Alum Merissa Nathan Gerson (Year ’10-’11) Publishes New Book

When I attend­ed yeshi­va at the Pardes Insti­tute for Jew­ish Stud­ies it was for one rea­son, and one rea­son only: I was an advice colum­nist, Ask Your Yen­ta, writ­ing about sex and dat­ing and I had no idea about what Judaism had to say on the top­ic. I spent a dif­fi­cult and amaz­ing year neck-deep in Jew­ish text study, and emerged with knowl­edge of nid­dah (rit­u­al sex­u­al rules dic­tat­ed by men­stru­a­tion), tum-tum (an often-ref­er­enced third cat­e­go­ry of sex and gen­der that appears in Tal­mud), mik­vah (a rit­u­al cleanse often in prepa­ra­tion for sex), and a thirst for so much more infor­ma­tion. When I went on to get a Master’s in Jew­ish Stud­ies the fol­low­ing year it was with one sin­gu­lar focus: sex and gen­der in Judaism.