Iyun Lemachshava English

Desiring People vs Desiring natural pleasure


Listen Later

This lecture examines Aristotle's distinction between natural/common pleasures and chosen/specific pleasures in Jewish ethics, focusing on food and sex as the two bodily pleasures subject to temperance. The instructor argues against materialist reductions of desire, showing how sexual and gustatory desires are mediated by narrative and cultural scripts rather than being purely physical phenomena. The mitzvah of kiddushin (marriage sanctification) transforms base physical desire into interpersonal, story-laden desire directed toward one's spouse, making proper measure a question of direction and context rather than mere quantity or self-control.
...more
View all episodesView all episodes
Download on the App Store

Iyun Lemachshava EnglishBy Yitzchok Lowy