Unfortunately you have taken the statement completely out of context. This reminds me of the person who decided he could not possibly accept Yiddishkeit because he had read in Bameh Madlikin on Friday evening that women died in childbirth on account of being lax regarding the Mitzvos of Chalah, Nidah, and Hadlakas ha'Ner. Only a cruel and illogical religion could prescribe the death penalty for such minor offences. Anyone who believes that, he said, must be quite unbalanced.

But he has taken it completely out of context without understanding the wider picture or the basic intent of this dictum of Chazal. So too here. The Gemara is not defining a woman or her attributes any more than the prophet Yeshayah is doing so (4:4) when he describes Hash-m washing away the filth of the daughters of Zion and the blood of Jerusalem. Or Akavya ben Mahalalel who said (Avos 3:1) that man comes from a putrid drop or Koheles (3:19) who writes that man is no better than a beast. And Chulin (5a,b) regarding men who are the equivalent of animals, or Vayikra Rabah 15:2 based on Iyov 28:25 that a man is half-water, half-blood and if there is any imbalance he becomes an Adripikos (a dropsy sufferer) or a Metzora.

Each of these statements is not intended to be derogatory to humankind generally but merely to illustrate a particular point. And it is the same here. The Gemara you quoted (Shabbos 152a) is attempting to show the infirmity of man in a series of situations. Verses from Koheles are quoted to show what happens in man's old age. He becomes weak and tired and his body can no longer function efficiently. The greatest Amora, Rav, groaned in the presence of Rav Kahana since he could no longer father children. Rav Kahana proceeded to make a deep philosophical observation on Hash-m's construction and control over His creation.

He points out that notwithstanding the fact that a human being finds semen and blood repulsive and that the place of intercourse exudes menstrual fluids, blood, urine and excrement (this is where he likens a woman to a container full of dirt with its openings full of [vaginal] blood), nonetheless, quite illogically, a man runs after her. This is how Hash-m arranged that procreation should take place.

This is his interpretation of the verse in Tehilim 33:9 which is defining Hash-m's control over the universe. He ordered the creation of woman but no child would have been born had He not also given the order for man's desire for a woman to override his sensitivity to her repulsive aspects. In fact the Jewish approach to intercourse as being an act of great holiness and purity is in stark contrast to the attitude of another religion which advocates celibacy as a preference and considers the sexual act to be dirty rather than pure. Rav Kahana is illustrating that when Hash-m sanctions something it becomes purified and welcome, completely overriding one's a priori, and perhaps even natural, propensity to repugnancy.

In summation, there is nothing derogatory in this Gemara about women. It is simply a clinical description given for the purpose of the lesson to be derived. Just as in the other cases I have quoted above, no one would take the slightest umbrage at the comparison between a man and an animal or the attribution of filth and blood to the daughters of Zion and Jerusalem, in the context in which the statements were made, so too this statement must be understood in its own context.

Kol Tuv,

Joseph Pearlman