, she is to become his wife (11QTa 66:8–11).100 The final extant text in the Temple Scroll prohibits incest, sometimes coupled with adultery. Among the women prohibited to a man are his father’s wife,101 his brother’s wife,102 his sister, his aunt,103 and his niece (11Q19 66:12–16).
In addition to the many passages that speak about women and marriage, the Temple Scroll makes a number of generic references to groups that would certainly include women and children. The most common of these expressions is “the children of Israel” (11QTa 26:11; 27:2, 4; 29:5; 37:12; 42:14; 46:7; 51:6, 7; 57:2; 58:19; 64:6, 10). The scroll speaks of the heads of families (11QTa 42:1–4) and makes references to the cities in which they live (11QTa 47:3, 8–9; 48:13–14; 64:4, 5; 66:1, 3, 5). The Temple Scrolls, 11Q19 and 11Q20, Temple Scrolla and Temple Scrollb, are among the longer texts found at Qumran.
Three of the caves at Qumran yielded fragmentary pieces of a document known to scholars since its discovery in the genizah of a Cairo synagogue at the end of the nineteenth century.104 After its discovery the document was known by several different names. The discovery of the fragmentary 4Q266 (4QDa),105 4Q267 (4QDb), 4Q268 (4QDc), 4Q269 (4QDd), 4Q270 (4QDe), 4Q271 (4QDf), 4Q272 (4QDg), 4Q273 (4QpapDh), 5Q12 (5QD), and 6Q15 (6QD) enabled scholars to determine the origin of the enigmatic document, now known as the Damascus Document. The ten fragments are part of that document.106
As has been noted, the Damascus Document cites Genesis 1:27, “male and female he created them,” in apparent argument with Pharisees, the builders of the wall, who take two wives in their lives.107 The text108 indicates that the prohibition of bigamy as well as the prohibition of a man marrying his niece are two things distinguishing the sectarians from other Jews.
Those who entered the new covenant in the “land of Damascus” are to refrain from fornication (zenut) in accordance with the regulation,109 but “if they reside in camps in accordance with the rule of the land, and take women and beget children, they shall walk in accordance with the law … and according to the regulation of the teachings, according to the rule of the law, as he said: ‘Between a man and his wife and between a father and his son’” (CD 7:6–8; 19:2–5; cf. Num 30:17).110 The contrast suggests that there were two groups of Essenes, those in the land of Damascus who abstained from sexual relations and groups that resided elsewhere and were married. This would support the view of the Essenes offered by Josephus.111 In contemporary terms we might think of a celibate monastic community and of a third order whose members adhere to the founder’s charism but otherwise live normal lives.
It would be for this latter group that the Damascus Document sets out rules for the possible annulment of a woman’s oath by her husband or father (CD 16:9–12).112 The document says that a wet-nurse should not pick up a baby in her arms and go in and out on the Sabbath and that not only the manservant but also the maidservant should not be compelled to work on the Sabbath (CD 11:11).113 Men are enjoined from sleeping with women in the city of the temple (CD 12:1–2).114 The Inspector (mebeqer) of the camp shall be consulted when men marry. It is his responsibility to assure the education of the children of men who have divorced (CD 13:16–19).115
In addition to the several stipulations with regard to women and marriage that are set out in the previous paragraph, all of which also appear in the fragments of the Damascus Document found in the cave, the tenth-century text has a few other regulations on marriage and sexuality. Citing Deuteronomy 17:17, the Damascus Document reiterates the law of royal monogamy (CD 5:1–2). Men who sleep with a woman during her menses or who violate the laws on incest are considered to have violated the temple (CD 5:6–9). And the laws of incest pertain “equally to females” (CD 5:9–11).
There are, however, a large number of statements concerning marriage, women, and sexuality116 in the ten fragments of the Damascus Document found among the Dead Sea Scrolls that do not appear in the tenth-century version of the text.117 Fragment three of 4QDa makes an enigmatic reference to those who make widows their spoils and murder orphans.118 The tattered sixth fragment of the scroll talks about menstruating women, women who have given birth, and wet-nurses.119 Qumran’s 4QDb imposes a ban on a man who has illegal sex with his wife.120 In 4QDd, frg. 9, 1–7, there are stipulations for a father who gives his daughter in marriage and speaks about eligible women who have had sexual experience while they were unmarried or widows. This fragment also mentions women who had a bad reputation while living in their father’s house. These are to be scrutinized by trustworthy women appointed by the Inspector. These stipulations are also found in 4QDe, frg. 5, 14–10 and 4QDf, frg. 3, 7–15. This fragment gives the most complete text of the regulations.
The scroll designated 4QDe reprises the matter of the unmarried woman who has a bad reputation and also speaks about widows who sleep with someone else and men who approach their wives at inappropriate times.121 In addition, 4QDe speaks about men who have intercourse with pregnant women, with their fraternal nieces, or with other men, as one sleeps with a woman.122 The text also speaks about a woman who uses rape as a defense when she has been accused of sexual infidelity.123 Thereafter the badly mutilated fourth fragment of 4QDe mentions kings, a ban on sleeping with certain women, the slave girl, and fathers giving a bride to their sons.124 Qumran’s 4QDe also includes passages that have been previously referenced in this overview of the Dead Sea Scrolls.125 All told, 4QDe contains six passages that speak about women and sexual intercourse.
Manuscript 4QDf contains four passages that speak about women and sexual activity. All of them replicate material found in other scrolls.126 Manuscript 4QDg contains purity regulations for menstruating women.127 Finally, the scroll found in cave six (6QD) contains material found in other scrolls—namely, the ban on two marriages128 and the prohibition of sexual intercourse with a pregnant woman, a fraternal niece, or a male.129
In sum, not only does the Damascus Document speak about women, marriage, and sexual intercourse but so, too, do seven of the ten mutilated scrolls of the document found at Qumran.130 This abundance of evidence indicates that, while the community of Essenes at Qumran may have been celibate,131 not all Essenes were.
Why, then, did the members of the monastic-like community observe celibacy? The texts themselves provide no clear answer. Scholars132 have offered various suggestions as to the motivation of their sexual abstinence. Koltun-Fromm says: “The evidence … does not suggest that the Qumranites were necessarily a mindfully celibate community but, rather, that they developed a heightened sense of semen pollution.” She continues, “proper sexuality plays a different role in protecting holy or “hyper-pure” space. In the early Yahad’s strident construct of holy space, active sexual relations and women are distanced from the center of activity—the Temple—as a precaution against semen pollution.”133 On the other hand, van der Horst134 suggests that the sexually abstaining Qumranites were aware of a need to be in a constant state of readiness for an eschatological war.135 That required the observance of the biblical rules136 for sexual abstinence in a war situation. Other scholars opine that the Qumranites were celibate because of their study of the Law, which they considered to be a cultic activity.
