(8 votes, average: 4.75 out of 5)
Loading...What is it with Greek pederasty? How could this be a thing, the widely accepted practice in classical Athens (at least) of an adult man taking an adolescent boy under his wing and into his bed, providing an education into the culture, social world, and politics of the city in exchange for sexual favors?
I’ve given two posts on it to this point, and in this one I want to reflect on what it was all about – at least what one particular of it was all about. My question: Why were adolescent boys seen as particularly beautiful – rapturous – and desirable sex partners, apparently far more then women, even among men who were heterosexually active, including with their wives ? Some of us today (who know a lot of teenagers) just don’t see the attraction. But reading the ancient texts, it’s pretty clear that at least among the Athenian social elites, it was not even much debated: Of *course* boys are greatly to be (especially) desired, sexually. Not just to one older fellow or another, but, apparently, to a wide swath of the culturally elite. (And to the non-elite as well? There’s no way to know. Our sources only come to us from elites writing about elites).
Let me say at the outset that
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I would like to inquire about the prominence of Albert Schweitzer in the field of Religious Studies. In the realm of Science, notable figures such as Isaac Newton and Einstein have significantly influenced the entire domain of scholarship. My question is whether Albert Schweitzer holds a similar stature in Religious Studies due to his notable work, “The Quest of the Historical Jesus.” Furthermore, are there any other prominent figures in Religious Studies who can be likened to the scientific luminaries you mentioned?
No, nothing like that I’d say. I widely popularized the idea of Jesus as an apocalyticist, but it wasn’t the same kind of complete revolutoin that Newton made. (For one thing, Johannes Weiss developed the idea earlier)
You just know it’s got to do with power. No, the human brain hasn’t evolved much at all.
Bart,
I just wanted to make an appreciation comment about your work. My whole family are Christian fundamentalists and me being the only agnostic athiest makes family gatherings a bit awkward. I just wanted to say that I very much admire your work and I find it refreshing that you give the Bible credit where it is due. I don’t see many Athiests doing that and is one of the main reasons I always go to your blog first for information. I’ve signed up for your upcoming lecture on why you’re no longer religious and I’m looking forward to it. You’re a huge role model of mine, and thank you again for sharing your work.
Thanks so much!
I started watching the webinar yesterday! 🙂
I’ve always found it interesting that Greek statues portraying men naked had small penises on upstanding men and large penises on evil men or demons. Was this a way to show the good men being more in control of their sexuality? It’s certainly different from masculine portrayal today (even if mentally.)
I don’t think I’ve noticed that! But I think even in antiquity there was no general sense that size had any effect on sexual drive.
Pattylt, you’re absolutely right. (I’m a retired classicist who taught courses on Greek and Roman art). With all due respect to Bart’s reply, there WAS a sense in antiquity that size correlated with sexual drive (in art, at least). Small penis size in art is generally assumed to be a visual signifier indicating self-control and sexual continence. Large penis size, which you can see on vase paintings of satyrs (mythical half-man, half-animal creatures who are famous for their sexual profligacy) and sometimes of foreigners as well, is meant to indicate lack of sexual self-control. Small penises were considered beautiful; large penises were considered grotesque and ugly. Circumcised penises were also considered ugly, btw.
I’d just add that the ideal adolescent boy (the eromenos, or “beloved”, in Greek terminology) was supposed NOT to enjoy the sexual contact physically. Part of the attraction was that he remained physically unmoved; that is, he was not subject to sexual desire himself, while the erastes (the “lover”) was filled with desire *for* the boy. The relatively small penis size of the just-pubescent boy–we are talking about boys right at the cusp of puberty, so mid-adolescents, and definitely NOT about small children–was undoubtedly part of the attraction.
WHOA! Is this Elizabeth Vandiver?? Please write me a private note. Patty, you’re talking here to a real expert — quite a treat. Elizabeth, I bow to your knowledge. Many thanks. Do we have any literary sources that match size and drive?
Private note on its way! I’d have to check for literary sources; there may well be something in Aristophanes.
