Bible against gays
Leviticus
“You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination.”[1] It is not a surprise that this verse seems to say that gay male sex is forbidden in the eyes of God. The dominant view of western Christianity forbids queer relations. This verse is one of the clobber passages that people cite from the Bible to condemn homosexuality. This essay first looks at the various ways the verse is translated into the English Bible and then explores some of the strategies used to create an affirming interpretation of what this passage means for the LGBTQ community. More specifically, it presents the interpretation of K. Renato Lings in which Lev. refers to male-on-male incest.
While Lev. is used to condemn homosexuality, we must realize that the phrase “homosexuality” was only recently coined in the English language. So did this term exist in ancient Israel? Charles D. Myers, Jr. confirms that none of the prophets in the Hebrew Bible mention homosexuality.[2] He also contends that in ancient Israel same-sex relations were viewed as an ancient Near East difficulty. The anc
The Bible and identical sex relationships: A review article
Tim Keller,
Vines, Matthew, God and the Homosexual Christian: The Biblical Case in Assist of Same Sex Relationships, Convergent Books,
Wilson, Ken,A Letter to My Congregation, David Crum Media,
The relationship of homosexuality to Christianity is one of the main topics of discussion in our culture today. In the descent of last year I wrote a review of books by Wesley Hill and Sam Allberry that take the historic Christian view, in Hill’s words: “that homosexuality was not God’s unique creative intention for humanity and therefore that homosexual drill goes against God’s express will for all human beings, especially those who trust in Christ.”
There are a number of other books that accept the opposite view, namely that the Bible either allows for or supports same sex relationships. Over the last year or so I (and other pastors at Redeemer) have been regularly asked for responses to their arguments. The two most read volumes taking this position look to be those by Matthew Vines and Ken Wilson. The review of these
What Does the Bible Say About Homosexuality?
What Does The Bible Express About Homosexuality?
Introduction
For the last two decades, Pew Research Center has reported that one of the most enduring ethical issues across Christian traditions is sexual diversity. For many Christians, one of the most frequently first-asked questions on this topic is, “What does the Bible say about attraction to someone of the equal sex?”
Although its unlikely that the biblical authors had any notion of sexual orientation (for example, the term homosexual wasn't even coined until the tardy 19th century) for many people of faith, the Bible is looked to for timeless guidance on what it means to honor God with our lives; and this most certainly includes our sexuality.
Before we can leap into how it is that Christians can maintain the authority of the Bible and also affirm sexual diversity, it might be helpful if we started with a short but clear overview of some of the assumptions informing many Christian approaches to understanding the Bible.
What is the Bible?
For Christians to whom the Bible
This article is part of the What Did Jesus Teach? series.
Silence Equals Support?
In a article for Slate online, Will Oremus asked a provocative question: Was Jesus a homophobe?1
The article was occasioned by a story about a queer teenager in Ohio who was suing his upper school after school officials prohibited him from wearing a T-shirt that said, “Jesus Is Not a Homophobe.”
Oremus was less concerned about the legal issues of the story than he was about the accuracy of the declaration on the shirt. Oremus suggests that Jesus’s views on homosexuality were more inclusive than Paul’s. He writes,
While it’s reasonable to assume that Jesus and his fellow Jews in first-century Palestine would include disapproved of gay sex, there is no write down of his ever having mentioned homosexuality, let alone expressed particular revulsion about it. . . . Never in the Bible does Jesus himself present an explicit prohibition of homosexuality.
Oremus seems to present that since Jesus never explicitly mentioned homosexuality, he must not have been very concerned about it.
There are at least two reas