In any case, there were other Essenes. These were those who lived in the cities, in “camps,” were married, as was the population at large. They may have subjected themselves to a more rigorous sexual discipline than other Jews, but there were men, women, and children—and marriage—in the religious movement to which the community at Qumran belonged. There is no need for this study to examine the texts in detail.137 For our purposes, the texts have been passed quickly in review to establish the fact of marriage among the Essenes.
Reviewing the evidence, Moshe Bernstein has said that the absence of a mention of women in Qumran’s “Rule of the Community,” the so-called “Manual of Discipline” (1QS), was an anomaly. When all the documents are taken into consideration, Bernstein is right on target.138 The publication of the Rule, along with the War Scroll (1QM), the Hymns (1QH), and the Isaiah scrolls (1QIsaa, 1QIsab), coupled with the views of Philo, Josephus,139 and Pliny and the presence of predominately male bones in the cemetery at Qumran gave rise to the widely popular view that the Essenes were a celibate community.140 That, however, was not the way of life for all Essenes. It was certainly not the lifestyle of the Essenes who lived in towns. There is no evidence that celibacy was practiced by city-dwelling Essenes, a Jewish religious group whose particular textual legacy includes Genesis 1:28, “Increase and multiply,” among its relatively few citations of the book of Genesis.
Rabbinic tradition, particularly those based on the sayings of the tannaim, provides us with some insights into marital customs and obligations in first-century Palestine. The scrolls found near the shores of the Dead Sea reflect the marital views and practices of a group of sectarian Jews, some of whom apparently lived in a monastic community at Qumran141 while others lived in enclaves around Palestine.
There is yet another source that might prove to be helpful in determining how first-century Jews might have expressed their sexuality. That source is the writings of a pair of Hellenistic Jewish authors, Philo of Alexandria and Flavius Josephus.
To some extent, Philo of Alexandria represents another subculture in first-century Judaism. He lived in Egypt where there had been a significant Jewish presence for centuries. The most remarkable witness to this presence may well be the Elephantine papyri, dating from the fifth century BCE. Elephantine142 is an island in the upper Nile, where Jewish soldiers were stationed during the Persian period (495–399 BCE). Archeological excavations have revealed the presence of a Jewish temple on the island. The papyri, written in Aramaic and discovered during the nineteenth century, include divorce documents, personal letters to family members, and contracts. Among other things the papyri tell us about Ananiah, an official in the Jewish temple, who married a former slave owned by a Jewish master, Meshullam. The story of Ananiah and the Egyptian Talmut is a witness to the existence of interracial and intercultural marriage and is an indication that the kind of endogamous culture that characterized Judaism of the Maccabean and subsequent eras143 was not a factor in the life of fifth-century BCE Jews who formed the Jewish colony at Elephantine.
Philo lived centuries after the heyday of the Jewish community in Elephantine. He was born in Alexandria ca. 20 BCE to a wealthy and aristocratic Jewish family who enjoyed Roman citizenship. Well educated and privileged, he once visited the Temple in Jerusalem144 and was a member of an Alexandrian Jewish delegation to the Emperor Caligula in 40 CE that sought to ease tensions between Jews and Romans in the imperial capital. Philo’s nephew Tiberius was for a time governor of Judea and was Titus’ chief of staff in suppressing the Jewish revolt (66–70 CE). Philo himself died ca. 50 CE, so he was a contemporary of Jesus and his disciples but his writings are of limited value for understanding marriage in first-century Palestine. Not only was Philo from Egypt, he was also of the upper class and his writings evidence a curious mixing (by our contemporary standards) of Hellenistic philosophy and the Jewish biblical tradition.
His views on sexuality and marriage145 are colored by his Hellenistic philosophical tradition. As often as not, what the Scriptures say about sex and marriage serve as a basis for Philo’s allegorical exposition. Thus, his treatment of Genesis 1:27, “God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them,”146 points to an asexual creation. William Loader correctly observes that Philo’s interpretation of the biblical text is not to be understood as positing the idea that the sexual is to be abandoned, thus creating an ideological ground for the practice of celibacy. Philo never uses the Scripture in this way.147
It is well known that Philo considered women inferior to men in several respects.148 On the other hand, he says that, “everything which is without a woman is imperfect and homeless.”149 As for marriage, a “woman changes her habitation from her family to her husband.”150 As for sex, Philo often warns against excessive passion but sexual intercourse in itself is good. Philo uses the imagery of sexual intercourse to speak about the soul’s intercourse with God.151 This is, in fact, an important motif in Philo’s writings.152
It is, nonetheless, clear that, for Philo, the purposes of sexual union is procreation. He writes that men and women, “in the course of nature come together for the procreation of children”153 and that marriage laws “are intended to promote the generation of children.”154 What he writes about the marriage of Isaac illustrates well his attitude toward sexual passion and the procreative purpose of sexual union: “It was not for the sake of irrational sensual pleasure or with eagerness that he had intercourse with his wife but for the sake of begetting legitimate children.”155
Philo’s brand of sexual restraint does not require sexual continence.156 Moses is, however, a special case. Exodus 34:28 says that Moses, “was there with the LORD forty days and forty nights; he neither ate bread nor drank water.” To Moses’ fast, Philo added an affirmation that Moses also abstained from sex.157 Moses, he wrote,
Had to be clean, as in soul so also in body, to have no dealings with any passion, purifying himself from all the calls of mortal nature, food and drink and intercourse with women [tēs pros gynaikias physiōs]. This last he had disdained for many a day, almost from the time when, possessed by the spirit, he entered on his work as a prophet, since he held it fitting to hold himself always in readiness to receive the oracular messages. (Moses 2.68–69)158
Moses was, however, an exception, the only such exception that appears in Philo’s extensive writing.159 And Moses had already fulfilled the command to increase and multiply before he embraced, in Philo’s view, a life of sexual continence for the sake of his prophetic mission.160 Richard Horsley observes that “although he [Philo] emphasizes the deeper, spiritual meaning of Scripture discerned through allegorical interpretation, he still retains a sense of the validity and importance of the Jewish Law as it bears on social life. Thus, he sees the human practice of sexual intercourse as Nature’s mode of reproduction according to natural, hence divine law.”161 Philo’s vision of the future, says Loader, “envisages a proper place for sexual desire, expressing itself in the pleasure of sexual intercourse in marriage for procreation, a reflection of what he insists should be the norm in the present.”162
