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sexual morality
- Thread starter Condemnation
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The reason I ask that question is because I have a friend who has come to me for help. She has a very close friendship with another woman who has become so attached to her that she has suggested they sleep together. My friend is very tempted but has, as yet, resisted. They are both christians and one of them is married. My friend says it just seeed so natural for them and she felt that it would be right and a comfort for each of them.
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Well, upset, if one of them is presentelly married, yes, it can be a problem. It'll probably hurt 3 people, in a way or the other.
Now, if the women are free, adult, are sure of their feeling for each other and wish to build a life together... as I see it, no problem at all.
... and now that the subject is on, come on, people, I am taking the bets. How long untill the thread is locked?
(come on, people, just kidding. I joke, you know )
Now, if the women are free, adult, are sure of their feeling for each other and wish to build a life together... as I see it, no problem at all.
... and now that the subject is on, come on, people, I am taking the bets. How long untill the thread is locked?
(come on, people, just kidding. I joke, you know )
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I can´t see nothing moraly wrong with too people that deliberately decided to caress one another, no matter the gender.
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I personally see nothing wrong with any act of sexual nature (aside from rape/sexual abuse). If you like the kinky stuff (i.e. whips, chains, sex toys etc) then go right a head and do it. All the more power to you for finding what you like and exploring it. Sex gets to be very boring if you use the same thing (positions/atmosphere etc) all the time. Sex is nothing to be ashamed of, but should be enjoyed. I also see no problem with same gender sex. Do as you wish as long as no one is getting seriously injured.
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It's wrong to do anything that might potentially harm a marriage. If a marriage is ending, let it end on its own. Nothing good can come of this until the marriage issue is resolved regardless of the morality of same sex intimacy.
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jayem
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I agree completely. And this should go without saying, but I'm sure everyone would agree that ALL participants need to be able to consent. So even if a husband and wife consent, sex with a child, a disabled person, an animal, or a dead body--all of whom who are unable to consent--would be wrong, IMO.Buzz Dixon said:
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Kisses, Caress, sex, and other forms of physical contact are an agreement between the individuals involved. If they all consented, that's ok to do it.
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Natman
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I can't believe some of the comments I've read on this thread.
"There's nothing immoral about sex with anyone, anywhere, as long as everyone's aware of what's going on and consenting."
"I also see no problem with same gender sex."
"Adultery" is alright as long as you don't KNOW that ther person you're have sex with is married.
"Poligamy" is OKAY too. Just don't try to marry someone elses wife.
Come on guys (and gals). We all KNOW better than that.
Gen 2:24; Matt 19:5; Mark 10:7; Eph 5:31 (NIV)
"For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh."
Gen 2:24; Matt 19:5; Mark 10:7; Eph 5:31 (NIV)
"Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh."
Please note that it says "a man" as in "one man" and "wife", not "wives". To "cleave" is to join together in such a way that it becomes destructive to separate them.
Almost every place where there are more than two involved in a marriage relationship, whether it is to poligamy, adultery, incest or fornication, anguish soon follows. They are examples of what NOT to do.
Also, are there verses in which God commands someone to take multiple wifes, or take for himself concubines?
Son-cerely,
Nate
"There's nothing immoral about sex with anyone, anywhere, as long as everyone's aware of what's going on and consenting."
"I also see no problem with same gender sex."
"Adultery" is alright as long as you don't KNOW that ther person you're have sex with is married.
"Poligamy" is OKAY too. Just don't try to marry someone elses wife.
Come on guys (and gals). We all KNOW better than that.
Gen 2:24; Matt 19:5; Mark 10:7; Eph 5:31 (NIV)
"For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh."
Gen 2:24; Matt 19:5; Mark 10:7; Eph 5:31 (NIV)
"Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh."
Please note that it says "a man" as in "one man" and "wife", not "wives". To "cleave" is to join together in such a way that it becomes destructive to separate them.
Almost every place where there are more than two involved in a marriage relationship, whether it is to poligamy, adultery, incest or fornication, anguish soon follows. They are examples of what NOT to do.
Also, are there verses in which God commands someone to take multiple wifes, or take for himself concubines?
