Return to Cross-Dressing and DragFurther explanation of Nazir 59aThis text is found in the Babylonian Talmud, in a discussion about how men and women can and cannot dress. The author of this passage, one of the Talmudic Sages, argues that it is not plausible to read the verse from Deuteronomy literally. Why? Because this author believes that wearing the clothes of another gender could not possibly be seen as completely off-limits! Therefore a simple ban on cross-dressing could not be what this verse really means. (This rejection of a literal reading of our Biblical verse is echoed by all the later medieval commentators on this text.) Instead, the author of this Talmudic text understands the Torah prohibition this way: wearing clothes of another gender in order to falsify your identity, and infiltrate spaces reserved for the "opposite" sex, is what is forbidden by the Torah.The key point here seems to be that cross-dressing is only prohibited when there are ulterior motives involved. This early rabbinic commentary sets the tone for the rest of the classical discussion on our verse. Therefore, the primary classical commentators do not read this verse literally. They do not believe that cross-dressing itself is explicitly prohibited by the Torah, as this text states clearly: "There is no to'evah [completely off-limits behavior] here!" |