Brennin
Wielder of the Holy Cudgel of Faith
- Aug 2, 2005
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Do you follow all the laws of Leviticus?
I doubt it
Do you cut your hair?
Wear clothing made of different fabrics?
Allow people with glasses to attend your church?
Keep slaves?
Eat shellfish?
It is interesting how those who dont follow the laws of Leviticus are so willing to inflict cherry picked verses out of this book to attack a minority and defend prejudice and discrimination.
Even though you personally do not follow the many laws of Leviticus yet you do not seem to have a problem using Leviticus laws to attack a minority. Why?
Using Leviticus to justify prejudice and discrimination has many issues
First we live under a new covenant. Jesus did away with the law and put in place his commandment
A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. John 13:34
Promoting or justifying discrimination against a minority is not loving. And no matter how one tries to twist the justification it is an act of hate.
If any one says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen. 1 John 4:20
A further problem is one of translation. Leviticus has many injunctions against engaging in sex specifically carnal knowledge. However carnal knowledge is not used in either Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13 the word that is used is shakab. It is popularly translated to mean to lay (lie) with but there is a problem with that translation. Shakab is used 52 times in the old testament and is always used to a sexual encounter typified by deceit or force, in other words, some type of rape.
Shakab Means "Rape" not copulation, not carnal relations rape.
Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13 means that a man shall not force, or in any way coerce, another man to have sex, in the way that a man is allowed to force sex upon his wife. In other words, man is not allowed to rape a man, it is an abomination.
A man raping a man is no more a description of homosexuality than a man raping a woman is a description of heterosexuality.
The issue here is the mangled translation of the word arsenokoites to mean homosexual.
It is claimed time and again by those seeking to justify personal prejudice that the word obviously means homosexual, but there is no evidence to support this assumption.
For most of the history of Christianity arsenokoites was translated to mean masturbation, the most recent bible to make this translation was 1968. It is only in the last fifty years or so that a shift in the translation of this word to mean homosexual has been seen.
The defense for claiming that arsenokoites means homosexual is made by claiming that the meaning of this compound word is derived from the meaning of its two root words: arseno (man or men) and koitai (bed). This approach is linguistically invalid. Deconstructing compounds is difficult no matter what language one uses. One cant just define a compound word by taking it apart, getting the meanings of its component parts, and then assuming, with no supporting evidence, that the meaning of the longer word is a simple combination of its component parts. To "understand" does not mean to "stand under." In fact, nothing about the meaning of understand has anything to do with standing or being under anything. This phenomenon of language is sometimes even more obvious with terms that designate social roles, since the nature of the roles themselves often changes over time and becomes separated from any original reference. None of us, for example, takes the word "chairman" to mean a man who sits in a chair. Therefore all definitions of arsenokoites that derive its meaning from its components are indefensible. Using this method it would be equally valid to claim that when using the word arsenokoites Paul was condemning the lazy or even the bed making industry.
Some claim that Paul coined this word by combining two words from the Septuagint because his audience would have no reference or understanding of homosexuality. The ancient Greeks clearly understood the concept and didnt have to make up words to discuss it either. That aside the real trouble occurs when one looks at the fact that the words arsen and koite ALSO appear in Leviticus 20:11, Leviticus 20:12, Leviticus 20:15 and a few other places, but none of them are connected to homosexuality. If you're going to use this justification to "prove" arsenokoites means homosexual when used in 1 Corinthians 6:9 then you pretty much have to ignore all the other appearances of arsen and koite and the fact that they were referring to completely separate things
So put all together "kai meta arsenos ou koimêthêsê koitên gynaikos bdelygma gar estin"
is saying nothing about homosexuality or even male to male sex. rather it is condemning adultery, specifically adultery where one of the participants is a sanctified man and then only during the time he is sanctified. Notice there is no prohibition of the sanctified man having intercourse with his wife or wives or even his concubines, rather it is about bringing another woman into the marriage bed during the time he is sanctified, a woman his is not and cannot be married to. And even then that condemnation is limited to changing his status to one of ritual impurity, not sin or even the lesser no-no abomination.
Writers contemporary to Paul used arsenokoites but rarely. Those writings do not support the translation of arsenokoites to mean homosexual either. What does become clear from those writings is that the word means a man who sexually exploits women for money IE a man who employees prostitutes.
You keep repeating the same falsehoods despite being corrected numerous times. You do not know Greek; I do, and you are wrong. Quit while you are behind.
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