Son-cerely,
Nate
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Eph. 3:20
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Hello Nate...
Some of these issues were brought up before in another thread we were both involved with, but I didn't want to address them there and cloud what was already a complicated issue. But I will address them here...
Agreed that once they are married they are not to seperate. That is the teaching of Matt. 19:5 and Gen. 2:24
Matt. 19:9-
"I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for marital unfaithfulness, and marries another woman commits adultery."
The context of this passage is clearly divorce, noted by the preceeding question and Jesus' answer.
If the man leaves his wife and marries another, but does not have sex with her, has he committed adultery? Of course, he has broken the marriage covenant. Sex may or not be part of the equation.
This passage is akin to Malachi 2:14, "...because you have broken faith with her, though she is you partner, the wife of your marriage covenant." This applied to a monogomous man or a married man..the principle is the same. You can't ditch one wife to marry another.
Again, it's no secret that men were divorcing there wives for erroneous reasons Jesus was addressing this. The marriage covenant was a lifetime comittment "from the beginning" (Gen.).
If sex outside of marriage is illegal then why weren't the patriarchs of our faith ever charged over the thousands of supposed transgressions?
There is far less conflict if you don't get married at all! This fact doesn't negate the allowance to take a wife. The more people involved the greater chances for conflict. It's just part of being human. This is true in marriage, business and family. Of all the things you mentioned above only polygamy is never rebuked, legislated against or ever mentioned as something that is displeasing to God. In fact God tells David, "I gave to you your master's house to you and your master's wives into your arms. I gave you the house of Israel and Judah. And If all of this would have been too little, I would have given you more." (2 Sam. 12:8) So if multiple wives is somehow sinful, we have God telling David that He provided multiple wives for hm and He would have given him more. This would make God the author of David's sin. Unthinkable.
Yes there are (wives) suprisingly...
The Law of Levirate or Levirate Marriage, is a legal provision in the Bible requiring a dead man's brother to marry his childless widow and father a son who would assume the dead man's name and inherit his portion of the Promised Land (Deut.25:5-10). It didn't matter if the man was already married, it made no difference.
God did this to protect the lineage of the family of the deceased brother. In fact this was Onan's sin. He refused to impregnate the wife of his deceased brother and well, you know what happened for his refusal (Genesis 38:8).
Also God's regulation for a man taking another wife:
"...if he marries another woman , he must not deprive the first one of her food, clothing and marital rights.
In any Biblical sexual law, God sought the protection of those involved in the relationship. God legislated against what He does not allow.
Concubines...
I think we would be hard pressed to say that progeny was the only factor for a concubine, frequently their function was to provide sexual gratification ("man's delight" Eccl. 2:8).
There is a multitude of passages that show OT men having concubines. Not one of them is shown as being illegal or displeasing to God. If we are going to make a Biblical case against a man having a concubine we will have to show that God was somehow displeased with it. This will prove to be most difficult as He has not commented on it.
Here is only one of a handful of examples of a married man having sex outside of their marriage that didn't involve polygamy or concubines (what we moderns would call fornication). There are not that many due to their culture where women were betrothed/married at any early age an afforded very few of the freedoms of their male counterparts.
Note:
David grows old and cold, so his servants find him a "beautiful young virgin ," Abishag is to lie with him to keep him warm, (1 Kg. 1:1-4). Why a beautiful young virgin? Obviously it was the sexual excitement that would increase the "heat" so David would become warm. She was to "service" David, or "to be familiar" with him in a sexual way, (Strong's 5532). The Septuagint renders it, "to excite him." The natural body of one even an extremely beautiful woman would provide no more physical warmth than any of his other many wives and concubines David already had. It is the added sexual "heat" that they counted on to warm David. And since David has so many women already, what difference does one more make? Abishag later becomes his concubine.
Now, what might this example say about "lust of the flesh" or "lust of the eyes?" Why do we not have here even a simple sentence like, "Now the Lord was not pleased with this plan.." or something to indicate that it was wrong, if indeed it was?
David had sons by several wives, "Besides the sons of the concubines," (1 Chron. 3:1-9).
