A good friend replying to my last blog said that we need to be up on our defense of how the Bible speaks on homosexuality.
He is correct, indeed.
So let’s do that.
In Leviticus 18:22, we are told that one is not to lie with a man as one lies with a woman. That is detestable. In some translations, an abomination. Let’s be clear.
First, the word abomination is a specific term and it is only used in Leviticus in chapters 18 and 20 in regards to sexual sins. Thus, anyone who uses the shellfish canard is missing the boat.
Is it being interpreted properly though? I had that charge brought to me once. I suggest someone consider these words I am reading from Josephus in “Against Apion” 2.30:
“Now the greatest part of offenses with us are capital, as if anyone be guilty of adultery; if anyone force a virgin; if anyone be so impudent as to attempt sodomy with a male; of, if upon another’s making an attempt upon him, he submits to be used.”
Notice how Josephus can seem to understand how someone could force a virgin to have sex, but when he gets to Sodomy, he adds on “If anyone be so impudent.” Josephus apparently saw this as a particularly heinous sin.
And friends, I really know no other way to interpret it. What is being condemned is clear and I’m not sure how it could be clearer.
Well, maybe it just relates to cultic practice.
Look at the verses before and after. Before it, child sacrifice is condemned. After it, bestiality is condemned. Are we to think that this just related to priests and is okay today?
If you think it is, then whenever I have children, I’ll make sure not to hire you as a babysitter.
Okay. Well maybe this is all the law of Moses!
Um. Check the verses to the end of the chapter. Why are the nations being cast out? Because they did all these things. Did they have the Law of Moses? No. Were they ever under it? No. The same applies to those of us who are Gentiles today. We were never under the Law. However, this is outside of the Law of Moses though it is recorded in it. The Law of Moses did have moral aspects that still continued though the punishment was different.
In other words, this is part of the innate moral law. God is saying “These nations should have known better. They did not need the written law code to know this is wrong.”
Now please be sure in all of this. We can say the Bible is wrong in condemning homosexuality. (I don’t think it is, of course, rest assured) However, we can make no mistake in the fact that it is condemning homosexuality.
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