It was just a few minutes prior to starting this article that I was performing my usual task of checking the latest news on the Huffington Post website. I saw a little regular-print link to an opinion piece about violence against LGBT citizens in the United Kingdom. Although I already knew that violence against this community was widespread, I cringed as I read several stories about attacks on gay and lesbian people. What added to my outrage was the apathetic attitude from governments and police officers. Apparently, even in a country I considered fairly progressive on LGBT issues, there is still widespread prejudice.
What we are witnessing is the next great civil rights movement – the movement to end the status of LGBT citizens being second-class citizens. As with any civil rights movement, however, there are peopel trying to stand in the way of equality.
Pretty much all the objections against equality for LGBT people are based on religion, although there is also a large group who do not object based on religious grounds, but form their objections in the form of “eww! it’s icky!”.
Before I go on with blowing up anti-LGBT arguments, I wish to point out a little hypocrisy. Every day, there are examples of hate coming from Christians, in the form of TV and radio broadcasts, churches around the nation, and just plain thought and speech. They just *love* to use Scripture to present opinions that are intolerant at the least and incndiary at the worst. Did they forget about this little verse called “Matthew 7:12”? For those not aware, that is the Golden Rule – something the conservative Christians seem to have, in large part, forgotten about.
It’s one of the absurdities of the human race: hate and even hateful violence being based on views from a religion that is supposed to be about love. The examples are littered throughout history, from slavery to war to today’s anti-gay movement. It really is sad.
What’s kind of funny, however, is that when you analyze the context of each of the supposedly “anti-gay” passages in the Bible, they either turn out to have been rendered irrelevant or are regulations instead of prohibitions (as with references to heterosexual behavior in the Bible). Let’s go over each and every one of the passages the haters like to use:
* Genesis 19:1-25 is the story of Sodom and Gomorrah. According to anti-gay Christians, these cities were burnt to the ground by God because they were practicing homosexuality. Let’s analyze the story further, though:
God announced a judgement on the cities, and sends two angels appearing as men to Sodom, where they end up staying at the home of Lot, Abraham’s nephew. All the men of the city gathered around the front of the house, and they demanded to see the angels so they could “know” them.
The reference to “knowing” them comes from a translation of the Hebrew word “yadha”. Most of the time, this word refers to finding out information about someone or a group, through interrogation or through seeing credentials. More rarely, it means to have sex with.
Conservatives use the latter meaning, as well as the fact that the people refused Lot’s offer when he offered his daughters to them instead of the angels, and imply that the people obviously wanted to have sex with the angels (although angels themselves have no gender, they appeared as men). They take it further and basically say things to the extent of, “they were after them for homosexual sex!”
This view not only fails to dig deep enough, but it barely makes a dent in the surface. No, not even that – they hit rock and their shovels bounced off the ground. First of all, it’s most likely they wanted some identification, as presented in the most common meaning of “know”, which kind of makes sense – they saw unfamiliar people in the city and were suspicious, as was common with old-time cities and is even true in many places today. As for the refusal of the daughters, well, if you wanted to know information about someone you’d not want to see replacements either. You’d want to see the people who you want to find out about. This ties into a verse about Sodom found later in the Bible, which I shall get to later.
However, let’s give the conservatives the benefit of the doubt for a little bit and say that they did want sex. If this is a condemnation of sex at all, it’s sounds to me like this is a reference to rape. Now, it’s just plain obvious that rape of any kind – hetero- or homosexual – is wrong. I mean shoot, sounds to me like they not only wanted to rape the men, they wanted to gang-rape the men. There’s no dispute or debate as to whether that’s wrong.
Moving on, there are passages later on in the Bible referring to Sodom and Gomorrah. Let’s look at a couple of them (all examples from the King James Version):
** Ezekiel 16:49-50:
“‘Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom, pride, fulness of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters, neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy. And they were haughty, and committed abomination before me: therefore I took them away as I saw good.'”
Speaks for itself, don’t it? (In case you missed the blaringly obvious, Sodom’s sin was being stingy, not homosexuality.)
** Jude 1:7. This is one of the conservatives’ favorite ones, for reasons you’ll see when you read it:
“Even as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.”
It’s pretty obvious that fornication is wrong in the context of Christianity. The operative phrase here is “strange flesh”. According to conservatives, this means going after people of the same gender. But let’s think about this for a moment. Male and female human flesh are scientifically similar, if not the plain old same. What flesh IS strange? Why, that of animals, of course. Ding! This is most likely a reference to bestiality.
* Moving on, we now focus on Pick-and-Choose Central, Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13. These verses direcly address homosexual sex.
18:22 – “Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination.”
20:13 – “If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.”
“See? It’s a sin!”
“Homosexuality is a choice!”
“Kill all fudgepackers!”
Whoa there – not so fast, Buckos. These verses are part of the Holiness Code, a series of rules spanning the chapters of Leviticus from 17 through 26. In this code are such prohibitions as the ones against eating shellfish and regulations about what kind of people you can own as slaves. Seems that the conservatives ignore the ones addressing stuff like that, while holding up Lev. 18:22 and 20:13.
