Intimate kissing only became prevalent in Ancient Israel after the Babylonian exile, or in the 6th century BCE, a recent study based on biblical textual analysis has suggested.The underlying article is published in JBL, behind a subscription wall:[...]
A History of Kissing in Ancient Israel: Evidence from the Hebrew BibleAs both articles note, the evidence is very limited and some of the argument is inevitably from silence. But this sounds like a good effort to collect all the evidence and draw what conclusions can reasonably be drawn from it.Rachelle Gilmour
Journal of Biblical Literature (2025) 144 (1): 21–41.
https://doi.org/10.15699/jbl.1441.2025.2Abstract
In this article I investigate when sexual mouth-to-mouth kissing was introduced and rose in prevalence in ancient Israel. Anthropological research shows that the practice of kissing is not universal across cultures, and it is thought to be transmitted to social groups through cultural contact. The presence of kissing in a culture often correlates with social stratification and political centralization. In conversation with these broader findings, and with a focus on textual evidence, I will examine sexual kissing in ancient Israel to evaluate whether there is diachronic change in the absence and presence of sexual kissing in biblical texts. In light of the limited evidence, and difficulties in textual dating, I will consider a range of factors, including texts where sexual kissing is expected but not present, and linguistic phenomena related to the formulations of non-sexual kissing. I will conclude that mouth-to-mouth sexual kissing is evidenced in the postexilic period, with a further argument that the practice was introduced to ancient Israel or rose in prevalence around the sixth century BCE.
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