It is supremely important to note, for this discussion, that they are not married. It is true that a concubine, slave and servants are under the care and provision of the master of the household but they are not married. Even if the intentions were progeny...sin is sin. If God prohibited a man from having sexual realtions outside of the marriage covenant, then this very act has violated that prohibition. Can we see the point here??? Having sex with a concubine was not considered a sin, it was accepted as common practice. Unless we can show Biblical evidence that it was prohibited for a man to have sex with his own concubine, the arguement becomes unjustifiable.
The nature of Law.....
Law is normally not written to permit activity. Whether we consider civil or Divine law, we do not look for law for permission to do a particular thing. Law is written to require positive behavior or to prohibit negative behavior.
Examples of positive mandates in the Decalogue (Ex.20)
"Remember the Sabbath Day to keep it Holy," (vs.8)
"Honor your mother and father," (vs.12)
Examples of negative mandates in the Decalogue (Ex.20)
"You shall have no other Gods before me,"(vs.3)
"You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain," (vs.7) etc...
Notice 80% of the commands are negative prohibitions. This illustrates the basic fact that law is written primarily to prohibit wrong behavior. As a general rule people do not have to be required to do what is good so there is no reason to write laws demanding they do so in most cases. Therefore it is necessary to establish limits to general behavior in order to protect other people. All law is written this way.
God wrote His law to make it clear what moral limits are. God prohibits things that conflict with His nature. This is the whole purpose of the 10 commandments. Especially in the sexual area, God dealt more specifically and in detail than with any other area of human life. This is doubtless due to the power of the human sex drive and the tendency of fallen humanity to fall easily and quickly into sexual sin. In order that humans might know exactly what are sexual boundaries are God specified what He prohibits. He did not have to command positive sex acts. Humans are not required to engage in sexual conduct. God mandates tell us what sexual behavior we must avoid. Once we have learned what God prohibits sexually we can then confidently enjoy whatever sexual activity is possible outside of those prohibitions.
If God does not forbid a particular sex act, then it is impossible for a human to violate God's law by enjoying that sex act. If there is no law against that act, then it is permitted. One cannot violate a law that does not exist. Thus humans are free to do whatever God has not prohibited. Only God establishes the morality of any act. Neither society nor the church has been granted the privilege of mandating morality. If God's law does not prohibit it, humans may do it even if the majority of people in the culture think it's immoral. Granted, it may be necessary for such frowned upon acts to be performed in privacy, but if it is not made sin by God no human law can make it so. The law that we are to obey now as NT believers id Jesus' "law of love." We are to do nothing that harms another or that dishonors God.
"Love does no harm to a neighbor, love therefore is the fulfillment of the law." (Rom. 13:10)
Eph. 3:20
Some of these issues were brought up before in another thread we were both involved with, but I didn't want to address them there and cloud what was already a complicated issue. But I will address them here...
Natman said:
Agreed that once they are married they are not to seperate. That is the teaching of Matt. 19:5 and Gen. 2:24
Matt. 19:9-
"I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for marital unfaithfulness, and marries another woman commits adultery."
The context of this passage is clearly divorce, noted by the preceeding question and Jesus' answer.
If the man leaves his wife and marries another, but does not have sex with her, has he committed adultery? Of course, he has broken the marriage covenant. Sex may or not be part of the equation.
This passage is akin to Malachi 2:14, "...because you have broken faith with her, though she is you partner, the wife of your marriage covenant." This applied to a monogomous man or a married man..the principle is the same. You can't ditch one wife to marry another.
Again, it's no secret that men were divorcing there wives for erroneous reasons Jesus was addressing this. The marriage covenant was a lifetime comittment "from the beginning" (Gen.).
If sex outside of marriage is illegal then why weren't the patriarchs of our faith ever charged over the thousands of supposed transgressions?
Natman said:
There is far less conflict if you don't get married at all! This fact doesn't negate the allowance to take a wife. The more people involved the greater chances for conflict. It's just part of being human. This is true in marriage, business and family. Of all the things you mentioned above only polygamy is never rebuked, legislated against or ever mentioned as something that is displeasing to God. In fact God tells David, "I gave to you your master's house to you and your master's wives into your arms. I gave you the house of Israel and Judah. And If all of this would have been too little, I would have given you more." (2 Sam. 12:8) So if multiple wives is somehow sinful, we have God telling David that He provided multiple wives for hm and He would have given him more. This would make God the author of David's sin. Unthinkable.