So what’s the truth? Well, if you turn to Galatians 3:23-25, you see this:
“But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed. Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster.”
For a clearer translation, let’s look at the NIV translation, and expand it to include verse 22 as well:
“But the Scripture declares that the whole world is a prisoner of sin, so that what was promised, being given through faith in Jesus Christ, might be given to those who believe. Before this faith came, we were held prisoners by the law, locked up until faith should be revealed. So the law was put in charge to lead us to Christ that we might be justified by faith. Now that faith has come, we are no longer under the supervision of the law.”
In other words, that Levitical Code and them other early Old Testament laws were rendered…totally irrelevant! Sound the fail horns!
* Next, we go to Romans 1:26-27:
“For this cause God gave 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.”
“Gayness is unnatural!”
Whoa, Bucko. Slow it down.
When we look at the “going against nature” part, we have to look at the science of sexual orientation. Science has proven over and over that a person’s orientation is set from birth, to the point where every major medical organization in America (save for the ones with an agenda) recognizes that sexual orientation is something you’re born with and cannot be changed (sexual *behavior* can be changed, though – that’s how them ‘ex-gay’ ministries work. it’s basically pushing natural homosexuals to have relations with the opposite sex instead. the attraction to the same sex is still there, however). This would be obvious even without science there, though – gay people know how their sexuality works, and you will never hear a gay person say they choose to be gay. You’ll always hear “it came naturally”.
Continuing with the point, your sexual orientation is what is “natural” for yourself. To go against nature, in this context, means to act against your own orientation. That’s right – a homosexual trying to act heterosexual is going against nature. Going further, it’s the ex-gay ministries themselves that are in violation!
There can also be a lot learned from the context. Let’s look at the whole story – Romans 1:22-32
“Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,
And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.
Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves:
Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.
For this cause God gave 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.
And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient;
Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers,
Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents,
Without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful:
Who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.”
Basically, the people turned against God and engaged in rituals, which earned them a punishment from God in the form of them going against nature, among other things. But let’s give the conservatives something again, and say that this is a condemnation of homosexual sex. If this is referring to homosexual sex being completely wrong in any way, it’s referring to it as part of rituals. not normal relationships.
* 1 Corinthians 6:9-10 and 1 Timothy 9:10
“Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.”
“Knowing this, that the law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and for sinners, for unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers, For whoremongers, for them that defile themselves with mankind, for menstealers, for liars, for perjured persons, and if there be any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine.”
Here, of course, we will first focus on the phrases “abusers of themselves with mankind” and “for them that defile themselves with mankind”. The analysis of this verse falls to the original language this part of the Bible was written in – Greek. The word “paiderasste” was the term Paul would have used if he meant homosexuals, since that was the Greek word at the time describing sexual behavior between men. He didn’t use that term, however – he used “arsenokoitai”, a word he actually invented himself. It’s a contraction of the Greek words for “male” and “bed”. Considering the phrasing in the translation, and how much Paul addressed prostitution around this area of the Bible, it’s most likely he was referring to male prostitution, not responsible homosexual behavior.
As for “effeminate”, the original Greek word, “malakos”, which translated as “effeminate”, actually means someone who lacks discipline, and not an “effeminate” man in the modern context.
That pretty much covers the major passages used by conservatives to criticize homosexuality, but there are other areas that are lesser used, which I will go over in brief each:
* Genesis 1:28 – the verse about being fruitful and multiplying. Conservatives often say “if God said it that way, then he must have only meant for men to be with women and vice versa.” But stop and think a moment – he’s probably talking about society in general. Even in a society with an active homosexual minority, society as a whole will still be making little kids.
* Genesis 2:23-24 – “The man said, ‘This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh’…For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife and they will become one flesh.” With this one, there are practical reasons why this cannot be applied to everyone, such as the presence of people who choose not to get married. Should they be punished too? Exactly. As for the part about Eve being created for Adam and the reference in Matthew 19:4-5, the same thing applies.
* In Deuteronomy 23:17, there is a call for the exile of sinners from Israel. The translations are all over the map here. At the center of all this mess is the word “qadesh”, which is often translated as “sodomite”. “Sodomite”, as a word, obviously refers to someone who acts like the people of Sodom did. All that was explained earlier, but it cannot be used to refer to (responsible) homosexuality. That aside, it’s a mistranslation. “Qadesh” means a practicer of pagan sex rituals. Once again, it’s ritual sex practices being condemned here.
* Judges 19:14-29 tells the story of a Levite who visited Gibeah, a Hebrew town, where an old farmer let him stay at his residence. A gang of men approached the old farmer and demanded that he give them access to the Levite, so they could rape him. He offered the Levite’s concubine and his virgin daughter. They accepted the daughter and had their way with her. She stumbled back to the house and died at the front door.
As you could probably deduce, this refers to rape, not responsible relationships.
So there you have it – an analysis of the Bible when it refers to homosexuality. Ain’t the picture much clearer when you analyze the context?
Misfit Manor 