scriptural basis for christian objection to homosexuality

[17th Angel]

A few interesting scriptures to consider hmmm

Gen 2:24 reads....

That is why a man will leave his father and his mother and he must stick to his wife and they must become one flesh.

Gen 13:13 reads....

And the men of Sod´om were bad and were gross sinners against Jehovah.

Romans 1:27 reads...

and likewise even the males left the natural use of the female and became violently inflamed in their lust toward one another, males with males, working what is obscene and receiving in themselves the full recompense, which was due for their error.

Jude 1:7 reads.....

So too Sod´om and Go·mor´rah and the cities about them, after they in the same manner as the foregoing ones had committed fornication excessively and gone out after flesh for unnatural use, are placed before [us] as a [warning] example by undergoing the judicial punishment of everlasting fire.

Lev 18:22 reads...

And you must not lie down with a male the same as you lie down with a woman. It is a detestable thing.

Ezekiel 16:49 - 50 reads.....

Look! This is what proved to be the error of Sod´om your sister: Pride, sufficiency of bread and the carefreeness of keeping undisturbed were what happened to belong to her and her dependent towns, and the hand of the afflicted one and the poor one she did not strengthen. And they continued to be haughty and to carry on a detestable thing before me, and I finally removed them, just as I saw [fit].

Just some interesting ones to read there...

[bananabrain]

Originally Posted by flowperson

does anybody think that the rapid disappearance of real privacy in all walks of life might be having an effect upon how we all regard sexual practices and behaviors? I'm inclined to believe that this is having a profound effect on western societies at least, notwithstanding what scripture tells us to do and how to behave in sexual matters.

i think this is a very good point.

@silas: if you don't want to discuss it, you are not obliged to. your choice.

Christians follow Jesus' teachings, Jesus follows God the Father's will and God the Father says that homosexuality is an abomination.

but if you have understood my earlier post, it is simply not as simplistic as that. the Torah works in a particular way and so does the language within it and the law derived from it. what i said was that properly understood, it can only be established with certainty that a particular homosexual behaviour, namely anal sex, is not permitted to jews, along with a bunch of other stuff we're not allowed to do. we have also established that "sexual immorality" is in the noahide laws (which are not, of course explicitly listed in the Torah, but derived via halakhic interpretation) is not to be understood simply as referring to homosexuality but to a whole set of exploitative, violent, non-consensual and idolatrous behaviours - it is *not at all* clear that this refers to committed, monogamous, consensual, loving homosexual partners, who i cannot see as being at all harmful to me, to society or to G!D.

Originally Posted by wil

Yo BB, there are plenty of Christian sects/denominations that accept homosexuals as members of thier church and clergy...tis what the riot is about.

yes, i understand that, but i am wondering how these sects/denominations deal with the passages from romans and corinthians?

Originally Posted by Dondi

What is the command of G!D in the beginning?

"So G!D Created man in the Divine Image, Created him in the Divine Image; male and female Created them.
G!D Blessed them, and God Said to them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it: and rule over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moves upon the earth." - Genesis 1:27-28

"Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall be joined to his wife: and they shall be one flesh." - Genesis 2:24

It is clear that this is the order of creation, before the fall of Man.

not at all! for a start, you will notice that in one verse, humanity is referred to both as singular and plural. our tradition understands this in a number of complicated ways, in particular that the original proto-human was Created with both male and female characteristics - the separation of the sexes (originally joined at the rib) does not take place until later. therefore one could easily make an argument that a certain androgyny was built into humanity from the very beginning - but it is only reproduction that is actually commanded, as opposed to pleasure, which is more of a value-add, as we'd say at work.

