Engendrer le tabou. L’interprétation du lévitique 15, 18-19 et 20-18 et de la menstruation sous l’ancien régime

Abstract

This article criticises the traditional representation of early modern elite male attitudes towards menstruation as misogynist, arguing that a fuller and more nuanced analysis of such attitudes is needed. It proposes that this can be reached through the heuristic application of “taboo” to an analysis of one of the sources of elite religious attitudes to menstruation: Leviticus 15, 18:19 and 20:18. It compares linguistic changes in the expression of menstrual taboos found in Leviticus 15, 18 and 20 in 35 Catholic and Protestant Bibles between 1530 and 1768 and 22 contemporary dictionaries. It refutes the idea that the Levitican texts were misogynistic and argues that the early modern Catholic and Protestant translators situated the menstrual and seminal taboos above all in the context of procreation and conjugal sexuality. Far from expressing hatred or disgust for the menstruating woman, early modern French theologians and lexicographers respected the gender neutral tone of Leviticus 15. In early modern France Levitican taboos were part of a ‘procreative theology’ rather than an attempt to justify the inferiority of women.