Isn’t it sort of irrelevant to the OP whether or not Paul’s letters really refer to homosexuality or not? Even if they don’t, most evangelicals think they do. Whether they’re right or wrong about this is a different issue.
And the reason evangelical Christians should treat gays with respect is that you should treat everybody with respect, even if they’re doing something or believe something you don’t approve of or agree with.
I thought Leviticus was directed to the Levites, the priestly caste, not necessarily all the tribes. It has been a while since I read Leviticus, so I am likely wrong.
There are aspects in Leviticus just addressing the proper sacrifices, cleansings & other rites conducted by the Levites & Priests. But the Levites were the enforcers of the Holiness Code which applied to all the Jews- the dietary laws, the Sabbaths & Festivals, the land laws, the religious & sexual regulations.
Of the sexual regulations, only the ban on sex during menstruation seems to be specifically Jewish. While looking on various Jewish “Seven Laws of Noah/B’nai Noah” sites, I see that the Law against Adultery/Sexual Sin applicable to the Gentiles is usually interpreted to ban all that Leviticus 18 bans, except for that (unless I missed it).
Thanks FriarTed
I have a question for you folks. I must admit to not having heard some of the interpretations mentioned here. They go against traditional thinking quite severely, and therefore against what I’ve always heard. Unfortunately, as I’ve said, I haven’t heard of them before, so I am curious how other scriptures are interpreted to get you to these beliefs.
Specifically, these two:
Leviticus 16:22
Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination.
Romans 1:26-27
For this cause God game them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature:
And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet.
So how do you interpret those passages.
Thanks,
Why the spoilers?
The Leviticus quote is addressed by pro-gay scholars in a couple of ways. The first is that it’s an injunction against patronizing Canaanite Temple prostitutes who were often males in drag, and not all homosexuality. The second point is that it’s a part of the “old” covenant (like eating shrimp) and is no longer binding on Christians.
The Romans quotation is about what happens when people worship idols (that is Paul’s real concern in the passage, not homosexuality). Paul says that when they worshipped idols they started behaving in way which were para phusin for them. That Greek phrase is translated as “unnatural” but is more accurately translated as “uncharacteristic” or “against one’s own nature.”
What Paul is saying is that idol worship caused people to go crazy and start engaging in acts that were a.) purely lustful and b.) out of character.
It’s kind of like if I got drunk at a party and started doing a striptease on a table top. It would be bizarre and out of charater for me but the act itself would not be “unnatural” in any greater sense (although it might fairly be called an abomination).
Stealing a post I did over on Christian Forums:
Correct. And the Word of God commanded us, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy mind, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. These two commandments sum up the Law and the Prophets”
And:
He also said
Therefore anybody who decides that a gay person is worthy of condemnation is rendering himself or herself culpable of God’s judgment for his or her own sins.
But reading the initial question of this thread, “Is being gay really a sin?,” I think people may be bringing different ideas of what it asks to the table.
Whenever I’ve heard a gay person using the term “being gay” of him- or herself, it’s with reference to the interior psychological orientation of feeling romantic and/or sexual desire for a person or persons of the same sex. (Cites: Mel White, Stranger at the Gate; Andrew Tobias, The Best Little Boy in the World; and several websites regarding being gay that I choose not to link to without a ruling from a moderator approving the link, but which I offer as available for documentation.) Both books and those websites go on to aver that that orientation is effectively unchangeable by human effort. (I believe [that other member] has some cites of people who have in fact made the change, through God’s intervention in their lives; but we’re talking unaided human effort here. Praying for a gift from God is one thing; other people condemning someone because they haven’t received that gift is quite another.)
Now, with one exception, the Leviticus and New Testament verses offered as proof of God’s condemnation of “homosexuality” are referencing the acts, not the interior mental state. And there are in fact serious grounds for being skeptical about whether the acts in and of themselves are being condemned, rather than the purposes for which they’re entered into. (By parallel, sexual intercourse is not itself condemned, but commanded within marriage; what is condemned is gratification of lust without commitment in fornication, adultery, and the like.) (Cite: Daniel Helminiak, What the Bible Really Says about Homosexuality; the Rt. Rev. John Shelby Spong, D.D., Living in Sin?)
