Kosher Queers

By popular request, we opened this week with a conversation about conversion and proselytizing and kiruv, in which we definitely had more than three opinions. Then we got to talk about actively choosing your parents-in-law, some bass-boosted Torah, and calvinballing the misogyny out of our religion.
Full transcript for this episode available here.
Here is the source the thing Jaz says at 2:25, about asking potential converts about why they would want to be Jewish given how much Jews suffer, (from Yevamot, in the Talmud) and directly after it, here's the source on explaining the downsides of needing to keep more mitzvot post-conversion. Here's the story of Hillel and Shammai telling the entire Torah to a gentile while he stands on one foot. Here are some of the many sources on treating converts well. Here's the EtymOnline entry for proselyte. Here's the thing about the Israelites dying at Sinai and coming back to life. Here's the source from the Talmud (Shevuot 39a) about future generations being at Sinai (and here's an interesting interpretation we didn't talk about on-air that might complicate that).
Content notes: death mention from 26:25-26:54.
Support us on Patreon! Send us questions or comments at [email protected], follow us on Twitter @kosherqueers, and like us on Facebook at Kosher Queers. Our music is by the band Brivele. This week, our audio was edited by Lulav Arnow. Our logo is by Lior Gross, and we are not endorsed by or affiliated with the Orthodox Union.

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This week, there are so many women in the story! By which we mean, a full three women, two of whom even get names. This we also get some sung folktales, a female friend who is too cool for you who you know is silently or not-so-silently judging you, and intermarried rabbis (meaning, of course, rabbis who marry other rabbis).
Full transcript here.
Lulav recommends Harry Potter and the Lack of Lamb Sauce by imagitory. She also mentions the podcast The Shrieking Shack, which is a Harry Potter podcast for lapsed fans, with extremely long episodes. Also, Jaz's friend who had a bat mitzvah recommended this article about swarming in their d'var Torah. You can check out our episode last year on the parsha Shoftim here. You can see the comment from Midrash Tehillim alongside the quote it's pulling from here. You can listen to the groups Jaz mentioned who are doing cool collective queer Jewish music on Soundcloud at the Queer Nigun Project and Let My People Sing and learn more about Let My People sing on their website. This is by no means a comprehensive list; there are many more cool queer Jewish singers.
This week's reading is Judges 4:4–5:31. Next week's reading is Isaiah 6:1–7:6 and 9:5-6.
Support us on Patreon or Ko-fi! Send us questions or comments at [email protected], follow us on Twitter @kosherqueers, and like us on Facebook at Kosher Queers. Our music is by the band Brivele. This week, our audio was edited by Ezra Faust, and our transcript was written by Reuben Shachar Rose. Our logo is by Lior Gross, and we are not endorsed by or affiliated with the Orthodox Union.

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This week, we debate the unholy combination that is polyamory, ponder the beauty of limericks, flirt briefly with pornoprophetics, and talk frankly a lot about words related to "gadol."
Transcript available here, but this week's transcript is also a little delayed due to the holiday, and the full thing will be up and correct shortly.
You can check out the band Really From at their bandcamp! You can also check out the work of Fat Torah at their website, where Jaz's classmate Emily Rogal has done cool work! The bit from Talmud we referenced about how angels don't understand Aramaic is in Shabbat 12b. If you're curious about the "Microsoft Sam" voice, there's a text-to-speech where you can listen to it here (though Lulav wishes to advise that you open it in an incognito window). Jaz references a TV show that they couldn't remember the name of that we're pretty sure was Joan of Arcadia (2003-05), which is apparently not available for legal streaming anywhere on the internet, because capitalism is not interested in cultural preservation. John Donne's most famous poem about being horny for Hashem can be found here, but if you want it longer, less blasphemous, AND with uncriticized examples of ancient colorism, Shir haShirim is right there.
This week's reading is Samuel II 22:1-51. Next week's reading is Ezekiel 38:18–39:16, and that'll be the last episode of season 2, and the formal end of the podcast for the foreseeable future!
Support us on Patreon or Ko-fi! Our music is by the band Brivele. This week, our audio was edited by Lulav Arnow, and our transcript was written by JJ Jensen, who you can follow on Twitter @pantspossum. Our logo is by Lior Gross, and we are not endorsed by or affiliated with the Orthodox Union.

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In this episode, we learn how sacrifices can lead us to a model of transformative justice, do some science on G-d's food choices, and decide that G-d is definitely on spiro. Also, Jaz outs themselves as a librarian and maybe also offers to burn books, but only because they like books so much? It's confusing. Plus, we get an unexpected bonus segment comparing different philosophies of halachah and different ideas of what Judaism is, so get hype for that.
Our transcript is available here. In everything that's been going on with the pandemic, unfortunately Jaz is a little behind, so the whole thing is here, but it's less polished than usual; it should be up to our usual standards within the next couple days. It should be pretty solid up until the bottom of page 18, which correlates with 29:17.
The comment from the Daat Zekenim on Vayikra 2:13 can be found here. Lulav referred to the parsha summaries created by Isabel Bard, @MyNameisNotBard on Twitter, and you can check out the specific tweet here. Thanks to Theo for sending in a comment, and you can follow Theo @bizzardweird on Twitter.
Content notes: this episode does contain multiple references to animal sacrifice and blood.
Support us on Patreon! Send us questions or comments at [email protected], follow us on Twitter @kosherqueers, and like us on Facebook at Kosher Queers. Our music is by the band Brivele. This week, our audio was edited by Lulav Arnow and our transcript written by DiCo and Jaz. Our logo is by Lior Gross, and we are not endorsed by or affiliated with the Orthodox Union.

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This week, Tanakh is used as a pickup line, Moshe gets into an argument with G-d about how everyone has value actually, scouts go exploring and name a place "Grape" even though they shouldn't be able to name it because people are already living there, and the Israelites are incredibly bad at Simon Says. Plus, we spend some time getting to know Yehoshua, but kinda wish we didn't because he's a narc.
Full transcript here.
The quote from Psalms that Jaz said at the beginning of the episode can be found here. Svara, the organization that sent it to Jaz, also is doing daily drop-in queer Jewish text study, which you can sign up for here. When talking about Grey's Anatomy, Lulav forgot the inimitable Christina Yang. She is culturally Jewish on account of her stepfather & mother, and therefore was the first Jewish main-cast character.
You can buy I Hope We Choose Love by Kai Cheng Thom here and Fierce Femmes and Notorious Liars, also by Kai Cheng Thom, here. The reference to Caleb being Miriam's husband comes from the Talmud, from this long bit in Sotah (11b and 12a) where they're talking about a lot of aspects of Caleb's family that are confusing.
Support us on Patreon! Send us questions or comments at [email protected], follow us on Twitter @kosherqueers, and like us on Facebook at Kosher Queers. Our music is by the band Brivele. This week, our audio was edited by Lulav Arnow and our transcript written by Jaz and Reuben Shachar Rose. Our logo is by Lior Gross, and we are not endorsed by or affiliated with the Orthodox Union.

Support the show