Toughs, Softs, and Jewish Mascuhnityrnby Paul GottfriedrnI ewish stereotyping is an activity in which Jews and their en-rn) emies have both engaged. Among the self-images that Jewsrnhave popularized is that of the bookish Jewish male. The medievalrnbiblical commentator Rashi depicts the patriarch Jacobrnas a scholar and homebody, “in the tradition of Shem andrnEber,” Jacob’s two Semitic ancestors to whom his qualities arernalso ascribed. Jacob’s brother Esau was a “cunning hunterrnand man of the field,” and he came to represent for rabbinicrncommentators the hostile Gentile whose way of life was decidedlyrnnon-Jewish. The contrast between Jacob and Esau wasrnalready critical for the later prophets: Malachi, for example,rnstates that God “loved Jacob but despised Esau,” who receivedrndesolation as his inheritance. The impetuous, blood-thirstyrnEsau became a symbol of what the descendants of Jacob werernto fear, and the rabbis saw that enemy as variously incarnatedrnin Israel’s Edomitc neighbors to the South (supposedly descendedrnfrom Esau), the Roman Empire, and the medievalrnChurch. All of these groups were identified with the color red,rngoing back to Esau’s association with the pot of lentils in returnrnfor which he sold his birthright to Jacob. (The Hebrew word forrnlentil, adorn, can also mean red.) All of Israel’s political foes,rnmoreover, were seen as sanguinary and unreflective, in contrastrnto Jacob’s scions, who were shown cultivating sedentary, domesticrnvirtues.rnThe Jewish self-image is of course tied to the stifling ofrnJewish masculinity that was evident by the Middle Ages. Thernreceived view, which the Zionist movement has stressed, is thatrnJewish manhood was stunted by the restrictions that a hostilernChristian world placed on Jewish society. This view is partlyrncorrect. The prohibitions imposed on Jews in medieval Eu-rnPaul Gottfried is a professor of humanities at ElizabethtownrnCollege in Pennsylvania.rnrope—against owning land and bearing arms—prevented Jewishrnmen from tilling the soil, practicing self-defense, and engagingrnin other manly pursuits. In the proverbial Jewish familyrnof the Eastern European ghetto, the wife ran a business andrnthe husband pored over Talmudic texts. This division of laborrnwas both the product of prolonged social discrimination and arncreative adaptation to an unfriendly environment.rnBut that family pattern, as Jacob Neusner demonstrates,rnwas already there, at least embryonically, centuries before, inrnthe Talmudic reconstruction of Jewish culture. In the face ofrnsuccessive defeats—the destruction of the Second Temple andrnof the Jewish Commonwealth and the rise of an ungratefulrndaughter religion—the authors and redactors of the rabbinicrntexts shifted the emphasis in Jewish life from national resurrectionrnto the study and performance of detailed rituals. As thisrnbecame the focus of Jewish life, it was also necessary to recreaternbiblical role models: thus the warrior King David is depictedrnas a proto-Talmudist, like the son of Noah, Shem, andrnShem’s grandson Eber. Anything orienting Jewisli life towardrnmilitary affairs is kept out of the Talmudic prescriptions: KingrnMessiah, for example, is exalted as a future respondent to legalrnconundrums but never as a warrior.rnThese interpretive traditions are critical for understandingrnmodern stereotypes (and self-stereotypes) of Jewish masculinity.rnThe polarity constructed between Jacob and Esau returnsrnin a provocative fashion in Nietzsche, for whom Jews becamernthe destined priests of slave morality. Unlike the joyous warriorrnwho innoccntK’ and instinctivelv ‘ents hostility, Jews, Nietzschernexplains, have learned to fight by cunning. Thev manipulaternthe “bad conscience” of others, which they have shaped bv introducingrn”guilt,” “sin,” and other servile concepts. Jews are accusedrnof making the West ashamed of the Hellenic worship ofrnphysical beauty and of supplanting a virile civilization with thernFEBRUARY 199423rnrnrn