Antisemitic Quotes from the Talmud Debunked

Antisemitic Quotes from the Talmud Debunked

Many of these quotations are not from the text, but a rewritten interpretation of the text to serve a narrative.

Claim: "Adam had sexual intercourse with all the animals in the Garden of Eden." Yebamoth 63a.
Truth: It was a hypothesis about what Adam did before he had Eve.

Claim: "A Jew may marry a three year old girl" (specifically, three years "and a day" old). Sanhedrin 55b.
Truth: This is a falsely quoted discussion excerpt. It was a discussion about what should be done if someone has intercourse with a girl under so and so age, as well as with animals. They decided that virginity is not lost if she is under 3, and it is if she is over three, and hence should be married to the men. It also goes on to discuss what to do with an animal if a girl has sex with it. Here, the animal is killed, but the woman is spared as she is young.

Claim: "A Jew may have sex with a child as long as the child is less than nine years old". Sanhedrin 54b.
Truth: This is a falsely quoted discussion excerpt, which is intended to misdirect people when they verify the real verse. It is a commentary dealing with sodomy. The Rabbis differentiate between active sodomy and passive sodomy. They say that an adult engaging in active sodomy will be liable, however, an adult engaging in passive sodomy won't be liable. Why? Because a child under nine years old cannot be the active sodomizer! The way in which they talk is hard to grasp, because the style of speech in Hebrew is different from that of English, but if you re-read knowing this, it will be perfectly clear.

Similarly, a child over the age of nine engaging in sodomy passively will also be liable, as he is considered as an adult for this law. Further, Maimonides explains in "Forbidden Intercourse" 1.14 of the "Mishneh Torah" legal code that a minor over the age of nine will not be punished, while the adult will be stoned.

But as per the same text, "To whom does the above apply? To the victim of rape. When, by contrast, a man engages in relations, there is no concept of being compelled against his will. For an erection is always a willful act."

Claim: "When a grown-up man has intercourse with a little girl it is nothing." Kethuboth 11b.6
Truth: This is also a falsely quoted discussion excerpt. What it says is that his actions mean nothing. To what? To the girl's hymen. The earlier discussion also discusses about whether a grown woman whose hymen was broken by intercourse with a male is similar to being broken by wood (Kethuboth 11b.5). What is mentioned is that the virginity of the girl is not lost if she is raped. The punishment for the rapist is a separate discussion.

Claim: "All gentiles converts to Judaism are like donkeys" Yevamot 62a.11
Truth: It only states the legal status of a gentile convert, in that they do not have a lineage. The donkey is not a stupid animal in Judaism. Instead, it is the animal that does the dirty work for the others. It is also the animal the Messiah arrives on. The Hebrews are said to be carrying the Torah around like donkeys, while the Gentiles are like dogs who struggle to carry the law, and placed the extra load atop the donkey, following only the Noahide Laws (Sifrei Devarim 343:6). However, Mohammed said that they are like donkeys carrying around the Torah, by not understanding its contents (Quran 62:5).

Claim: "All gentile children are animals." Yebamoth 98a.3
Truth: This is from the discussion regarding converts to Judaism that goes "i.e., the offspring of a male gentile is considered no more related to him than the offspring of donkeys and horses". But what it really means that legally, the gentile lineage of a convert is discarded when he converts. But the lineage is recognized whenever possible to ensure that they follow the laws against sexual relationship with anyone who is not twice-removed from them.

Claim: "Gentile girls are in a state of niddah (filth) from birth." Abodah Zarah 36b
Truth: It doesn't say that, it says that gentile girls are considered as menstruating, legally, so that they are not to be married by Jews. In Jewish law, when women are menstruating, one must not have sexual relationships with her.

Also Niddah means the state of menstruation, not "filth" itself.

Claim: "The Jews are human beings, but the nations of the world are not human beings but beasts." Bava Metzia 114b.2
Truth: It's stating that standing at the grave of a gentile doesn't make you impure, as they are not considered like Israelites under the law. That is, Israelites have harder commandments than gentiles, and those don't apply to the gentiles.

Claim: "He (Jesus) was sexually immoral, worshipped statues of stone (a brick is mentioned), was cut off from the Jewish people for his wickedness, and refused to repent." (Sanhedrin 107b; Sotah 47a)
Truth: Sanhedrin 107b speaks of people who calls themselves god, and why Jews must not listen to them, for they are idols.

Aside from that, in Sotah 47a Jesus is specifically mentioned to have admired the innkeeper's eyes (hence he's called sexually immoral) and that he's mocked Rabbis by worshiping a brick and complained that they didn't let people repent for their sins, and performed sorcery to cause the masses to sin. Needless to say, they do hate Jesus, but they didn't say just about anything (that he was completely sexually immoral, or that he used to worship bricks routinely).

Claim: "Gentiles prefer sex with cows." Abodah Zarah 22a-22b
Truth: It was dealing with bestiality. It says it is prohibited for both Jews and Gentiles. It doesn't say any side preferred bestiality.