But you will notice that there was a fundamental change in the countenance of man. The woman now had to give birth with travailing pain, and the man had to work by the sweat of his brow, and the whole creation was cursed.

you may also be unaware that our tradition says that one of the reasons G!D decided to split the sexes is that the proto-adam was starting to get a little too friendly with the animals in the garden, if you catch my drift. even after the split, but before the fruit-eating, there was sex, but it was animal-style, meaning that the specifically female end of it did not involve much desire; there were no female orgasms in the garden, or something like that (see gen. 3:16) - so the "order of creation" is nothing like as straightforward as you suppose.

the whole creation was cursed. What the fall did was disrupt the perfect nature of creation. The ground was cursed because of Adam's sake. As a result, the natural became unnatural. The thistles and thorns sprouted up in the garden, where there were none before.

this is absolutely not our understanding of the difference between the edenic state. we do not believe that the world is unnatural, or that sex is bad, or that work is bad. choice implies free-will, as i've said before - and real life requires challenge. without challenge, how can you have choice to meet the challenge or fail it?

I think it also affected the animals. So it is no surprise to me that certain animals exhibit deviant behaviour as well, for they are also cursed.

there is no support in the Text for this view. we do not agree that everyone has been cursed - this is a christian view which is presumably required in order for salvation and so on. we don't believe this is necessary, so i suppose this is at the bottom (so to speak) of our different attitudes to sexuality.

Then perhaps you can direct me to process of halakhah in regards to homosexual behaviour. Do you have a link or reference?

it is a complicated subject but here is a good place to start: MyJewishLearning.com - Ideas & Belief: Overview: Jewish Views on Homose and MyJewishLearning.com - Ideas & Belief: Homosexuality and Halakhah

What we cannot agree on is on the issues like homosexual behavior and abortion. Both of which oppose clear teaching from the scriptures.

clearer in yours than in mine, to be precise. and in any case, the action to be taken is even less clear.

Homosexual behavior is disruptive because it undetermines the sanctity of marriage ordered by G!D. It doesn't procreate the species.

ok, but this is not the only reason for sex as far as we are concerned.

Furthermore, it is subject to the spreading of all kinds of disease which can affect the health of the society.

oh, come on. by far the greater incidence of AIDS, for example, is transmitted by heterosexuals. viruses do not discriminate.

So tell me, does your tradition treat rebellious children and adulterer's? Shouldn't they be stoned by the congregation? Or is all that kind of thing rhetorical?

have you read any of the stuff i have written about the death penalty? take a look here:

http://www.comparative-religion.com/...ment#post10564
http://www.comparative-religion.com/...ment#post21860
http://www.comparative-religion.com/...ment#post22144

these posts ought to answer your question.

I'd say Jesus was far less tolerant about sin than you think

well, i'd say like anyone, he had his irritable days.

@lunamoth: thanks verey much for the peter gomes quote. that pretty much puts it in a nutshell as far as i can see - clearly he can reconcile things to a degree.

Originally Posted by China Cat Sunflower

First, you may have started this thread, but you don't own it. I'll write about anything I damn well please. Dondi gave you an excellent response, what more do you want?

sorry CCS - of course, i don't own it, but it seemed at one point to be turning into a set of anecdotes, personal opinions and generalisations, which for me is less valuable; i was just trying to get back to the texts rather than be diverted off into "how would you feel about X" and "what about gay porn" and so on.

You seem to be saying that O.K., our Torah condemns homosexuality, but, we don't do what the Torah says anyway, so why should we make an exception for this?

hehe. that would be a slightly cynical interpretation of what i am saying, but in a nutshell, i believe although all this stuff is equally important, that G!D's priorities work rather differently than ours and that we are expected to sort out things between human-and-human rather than between human-and-G!D, because G!D Is perfectly capable of dumping on gays if it were necessary. there's no need for us to pre-empt G!D's priorities if G!D isn't doing so. in fact we might actually be smart and take the hint - clearly these things happen for a reason, even if we don't necessarily understand it ourselves.

Let's just be honest and say we don't buy what the Bible says because it's silly and out of date.

i think that rather than this, G!D approves of our using our brains to make a case. the following sources would be of help, i suspect:

Oral Law - Legitimacy of Innovation

the particular question to understand is the talmudic debate over the oven of achnai, where G!D *Laughs*, saying "My children have defeated Me". why would G!D Laugh if not pleased?

b'shalom

bananabrain

[17th Angel]

Originally Posted by bananabrain

but if you have understood my earlier post, it is simply not as simplistic as that. the Torah works in a particular way and so does the language within it and the law derived from it.

