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Originally Posted by Infinite_Loser
No, I don't. As most theologins will tell you, this is a relatively new, man-made concept which has no bearing on the Bible.
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Homosexuality as a state of being is a modern
concept this is true. It is not a modern invention, but a result of the greater understanding of psychological processes that has come with systematic study of human psychology and biology.
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1.) There are not plenty of gender specific admonitions. As I stated earlier, there are a handful of such laws (Even fewer). Off the top of my head I can name two. There might be one or two more, but that is it. The majority of laws are male specific but also referred to females as well.
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Your first and last sentences contradict each other, and the last contradicts itself.
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2.) I'm slightly curious. It seems to me that you are saying that homosexuality in males is unacceptable but homosexuality in females is acceptable, as it's not explicity condemned. Am I right in my assumptions?
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No, and it amazes me that you could get that out what I’ve been writing.
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The state of being homosexual is a relatively new concept which people have come up with to try to describe homosexuality. Unfortunately, it has no bearing on the Bible, primarily due to the fact that there is no Hebrew or Greek word (At the time) dealing with the state of being homosexual.
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EXACTLY! Finally I think we can agree completely on something.
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Yes, it can. And one of those terms is regarding homosexuality.
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Well, no. As you admit above, homosexuality was a concept that did not exist in biblical times and there were no words for it in the languages used at the time. Therefore, those terms could not mean homosexuality in the modern sense.
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The state of being homosexual is directly intertwined with feelings. How is that distorting what you said?
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Because they’re not the same thing. One can have homosexual feelings without being homosexual. Most heterosexuals have homosexual feelins at some point. Bisexuals by definition all have homosexual feelings but are not homosexual. Being homosexual is inself more than having homosexual feelings. One of those feelings is, by the way, love, endorsed all over the place throughout the bible.
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As I stated earlier, there are four main types of love reffered to in the Bible; The love between a man and a woman, the love of God for his children, the love of Christ for the church and the love of man for his neighbors.
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Eros and Agape can both be shared either between opposite sex couples or same sex couples. The love I feel for my wife is the same kind of romantic love a man feels for a woman.
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Now, because I'm curious, under what category would the love between two homosexuals fall under?
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Eros and agape both.
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Natural to you may or may not be natural to God. If anything you do would be considered a perversion unto God then it is deemed unnatural. Whether or not you realize it (Or choose to accept it), Paul deams homosexual activities as a perversion and, therefore, unnatural.
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In Romans, Paul deems homosexual acts unnatural when engaged in by heterosexuals as part of a pagan temple orgy. They aren’t unnatural because they’re homosexual, but because homosexual acts are unnatural to heterosexuals. Likewise, heterosexual acts would be unnatural to homosexuals.
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A bit of circular logic here, but one of the underlying principals of Christianity is that God commanded people to write the Bible. Since God is infallible, the Bible is true and without error. To claim that the Bible is erroneous in some area would be to claim that God is prone to human error.
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No, circular logic invalidates the argument. To claim that the bible is not a perfect record is to accept that humans are fallible. Because humans wrote, edited, and translated the Bible, errors and prejudices are bound to have crept in. In addition, there’s cultural context. What is true for one cultural context may not be equally appropriate in another.
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Oh, and if you would have read the Bible the nature of God is clearly defined.
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That’s where we’re different. Things you see as “clearly defined" seem somewhat muddled and ambiguous to me. It is God’s place to judge me, not the other way around. It is never my place to speak for God.
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This is the last time I'm going to address this.
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Good. That means I get the last word.
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There are very, very, very few laws which specifically mentioned women, as women were considered subordinates of their husbands/fathers. The majority of laws were given to the men who later conveyed them to those in their households.
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We’re discussing sexuality and sexual roles, and these are inherently different for men and for women, moreso in the time we’re discussing for the reasons you identify above. A man taking the female role in sex was lowering himself by acting like a woman. It was not possible for a woman to take the male role in either sense, either as the physical act or in the social role.
Look at the wording of Leviticus: You shall not lie with a male as with a woman. This is unambiguously specific to men. It cannot be a blanket condemnation of homosexuality because, as you admit above, that concept did not exist at the time. Also, if it is equally applicable to both sexes, then it says that women are not to lie with men as they do with woman. If it applies to both sexes, it actually becomes an endorsement of lesbianism. Woo hoo! Another endorsement. I’m going to tell my wife about this.
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]If the Bible says that homosexuality is a sin, then it can be inferred that all homosexual practices are a sin. Why would the Bible need to elaborate on a concept which it has already condemned?
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Circular reasoning again. It doesn’t condemn homosexuality because, as you say above, that concept did not exist at the time and the language had no word for it. It condemns certain homosexual acts, which you are extrapolating to cover all homosexuality and then extrapolating from that to all homosexual practices. One of those practices is, by the way, loving each other, something endorse quite freely in the Bible.
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Inherencies and roles involved are irrelevant to the discussion. The idea of sex being different for males and females is a relatively new concept and therefore can not be applied to laws written over 2,500 years ago.
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Um, you really can’t condemn homosexuality without an understanding that male and female sexual roles are different. Also, I’m flabbergasted that you believe people didn’t understand that sex was different for men and women. Leviticus condemns a man who acts like a woman.