The philosopher’s description of Moses who took up a life of sexual continence so as to be in union with God and be ready to receive oracular messages is remarkably similar to his description of the so-called Therapeutae and Therapeutrides, who
When they have divested themselves of their possessions and have no longer aught to ensnare them they flee without a backward glance and leave their brothers, their children, their wives, their parents, the wide circle of their kinsfolk, the groups of friends around them, the fatherlands in which they were born and reared, … pass their days outside the walls pursuing solitude in gardens or lonely bits of country. (Contempl. Life 18, 20)163
The group is acceptable to a Jew like Philo because the men already had wives and children and therefore had fulfilled the command of Genesis 1:28.164 Subsequently they embraced a life characterized by enkrateia, the virtue of self-control, in this case in the form of sexual abstinence, in order to devote themselves to the contemplation of the divine. Drawn from affluent and well-educated circles,165 they lived in clustered houses outside of town, each of which had a small room, a “sanctuary,” devoted to meditation. So that the inhabitants would not be distracted, their houses were not as close to one another as were houses in town.166 The best example of such a community, says Philo, was a group that lived near the shores of Lake Mariout,167 fairly close to Alexandria. The group included women, “most of them aged virgins.”168 The order of reclining in their festal gatherings was based on their seniority in their community. The men gathered on the right, the women by themselves on the left.169
Philo’s overarching concern was to present Judaism in a way that made it comprehensible to and accepted by his Hellenistic readers. His desire in this regard is most evident in his allegorical interpretation of the Jewish Scriptures. It may be that his eagerness to be in dialogue with Hellenists may have colored his description of the Therapeutae and Therapeutrides as an ideal expression of religious devotion. It could be that the exposition of his ideas was influenced by the cult of Isis’ linking of sexual continence to the exercise of the cult170 or by his desire to show that Jews were at least as virtuous as those who espoused the sexual abstinence put forth as an idea by the increasingly popular Stoic and Cynic philosophies.171 One might even question whether the Therapeutae and Therapeutrides ever existed. They may have been a product of the philosopher’s fertile imagination, a fictive contemplative community whose way of life represents what he considered to be an idyllic kind of human existence.172
Having acknowledged his dependence on Moses—that is, the Torah—as his source, the historian, Flavius Josephus, begins his story of the Jewish people with the story of creation. Coming to the sixth day of creation, he writes simply, “the sixth day He [God] created the race of four-footed creatures, making them male and female; on this day also He formed man [anthrōpon]” (Ant. 1.32). Josephus makes no mention of the creation of gendered humanity nor does he cite Genesis 1:28’s “Increase and multiply.” He also omits the command in Genesis 9:1 from Genesis’ narrative of the aftermath of the flood (Gen 9:1).173 Josephus does, however, say of Adam that he “longed for children, and was seized with a passionate desire to beget a family.”174
Josephus’ story of the noble history of his people passes in review many of the sexual episodes in the biblical narrative and touches on the marital escapades and sexual practices of the Herodians, but his account of Moses on Sinai refers only to his abstinence from food.175 There is no reference to Moses’ sexual abstinence, as there was in Philo.
Tracing his ancestral story, Josephus comments on the heroes and heroines as well as the antiheroes, making abundant references to their marital and sexual experiences. His accounts include an element of romantic love, undoubtedly under the influence of the Hellenistic176 culture in which he lived. The historian comments as well on the laws of his people, including the various laws on marriage, sexuality, and ritual purity. He affirms that marriage is for the sake of procreation177 but he says nothing about a divine ordinance to that effect.
For Josephus marriage appears to be the normal form of social life throughout history, including the period in which Jesus lived. The singular exception that he mentions is a small group of Jewish men who were so suspicious of women178 that they gathered together in a males-only community whose members embraced a life of sexual continence.
While we may be inclined to consider the marital situation in first-century Palestine solely from a Jewish religious-cultural perspective, we ought not forget that at the time of Jesus Palestine was under the imperial domination of the Roman Empire. The laws and policies of Rome were not without import for people living in the empire.
With regard to marriage,179 the principal laws at the time were the Lex Iulia de maritandis ordinibus (18 BCE),180 the Lex Iulia de adulteriis coercendis (18 BCE), and the Lex Papia Poppaea (9 CE). Caesar Augustus was successful in getting the consuls to sponsor this latest legislation.181 The earlier laws addressed the issue of the low rate of reproduction among Roman citizens while the latter was chiefly concerned with promiscuity. The Lex Papia Popaea emended the earlier Lex Iulia de maritandis ordinibus which Augustus had passed by means of his tribunician power (tribunicia potestas). Together the two laws were popularly known as the Lex Iulia et Papia Poppaea.182
The laws were aimed at restoring the moral basis of society and were intended to promote marriage and procreation.183 As such, they had a sociopolitical purpose. The Julian laws punished adultery and penalized those who were not married or were childless.184 Men between the ages of 25 and 60 were bound185 by the law, as were women between 20 and 50. Those whose spouse had died and who had divorced were granted a short period of time in which to bring their lives into conformity with the law.
Men were penalized if they did not marry.186 For example, bachelors were not allowed to receive inheritances or legacies. Since betrothal was considered as marriage for purposes of the law, some men who did not want to marry entered into a long-term betrothal. The Lex Papia Poppaea closed this loophole by limiting the engagement to two years and forbidding betrothal to young girls. If a couple had no children, the surviving spouse could inherit only 10 percent of the deceased’s estate.
Divorced women were granted a period of eighteen months within which to remarry. For widows, the grace period was two years. Nevertheless, they were required to wait twelve months before remarrying to make sure that they had not become pregnant by their former husbands.187 The purity of the family line was a most important consideration in the Julian laws on marriage.
