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Jewish World Review April 11, 2000 / 6 Nissan, 5760
THE CHILDLESS. That's the term which James Merrill, the great American poet
of the last century, used to describe his own identity as a homosexual. He
used the term without rancor or self-criticism --- merely as a way of describing
a condition that set him and his friends apart from others. And this
separateness was not, to his mind, a bad thing. For him childlessness was
more than a "sexual preference," more significant than a taste for one kind
of sexual intercourse over another. For him it was a defining state of soul,
something that set him apart from the rest of the human world. In his case
it was something that defined his identity as an artist. His childlessness
did not make him feel un-natural --- but he did acknowledge that it put him
outside the chain of generation that links us through our parents to the
beginning of time, and through our children to the future --- one hopes, a future
which endures forever.
The maelstrom of concern around homosexual "marriage" is odd, because those
on both sides who are most exercised by the issue find it hard to justify or
explain their passion about the issue. I know, because I count myself among
those who are passionately opposed. But when it comes to explaining why
homosexual marriage should be instituted, or not, people on both sides revert
to the language of rights or of religious teaching. I have done so myself.
But in a curious way, these languages have a way of missing the point.
One could argue that nothing could more dramatically mark a break with
everything in human culture than homosexual marriage, except, of course,
allowing threesomes to marry. (Which, if one goes by numbers, would be a
much more sensible and democratic first step, because there are so many more
adulterers among us than homosexuals!) But the opposition to homosexual
marriage extends to those who would regard the Torah's teaching as passe and
"judgmental." I think that the reason for this opposition is best described
simply: homosexuality doesn't matter.
In a world where every culture exerts its greatest ingenuity and imagination
to marking the occasion where a woman and a man commit their sexuality to one
another, in theory, for ever, homosexuality counts for nothing --- nothing at
all. Because every male homosexual marks the end of the line for a struggle
to exist and survive that has gone on since the beginning of life. He is, as
the French say, fin de ligne --- a washout. And it is this, rather than visceral
or ethical horror at the nature of single-sex sexuality, that marks the
tragedy within families --- the drama which is endlessly played out in gay
literature of "telling the parents."
A friend said to me, "good, they've banned single-sex marriage in California.
That's only a first step --- now let's complete the job and ban opposite-sex
marriage." But the fact of homosexual union is that it is profoundly and
pathetically imitative of the difficult act of forging a family that men and
women, and their children, and their parents, and their children's children
do, when they marry.
Of course --- men and women can marry and not have children. Of course gay men
and gay women have always raised children. And attachment between
homosexuals can be lifelong, tender, and profound. But such attachments are
private --- to the world, to the future, they are profoundly inconsequential.
Straights are asked, by such intelligent gay writers as Bruce Bawer, to
consider whether the institution of marriage would not make life more stable
and 'bourgeois' for gays. Perhaps it would, or again, perhaps not. The
point Mr. Bawer never considers is this: it is a matter of consummate
indifference to the human community, as it preserves itself and weathers the
various storms it must undergo, whether private relationships --
relationships that are not part of a biological continuity -- are stable or
whether they are not.
To these folks we can certainly say "have fun and don't
get hurt," but our religious institutions and our legal system have no
obligation to help grown-ups play "dress
Gay Marriage: Fin de ligne
By Sam Schulman
This was brought home to me by reading about the way that the Reform
movement's decision to permit its Rabbis to "bless" single-sex "dedication
ceremonies" has riven the Jewish community. Rabbi Avi Shafran has written
eloquently here about how the notion of marriage between two males simply
cannot be reconciled with the Torah. In an interview, Rabbi Shafran remarked
that the Reform resolution should "convince all Jews that anything goes in
Reform leadership. Even the prohibition against incest could go."
It is not because parents are hung-up,
bourgeois, square, or that they are worried about their son's health, that
they find the prospect of a homosexual child to be distressing --- but because it
means that their genetic line, which has survived, in one form or another
from the beginning of life itself, has come up against a small tragedy upon a
biological, epochal stage. The end of the road.
Marriage between the two sexes, in pairs, exists not because of custom or a patriarchal or matriarchal conspiracy (though isn't
it pretty to think so) -- but because through marriage -- and the generation it
permits, the continuity of life that, imperfect as it is, only some form of
marriage engenders-the world exists. Marriage is how we are connected
backwards in time to our Creator (or, if you like, the primal soup), and how
we are linked to our future. For men who love men-for women who love
women-for men who can't decide between a wife and "oh you kid" --- marriage is
merely imitative. 
JWR contributor Sam Schulman is deputy editor of Taki's Top Drawer, appearing in New York
Press, and was formerly publisher of Wigwag and a professor of English at
Boston University. You may contact him by clicking here.