That exception is in the first chapter of Romans:
However, the entire first chapter of Romans, which I forebear to quote in full, deals with the evidence of God’s Law in the natural order, and then in people who have intentionally turned from the worship of Him to the worship of some part of His creation. The character of these people is described by Paul:
I submit that this does not specifically and exclusively characterize modern homosexual people, but rather was a very apt character description of the Roman elite described in Tacitus (History) and Petronius Arbiter (Satyricon and other works), who were known to “turn from the natural use of the women to burn with lusts for one another” and who were in fact “full of envy, murder, debate, decit, malignity, whisperers, backbiters…” In other words, that passage is not speaking of gay people per se, but of the worldly-minded, including a tendency to seek sexual gratification by homosexual acts among the wide variety of sinful attitudes which they exhibit. It may well include some worldly-minded gay people, but on account of their rejection of God rather than their sexuality. (Sources: a variety of commentaries on Romans, including the Helminiak and Spong books cited above as they touch on the passage.)
What is really interesting about all of this is that immediately after the passages cited above (and remember that the division of the Bible into chapters and verses comes centuries after the New Testament was written), Paul goes on to say:
In other words, we have all sinned against Him and our sins no more or less than anyone else’s warrant condmenation. In judging them, you judge yourself.
That means the original post is actually asking three questions:
With reference to 1, the answer would have to be, that which one cannot change is not in and of itself sinful. It is a part of human nature that our sexuality does not correspond with what God appears to originally have had in mind. And that goes for all of us, not just gay people. One works with what one has, and trusts God for the rest.
Make your own judgment. It’s absolutely clear that doing them for idol worship, for gratification of lust, for casual pleasure is. It’s the longstanding tradition of Christianity, against which some modern Scriptural interpreters teach otherwise, that they are sinful under any circumstances. But the solution in either case is clear: in any circumstance where you believe them to be sinful (which may be all circumstances), do not yourself commit them.
What’s our task? To love them as ourselves. To do unto them as we would have them do unto us. That does not include denouncing them, condemning them, bearing false witness against them, stereotyping them all by the worst image possible. Doing those things are themselves sins of which we are called to repent, and to renounce support of those who continue to do them. It may call for loving correction as of a brother and sister – after a Christian friendship is established. To “speak out against sin” when doing so involves condemning their acts and by implication them themselves, is clearly forbidden. “Standing firm against sin” may mean a lot of things to a lot of different people, but one thing it does not and cannot mean is that we’re entitled to sit in judgment over our fellow man’s sins as the Pharisees did over the rest of the Jews. Jesus makes that more than explicit in passage after passage of the Gospels.
Except, in Romans, it’s a more general condemnation. Paul is channeling the Stoics here, who saw homosexuality as against the nature of men generally. So, you know, you see condemnation of homosexuality among the Stoics of that period. Something interesting, which seems to parallel Paul’s writing, is part of the twelfth discourse of Musonius Rufus ("On Sexual Immorality:), bolding mine:
Where do you get that Paul was a Stoic?
Perhaps I’m missing something here, but doesn’t your own interpretation of 2:1 make it clear that this passage refers to all humanity? I don’t see how the Roman elites enter into it.
He wasn’t. What I’m saying is, first, the focus on “natural” and “contrary to nature” was a Stoic fixation, and second, that Paul was using (and abusing) Stoic arguments in Romans.
Well, yeah, good objection. I was in my haste to write that conflating original audience: the small Christian fellowship in Rome ca. AD 60, meeting in the Catacombs less than a mile from where the Roman elite were doing their thing; and the general application that “All men have sinned and fallen short of God’s glory” (which Paul says in those words a couple of chapters farther on). I was saying that the people he’s holding up as an example of Bad News were the hedonistic Roman elite, not the local homosexual population. And then he draws the point that everybody sins, not just the people he’s just pointed out as special examples.