The Julian legislation provided benefits for those who had large families.188 Privileges were accorded to those who had three children (iustos tres liberos189). According to Aulus Gellius, among the privileges accorded to the person who had more children than his colleague was priority in taking the fasces to the consul.190 Former slaves, freedmen, were encouraged to form traditional familiae.191 Female Roman citizens who had three live births and freedwomen who had four lives births, all of whom had to be born after she was freed, were exempt from male guardianship.192 They were allowed to conduct business and legal affairs without a tutor and thus were able, for example, to initiate divorce proceedings.
These laws were principally enacted to counteract a falling birthrate, principally among the upper classes.193 The legislation was neither entirely popular194 nor fully successful but it was the law of the Empire. To what extent they were enforced in a far-off territory like Palestine remains a moot question. They were, nevertheless, the pertinent laws of the Empire under which Jesus and his disciples lived.195
Although we have no direct evidence of any legal or social obligation that first-century Palestinian Jewish men marry, an abundance of circumstantial evidence warrants the conclusion that Palestinian men of that era did marry in fidelity to their Jewish tradition and in order to propagate their race.
The rabbinic tradition, with roots in first-century Palestine, linked the requirement of marriage to the fulfillment of the first mitzvah in the Law, “Increase and multiply.” The tradition gives no clear examples of any observant Jewish men who were not married. The inherent conservatism of the tradition allows its reflections of the obligation to marry to be retrojected onto the situation in first-century Palestine.
Thanks to the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, scholars are now much more aware of the diversity in first-century Palestinian Judaism than they once were. “Normative Judaism” as a cipher for rabbinic Judaism is now past history. The discovery of the scrolls along with the nearby archeological digs at Qumran have confirmed the existence of a monastic community of Jews whose members embraced sexual continence but that also confirmed the existence of like-minded sectarians who married and lived in the cities in faithful observance of the Jewish Law. It is not beyond the realm of possibility that the Qumranites were men who had fulfilled the first commandment in the Law before retreating to a life of prayer and study or fulfilled in locations outside the monastic environment where cultic obligations and the avoidance of pollution required an absence from women.196
What Philo, Josephus, and Pliny said about the Essenes now appears to be descriptive of a monastic community rather than of a broader movement. At most, its existence was an exception to a general rule. With respect to celibacy, the views of the Hellenistic authors, Philo, Josephus, and Pliny, on the Essenes do not concur with what the texts found at Qumran actually say. Rather, they conform to a philosophic ideal of a religious community. These writers’ distorted views of the Essenes’ sexual mores were influenced by their own peculiarly Hellenistic views of human sexuality.
To quote a recent study, “Neither the Essenes nor some segments of their group were celibate; they did not disdain marriage or non-procreative sexual activity.”197 Heger notes, “I would … hesitate to impose on the Torah-centered Essene/Qumran group a way of life fundamentally in conflict with the divine command to the first humans to multiply.”198
As David W. Chapman writes, marriage and procreation were “duties for most Jewish people.”199 First-century Jewish men considered it to be among their primary obligations to marry and raise a family. Such was the situation when Jesus of Nazareth appeared on scene, proclaiming, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news” (Mark 1:15).
1 Cf. Matt 22:30.
2 The earlier Markan version of the discussion between the Pharisees and Jesus describes them as asking a less nuanced question, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” (Mark 10:3). Matthew’s editorial modification is deemed to stem from a discussion within Palestinian Judaism in the late first century CE.
3 This and all following English language translations of the Mishnah are taken from Herbert Danby, The Mishnah Translated from the Hebrew with Introduction and Brief Explanatory Notes (London: Oxford University Press, 1933).
4 Cf. Daniel Boyarin, Carnal Israel: Reading Sex in Talmudic Culture (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993), 26.
5 Thus, Bruce D. Chilton and Jacob Neusner write: “No critical scholar today expects to open a rabbinic document, whether the Mishnah of ca. 200 CE or the Talmud of Babylonia (Bavli) of 600 CE, and to find there what particular sages on a determinate occasion really said or did. Such an expectation is credulous.” See Bruce D. Chilton and Jacob Neusner, “Paul and Gamaliel,” in In Quest of the Historical Pharisees, ed. Jacob Neusner and Bruce D. Chilton (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2007), 175–223, 175.
6 See Jeremy Cohen, “Be Fertile and Increase, Fill the Earth and Master It”: The Ancient and Medieval Career of a Biblical Text (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1989), 158–65, where he examines the binding force of the blessing in the rabbinic tradition.
7 Danby’s edition of the Mishnah gives “Sisters-in-Law” as the English language title of the tractate. The term Yebamoth literally means levirate marriages. It is derived from ymb, “perform a levirate marriage” (cf. Gen 38:8; Deut 25:5, 7).
8 Cf. b. Yebam. 61b.
9 The oldest complete manuscript of the Bavli, the Munich Talmud, dates from 1342.
10 The Bavli’s insistence on early marriage was similar to the opinions of the surrounding Zoroastrian culture that view early marriage as the only antidote for sexual temptation. To some extent, the Bavli’s insistence on marriage and the use of sexual activity can also be seen as a reaction to an increasingly sexual asceticism in Christianity.
11 The Genesis 9:1–17 account is a priestly narrative as is the creation story in Genesis 1.
12 The English translation comes from Flavius Josephus, Jewish Antiquities XVIII–XIX, trans. Louis H. Feldman, Loeb Classical Library 433 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1965).
13 The citation comes from Qoh 11:6.
14 Boyarin, Carnal Israel, 165; cf. Michael Satlow, Jewish Marriage in Antiquity (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2001), 32.
15 The tradition rejected the interpretation of Rabbi Johanan ben Baroka cited in m. Yebam. 6:6. On the other hand, “in respect of conjugal union all agree that the [wife who refuses] is to be regarded as rebellious” (b. Ketub. 63b). This and subsequent English language translations of the Babylonian Talmud’s tractate Ketubbot are taken from Samuel Daiches and Israel W. Slotki, Tbe Babylonian Talmud: Seder Nashim, vols. 3–4, ed. Isidore Epstein (London: Soncino, 1936).
16 Hiyya was an early fourth-century rabbi.
17 English-language translations of the Bavli are given according to Isidore Epstein’s Soncino edition (London, 1936).
18 Eleazar ben Shammua, one of the sages of Jabneh and one of the five disciples of Akiva, was a fourth-generation rabbi who lived in the second century CE. He is often cited in rabbinic literature, generally without mention of his patronymic.
19 Cf. Gen 1:27; 5:2. In a footnote to b. Yebam. 63a, the translator Israel W. Slotki comments, “Adam = man. Only when the male and female were united were they called Adam” (The Babylonian Talmud. Seder Nashim. Yebamot I, 419, n, 10).