Ah, I’d love it if there were!
I think this was always a tricky subject among classicists, especially as any sexual activity with a child (the youths were around 12 or 13) is regarded as a serious crime worldwide today. And yet Plato and Socrates are among the most admired figures in Western culture. The British classicist, Peter Jones, suggested the ‘sex’ was intercrural and non-penetrative, presumably based on his interpretation of the the illustrations on Greek pottery you referred to. I’m not sure any ancient source goes into explicit detail of the nature of the sex within pederasty. As to its attraction, I think the Emperor Hadrian is probably
pederasty’s greatest publicist. Hadrian was an Hellenophile par excellence and his relationship with the Bythinian boy, Antoninus, produced some extraordinary artwork. I am heterosexual but am still blown away by just how beautiful Antinous was, assuming that is what he actually looked like. Part of the attraction, from my perspective at least, is that his face is made to look very feminine, although his body remains clearly masculine. Thank you for another fascinating post.
Tha’s right, it was almost certainly intercrural.
The general consensus is that the boys were probably somewhat older than that, more like 14 or 15. They became “undesirable” as objects of sexual attraction for grown men when their beards began to grow–that is, when they became fully and wholly masculine themselves. Most scholars, I think (though this isn’t my area of specialization), put the growth of the beard at somewhere around 17 or 18 for most boys in the ancient world.
Regarding recent scholarship on this question, and I hope this isn’t an insulting suggestion, but have you looked at Wikipedia’s “Pederasty in Ancient Greece”? The “References” section is loaded with citations of books and articles that look like they might prove useful. For example, notes 19 and 23 point to an essay by Martha Nussbaum (“Platonic Love and Colorado Law”) in which she claims that the ‘erômenos’ is generally old enough for military and political action.
Interesting. She’s the real deal, a very serious philosopher with astounding depth and range. But I’d like to see if she was claiming that for *all* eromenoi, or saying that some were in that range.
A quote from p. 308 of her “Sex and Social Justice”:
To modern American ears the word “boy” suggests someone between the ages of, say, four and twelve. But the erômenos of Greek custom was typically, and ideally, a young man between the time of full attainment of adult height and the full growth of the beard: if we go by modern growth patterns, perhaps sixteen to nineteen, but more likely, since the ancient Greek age of puberty seems to have been slightly later than ours, the age of a modern college undergraduate.
Yes, she’s referring to the *end* of the boy’s adolecence, the point at which the sexual relationshipo would end (with puberty); they would start when he had reached an adult height.disabledupes{af50514471cc00d8d41831f08783e7ac}disabledupes
Very interesting post and something I haven’t considered before as well. As someone who has published amateur sociological research, and did my undergraduate capstone on the expressions of hierarchies in preindustrial societies, I must issue contention with one point, purely from a scholarly perspective:
“the percentage of people in antiquity with various gender identifications and sexual preferences…were the same as today”
I have often seen this asserted, but it seems unsubstantiated. A glaring example would be the preindustrial Etoro people, who still maintain ritual homosexuality (albeit less frequently), where ethnographers documented near universal engagement from adult males emitting semen into adolescent boys mouths. As you noted above, you have no attraction to young boys, and neither do I. This seems to indicate there is a massive cultural influence on sexual preference and expression.
Just as widely held beliefs aren’t inherently moral, neither are biologically motivated tendencies, e.g. rape. So whether non-normative sexual preferences are biologically determined is irrelevant to any discussion of morality, but purely for the sake of truth, I don’t see sufficient evidence to merely assert the claim as you do.
Overall, great article as always!
The logic is that gender identification and sexual orientation have to do with physiologial structures, not choice or culture. It’s true that some cultures have various sexual practices not found in others , but that does not address teh question of orientation, which is a personal mental/internal state, not an action. And since brains have not evolved significantly over the past several thousand years, it appears safe to say that ids and preferences/orientations have not either.
