Biblical support for gay sex? A simple question

[D.W.Washburn]

What part of:

"Think not that I came to destroy the law or the prophets: I came not to destroy, but to fulfill"

Don't you understand?

And Mark 10:6-9 and Matthew 19:4-6 most certainly say something about same sex "unions." Kindly remove your head from the sand.

If you want to shoot Bible bullets at one another, here's one for you:

Proverbs 15:1 (NKJV)
A soft answer turns away wrath, But a harsh word stirs up anger.

I am sorry to see you resort to sarcasm so early in our conversation. Though I have occasionally used the tactic myself, I know it is not conducive to civil discourse. Disagree with me, if you wish, but please do so politely.

I think that I have a clear understanding of Matthew 15:1. Jesus claims to fulfill the OT Scriptures. It seems obvious to me that the Apostles did not think this meant that Christians needed to keep the Law in its every detail. Certainly Paul argued against that idea.

I also think I have a good understanding of Matt 19:5 and its Markan parallel. It is quite clear to me that those words were spoken in the context of a dispute about divorce and that they are about traditional male/female marriage. In order to make these words say anything about same sex unions involves reading implications into the text that aren't necessarily there.

 

[EnemyPartyII]

notice that you and others are not only unable to quote the specific verses of the texts I quote, but unwilling to acknowledge what they say you have only offered support for gay sex as 1 Samual and the Davd and Jonathan account and the Centurion with the slave in Luke and Matthew.

And Genesis, and the sermon on the mount, and Galatians...

Where are the opportunities and references for men with men?

The Bridegroom and the Bride, Matthew 5, 25, Mark 2, Luke 5, John 2, 3, all the Bridgrooms are male, no idication any brides are male.

Here is another...
1 Corinthans 11:9 "neither was man created for woman, but woman for man."

Normative, not proscriptive.

I have pricipally offered direct references to the unique purpose of woman and man to be united in God'd creation purpose,

"unique" is you adding your personal interpretation again... the Bible NEVER says that heterosexual marriage is the UNIQUE or ONLY purpose for men and women.

A purpose, certainly, but not the ONLY purpose.

And I appreciate your attempting to stand back a bit

 

[EnemyPartyII]

Ah but are they looking for the straight gene? Are you saying only homosexuals have a gene which causes sexual attraction? Why aren’t they looking for straight genes or paedophile genes then they could find a genetic cure for them?

"straight" genes are the genes that don't result in homosexual attraction. They may well be looking for a paedophile gene. I don't know, I'm not a geneticist. But if you think thats a valid line of research, lobby your local government rep for more funding for biological research.

But that’s a different argument altogether and I am not sure paedophiles would agree with you and neither do I as I believe all sexual activity outside marriage is harmful 1 Corinthians 6:18-20 If genetic deternones what is natural then why interfere with genes which cause disease?
Where is your Biblical evidence for genetics? This thread is about the Bible.

OK, more specifically... paedophilic action harms others who then claim to be harmed. So regardless of what the paedophile thinks, we have a case for harm. However, no one involved in a consentual homosexual, adult relationship is harmed. My Biblical support for this? Again, "love thy neighbour..." because anyway you slice it, paedophilia fails the role reversal test, whereas consentual homosexuality does not.

Gen 1:27 “So God created man in his own image,
in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them.

I agree with this, although "created man in his own image" is the gender neutral form of man, and would better be replaced with "people". And since homosexuals form a subgroup of people, that tells us that God created homosexuals in his own image, thus approves of them.

Matt 19: that at the beginning the Creator 'made them male and female,' 5and said, 'For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh'.

Is irrelevant, being a normative descripotion of marriage in the context of divorce, rather than a treatise on the acceptibility or otherwise of homosexual relationships.

So where is your man and man or woman and woman if God made them in his image so that a man shall be united with his wife? Jesus compares the union of man and woman, bridegroom and bride with Himself and His church.

Again, normative, not proscriptive. The most common, most contextually applicable relationship is chosen to highlight a general idea, rather than bogging down in the specifics and minutiae of every possible permutation of human intimacy.

firstly I don’t have to, as I have just explained that’s not the purpose of the thread, and secondly I can and have done at the start of this post.

Am I correct in understanding that you consider homosexuality immorral because you consider it a dysfunction? Do I understand that correctly?