20 Rabbi Tanhum was a Palestinian Amora who lived in the second half of the fourth century CE.
21 Scriptural grounds for these three deprivations were found in Deuteronomy 14:26; Ezekiel 44:30, and Genesis 2:18, respectively.
22 This and subsequent English language translations of the Babylonian Talmud’s tractate Qiddušin are taken from Harry Freedman, The Babylonian Talmud: Seder Nashim, vol. 8, ed. Isidore Epstein.
23 Cf. m. ʾAbot 5. 21.
24 The Shulhan Arukh says that the courts can compel a man to marry if he has not married by the age of twenty (cf. E. H. 1:3).
25 “Raba,” Abba ben Joseph bar Hama, was a fourth-century Babylonian amora. He is often cited in the Bavli, the Babylonian Talmud. In the vast majority of disputed issues, his opinion held sway.
26 The Talmud immediately adds that the proud Rabbi Hisda said, “The reason that I am superior to my colleagues is that I married at sixteen. And had I married at fourteen, I would have said to Satan, An arrow in your eye.”
27 Joshua ben Levi was a Palestinian amora of the first half of the third century CE.
28 Cf. Job 5:24.
29 Cf. m. Ketub. 5:6.
30 In a footnote, n. 35, the translator, Samuel Daiches, comments that the expression refers to “men who have no need to pursue an occupation to earn their lives and are able ‘to walk about’ idly.”
31 See the commentary in b. Ketub. 61a–63b.
32 Rav Judah, Judah bar Ezekiel (220–99 CE) was a second-generation Babylonian amora. After the death of his mentor, Rav, he studied under Samuel of Nehardea and founded the academy in Pumbedita.
33 The Scripture is Jer 29:6.
34 Cf. b. Qidd. 71b.
35 Cf. b. Qidd. 30b
36 R. Johanan, Johanan ben Zakai (ca. 30–90 CE) was one of the most important among the Palestinian tannaim.
37 See the lengthy discussion in Boyarin, Carnal Israel, 134–64.
38 Cf Sir 7:25.
39 Cf. b. Sanh. 76a. Cf. Harry Freedman, trans., The Babylonian Talmud: Seder Nezikin, vol. 6, ed. Isidore Epstein.
40 See also Harvey McArthur, “Celibacy in Judaism at the Time of Christian Origins,” AUSS 25 (1987): 163–81.
41 Satlow observes that early marriage is the ideal expressed in the Babylonian Talmud. The reality might have been quite different, especially in the Palestine of an earlier period. See Michael Satlow, Jewish Marriage in Antiquity (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2001), 104–11.
42 Boyarin says, “the Rabbis disallowed virginity in principle,” while David Novak observes, with reference to b. Yeb. 63b, which, in turn, references Gen 9:6–7, “the rabbinic tradition regarded the commandment to marry and have a family to be without exception.” See Boyarin, Carnal Israel, 41; David Novak, “Jewish Marriage: Nature, Covenant and Contract,” in Marriage, Sex, and Family in Judaism, ed. Michael J. Broyde and Michael Ausubel (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2005), 61–87, 79. See further Elliott N. Dorff, “The Jewish Family in America: Contemporary Challenges and Traditional Resources,” in Marriage, Sex, and Family, 214–43, 214, 225.
43 Simeon ben Azzai, sometimes cited simply as Ben Azzai, was a tanna of the first third of the second century. Van der Horst comments that Ben Azzai: “In spite of Gen. 1:28 and in spite of the social pressure of his co-religionists, purposefully renounces marriage and the founding of a family in order to enable himself to pursue a higher goal with all the more determination: i.e., greater knowledge of the Torah and hence a better understanding of God’s will.” Pieter W. van der Horst, “Celibacy in Early Judaism,” RB 109 (2002): 342–90, 392–93. Boyarin calls him a “complicated hypocrite” while Diamond styles him “the exception that proves the rule.” See Boyarin, Carnal Israel, 135; Eliezer Diamond,“‘And Jacob Remained Alone’: The Jewish Struggle with Celibacy,” in Celibacy and Religious Traditions, ed. Carl Olson (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008), 41–64, 53.
44 Cf. Gen. Rab. 34:14.
45 Another case that is sometimes cited is that of the third-century Babylonian rabbi, Hamnuna. When he was introduced to R. Huna, he appeared without a headdress. His bareheadedness prompted the question “Why have you no head-dress? Hanuhna responded, “Because I am not married.” “Thereupon he [Huna] returned his face away from him. ‘See to it that you do not appear before me [again] before you are married’” (b. Qidd. 289b.). Apparently Hamnuna did marry later on. The Talmud reports that he had a good relationship with Huna. See b. ʾErub. 63a.
46 Cf. b. Ketub. 63a.
47 There is, however, no evidence that the rabbis reflected on the use of the term Qiddusin. The Hebrew term may be a loan term from the Greek. Authors such as Plato and Aristotle used the word ekdosis in reference to the handing over of a bride in marriage. Cf. Satlow, Jewish Marriage, 77.
48 What Paul writes to the Thessalonians in 1 Thessalonians 4:3–8 reflects this tradition. In this first of his extant letters Paul writes about marriage in a passage devoted to sanctification and holiness.
49 Cf. Diamond, “‘And Jacob Remained Alone,’” 41.
50 Cf. Naomi Koltun-Fromm, Hermeneutics of Holiness: Ancient Jewish and Christian Notions of Sexuality and Religious Community (New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), 9–10.
51 Tanhum ben Hiyya was a collector of the saying of third-century CE Palestinian sages.
52 Scriptural grounds for these three deprivations were found in Deuteronomy 14:26; Ezekiel 44:30; and Genesis 2:18, respectively.
53 Ben ʿUlla was a third- or fourth-century Palestinian amora.
54 The Scripture is Job 5:24. The rabbis took “tent” as a reference to a man’s wife.
55 Eleazar ben Azaria was a first-century CE Palestinian tanna.
56 Cf. Gen 1:27.
57 The Scripture is Genesis 30:1. In a footnote, n. 14, H. Freedman, the translator, says, “Possibly the inclusion of the poor and childless (in addition to the leper and the blind man) was directed against the early Christian exaltation of poverty and celibacy.”