By the way, if anyone is offended by my apparent damning gays with faint praise in that post, remember that I was writing for an audience focused on sin and God’s Law, and prepared to condemn sinners; I would certainly have phrased things quite differently if I had written it here.
But the Stoics did not use the terms phusin or para phusin to imply a sense of inherent moral nature (or lack of it). They used it to designate what was or was not rational or sensible. Paul also used the terms to refer to cultural contexts. For instance, he says that Gentiles are uncirmucised “by nature” (kata phusin) so I still think even in a Stoic sense, there is no necessary implied moral condemnation of homosexuality per se but just an implication that people were behaving irrationally and outside the norms of what was expected for them.
Understood.
And FWIW, I think you (and perhaps the OP) greatly underestimate the number of evangelicals who make the distinction between orientation and acts, are aware that it all hangs on interpretation of scripture and are quite uncomfortable with the rhetoric of the Falwells and Robertsons.
IMO, as a matter of theological politics, it is a very foolish thing for liberals such as yourself to lump evangelicals in with fundamentalists. If anything, you should be seeking to emphasize the divide between, on the one side, the Methobapterian Evangelicals who say that homosexual activity is wrong, but that the orientation may well be something innate, and on the other, the Fred Phelps fundamentalists.
If the greater divide comes there, you will have the long-term dialectic heading your way. Conversely, if you stress the divide between those who fully accept and embrace all homosexual activity, including gay marriage, and those who don’t – which you have, in hundreds of posts on *this * board – you’re driving the center into the arms of the right.
The Stoics used the term kata phusin and para phusin to refer to what was and wasn’t in conformity with the underlying order of the universe. The sun rising in the east, reproductive sex, a man obeying his father…that was all kata phusin. I mean, you’re right that, for the Stoics, things that are para phusin are not rational or sensible, but for them, the statement “You are not acting rationally” is a moral condemnation.
Here’s Eugene Rice’s take on it, as well as the development of the condemnation of homosexuality by the patristic fathers:
Chalk it up to me being a newbie and not being sure about the acceptance of publishing such things as Scripture in the open.
I would agree with the term “binding,” but I don’t know that that specifically means that it is not “wrong” in God’s sight. That is to say, by Paul’s explanation of Christian liberty, I am not bound by the Laws, but that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t obey them.
That said, I don’t believe that eating shrimp is a sin. I believe there are certain laws that are not carried over to the New Covenant and are invalidated, while others are incorporated. Granted, I understand how potentially subjective this can be. I’m not altogether convinced myself, but this is where I lean to now.
As to the explanation of the Leviticus passage, the Sodom and Gommorah story, the Exekiel passage, the various passages by Paul (including Romans 1) and the brief mention by Jude, no offense meant to anyone, but I see it as a modern day wrangling to “play nice” with the homosexual community. Don’t misunderstand, I may be a fundamentalist and believe that the act is a sin, but I don’t do marches or anything so activist. I think the evangelical and fundamentalist attitudes are just as much of a sin (see below).
I guess that I see the explanations given above and in other threads as more of a stretch and an attempt to “fit” Scripture to our modern world. Maybe it is simply because these explanations are new to me. It feels to me as if we are trying to come up with a different interpretation for some reason.
To some degree, I agree with the statements above. As far as a homosexual orientation, I don’t see is so much as a sin, but as a symptom or predelection. We all have them, but acting on them is a sin. By analogy, when my wife fixes me a chocolate on chocolate cake for my birthday, the desire I have to eat half or more of it in one sitting is simply a symptom of my fallen nature. It is a natural predelection. It isn’t until I act on it that I sin.
(I’m sure someone will comment about the difference in denying myself an inordinate amount of cake as not being comparable to denying myself the companionship of a “soul-mate”, so I’ll hold off on explaining that for now in light of the space available.)
That would provide my answer for the first question.
In certain respects, I agree with the second answer, but in others I don’t. I agree that if one believes it to be a sin, they should not participate. The problem arises in that there are people who are (sometime too) concerned with the sins of others. This gets into the entire judgement issue.
