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Will...at some point, i can't really get very involved in debating the validity of this. My masters is based on the study of Paul in cultural context. Dale Martin teaches Paul at Yale University. What i've been posting comes out of his work, and notes on Greco-Roman culture from my classes with Prof. Diana Swancutt, also of Yale. What's your source material?
And before you snap at me for repeating myself, i was asked by ziedel to elaborate, so back the truck up and let it go.
I don't think the chronological argument makes much sense...when paul talks about pornea, he doesn't really cite a lot of scripture. He uses Stoic language to talk about desire and the invasion of sin into the body of Christ. 1 cor 6 is a good example.
Your mistake is to seriously underestimate the Roman influence on Paul in talking about sexuality. Without understanding this, it appears as if the origin of this attitude is uniquly abrahamic. But when it is understood, the discourse of masculinity as placed in opposition of desire/being penetrated/"libertinism" and etc...it makes a lot more sense. Religion can and has transmitted these ideas. But that's not the whole story, not by a long shot.
Objections to queer sex doesn't exclusivly hang on religious objections, it's grounded in cultural discourses as well. There are plenty of irreligious folks out there who are still raving homophobes. Ever wonder how they got that way? Our ideas of the natural are still grounded in the inheritance of Stoic discourses. Even though we alledgedly believe in fixed gender, we use orientation to work out our fears of emasculation. Too much "soft" play will make a boy gay... Desire can still make a person, especially a woman, in to a slut who is stereotyped as having no control over her body.
And tough men don't cry...
Our ideas of natural law, and what is normative gender expression has a whole lot more content that simply the "puritan" religious impulse, as you so anachronistically like to call it. Those concepts will keep queer sexuality as culturally subordinated even if the religious fight is won. I dunno about you, but since my standing in this culture depends on how queer idenity is represented and recieved...i'd rather understand all the mechanisms by which they are coded as anti-normative.
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For God so loved creation, that God sent God's only Son that whosoever believed should not perish, but have everlasting life.
-John 3:16
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