Homosexuality Is Part of Jewish Tradition
Contrary to the common perception, intimate relations between people of the same sex did not always have a negative image in Jewish communities.
Ofri Ilany
Aug 5, 2015
(...) In general, there is a perception that homosexuality is a vice originating in the East. Thus the Nazis charged sexologist and gay rights activist Magnus Hirschfeld that as a Jew he “brought the oriental vice to Germany.”
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The Jews did not strictly preserve “the heterosexual principle.” Intimate relations between men existed in Jewish communities and apparently were also common. Historian Yaron Ben-Naeh has shown in his research that despite the explicit biblical prohibition, in Jewish communities in the Ottoman Empire same-sex relations were rather common. This is indicated by dozens of sources. Moreover, until the modern era, grown men who had a need for the favors of youths did not have a negative image in Jewish society.
https://www.haaretz.com/jewish/2015-08-05/ty-article/.premium/homosexuality-part-of-jewish-tradition/0000017f-f64d-d5bd-a17f-f67f92080000