I do understand the logic you’re employing, but it still appears entirely unsubstantiated by evidence. To say that “personal mental/internal state[s]” are principally dependent on the evolution of the brain is a standard we wouldn’t attempt to uphold for any other subject. Martin King Whyte’s seminal “The Status of Women in Preindustrial Societies” found that in 100% of preindustrial cultures studied, women performed more household work and 77% of societies explicitly believed men should dominate their wives. We would never argue that these inward feelings about the other gender are immutable over time. It also seems to dilute the meaning of orientation to nothingness. If an entire tribe can engage in homosexuality for their entire lives, to say that they don’t “really” have a homosexual preference seems silly. We wouldn’t tell any western homosexual that they don’t really feel the way they do, and neither to a heterosexual. Simply comparing a 100% homosexual (in reality bisexual) tribe to the United States would empirically demonstrate there is a cultural influence, unless the argument is put forth that these two populations brains are significantly different in regards to sexual preference, which I also see no evidence for.
I think there is a very big difference between internally experienced sexual orientatoin and culturally enforced social organization. Both might seem like common sense but they derive from different places/forces.
“But men were more divine. That means that, among other things, a superb male specimen was particularly beautiful. And so, presumably, to be desired.”
Bart, you may want to read Isocrates’ Encomium of Helen. Isocrates, a contemporary of Plato and AFAIK an intellectual rival, extols Helen as the most beautiful of humans as Heracles was the strongest. Isocrates says that Zeus honored Helen more than any other child of his by a human mother, and that’s why she surpassed all in beauty. Her beauty was more powerful than Heracles’ strength!
To the best of my knowledge, Isocrates never praises male-male erotic love. Isocrates is more forthright a spokesman for the Athenian democracy than was Plato, for whom democracy was suspect. It would be interesting if someone has done a study of Athenian elite figures (i.e. highly educated) who were not enthusiastic about boy-love or whatever we call it.
Yes, as you might imagine, I’ve read the Encomium of Helen. I’m making generalizations that are broadly true for the sake of a broader audience, kind of like I’d explain the American economy by saying that most American elites subscribe to capitalism.
I recently read an article by Kevin Young about the story in Matthew 5-13 where Jesus cures a Roman Centurion’s “servant” which could indicate Jesus’s approval of homosexuality or at least his lack of disapproval. The author contends that the English translation of the word pais to servant was incorrect and that Jesus understood the sexual nature of the relationship between the servant and the Centurion. Is this correct or erroneous or someplace in between. If this is correct it would seem to me that it could be significant in how Christianity views homosexuality. I am no scholar or theologian but someone who feels the treatment of the gay community has been egregious. I greatly condensed the article and anyone who wishes may find it here.
https://email.mg-d0.substack.com/c/eJxUkD3u4yAQR09julh8GAIFxTa5hjXA4LAxYNmwkff0K–_iFKP5r2nn4eGS91PG3fE2xtXXzOSYJWAKANBy5QWQktjJMEMaZ0XLLhDwzBD-1wnzTR5WuPiBBCjuzPDvFaaUi3iXTGtJho4J8lyygWVVDHJBOOjGJELVDKEAEJFHvSoK7C_S9yGieblFuh4dHc08K_R10zSMV-tV4tte0ey2mdr2yB-Dfwx8McL_6Ry1l6W77-tu9nXnHtJ7ZyxgFsx_BC27tbkoaVa5hSsMIwJSXb7G863UsNEl8v2n3J0F2qGVOzHQ9r3ev3A_eIwo4WZFP0XAAD__2vndPU
Pais is a VERY common word in Greek, and could mean a range of things — mainly “servant” but also “child.” To decide its meaning depends on a close evaluation of the literary and historical context. I see nothing in the literary context of Matthew to suggest it’s an instance of pederasty; possibly more important, pederasty was not widely practiced in Roman world (unlike classical Athens). Possibly the article provides some evidence that it was relatively common inthe Roman army? I very much doubt it but would love to know if I’m wrong.
Bart, is eromenos found in New Testament Greek?
No.
Oh okay