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So, what you're essentially saying is that the unilateral condemnation of homosexuality isn't unilateral at all? Well, I suppose that you're the leading theologin on Christianity-- Even moreso than the majority of theologins who agree that the Bible takes a hard defined stand on homosexuality.
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Once again, you are attributing to me ideas that I did not express. Please stop doing this.
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Since this is going nowhere fast, let me ask you a fairly simple question.
Which statement appears in the Bible:
A.) Homosexuality is an abomination to me or
B.) Some forms of homosexuality are an abomination to me.
It's not rocket science nor is the choice hard. There is no clause in the Bible which states that some forms of homosexuality are acceptable to God; It is, in fact, quite the opposite. The statement is starkingly unambiguous.
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Which statement appears in the Bible:
A. everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.
B. everyone who believes in him may not perish, except for those dirty homosexuals.
This is fun! Let’s try some more:
A. For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.
B. For everyone who asks receives, except if they‘re homosexual; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.
A. Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God.
B. Dear friends, let us love one another, except for those damn homos, for love comes from God.
Hee hee. This is really delightful.
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And now you are assuming as to what the bans of homosexuality were in reference to. As I stated prior, there is no clause in the Bible which qualifies homosexuality. None.
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This includes those about love.
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The Bible states that killing (Murder) is unacceptable. Obviously what God really meant was that you shouldn't kill (Murder) unless you really feel the need to.
The Bible also states that stealing is an unacceptable behaviour. You see, though, what God really meant was that it's okay to steal just so long as you don't do it on the Sabbath.
You see? I can turn a concrete statement into a matter of assumptions, too!
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Good to see you having some fun with it. What good is a discussion of theology without a little levity?
Interpretation based on context is rather a different thing from assumptions. I’m doing the former.
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Ezekiel 3:18
Isaiah 5:20
Psalms 45:6-7
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None of those say “Love the sinner, hate the sin.”
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To put it as nicely as possible, you're taking a non-abiguous statement, claiming that it's ambigious and then interpreting it in a way which would conform to your lifestyle.
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Lifestyle? I love this one, my lifestyle. I live in an upper-middle class neighborhood, teach English and teacher education, and I’m married to a nurse instructor. I eat a healthy breakfast every morning, drive through commuter traffic to get to work, teach, advise students, have lunch by myself or with my wife or sister. I read poetry books, classic novels and graphic novels. I collect and read comic books. I go to church every Sunday. I’m kind and considerate as best I can be. I dress nicely because it makes me feel good about myself. I listen to folk music and love Hong Kong action movies and Asian horror. I take periodic trips to amusement parks with my family. I go to conventions and sometimes wear costumes.
That’s my lifestyle. If that’s a homosexual lifestyle, there are plenty of straight people living one. Homosexual is my orientation.
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Proverbs 8:13
Romans 12:9-13
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Neither of those says “Love the sinner, hate the sin.”
Quick quiz. Does Romans 12:10 say:
A: love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honour.
B: love one another with mutual affection, unless you‘re homosexual; outdo one another in showing honour, unless you‘re homosexual.
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No offense to you, but this is why I seldom get into argument with people concerning the Bible (Or any religious texts, for that matter). If you're going to argue using the Bible as basis, then at least know what you're talking about.
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That I disagree with you does not mean that I don’t know what I’m talking about.
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God loves everyone equally, hence him sending his only begotten son to die for the sins of humanity. However, not everyone is a child of God (1 John 3:10). Simply because you believe that Jesus' died for your sins doesn't mean that you are guaranteed eternal life; You must also adhere to God's word.
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[John 3:16: For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.
That said, though I’m not perfect, I do adhere to the teachings of the bible as best I can. Do I observe all of them strictly? Nah. I wear my hair short (see my profile picture), don’t cover my head in church, eat shrimp and shellfish (a lot of it actually), wear fibers made of two different threads, and my garden has more than one crop in it. All of those are abominations in the biblical sense, but I seriously doubt that those things are going to have much of an impact on God’s love or my relationship with him.
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In every language translated, there is almost a unilateral concensus that God's stance towards homosexuality is not a favorable one, regarding it as an "Abomination".
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Abomination is an English word, so I doubt other languages have a concensus regarding that usage. I can name a dozen churches in the US that don’t have a problem with homosexuality or believe that it is a moral sin. Abomination in this sense is a judgement regarding procedural matters, not morality, and again, refers to certain specific acts, not homosexuality in general. How could it? The concept didn’t exist at the time.
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Originally Posted by Infinite_Loser
I don't recall ever saying that the Bible was the universal truth nor that it was infallible
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Didn't you dispute Biblical fallibility above? I made reference to not believing in Biblical inerrancy, and you debated with me on that point.
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My point is that if you're a Christian and you're going to conform to the Christian lifestyle, that you'd be wrong to assume/say that the Bible doesn't have a problem with homosexuality, as this claim has been largely disproved by theologins over the past few hundred years.
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Not all Christians believe this. Me, for example. Not all churches believe this. UUA, Unity, MCC, Episcopaleans, for example.
Gilda