Natman said:
Yes there are (wives) suprisingly...
The Law of Levirate or Levirate Marriage, is a legal provision in the Bible requiring a dead man's brother to marry his childless widow and father a son who would assume the dead man's name and inherit his portion of the Promised Land (Deut.25:5-10). It didn't matter if the man was already married, it made no difference.
God did this to protect the lineage of the family of the deceased brother. In fact this was Onan's sin. He refused to impregnate the wife of his deceased brother and well, you know what happened for his refusal (Genesis 38:8).
Also God's regulation for a man taking another wife:
"...if he marries another woman , he must not deprive the first one of her food, clothing and marital rights.
In any Biblical sexual law, God sought the protection of those involved in the relationship. God legislated against what He does not allow.
Concubines...
I think we would be hard pressed to say that progeny was the only factor for a concubine, frequently their function was to provide sexual gratification ("man's delight" Eccl. 2:8).
There is a multitude of passages that show OT men having concubines. Not one of them is shown as being illegal or displeasing to God. If we are going to make a Biblical case against a man having a concubine we will have to show that God was somehow displeased with it. This will prove to be most difficult as He has not commented on it.
Here is only one of a handful of examples of a married man having sex outside of their marriage that didn't involve polygamy or concubines (what we moderns would call fornication). There are not that many due to their culture where women were betrothed/married at any early age an afforded very few of the freedoms of their male counterparts.
Note:
David grows old and cold, so his servants find him a "beautiful young virgin ," Abishag is to lie with him to keep him warm, (1 Kg. 1:1-4). Why a beautiful young virgin? Obviously it was the sexual excitement that would increase the "heat" so David would become warm. She was to "service" David, or "to be familiar" with him in a sexual way, (Strong's 5532). The Septuagint renders it, "to excite him." The natural body of one even an extremely beautiful woman would provide no more physical warmth than any of his other many wives and concubines David already had. It is the added sexual "heat" that they counted on to warm David. And since David has so many women already, what difference does one more make? Abishag later becomes his concubine.
Now, what might this example say about "lust of the flesh" or "lust of the eyes?" Why do we not have here even a simple sentence like, "Now the Lord was not pleased with this plan.." or something to indicate that it was wrong, if indeed it was?
David had sons by several wives, "Besides the sons of the concubines," (1 Chron. 3:1-9).
It is supremely important to note, for this discussion, that they are not married. It is true that a concubine, slave and servants are under the care and provision of the master of the household but they are not married. Even if the intentions were progeny...sin is sin. If God prohibited a man from having sexual realtions outside of the marriage covenant, then this very act has violated that prohibition. Can we see the point here??? Having sex with a concubine was not considered a sin, it was accepted as common practice. Unless we can show Biblical evidence that it was prohibited for a man to have sex with his own concubine, the arguement becomes unjustifiable.
The nature of Law.....
Law is normally not written to permit activity. Whether we consider civil or Divine law, we do not look for law for permission to do a particular thing. Law is written to require positive behavior or to prohibit negative behavior.
Examples of positive mandates in the Decalogue (Ex.20)
"Remember the Sabbath Day to keep it Holy," (vs.8)
"Honor your mother and father," (vs.12)
Examples of negative mandates in the Decalogue (Ex.20)
"You shall have no other Gods before me,"(vs.3)
"You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain," (vs.7) etc...
Notice 80% of the commands are negative prohibitions. This illustrates the basic fact that law is written primarily to prohibit wrong behavior. As a general rule people do not have to be required to do what is good so there is no reason to write laws demanding they do so in most cases. Therefore it is necessary to establish limits to general behavior in order to protect other people. All law is written this way.