Again, as I said above, I believe the current evangelical and fundamentalist attitude toward homosexuals is incorrect, I do have to disagree with Polycarp reasoning about judgement. I agree 100% that when I exercise judgement about the actions another person takes, I am submitting myself to the exact same treatment by God.
The difference is that I also believe that it is not necessarily wrong in that we exercise judgement every day. Exercising judgement is not the same as being judgemental. When I mentioned here and elsewhere that I am a fundamentalist, several (many? most?) of you made a judgement in your minds about that statement. I don’t believe that is wrong. However, if you become judgemental of me (condemning, rude, offensive) simply because of what you think/feel/believe about a fundamentalist that isn’t right. Thankfully, so far, no one has taken that route.
Essentially, making a judgement involves making a decision (in this case whether the act of homosexuality is a sin) whereas being judgemental involves how I react to someone.
As to the issue of being judged by God, I agree. I think that God has the same weights and scales to judge each of us. We all have to stand up next to the same mark of perfection that was displayed by Jesus Christ. We all fall miserably short. I don’t expect God to judge my sins any differently than he would a lifelong, habitual homosexual nymphomaniac. Whether God even looks at those sins isn’t determined by how many I commit or how bad they are. What matters is whether I’ve accepted the payment Christ provided for those sins.
I believe when the scales of our own delisuions are removed; however, that many “saved” people (evangelical, liberal, and fundamentalist alike) will be woefully sorry at the sins they “grieved the Spirit” over. This, in my opinion, will be one of the many sources of the “tears” that Christ will wipe away.
In any case, I don’t believe making a judgement call about whether an activity (homosexualit or otherwise) is a sin or not (regardless of whose life it is in) is wrong. Acting on that decision to treat someone other than you should (judgementally) is, however, a sin all by itself. (See John 7:24)
I guess that somewhat that covers the third question as well. The only issue that I’m struggling with is at what point does this leave the personal and enter the legal process. I’m not talking about just homosexuality, but in general.
I’m not willing to go entirely libertarian, but at the same time, I understand the problems of legislating one person’s interpretation over another’s. I guess this is where I am personally. I know very well what I believe, and while I would love for the laws to reflect my own personal beliefs about morality, I see the danger’s inherit in that system. This was briefly covered in a different thread, but I’m not sure where I think the answer needs to be. Any suggestions?
Regardless of where the “right” answer is, I don’t believe the current evangelical/fundamentalist response is either proper or helpful.
While I’m not up on who Fred Phelps is (as I’ve said, I’m fundamentalist, but not activist), I can’t agree more. As much as I don’t necessarily believe it is right (division is never right in religion), the only real way to get mainstream Christianity to accept the homosexual lifestyle is to show the mean-spirited, incorrect, judgemental reaction to it as a fundamental, legalistic approach.
Unfortunately, it isn’t likely to happen unless a “leader” takes this stance. Generally, they are too busy fighting amongst themselves over some minutia of doctrine, or passing a plate, or vilifying politians, or … Well, you get the picture.
Very well put; my own feelings exactly; and a distinction that many either do not or will not get.
Phelps, his supporters and members of his church attend said gatherings, as well as other gay-related events, with signs bearing anti-homosexual slogans. Reverend Phelps has characterized the Names Project Quilt as “100,000 living fags slobberin’ around 45,000 dead fags,” and declared Elizabeth Taylor, a fundraiser for AIDS research, to be a “world-famous Jew whore” and a “filthy Jew whore.” Other favorite anti-gay slogans of the Reverend Phelps include “God Hates Fags,” “Homosexuality=Death,” “Fags Die, God Laughs,” “Matthew Shepard Rots In Hell,” “AIDS: Kills Fags Dead,” and “Ellen DeGeneres Is a Lesbian Slut.”
Fundamentalist though I may be, let me just add to everything else I’ve said (after reading the above quote)…
Ewwww.
Having driven an openly gay employee home from my first after college job, and openly discussed several religious and non-religious themes with him, I hope that you will all accept my deepest apologies for the idiots like Mr. Phleps who give fundamentalism a bad name. Unfortunately, there are way too many of them.