The onus is on you to provide biblical passages to support gay sex, that God created humans in His own image is proof He didn’t create people’s sexuality or He would have created adulterers and those who practice homosexuality, paedophilia and all the other sexual immorality the Bible warns about.

God did create homosexuals in his own image, and I have provided multiple passages that support the idea that God approves of mutually consentual homosexual relationships.

"adultery" is not a sexual orientation. I am, initially, loath to consider paedophilia an "orientation", since all evidence appears to be that paedophilia stems from abuse or trauma, while homosexuality is inborn. Further, even if God did create paedophiles as an orientation, they cannot act on their impulses without harming others, hence sin. Loving homosexual relationships don't harm others, thus abide by Jesus' new commandment.

 

[EnemyPartyII]

And Mark 10:6-9 and Matthew 19:4-6 most certainly say something about same sex "unions." Kindly remove your head from the sand.

I just looked them up. Same sex union never gets mentioned. What Bible are you reading?

 

[Brennin]

I just looked them up. Same sex union never gets mentioned. What Bible are you reading?

It is not mentioned explicitly because it is not even a consideration for Jesus Christ. He makes it clear that one man and one woman is the only sort of union sanctioned by God.

 

[Brennin]

...I have provided multiple passages that support the idea that God approves of mutually consentual[sic] homosexual relationships.

Pull the other leg.

 

[EnemyPartyII]

It is not mentioned explicitly because it is not even a consideration for Jesus Christ. He makes it clear that one man and one woman is the only sort of union sanctioned by God.

So, he never mentions it, and that makes it clear that men and women are the ONLY acceptible form of union? Seems a bit of a logic leap there...

 

[KCKID]

So, he never mentions it, and that makes it clear that men and women are the ONLY acceptible form of union? Seems a bit of a logic leap there...

Jesus would not have volunteered the 'man and woman' thing either had He not been responding to a question asked of Him by the Pharisees. As has been mentioned previously, some Pharisees came to Jesus to ask, "Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any and every reason?" The Pharisees, as usual, were testing Jesus. Jesus knew this, of course, and He used the scriptures to make his point. He did something similar with the coin example - "Give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar, give to God what belongs to God", and also the way He addressed the hypocrites in 'The Adultress Woman," etc. etc. Jesus is merely responding to a 'trick' question that has nothing to do with a 'command' for man and woman to marry. Jesus' response CERTAINLY has nothing to say either for or against 'gay' unions. Zilch!

Christians who use Matthew 19:1-11 and the Mark counterpart for the purpose of slighting others are undoubtedly using deceit to promote their own anti-'gay' propoganda. PLEASE, folks, read these scriptures in context and you'll see as clear as day what is actually going on.

 

[OllieFranz]

Actually, the question was to find out Jesus' position on a question that had the Pharisees divided into two warring camps. A "divorce for any reason" was a relatively new idea, similar to our no-fault divorce, where the grounds for the divorce did not have to be spelled out. Some think that this is what Matthew meant when he said that Joseph planned to put Mary away privately when he discovered that she was pregnant with a Child that was not his.

The great rabbi Hillel had favored allowing these divorces and sparing the families involved a lot of public humiliation. His grandson Gamaliel (Paul's teacher) was the leading light of the branch of Pharisaic philosophy that held to Hillel's position in Jesus' generation.

The Pharisees who questioned Jesus were from the more legalistic and conservative branch of the movement, and were trying to portray Jesus as a liberal heretic like Gamaliel. In a lot of ways (but not the ones that today's conservatives think), this incident is very much relevent to the discussion of same-sex marriage.

Jesus was saying, that if we follow God's ideals and work on the love in our marriages, then it does not matter what the law allows and does not allow in a divorce proceeding, because there would be no divorce. The spouses become one person, one flesh. Paul would later tell us exactly how to follow this plan: each spouse must put the other's needs above their own (1 Corinthians 7:1-7; Ephesians 5:22-29).

I believe that if He were here in the flesh today and the question of same-sex marriage were put to Him by the legalistic conservatives of today, He would say that laws against sex without love and outside marriage cannot be applied to loving, committed, Christ-filled relationships, and would refuse to expand them beyond their original intentions. Except that He would find a better way of saying it than I have, one that confounds the "pharisee's" intention to "prove" Him a heretic.

 

[brightmorningstar]

To Brennin,

I just looked them up. Same sex union never gets mentioned. What Bible are you reading?

