Sexuality
in the Old Testament

Irmtraud Fischer, La sessualità nell’Antico Testamento. Amore, vizio, piacere sessuale e sofferenza [Sexuality in the Old Testament. Love, Vice, Sexual Pleasure and Suffering], Queriniana 2023

Once upon a time, I heard a professor of morality say that most confessions have as their theme de sextu, the sixth of the commandments. When I heard this, on the one hand I was displeased that God's mercy was counted on for sexual infractions; while, on the other hand I became curious about how sexuality, which is so rarely treated in the Second Testament, had instead become the diriment of the relationship with God until the present day.

Upon reading about Sexuality in the Old Testament. Love, Vice, Sexual Pleasure and Suffering a book by Irmtraud Fisher, an Austrian, and one of Europe's most incisive theologians, I thought it might help to clear my mind a little more. The Bible, particularly the Old Testament, has often been called into question to justify gender inequality, restrictive sexual morality, and the prohibition of same-sex relationships. Fischer illustrates the Hebrew Bible's claims about sexuality. In addition, he reviews creation narratives, legal provisions, love songs, joys and labors in male-female relationships, without shirking the challenge of examining intolerable pages on sexual violence that even present God as complicit.

Rosa Lupoli is a Capuchin nun from Naples, abbess of the Santa Maria in Gerusalemme monastery known as the Trentatrè, founded by Blessed Maria Lorenza Longo

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