The Soul of the Stranger: Reading God and Torah from a Transgender Perspective (HBI Series on Jewish Women) - Softcover

"This heartfelt, difficult work will introduce Jews and other readers of the Torah to fresh, sensitive approaches with room for broader human dignity."-- "Publishers Weekly (starred review)" "Defining transgender as having a sense of self that does not fit the traditional binary gender categories of male and female, she finds a connection with those in the Bible who abandoned or violated their assigned gender roles. But it is to God she always returns, concluding that to open ourselves to the deity, we must open ourselves to the stranger."-- "Booklist" "Joy Ladin writes from her heart and from the core of her being. In giving us new ways to see the holy texts, we see the Torah as a sensitive and dignified manuscript. I love that the journey we take here is both spiritual and intellectual."-- "Reviews by Amos Lassen"

Reading some of the best-known Torah stories through the lens of transgender experience, Joy Ladin explores fundamental questions about how religious texts, traditions, and the understanding of God can be enriched by transgender perspectives, and how the Torah and trans lives can illuminate one another. Drawing on her own experience and lifelong reading practice, Ladin shows how the Torah, a collection of ancient texts that assume human beings are either male or female, speaks both to practical transgender concerns, such as marginalization, and to the challenges of living without a body or social role that renders one intelligible to others-challenges that can help us understand a God who defies all human categories. These creative, evocative readings transform our understanding of the Torah's portrayals of God, humanity, and relationships between them.