EnemyPartyII and others here have a problem recognising what the Bible says so its difficult to debate about the Bible with them. I have already asked EnemypartyII how a man lying with another man as with a woman, (Lev 18 & 20) and men lusting after men instead of the natural with women and committing indecent acts with those men can possibly be heterosexual. I mean Romans 1:26-27 is basically a dictionary definiton of homosexual practice.

 

[brightmorningstar]

Olliefranz wrote

Actually, the question was to find out Jesus' position on a question that had the Pharisees divided into two warring camps. A "divorce for any reason" was a relatively new idea, similar to our no-fault divorce, where the grounds for the divorce did not have to be spelled out. Some think that this is what Matthew meant when he said that Joseph planned to put Mary away privately when he discovered that she was pregnant with a Child that was not his.

This legalistic eisegesis is how not to understand the Bible. Matthew didn’t necessarily mean anything other than an accurate record of what Jesus said and meant. This questioning of the writer indicates Olliefranz doesn’t believe what the writer has written.
Jesus answer is the truth, not what the Pharisees thought. That God created women for man to be united as one flesh is the answer to divorce, its not about divorce but it about a situation that rules out divorce. It also rules out same sex unions.
The other problem with Olliefranz’s comment is that Matthew recorded what Jesus told the Pharisees, Paul, Peter, and the writer of Hebrews from Acts onwards tell the believers what Jesus taught them. As disciples we need to knw what Jesus taught disciples rather than what the non-believing Pharisees were pondering on.

I believe that if He were here in the flesh today and the question of same-sex marriage were put to Him by the legalistic conservatives of today, He would say that laws against sex without love and outside marriage cannot be applied to loving, committed, Christ-filled relationships, and would refuse to expand them beyond their original intentions.

Except that in same-sex unions the unions are not Christ filled, Christ gave the alternative to grumblers about faithful man/woman marriage, celibacy.
I think Christ may say the same sort of things to those who support same sex unions as He did to who didn't believe in the first place, you stiff necked people and hard hearted generation, I told you what the options were but you never opened your heart to me or your ears to my words.

 

[Brennin]

To Brennin,
EnemyPartyII and others here have a problem recognising what the Bible says so its difficult to debate about the Bible with them. I have already asked EnemypartyII how a man lying with another man as with a woman, (Lev 18 & 20) and men lusting after men instead of the natural with women and committing indecent acts with those men can possibly be heterosexual. I mean Romans 1:26-27 is basically a dictionary definiton of homosexual practice.

It is refreshing to see an Anglican who has not fallen prey to false doctrine.

 

[brightmorningstar]

Both enemyPartyII and Olliefranz are still off topic. If nothing is said it doesnt support gay sex any more than it condems it. The onus in this thread is for the likes of EnemyPartyII and Olliefranz to provide Biblical support for gay sex not to argue form silence or dispute passages that exclude it with assumptions that they dont.

 

[Dogbean]

So, he never mentions it, and that makes it clear that men and women are the ONLY acceptible form of union? Seems a bit of a logic leap there...

Not a logic leap at all. It goes all the way back to the creation of women.

Genesis 2:21-24 21 And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall on Adam, and he slept; and He took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh in its place. 22 Then the rib which the LORD God had taken from man He made into a woman, and He brought her to the man.
23 And Adam said:
“This is now bone of my bones
And flesh of my flesh;
She shall be called Woman,
Because she was taken out of Man.”
24 Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and they shall become one flesh.

And look back at verse 18.

Genesis 2:18 And the LORD God said, “It is not good that man should be alone; I will make him a helper comparable to him.”

If God wanted men to have sex with other men, then man would not have been labeled as "alone" by God in this case here. It's pretty clear what God wants.

 

[brightmorningstar]

Dear Brennin,
As seen with GAFCON, the majority of Anglicans have not fallen prey, which supports the idea that those who have are shouting loudly, incorrectly, and giving the totally wrong impression.

 

[OllieFranz]

Both enemyPartyII and Olliefranz are still off topic. If nothing is said it doesnt support gay sex any more than it condems it. The onus in this thread is for the likes of EnemyPartyII and Olliefranz to provide Biblical support for gay sex not to argue form silence or dispute passages that exclude it with assumptions that they dont.

There is an assumption in even asking the question in the Original Post that any percieved lack of verses supporting "gay sex" means something -- and given the position of the Original Poster, that meaning is that "gay sex" is forbidden. This, once explicitly stated, is the logical fallacy known as an argument from silence -- unless either or both of two other conditions is true. If the Bible explicitly condemns "gay sex" or if it explicitly supports hetero-sex.