God wrote His law to make it clear what moral limits are. God prohibits things that conflict with His nature. This is the whole purpose of the 10 commandments. Especially in the sexual area, God dealt more specifically and in detail than with any other area of human life. This is doubtless due to the power of the human sex drive and the tendency of fallen humanity to fall easily and quickly into sexual sin. In order that humans might know exactly what are sexual boundaries are God specified what He prohibits. He did not have to command positive sex acts. Humans are not required to engage in sexual conduct. God mandates tell us what sexual behavior we must avoid. Once we have learned what God prohibits sexually we can then confidently enjoy whatever sexual activity is possible outside of those prohibitions.
If God does not forbid a particular sex act, then it is impossible for a human to violate God's law by enjoying that sex act. If there is no law against that act, then it is permitted. One cannot violate a law that does not exist. Thus humans are free to do whatever God has not prohibited. Only God establishes the morality of any act. Neither society nor the church has been granted the privilege of mandating morality. If God's law does not prohibit it, humans may do it even if the majority of people in the culture think it's immoral. Granted, it may be necessary for such frowned upon acts to be performed in privacy, but if it is not made sin by God no human law can make it so. The law that we are to obey now as NT believers id Jesus' "law of love." We are to do nothing that harms another or that dishonors God.
"Love does no harm to a neighbor, love therefore is the fulfillment of the law." (Rom. 13:10)
Eph. 3:20
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Natman
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Eph 3:20,
I have to admit that I have not as yet taken the time to study up on the Biblical understanding of "poligamy", "concubines" and "prostitutes". It has not been an important issue to me because I do not see how it would apply to my life as I happen to love my wife more than any other human being and would not possibly consider muddying up our relationship with another person, wife, concubine or prostiture. Besides, I don't think my finances could handle more than one wife and family at a time.
This looks like it might be an interesting topic within this thread and should cause quite a bit of conversation and controversy.
BTW, are you married, and if so, what does your wife feel about this issue?
Son-cerely,
Nate
I have to admit that I have not as yet taken the time to study up on the Biblical understanding of "poligamy", "concubines" and "prostitutes". It has not been an important issue to me because I do not see how it would apply to my life as I happen to love my wife more than any other human being and would not possibly consider muddying up our relationship with another person, wife, concubine or prostiture. Besides, I don't think my finances could handle more than one wife and family at a time.
This looks like it might be an interesting topic within this thread and should cause quite a bit of conversation and controversy.
BTW, are you married, and if so, what does your wife feel about this issue?
Son-cerely,
Nate
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Natman
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If "life" begins at conception, then contraception the destroys a human zygote (fertilized egg) could be considered "murder" which is immoral.Monica02 said:
Alternately, contraception that prevents sperm from fertilizing an egg, such as abstention or use of a condom does not destroy life.
It is my understanting that there are several types of oral contraception. Some prevent gestation (egg production) while others either destroy the fertilized egg or prevent the fertilized egg from implanting in the uterus. This second set of methods as well as IUD's would be my primary concern (not to mention abortion).
Son-cerely,
Nate
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Life begins before conception. A spermatozoid is a living being. An unicellular and very specialized form of life, but a life. An spermatozoid can be killed. Even a virus, a bacteria is life.Natman said:
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Natman
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Point taken.an7222 said:
I should have said "HUMAN life".
I don't think that killing "unicellular life" other than a human zygote could be considered immoral, as we do that simply by scratching, walking, chewing or any other number of naturaly expected actions, every single second of every single day.
Son-cerely,
Nate
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Fuzzy
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"Life", according to the American Heritage Dictionary:an7222 said:
The property or quality that distinguishes living organisms from dead organisms and inanimate matter, manifested in functions such as metabolism, growth, reproduction, and response to stimuli or adaptation to the environment originating from within the organism.
Spermatozoa:
Metabolism? Yes
Growth? Not outside the testes
Reproduction? No. Sperm cells exist merely to deliver genetic information to
the ovum. Sperm cannot reproduce on their own, and are made from
specialized cells in the testes, or from stem cell cultures in a lab (recently
done with mice)
Response to stimuli? Hard to say. They swim a lot, but only in hospitable
environments. All they ever do is swim.
Adaptation to the environment from within the organism? No. The ideal
environment for a sperm cell, seminal fluid, is produced by other parts of
the body
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