Scriptural basis for christian objection to homosexuality, thats the topic right? ;/ I don't see what the Torah has to do with it.... Explain please? :/

[wil]

Originally Posted by BB

Quote:
But you will notice that there was a fundamental change in the countenance of man. The woman now had to give birth with travailing pain, and the man had to work by the sweat of his brow, and the whole creation was cursed.
you may also be unaware that our tradition says that one of the reasons G!D decided to split the sexes is that the proto-adam was starting to get a little too friendly with the animals in the garden, if you catch my drift. even after the split, but before the fruit-eating, there was sex, but it was animal-style, meaning that the specifically female end of it did not involve much desire; there were no female orgasms in the garden, or something like that (see gen. 3:16) - so the "order of creation" is nothing like as straightforward as you suppose.

Quote:
the whole creation was cursed. What the fall did was disrupt the perfect nature of creation. The ground was cursed because of Adam's sake. As a result, the natural became unnatural. The thistles and thorns sprouted up in the garden, where there were none before.
this is absolutely not our understanding of the difference between the edenic state. we do not believe that the world is unnatural, or that sex is bad, or that work is bad. choice implies free-will, as i've said before - and real life requires challenge. without challenge, how can you have choice to meet the challenge or fail it?

Namaste all,

Such a wealth of information. We must all be aware that as Christians we use our Bible. A book of 66 books, selected out of hundreds to be our be all and end all. What BB is referring to is the mountain of information and stories that accompany what we refer to as the Old Testament. We have basically selectively taken a portion of the Judaic thought, and a portion of the Christian thought and combined it into one book and have left out probably 90% of the available information that was floating around during Jesus day and the first centuries afterword. Jesus studied and learned the information BB is referring to...we just haven't as the powers that were that bound the book for us deemed it not cannonical.

[Quahom1]

Originally Posted by cavalier

Come on Q, that's a little off, to say everything you want to say and then leave me without a means of reply.
Firstly it's not as simple as you think. You object to homosexuality, I am not sure that I agree with your objection, but you're a Biblical guy and as such there are more than enough texts in the Bible to justify your objection. That's fine, I can't argue with you there.
It's the stories though, the entirely subjective little observations you use to try and validify your opinion.

Then speak your mind.

My little stories are all I have, because that is what I haved lived and experienced. And there isn't one good story to tell that would shed a little glimmer of positive light on the subject.

I don't discount parts of the Bible to fit my mold of what I think should be.

As far as the US getting blown up and put on the ash heap of history...it hasn't happened yet.

[InLove]

Just wanted to jump in here for a second to thank both bananabrain and lunamoth for the links provided. Much food for thought there. Very helpful.

InPeace,
InLove

[paul]

Scripture, life, creation, nature, it shows us homosexuality is an evil.

Not a voilent evil as to deliberately hurt someone, but something which developes in certain people and we have the reasons even for this in life and scripture.

What we see with homosexuals from their own testimonies is that this evil can develope in them because of sexual abuse they have suffered.

Surely from this we see it is an evil state.

Also we see in Scripture it says God gave them up, because of self worship and they turn from Him.
We see the type of people homosexuals are, they are very theatrical, want to be the centre of attention, it is all about self, that's why scripture says it is fitting that God gave them up to such a sexuality, if you can call it that.

We see in scripture and history and life, religion, Prophets, great men of God, Saints, they are never homosexual.

We even see the great error and lack of truth and understanding and spirituality in homosexuals that they have even tried to pervert historical men of God to have had homosexual desires.
They have accused David and Johnathan, even Jesus and His disciples.

If anyone has any spiritual understanding, you can plain see their error, their lies, their lack of understanding, of spirituality and love, for if they had it, they would not have accused such men and even women of such.

