Drunkenness and Prostitution in Second Temple Jewish Literature

The book researches the writings of Jewish writers in the Second Temple period and analyses their attitudes to Drinking and Prostitution. The book focuses on three stories in the book of Genesis; Noah's Drunkeness, the immoral behaviour of Lot's daughters and the story of Judah and Tamar. In each story, the author examines second temple sources to discover the attitude of these early writers to both drunkenness and prostitution. The study focuses on the literary and rhetorical aspects of these Genesis texts and the exegesis of ancient biblical interpreters. Using close reading and rhetorical techniques, this work seeks to discover the views of the ancients to these vices and how these views were influenced by the culture in which Jews lived at the time. By so doing, the work seeks to explore the views of the ancient rabbis as to what was considered moral and ethical behaviour at this time.

Autorentext

Rabbi Dr Eli Kohn is Director of Curriculum Development at the Lookstein Center, School of Education, Bar Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel. He specialises in the development of Judaic Studies Curriculum for days schools throughout the world.