58 Cf. J. W. 2:119.
59 Cf. Matt 3:7; 6:1, 6, 11, 12 [2x]; 22:23, 34; Mark 12:18; Luke 20:27.
60 J. W. 2:120–161.
61 See Life 10–11. Josephus says that he made a thorough investigation of the three sects in order to “be in a position to select the best.”
62 The Greek word is semnotēta. H. St. John Thackeray, the editor of the Loeb edition of this work, notes that the Greek could be translated as “solemnity.” It should be noted that the first sentence in the English translation is a subordinate clause in Greek, where it is found in par. 119.
63 English-language translations of book 2 of The Jewish War are taken from Flavius Josephus, The Jewish War Books 1–2, trans. H. St. John Thackeray, Loeb Classical Library 203 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1927).
64 That is, the Essenes in Josephus’ view of them.
65 William Loader, Philo, Josephus, and the Testaments on Sexuality: Attitudes towards Sexuality in the Writings of Philo and Josephus and in the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2011), 337.
66 Josephus says that the number of men (andres) in the group is more than four thousand. See Josephus, Ant. 18.20. Philo, Good Person, 75, gives a similar number. Both authors report that the Essenes were held in high regard by the rulers of Palestine, by Herod, as Josephus reports (Ant. 15.10.5), or, more generally, as Philo, who speaks of the admiration of the Essenes by commoners and great kings, asserts (Hypothetica 11. 18).
67 In a footnote, the editor of the Loeb edition observes that “the text can hardly be right; the Lat. has ‘constanti purgatione.’”
68 Introducing the short description of the three sects, Josephus refers his readers to the longer descriptions in book 2 of the Jewish War. Cf. Ant. 18.11. Josephus mentions only three sects in both the Jewish War and The Life but adds a fourth in the brief overview given in the Jewish Antiquities. The fourth is that of Judas the Galilean about which Josephus is hesitant to say very much. Cf. Ant. 18.23–25.
69 See also Ant. 15.10.4–5.
70 The English translation comes from Flavius Josephus, Jewish Antiquities XVIII–XIX, trans. Louis H. Feldman, Loeb Classical Library 433 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1965).
71 Cf. Philo, Good Person, 84.
72 Philo, Good Person, 85. This translation is taken from Philo Volume IX, trans. F. H Colson (Loeb Classical Library 363. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1941).
73 The second abstract, Hypothetica 8.11.1–18, is a description of the Essenes.
74 Interestingly, however, Philo’s description of the Essenes who lived in Palestinian Syria has nothing to say about sexual matters. See Philo, Good Person, 75–91.
75 Philo’s description of the Essenes negative views on women far exceeds that given by Josephus in Ant. 2.161.
76 1QIsaa and 11QPsa are among the rare exceptions of scrolls containing an entire book of the Bible. As far as Genesis 1:28 is concerned, 4Q1 (4QGenb), frg. 2; 4Q10 (4QGenk), frg. 3; and 4Q483 (4QpapGen) have portions of Gen 1:28, but together they yield only this text: “And [God] blessed [them, and God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply,] and replen[ish the earth, and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the heavens, and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.]’” Cf. Martin Abegg, Jr., Peter Flinch, and Eugene Ulrich, The Dead Sea Scrolls Bible: The Oldest Known Bible Translated into English for the First Time (San Francisco: Harper, 1999), 7.
77 Maimonides’ identification of the 613 commandments likewise does not include any commandments in Genesis, not even Genesis 1:28.
78 Only fragments of this document were found in the caves around Qumran. See also Mayer I. Grubner, “Women in the Religious System of Qumran,” in Judaism in Late Antiquity, 5: The Judaism of Qumran: A Systemic Reading of the Dead Sea Scrolls 1: Theory of Israel, ed. Alan J. Avery-Peck, Jacob Neusner, and Bruce Chilton (Leiden: Brill, 2000), 173–96, esp. 178–89.
79 CD 4:20–21; 6QD, frg. 1. On this text, see Koltun-Fromm, Hermeneutics of Holiness, 61.
80 Satlow, Jewish Marriage, 22.
81 Cf. Joseph E. Zias, “The Cemeteries of Qumran and Celibacy: Confusion Laid to Rest?,” DSD 7 (2000): 220–53. The bones of five females about thirty years old were found.
82 A whorl of a spindle has also been discovered on site.
83 Josephus had, nonetheless, observed that there was another order of Essenes whose members married. See J. W. 2.160–61, above, p. 47.
84 In the Martínez-Tigchelaar edition of the Scrolls, 1:101, the italicized letters are enclosed between brackets. These letters come from the editors’ reconstruction of the text.
85 Cf. 1QSa 1:11–12.
86 Cf. Deut 17:18.
87 Again in the Martínez-Tigchelaar edition of the Scrolls, 1:619, the italicized letters are enclosed between brackets. The text belongs to the Damascus Document and has been studied by David Rothstein (“Gen 24:12 and Marital Law in 4Q271:3: Exegetical Aspects and Implications,” DSD 12 [2005]: 189–204); and Aharon Shemesh (“4Q271.3: A Key to Sectarian Matrimonial Law,” JJS 49 [1998]: 244–63). An expanded version of Shemesh’s study was published in Hebrew, in Jerusalem, 2001.
88 Cf. Moshe J. Bernstein, “Women and Children in Legal and Liturgical Texts from Qumran,” DSD 11 (2004): 191–211.
89 Cf. Lawrence H. Schiffman, “Laws Pertaining to Women in the Temple Scroll,” in The Dead Sea Scrolls: Forty Years of Research, ed. Devorah Dimant and Uriel Rappaport, STDJ 10 (Leiden: Brill and Jerusalem: Magnes Press and Yad Ben Zvi, 1992), 210–28.
90 Cf. Maurice Baillet, DJD 7 (1982), 81–105.
91 Cf. 11QTb 16:1–7.
92 Much of the material in the Temple Scroll follows the Torah rather closely.
93 Cf. Deut 22:13–21.
94 Cf. 11QTb 13:2.
95 Cf. 11QTb 12:4–5.
96 Cf. 11QTb 14:17–21.
97 As is the case with all the scrolls, the Temple Scroll has deteriorated; numerous pieces of the scroll are no longer extant. Sometimes the lacunae were such that the editors could not reconstruct the full text.