The historical Saints, the very ones who perserved the scripture, who passed it down, who lived it, who confirmed it by their own lives.
The ones who submitted to the love of God above all people throughout history, are always of one voice, one understanding, on homosexuality and many other things.
To say scripture ever remotely condones the evil of homosexuality, to say it doesn't even clearly condemn homosexuality as evil, is clearly from the mind of man, and contrary to the scripture.

For of the lies of men on using scripture to condone homosexuality you can trace it's orgins to men, being a new teaching orginating from themselves.
And such having no real understanding of scripture, of life, of spirituality, but speaking contrary it.

And this can be proved.
Whether people are willing to listen and accept, is something else.
But it can be proved to all, and the only way to dismiss it, is to dismiss religion, to dismiss scripture, to dismiss God.

[Silas]

Scripture, life, creation, nature, it shows us homosexuality is an evil.

Good point! We dont have to bring scripture into this, the truth is obvious enough. For this fact, the Bible says, "if you want to believe a lie, God will give you over to a depraved mind whereby you will believe and live this lie." Romans 1 speaks about this indepth and it is scary. The truth about homosexuality is axiomatic, we all know intrinsically that it is wrong. We, however, choose to supress the truth and choose to believe that it is OK. This is why God's hell is just. We choose to break His laws and sin agaisnt Him. We dont love Him - we love sin and self. We dont deserve God!

[bananabrain]

Originally Posted by paul

Scripture, life, creation, nature, it shows us homosexuality is an evil.

i refer you to my earlier point about 1500 species having been shown to engage in homosexual behaviour with no evidence to suggest that it is, as you say "evil". how can something be "evil" if evil requires free-will to exist and animals don't have free-will? this simply flies in the face of reason and evidence - including biblical evidence and reasoning.

For of the lies of men on using scripture to condone homosexuality you can trace it's orgins to men, being a new teaching orginating from themselves.
And such having no real understanding of scripture, of life, of spirituality, but speaking contrary it.

ahem - i think i have demonstrated pretty conclusively that it's not me that lacks understanding of "scripture" but those who think they can interpret Torah without any knowledge of hebrew or jewish law. obviously as far as christian texts are concerned, i defer to my christian friends, but they don't seem that clear about it themselves either, although the loudest denouncers seem to be those who are least concerned with the actual Text and more with rationalising their own prejudices. and don't try that pseudo-biblical tone on me, because it makes you feel like somehow G!D is speaking through you. that's a shabby rhetorical trick.

Originally Posted by Silas

We dont have to bring scripture into this, the truth is obvious enough...The truth about homosexuality is axiomatic, we all know intrinsically that it is wrong.

hur, hur, hur. i am always amazed at how some people seem so clear about how obvious the truth is when the most intelligent, wise and learned people on the planet have found it to be consistently complicated and recondite. i think the conclusion should probably be obvious. amazingly, homosexuals don't seem to "know intrinsically" that it is wrong - i think you actually ought to go out and talk to one or two if you're really interested in finding out how the world actually works.

b'shalom

bananabrain

[Faithfulservant]

hmm I hear more accounts of homosexuals battling shame and fear than wholly accepting their sexual preference. If its not wrong why then do they have fear and shame? I already know you are going to say its society's views... but then how come in the entire history of the world is it just now becoming acceptable??? Somethings wrong whether people will admit it or not.

[wil]

Originally Posted by Faithfulservant

hmm I hear more accounts of homosexuals battling shame and fear than wholly accepting their sexual preference. If its not wrong why then do they have fear and shame? I already know you are going to say its society's views... but then how come in the entire history of the world is it just now becoming acceptable??? Somethings wrong whether people will admit it or not.

Why do they have fear and shame?? That sure isn't hard to contemplate, when faggot and homo are words that are used regularly to demean people. When everywhere they go, including the church that they were raised in people stare, point, whisper or openly condemn....I don't know why they hide their preferences from others...

