Blinding Birds, Bartered Bodies, and Bestial Betrothals: Exploring Interspecies Intersectionality in the Damascus Document and Book of Tobit

This article argues that a full analysis of intersectionality in Second Temple literature must attend to nonhuman animals. That is, the societal nexus of intersecting powers—generally recognised to include dynamics like gender, race, class, and disability—is incomplete unless it also attends to dynamics of species. In this article, we substantiate this view by exploring two case studies: portions from the Damascus Document and the Book of Tobit. In these texts, dynamics of species are thoroughly entangled with dynamics of slavery, sex, and bodily status. We draw out three points in particular: first, nonhuman animals and subordinated humans are mutually implicated in intersecting societal power dynamics; second, though working towards domination, these power dynamics might present themselves as beneficial; and third, such dynamics are not inviolable, but can be contravened by expressions of agency from humans and nonhumans alike.