98 Cf. Num 30:7–9; 4Q271, frg. 4. 10–12.
99 Cf. Deut 22:22–27.
100 Cf. Deut 22:13–21; Lev 18:8.
101 Cf. Deut 22:30.
102 Cf. Lev 18:16.
103 Cf. Lev 18:12–14.
104 Cf. Solomon Schechter, Documents of Jewish Sectaries, vol. 1 (Cambridge: University Press, 1910).
105 Of the ten fragments, 4QDa contains the largest portion of the Damascus Document. It consists of eleven individual fragments, several of which contain more than one column.
106 Columns 1–16 of the Damascus Document belong to a tenth-century document (CDa); columns 19–20 (CDb) belong to another document, coming from the twelfth century. While some of the material in the Qumran fragments supplements these documents; other material is found in the later texts. For the reconstituted text, see David Hamidovic, “Écrit de Damas”: Le manifeste des esséniens, Collection de la Revue des Études Juives, 51 (Leuven: Peeters, 2011).
107 Cf. CD 4:20–5:1; 6QD frg. 1, 1–3.
108 CD 4:20–5:11.
109 CD 7:1–2.
110 Questions can be raised as to the pertinence of such texts. Do they simply rehearse Pentateuch laws, do they present a vision for a renewed Israel, or do they reflect actual life among the Essenes?
111 Cf. J. W. 2.160–161, cited above, p. 47.
112 Cf. 4QDf, frg. 4, 2:10–12.
113 Cf. 4QDe, frg. 6, 5:16–17; 4Q271, frg. 5, 1:7–8.
114 Cf. 4QDf, frg. 5, 1:17–18.
115 Cf. 4QDa, frg. 9, 3:4–7.
116 That is, in addition to the five statements in 4QDa, frg. 9, 3:4–7; 4QDe, frg. 6, 5:16–17 (=4QDf, frg. 5, 1:7–8); 4QDf, frg. 4, 2:10–12; 4QDf, frg. 5, 1:17–18; and 6QD frg. 1, 1–3, all of which are replicated in CDa.
117 The corpus of statements pertaining to women in the Damascus Document has been studied by Cecilia Wassen, Women in the Damascus Document, SBLABib 21 (Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2005).
118 Cf. 4QDa frg. 3, 2:22.
119 Cf. 4QDa frg. 6, 2:1–13.
120 Cf. 4QDa frg. 98, 6:4–5; 4QDe frg. 7, 1:12–13.
121 Cf. 4QDe frg. 2, 1:1–18
122 Cf. 4QDe frg. 2, 2:15–17 (= 6QD frg. 5, 2–4).
123 Cf. 4QDe frg. 4, 1:1–7.
124 Cf. 4QDe frg. 4, 1:9–19.
125 Cf. 4QDe frg. 6, 5:16–17 (=4QDf frg. 5, 1:7–8; CD 11:11) and 4QDe frg. 7, 1:12–13.
126 Cf. 4QDf frg, 3, 7–15 (= 4QDd frg. 9, 1–7; 4QDe frg. 5, 14–10); 4QDf frg. 4, 2:10–12 (= CD 16:9–12); 4QDe frg. 6, 5:16–17; 4QDf frg. 5, 1:7–8 (= 4QDe frg. 6, 5:16–17; CD 11:11); and 4QDf, frg. 5, 1:17–18 (= CD 12:1–2).
127 Cf. 4QDg frg, 1, 2:6–17 (cf. 4QDa 6, 2:1–4).
128 Cf. 6QD frg. 1, 2–3 (= CD 4:20–21).
129 Cf. 6QD frg. 5, 2–4 (=4QDe frg. 2, 2:15–17; 4QDf frg. 2, 2:15–17).
130 The exceptions are 4QDc, 4QpapDh, and 5QD.
131 Koltun-Fromm, Hermeneutics of Holiness, 71.
132 The contemporaries of the Qumranites, Philo and Josephus attributed the sexual continence of the Essenes to their negative regard for women. Cf. Philo, Hypothetica 11:14; Josephus, J.W. 2.121. Philo also sees celibacy as necessary for life in common.
133 Ibid., 72.
134 Cf. Van der Horst, “Celibacy,” 397.
135 Cf. 1QM; 4Q491–496.
136 Cf. Deut 23:10–15; 1 Sam 21:5–6; 2 Sam 11:11–13.
137 For such a study, see William Loader, The Dead Sea Scrolls on Sexuality: Attitudes towards Sexuality in Sectarian and Related Literature at Qumran (Grand Rapids, MN: Eerdmans, 2009).
138 Bernstein, “Texts from Qumran.”
139 Josephus remarks about another order of Essenes was largely overlooked (J. W. 2.160–61). He mentions that this other group is “at one with the rest in its mode of life, customs, and regulations” but “differs from them in their view on marriage” (J. W. 2.160). Nevertheless it is at Qumran, apparently the location of “the rest,” that texts pertaining to marriage have been found.
140 There is no need here for me to consider the issue as to whether the name “Essene” should be reserved for the monastic community or whether it was equally apropos of city-dwellers who shared their views of Judaism.
141 Some years ago Hans Hübner expressed the view that scholars may have exaggerated the celibacy of the Qumran community. He held that its members might have embraced temporary sexual abstinence for special reasons. Cf. “Zölibat in Qumran?,” NTS 17 (1971): 153–67.
142 At the time the island was called Yeb.
143 Philo of Alexandria, for example, was opposed to intermarriage. See Spec. Laws 3.29.
144 Cf. Providence 2.64.
145 Cf. Richard L. Baer, Philo’s Use of the Categories Male and Female, ALGHJ 3 (Leiden: Brill, 1970); William Loader, Philo, Josephus.
146 Cf. Creation 134; Heir 164.
147 Cf. Loader, Philo, Josephus, 16.
148 See, for example, Questions and Answers on Genesis 1.27.
149 Questions and Answers on Genesis 1.26.
150 Questions and Answers on Genesis 1.27.
151 Cf. Questions and Answers on Genesis 4.18.
152 Cf. Richard A. Horsley, “Spiritual Marriage with Sophia,” VC 33 (1979): 30–54, esp. 32.
153 Cherubim 43.
154 Spec. Laws 1.112.
155 Questions and Answers on Genesis 4.154; cf. 4.86; Moses 1.28–29.
156 Cf. Horsley, “Spiritual Marriage,” 39; Loader, Philo, Josephus, 109.
157 Philo may have been influenced in his portrayal of Moses’ sexual abstinence by Exodus 19:15.
158 The translation is taken from Philo Volume VI, trans. F. H Colson, Loeb Classical Library 289 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1962).
