Biblical condemnations of homosexual acts are manifestly obvious:
Oxford Companion to the Bible:
: "Leviticus 20.13 prohibits sexual relations between men, defines
them as an 'abomination,' and places them under the death penalty (see
also Lev. 18.22). Ethical considerations such as consent, coercion, or
the power imbalance inherent in adult-child relations are not legally
relevant in these passages (nor in the surrounding levitical laws on
adultery, incest, and inappropriate behavior with animals). Thus, regardless of the sexual
relationship of the participants (a man and his consenting male
partner, an adult male whom he had raped, or a child victim), all are
equally culpable, since all are equally defiled (see Philo, De spec.
leg. 3.7.37-42).
: "Like Leviticus, Paul does not employ the ethical categories of
consent or age for distinguishing between sanctioned and condemned
sexual relations. His letters contain linguistic and conceptual
parallels to the levitical laws about same-sex sexual relations. Thus,
1 Corinthians 6.9-10 states that "the ones who lie with men" (NSRV:
"sodomites"; cf. Lev. 20.13) will not "inherit the kingdom of God"
(see also the Deutero-Pauline 1 Tim. 1.10; and see Ethical Lists).
Paul describes male-male sexual relations as "impurity" and asserts
that such men "deserve to die" (Rom. 1.24-32). Paul extends
prohibition to include sexual relations between women (Rom. 1.26) as
do other postbiblical Jewish writings. Like other writers in the Roman
world such as Philo, Ptolemy, and Martial, Paul sees same-sex sexual
relations as transgressions of hierarchical gender boundaries. For
example, "unnatural" (Rom. 1.26) most likely refers to the women's
attempt to transcend the passive, subordinate role accorded to them by
nature. Similarly, the men have relinquished the superordinate, active
role (see 1 Cor. 11.13) and have descended to the level of women.
: Some postbiblical Jewish and early Christian writers specifically
define the sin of Sodom and Gomorrah (Gen. 18-19.28; cf. Judg. 19) as
same-sex relations rather than as rape or inhospitality; see, for
example, Jude 7 and Philo, De Abrahamo 26.134-36 (cf. 2 Pet. 2.6;
Testament of Naphtali 3.4-5; 4.1).
: Biblical prohibitions of same-sex love directly influenced later
Roman law and, indeed, Western legal statutes until the present (e.g.,
sodomy statutes in the U.S. criminal law). See also Sex.--Bernadette
J. Brooten
Encyclopedia of Early Christianity:
Wright 1
Wright 2
David F Wright, MA, DD
Immoralism, Homosexual Unhealth, and Scripture
Robert A. J. Gagnon is Associate Professor of New Testament at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. He came to PTS in the Fall of 1994 after a one-year position as Visiting Professor of Religion at Middlebury College in Vermont. He has a B.A. degree from Dartmouth College, an M.T.S. from Harvard Divinity School, and a Ph.D. from Princeton Theological Seminary. His main fields of interest are Pauline theology and sexual issues in the Bible. He is a member both of the Society of Biblical Literature and of the Studiorum Novi Testamenti Societas [Society of New Testament Studies].
