Judaism

In the Jewish religion, a boy of 13 - the approximate age of puberty - is considered an adult. This means he can be counted as part of a minyan (quorum of 10 men for prayer - women are not counted in Orthodox Judaism) and contract marriage and do other adult functions under Jewish law. (Do not confuse Jewish law with Israeli law.)

Judaism, like Islam, and in striking contrast to Catholicism, is very sex-positive. Sex is good and everybody ought to have it, the more the better. Everybody should get married; an unmarried rabbi will find it hard to get a job. Male sexuality needs an outlet; then the community is much safer. Be fruitful and multiply (though abortion is all but a non-issue in Judaism). Orthodox Jewry is openly positive on oral and anal sex among married couples. See Rabbi Shmuley Boteach's best-selling Kosher Sex". Prostitutes typically have disproportionate numbers of Jewish clients, definitely including Orthodox Jews. One may be seen in the movie "The Girlfriend Experience".

If you're an Orthodox Jew you can't watch TV or drive a car on the Sabbath. But you can definitely have sex. Rabbis openly recommend it. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shabbat#Encouraged_activities And it's definitely not limited to procreative sex, though babies are wanted and loved. Orthodox and Haredi kids are warped in some ways, but they are happy families and happy kids. In a traditional Jewish marriage contract (ketuba) the groom agrees to keep his wife sexually satisfied. Sex during the menstrual period is prohibited, though this is justified by saying that it makes sex on the days it is permitted hotter.

Among Sephardic (formerly Spanish) Jews who used to live in Islamic countries, multiple wives were permitted, as in Islam.

Orthodox Jews do not cooperate with the police in the case of pedophile rabbis, of whom there are more than a handful.

Divorce is fairly easy to get for the male. The man can easily divorce his wife, but the woman barring very unusual circumstances, is unable to divorce her husband. This sometimes leads to problems when the husband refuses to give his wife a divorce (the document is called a "'get). He must return her dowry. This is not rare, but other Jewish men - community leaders - may put serious pressure on the husband, including economic pressure, shunning (herem) and violence.

Judaism is riven from within by religious disputes about what it is. See for example http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Who_is_a_Jew%3F

Liberal wings of Judaism - Reform, Reconstructionist, and to a lesser extent Conservative - are dropping fast in membership and are talking about merging seminaries and selling some of their very valuable real estate. In contrast, Orthodox and Ultra-Orthodox (or Haredi) Judaism are growing strongly everywhere Jews are found. These sectors are far more pedophile-friendly than the liberal ones.

It is striking how many sexual innovators and radicals are Jewish or from a Jewish background (ethnically Jewish). Among them are Sigmund Freud, Magnus Hirschfeld, Wilhelm Reich, Ruth Westheimer (a Haganah sharpshooter), and we mustn't forget Emma Goldman.

The father of Xaviera Hollander, the happy hooker, was Jewish.

Allen Ginsberg was Jewish.

Jews are also very visible in the pornography industry: Bill Margold, Annie Sprinkle, Nina Hartley, Al Goldstein, Harry Reems, Jamie Gillis, and Ron Jeremy. See "The Jewish Masters of Porn", http://jewishfaces.com/porn.html, and the Wikipedia articles on those actors. And the novelists Philip Roth and Erica Jong. Henry Miller, whose parents were Lutheran Germans, grew up among Jews in Brooklyn.

Judaism and homosexuality

There are of course the condemnations in the Bible, though the ones who talk the most and the loudest about it are conservative and ecumenical Protestants, not Jews. Yet the Tanach (Old Testament) or even the Torah (first of three parts of the Tanach) is not the same as Judaism. Judaism was around for many centuries before the Torah was put together.

David is Israel's great iconic king: father of the nation, shepherd and poet. (Also mythical, of course. See the Wikipedia article on him.) It is his star that is on Israel's flag.

And yet he is Israel's boy-king, Jesse's youngest son. Jonathan loved him and his love was sweeter than that of a woman (2 Samuel 1:26).

Temple prostitution was common during the reigns of David and his son Solomon.

During the great flowering of Sephardic culture in medieval Spain, there is abundant pederastic poetry, much untranslated. Jews and homosexuality remained linked in the popular imagination up to the twentieth century. The Jews expelled from Spain in 1492 found new homes in countries where homosexuality was tolerated, such as the Ottoman empire. (See the article "Jews, Sephardic" in the Encyclopedia of Homosexuality.)

Judaism and pedophilia

(i'm not finished.)