Today smoking and excessive sugar and transfats is on its downturn...it is passing its heyday..when conspicuous consumption of things detrimental to the body temple were the 'in' thing.... Nudity, and what body parts are acceptable to be exposed in what situations...is always on a rollercoaster...society to society...time to time...

Why are women shamed for breastfeeding in public...do we think G-d doesn't want them to feed their child? It has to do with the prudish nature of western society...shamed a civilization so much that in the 1950's almost 100% of the mothers and doctors decided that formula was better than what G-d provided and completely cut a swath across the entire US, and for almost two generations no child received the immunities that were passed down from mother to child for millenia.

It appears to me this issue, like most others has been on a rollercoaster...of acceptablity and unacceptable... There were times when much of what we consider homosexual acts were part of the unmarried males culture...all to change at manhood and when one takes a wife, or consort...

I've got no horse in this race. I am not gay, don't have a large contingent of gay friends. But I truly can't see jumping on the bandwagon to condemn them for their actions...and don't see that they've done something I need to forgive them for either...

I do believe as usual I've got a lot of work to get myself further down the path before I start to tackle the foibles of those around me.

[Faithfulservant]

Originally Posted by wil

Why do they have fear and shame?? That sure isn't hard to contemplate, when faggot and homo are words that are used regularly to demean people. When everywhere they go, including the church that they were raised in people stare, point, whisper or openly condemn....I don't know why they hide their preferences from others...

Today smoking and excessive sugar and transfats is on its downturn...it is passing its heyday..when conspicuous consumption of things detrimental to the body temple were the 'in' thing.... Nudity, and what body parts are acceptable to be exposed in what situations...is always on a rollercoaster...society to society...time to time...

Why are women shamed for breastfeeding in public...do we think G-d doesn't want them to feed their child? It has to do with the prudish nature of western society...shamed a civilization so much that in the 1950's almost 100% of the mothers and doctors decided that formula was better than what G-d provided and completely cut a swath across the entire US, and for almost two generations no child received the immunities that were passed down from mother to child for millenia.

It appears to me this issue, like most others has been on a rollercoaster...of acceptablity and unacceptable... There were times when much of what we consider homosexual acts were part of the unmarried males culture...all to change at manhood and when one takes a wife, or consort...

I've got no horse in this race. I am not gay, don't have a large contingent of gay friends. But I truly can't see jumping on the bandwagon to condemn them for their actions...and don't see that they've done something I need to forgive them for either...

I do believe as usual I've got a lot of work to get myself further down the path before I start to tackle the foibles of those around me.

[Dor]

They will still be here when Im gone.

[paul]

Originally Posted by bananabrain

as far as christian texts are concerned, i defer to my christian friends, but they don't seem that clear about it themselves either, although the loudest denouncers seem to be those who are least concerned with the actual Text and more with rationalising their own prejudices. and don't try that pseudo-biblical tone on me, because it makes you feel like somehow G!D is speaking through you. that's a shabby rhetorical trick.

I'm not suggesting God is speaking through me, but through His Saints throughout history, but it is you who hold yourself up as if you have a better understanding than them as many do.
But the truth of God Himself shines through them continually, thoughs who try to extinguish the flame, only push themselves away from getting a light off them.

[bananabrain]

I'm not suggesting G!D is Speaking through me, but through His Saints throughout history

i am not disputing that. what i am disputing is how the words transmitted via the saints are understood and interpreted.

but it is you who hold yourself up as if you have a better understanding than them as[sic] many do.

well, i don't know about that, but when people quote jewish texts to me i feel it is only right that they understand how jews interpret these texts.

But the truth of G!D Himself shines through them continually, thoughs who try to extinguish the flame, only push themselves away from getting a light off them.

i'm not trying to "extinguish the flame". i'm trying to prevent people like you from using it to set fire to homosexuals.

didn't jesus say something like "render unto caesar what is caesar's, but render unto G!D what is G!D's"? i am saying that the putative sanctioning or punishment of homosexuality is not a matter for human action, but for G!D, insofar as it is no skin off my behind what someone else does in their bedroom.

b'shalom

bananabrain