159 The tradition that Moses abstained from sexual intercourse during this period of his life appears in later rabbinic literature. See b. Yebam. 62a; b. Sabb. 87a; b. Pesah. 87b cf. Sifre on Num 2:1–2 (= 99–100); Exod. Rab. 46:3.
160 Extant literary witness to the rabbinic tradition includes a couple of passages that point to Zipporah’s displeasure with the idea of prophetic continence. Cf. Avot of Rabbi Nathan 9:22, a fairly late text, and the much earlier Sifre on Num 11:26–30. Sifre says that Miriam, Moses’ sister, thought that he was neglecting the divine command in Gen 1:28. See the discussion in Boyarin, Carnal Israel, 159–64.
161 Horsley, “Spiritual Marriage,” 39.
162 Cf. Loader, Philo, Josephus, 133, with reference to Rewards 108–10.
163 The translation is taken from Philo, Volume IX, trans. F. H Colson, Loeb Classical Library 363 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1941).
164 Cf. Joan E. Taylor, Jewish Women Philosophers of First Century Alexandria: Philo’s Therapeutae’ Reconsidered (London: Oxford University Press, 2004), 264.
165 See Taylor, Jewish Women Philosophers, 103.
166 Cf. Contempl. Life 24–25.
167 During the twentieth century the lake, known in antiquity as Lake Mareotis, was reduced in size to less than twenty square miles, about one quarter of its size at the beginning of the century.
168 Contempl. Life 68.
169 Cf. Contempl. Life 67, 69.
170 See Taylor, Jewish Women Philosophers, 256–57.
171 See Joan E. Taylor, “Philo of Alexandria on the Essenes: A Case Study on the Use of Classical Sources in Discussion of the Qumran-Essene Hypothesis,” The Studia Philonica Annual 19 (2007): 1–28, esp. 24.
172 Cf. Boyarin, Carnal Israel, 40; Troels Engberg-Petersen, “Philo’s De Vita Contemplativa as a Philosopher’s Dream,” JSJ 30 (1999): 40–64; Ross Shepherd Kraemer, “Spouses of Wisdom: Philo’s Therapeutrides, Reconsidered,” chap. 3 in Unreliable Witnesses: Religion, Gender, and History in the Greco-Roman Mediterranean (New York/ Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 57–116.
173 Cf. Ant. 1.109–12.
174 Ant. 1.67.
175 Cf. Ant. 3.339.
176 Cf. Louis H. Feldman, Josephus’s Interpretation of the Bible (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), 185.
177 Cf. Ant. 4.259, 261, 290; 5:168; Ag. Ap. 2.199.
178 Cf. Philo, Hypothetica 11:14.
179 See Susan Treggiari, Roman Marriage: Iusti Conjuges from the Time of Cicero to the Time of Ulpian (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991).
180 For the history of this law, see Giovanni Rotondi, Leges publicae populi Romani: Elenco cronologica con una introduzione sull’ attività legislativa dei comizi romani (Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1966, a photographic reproduction of the 1912 Milan edition), 443–45.
181 Cf. P. A. Brunt and J. M. Moore, Res Gestae Divi Augusti: The Achievements of the Divine Augustus (London: Oxford University Press, 1967), 11, 47.
182 Cf. Biondo Biondi, Storia di Roma, 20: Il Diritto Romano (Bologna: Licinio Cappelli, 1957), 322. Rotondi notes that it is impossible completely to distinguish the two laws from one another. Cf. Leges publicae, 445.
183 Cf. Biondi, Il Diritto Romano, 322, 348; see also Tacitus, Ann. 3.25.
184 Cf. Jane F. Gardner, Family and Familia in Roman Law and Life (Oxford: Clarendon, 1998), 128, 226.
185 Cf. Biondi, Il Diritto Romano, 322.
186 Plutarch used the expression agamiou dike to describe the legal action taken against a bachelor for not marrying. Cf. Plutarch, Lysander, 30.
187 Cf. Bonnie Bowman Thurston, Women in the New Testament: Questions and Commentary, Companions to the New Testament (New York: Crossroad, 1998), 22.
188 In a society in which the rate of infant mortality was high, an infant who survived until its naming day, generally eight days after the birth, was considered a live birth for purposes of the Law. Cf. Lynn H. Cohick, Women in the World of the Earliest Christians: Illuminating Ancient Ways of Life (Grand Rapids, MN: Baker Academic, 2009), 109, n. 24.
189 Gardner discusses the implications of the phrase. Did it mean only legitimate children? Did it include adoptive children? Did it refer only to living children? Cf. Gardner, Family and Familia, 47–55.
190 Cf. Noctes Atticae 2.25.4. Gellius references chapter 7 of the Lex Julia. See Gardner, Family and Familia, 47.
191 Cf. ibid., 182.
192 Cf. Gaius, Inst. 1.145, 171.
193 Cf. Brunt-Moore, Res gestae, 46–47. In this regard, one might note that the Lex Iulia et Papia Poppaea prohibited marriage with a person of lower social rank. Cf. Biondi, Il Diritto Romano, 339.
194 In this regard, Brunt-Moore (Res gestae, 47) remarks, “One may suspect that Augustus was not entirely frank when he said that the senate wished him to pass it [the legislation].”
195 More than thirty years ago, Corrado Marucci demonstrated the importance of the Julian laws on marriage, adultery, and divorce for the “exception clause” in Matthew 5:32; 19:9. Under Roman law in effect at the time, a man was required to divorce his wife if he suspected her of adultery. See Marucci, Parole di Gesù sul divorzio: ricerche scritturistiche previa ad un risonsamento teologico, canonistico e pastorale della dottrina cattolica dell’ indissolubilità del matrimonio, Aolisiana 16 (Naples: Morelliana, 1982).
196 Van der Horst suggests that the development might possibly have been in the other direction, namely, from a “strictly celibate movement towards a situation in which gradually married couples were also tolerated or accepted” (“Celibacy,” 394).
197 Paul Heger, “Celibacy in Qurman—Hellenistic Fiction or Reality? Qumran’s Attitude Toward Sex,” RevQ 101 (2013) 21–90, 90.
198 Heger, “Celibacy in Qumran,” 60.
199 David W. Chapman, “Marriage and Family in Second Temple Judaism,” in Campbell, Marriage and Family, 182–240, 215.