What the Bible Really Says About Homosexuality

By Daniel Helminiak

Part 2 of 3

January 22, 2003

Presented by Jack McKinney

Introduction – What to remember as you read the “clobber” passages that supposedly condemn homosexuality

1. Helminiak relies heavily upon two scholars in the passages we will examine tonight: John Boswell and William Countryman. Boswell’s scholarly work brought him notoriety because of his discoveries of thriving gay cultures in the church during the Middle Ages. Countryman has done import research around the role of purity laws in the Bible.

2. The Bible is written in a patriarchal world where men were the unquestioned superiors and everyone else was inferior. This hierarchical system was the foundation for culture, religion, economics, and more. To fail to account for this patriarchal worldview is to misunderstand a great deal of the context in which the scriptures are written.

3. Homosexuality was not a hidden part of the ancient culture. In some parts of the Greco-Roman world it was an openly understood part of life.

4. Jesus never mentions homosexuality.

Genesis 19:1-11 – The Sin of Sodom

Traditional Interpretation: Since the 12^th Century, this text has been used to condemn homosexuality. Around that time the term sodomite came to refer to male homogenital acts.

Issues to Consider

1. Some biblical scholars do not believe the verb “to know” in this passage is a sexual reference, but most scholars do believe that is the context.

2. The key to understanding this passage is understanding the role of “hospitality” in the ancient world. There was a legal and cultural presumption that one would offer refuge and security for the stranger, even if that stranger was associated with the enemy. This system of hospitality sustained people who were vulnerable or who were in foreign lands.

The Interesting Twist

1. One principle of biblical interpretation is that you should allow the Bible to interpret the Bible. Other passages in the Bible repeatedly refer to the sin of Sodom, and that sin never has anything to do with homosexuality. The sin is always associated with the lack of hospitality offered by the citizens of Sodom.

2. It is important to distinguish between rape and sex in this passage. The passage describes a mob scene where the intent is to rape and abuse the strangers. In battle scenes it was not unusual for men to rape other men to show superiority and demean the enemy, not as a signal of sexual orientation.

3. A more accurate reading of this story would result in the support for taking in the outsider and providing care and protection. Who is more of an outsider in our culture than gay men and lesbians? Instead, the church has consistently used the passage to reject those very people and, therefore, repeatedly commit the sin of Sodom.

The Bigger Questions

1. What does this story say about the role of women?

2. How should we feel about the image of God’s judgment in this text?

Leviticus 18:22, 20:13 – The Abomination Texts

Traditional Interpretation: These texts demonstrate that homosexuality is such a heinous sin that it is deserving of capital punishment.

Issues to Consider

1. The Holiness Code is a religious code found in the book of Leviticus. The purpose of the code was to enforce purity among the Jews who lived amongst the Canaanite culture. The difference between this code and legal codes found in the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament) is that the purpose is to shape identity, not speak about morality or ethics. Dietary laws, what one could wear, and a host of other rules were in place to keep the children of Israel unstained from the cultures around them. The two “abomination” texts fall in the Holiness Code and are part of this system of keeping pure from foreign contamination.

2. Capital punishment is used in many instances in the Hebrew Bible as a way of enforcing the patriarchal structure (e.g., the cursing of parents was a capital offense).

The Interesting Twist

1. The word abomination carries such weight in the way we have heard it as God’s most repulsed reaction to certain sins. In reality, the word means “unclean” and refers to impurity in these texts instead of sinfulness.

2. It is hard for us to grasp the difference between impurity and sinfulness. Purity laws are found in all cultures, however, as a way of maintaining identity. Helminiak uses the example of Catholics who would not eat meat on Friday. This didn’t mean that Catholics felt that Protestants who ate meat on Fridays were morally wrong. It was simply a way of identifying themselves as Catholics.

3. Lesbians get a free ride in these texts. The prohibition is against men penetrating men. This penetration was the source of the unclean act that made one ritually impure.

The Bigger Questions

1. Why do some Christians still enforce these two texts but see all other prohibitions in the Holiness Code as just a part of an ancient culture that has no authority over us?

2. How do we understand the competing visions of God and the people of God in the Hebrew Bible? Some texts like these emphasize purity and the separation from the Gentiles, while other books in the Bible (Ruth, Jonah) emphasize a vision of interaction and reaching out.

Romans 1:18-32 (esp. 26 and 27) – The Unnatural Passage

Traditional Interpretation: This is a comprehensive condemnation of gay men and lesbians, and their unnatural sex acts result in God’s judgment upon them.

Issues to Consider

1. I am very uncomfortable with Helminiak’s description of the Jews as he talks about their use of purity in relationship to Jesus and other places in the Christian Testament. Helminiak repeats the traditional Christian mistake of describing the Jews as legal hypocrites or those who were more concerned with outward purity than motives and ethics. Remember, Jesus was a Jew and his teachings come within the context of Judaism.

2. There is great debate over the Romans passage. Conservatives use this passage more than any other as a clear condemnation of gays and lesbians. If this is the definitive biblical text on homosexuality, however, it is easy to see how absurd it is to say the Bible has much to say on the subject. Helminiak goes to great lengths to discredit some established interpretations of the passage. I think he stretches at some points, but in other places I think the weight of the argument is on his side.

3. The role of vocabulary in this passage is important. The phrases “degrading passions,” “unnatural,” and “shameless” are not words related to sinfulness or ethics. Once again, these are terms related to purity and ritual cleanliness. The words Paul uses in verses 28-32 are clearly describing sinful or immoral acts, but the words in verses 26-27 are related to the impurity of the Gentiles who are “unnatural.”

The Interesting Twist

1. Verse 26 in not a condemnation of lesbians. Scholars are in great disagreement about what is actually being prohibited here, but historically the church has not even seen this passage as a clear denunciation of lesbians.

2. Purity, not sinfulness, is still the key. Whereas the Leviticus passages deal with the purity issues in the Holiness Code, the Romans passage relates to the impurity of the Gentiles in the first century Roman world.

3. The great irony of this passage relates to the overall purpose of Paul’s letter to the Romans. One of the main messages of Romans is grace. Paul uses the first chapter as a way of setting up his readers by playing up their worst characterizations of the Gentile world. If you keep reading you see he then speaks about the problems among Jewish Christians. In the end of the letter Paul will convey the message that those things that may seem unnatural from the Gentile world are not sinful.

The Bigger Questions

1. What is the danger of making things that are unclean or taboo in one culture into something evil or sinful?

2. What has been the historic impact of Christian misinterpretations of Judaism?