So EPII's posts concerning the passages some people claim condemn "gay sex" and mine asking for passages where the Bible supports hetero-sex are not off topic unless you want to turn this entire thread into an ad hominen instead of a dialog. So either petition the moderators to close this thread as irrelevant gay-baiting, or stop making claims that attempts to point out the underlying assumptions are off topic.

 

[OllieFranz]

If God wanted men to have sex with other men, then man would not have been labeled as "alone" by God in this case here. It's pretty clear what God wants.

Are you claiming that Adam was not the first man? That there were other men in the next Garden of Eden over? Otherwise how does Adam being "alone" translate into a rejection of male humans as potential helpmeets?

In the same passage, Adam is offered the beasts as companions and rejects them. He is alone in the midst of them because they are not suitable as helpmeets. There is no mention of either being offered or rejecting male humans. Instead, since there are no other humans, one has to be created to be Adam's helpmeet.

 

[Dogbean]

Think about it, Ollie. Stop focusing on trying to tear it apart and just think a little.

 

[brightmorningstar]

To Olliefranz,

There is an assumption in even asking the question in the Original Post that any percieved lack of verses supporting "gay sex" means something -- and given the position of the Original Poster, that meaning is that "gay sex" is forbidden.

No! On the contrary. About a dozen passages have been given which the Christian churches believe exclude and condemn same sex activity and union, or ‘gay sex’. That you and some others don’t believe they do is not the subject of this thread. So there is no logical fallacy as argument from silence from us. There is therefore a logical fallacy from your position.
You are trying to pin the problem with your argument on those who don’t have that problem.

So EPII's posts concerning the passages some people claim condemn "gay sex" and mine asking for passages where the Bible supports hetero-sex are not off topic unless you want to turn this entire thread into an ad hominen instead of a dialog.

The passages which support hetero-sex have been given here and on many threads, again, the dialogue is open to you to provide scripture to support gay sex and argue it in debate. Once again you are trying to pin the problem with your argument on those who have that problem.

So either petition the moderators to close this thread as irrelevant gay-baiting, or stop making claims that attempts to point out the underlying assumptions are off topic.

Well I guess it could be seen as gay-baiting as there is no Biblical support for gay sex and this thread is designed to establish that, as it is doing. What it is also showing is the unwillingness of those who support gay sex and unions to debate the issue.

 

[KCKID]

Well I guess it could be seen as gay-baiting as there is no Biblical support for gay sex and this thread is designed to establish that, as it is doing. What it is also showing is the unwillingness of those who support gay sex and unions to debate the issue.

What's the debate again? Is there biblical support for 'gay' sex? Well, it's already been generally acknowledged that there is no biblical support for 'gay' sex as such. So, that's the answer. How much more do you want?

Having said that I would then have to say, so what? What does the silence about 'gay' sex prove? That 'gay' people don't exist? I can assure you they do. Actually, a similar question could be asked: Is there biblical support for heterosexual sex other than for procreation? Where do we find texts that support heterosexual 'recreational' or 'casual' sex? Sex in the Bible is intended for procreation and appears to be quite a 'clinical' process. God evidently did not intend heterosexual people to indulge in sex as a form of 'love making' as we see it today. And, Paul submits a text that seems to encourage sexual release for a male 'on heat' more so than an act of love ...a questionable piece of scripture if ever I saw one! The female seems not to get a mention in the deal ...but then, they were little more than property anyway.

Appealing to ancient texts from a totally foreign culture to ours that are often based on superstition, ignorance, and fear is foolhardy. The facts are that 'gay' people are a part of our society. If some of you don't like that then that's too bad. Live with it! If you look to the Bible to support practically any discriminatory thought you might have then you'll probably find it. Start using your God-given brains and leave the ancient texts where they belong. The people who authored them are long dead. OR, if you really DO desire to 'get off' on the ancient ways, then adhere faithfully to ALL of the rules, regulations, taboos, and superstitions of Leviticus and other books of the Bible and stop being selective. Here are a couple of NT ones to get you started. Make a stand against divorce and remarriage which equates to adultery; and ...put an immediate stop to any female who has the audacity to speak in church. They are to remain silent. They must also wear a head-covering at all times. So sayeth the Bible.