Per our mission of fostering theological conversation, ThinkTheology.org is hosting a conversation between Bill Hoard and our very own Luke Geraty in regards to homosexuality and the Church. This is a six part series where Bill will offer a perspective and Luke will respond (see the first exchange). If you have any questions or comments, feel free to join the discussion below. Our authors will do their best to respond.
Bill Hoard’s 2nd Post
In reference to my proposed order of approach, addressing the O.T. first would be more canonical and may well serve to help with an intertextual understanding of the issue, particularly regarding the Hebraic influences on Jesus’ and Paul’s worldviews, I don’t disagree. The reason for the order I chose is mostly pragmatic and experiential. In most of the conversations I have with people on this topic, they are most interested in how I handle the NT direct passages. If they find my answers satisfactory on that level, it is only then that they move on to asking about the OT passages, then the overall tone of the Bible, and often end with a semi-theological appeal to natural law theory. So I thought it would be worthwhile to structure our conversation along the lines which seem, to me, to be the most pressing on the mind of most evangelicals. That said, I am hopeful that these blogs will create a sort of gestalt argument if readers are willing to jump around a bit as I will be making assertions in some entries which will not be fully defended till later blog posts. In lieu of this I hope to spend this post and the next dealing with direct N.T. texts, address the O.T. texts in the fourth post, oblique references in the fifth and then use the last as a conclusion, touching on natural law theory and wrapping up the discussion.
Regarding Acts 15, I am absolutely willing to include it (and the assorted passages which relate to it)[1] in our discussion of porneia. I didn’t mean my list to limit us to the passages I mentioned, only to give what I think of as the primary examples in each instance. Luke, please feel free to include discussion of any passages you think I have overlooked.
Direct NT passages, Arsenekoitai and Malakoi; 1 Corinthians 6, and 1Timothy 1:
So there are basically two passages in the NT where, depending on your English translation, the word “homosexual” will actually show up: 1 Corinthians 6:9[2], and 1 Timothy 1:10[3]. In these passages, the term is a translation of the Greek words asenekoitai and malakoi. While malakoi is a fairly common word in classical Greece, its application to a group of people in a potentially sexual context is extremely uncommon, while arsenekoitai is admitted by some of the most traditional scholars to have been coined by Paul himself[4]. Most of the N.T. scholarship with which I am familiar equates these terms somewhat more specifically to “active partner in gay sex” and “passive partner in gay sex” or to “homosexual man” and “effeminate” respectively. I believe that there are three distinct problems with the way these two terms have been translated and are used.
The first problem is the infrequency of these terms’ usage. It strikes me that if we are going to restrict the church participation of a person[5] on the basis of our interpretation of key vocabulary, that vocabulary ought to be thoroughly vetted in terms of its meaning. In the case of arsenekoitai we are looking at a term which Paul seemed to have coined[6] [7] while malakoi is used in an almost unique way – it is generally translated as “soft”, “delicate”, or sometimes “morally pliable” in most other literature[8].
The second problem with these terms is the basic fact that Paul bothered to coin them. We generally only coin terms when there are no existing words available to express an idea. This is problematic for the traditional interpretation of arsenekoitai and malakoi because Greek already had words which were commonly used to refer to the active and passive partners in a gay relationship. In classical Greek, the words Erastes and Eromenos were used to refer to the active and passive male partners respectively. We can only speculate as to why Paul would have chosen to coin and appropriate new words when he already had terms available but it is clear that he must have been rejecting the existing words for some reason and I think it is fair to conclude that Paul wanted to avoid something intrinsic to either the connotation or denotation of the existing words. After all, a well educated writer does not make up entirely new terminology when there are existing words which carry the necessary meaning, he only does so when there are no exitisting words which properly express his idea. This leads me to believe that Paul had a specific reason to reject Erastes and Eromenos as bad expressions of the sort of people he was describing in 1Corinthians 6 and 1 Timothy 1.
I will suggest that he may have chosen to do so because Erastes and Eromenos often included the possibility of a loving, mutually beneficial relationship[9]. In contrast to the language and culture of classical Greece, the culture of Rome and classical Latin (in which Paul was operating) did not have terms or concepts which readily admitted of loving-mutually encouraging relationships. Instead, the relevant Latin terms (and parallel concepts) connoted either a self-serving seducer and conqueror intent on using his partner for pleasure[10] or a sexualy ambitious submissive willing to demean himself by exchanging sex for influence and opportunity – alternately, the reference could be to rape of male slaves.
I think it likely that Paul chose to coin and appropriate new terms specifically in order to make reference to the Latin/Roman form of the relationship rather than the Greek form. If this is the case, then Paul’s word choice would mean that he is specifically not referring to loving, mutually supportive relationships but to selfish, mutually degrading ones[11].
Finally, there is the cognitive dissonance which the traditional interpretation of these terms ought to create between the contextual implications of the terms and our lived experience of LGB persons. In 1 Corinthians 6:8-10, arsenekoitai and malakoi appear on a list of people who are not going to inherit the kingdom of God; in 1 Timothy 1:6-10, arsenekoitai appear on a list of the unrighteous who have something to learn from the law. But I, at least, know LGB Christians who are actively inheriting the kingdom of God. If I do not want to conclude the Bible is wrong about them, the most obvious alternative would be that it is not referring to them in these lists but to the perverse relationships of the classical Roman world.
So my argument here boils down to the following three points:
- Arsenekoitai and malakoi are too rarely used to base a practice of exclusion on them.
- Because they were specifically coined and appropriated, arsenekoitai and malakoi are likely to indicate something other than the loving, mutually supportive relationships which could have been indicated if Paul had used the common terms.
- The traditional interpretation of arsenekoitai and malakoi is problematic because it would force us to conclude that LGB people who claim Jesus as their savior will not inherit the kingdom of God so long as they continue to identify and act as LGB persons and that contradicts our lived experience of LGB Christians.
My next post will finish up the direct N.T. passages with a look at Romans 1 and a further investigation into the culture of the Roman world in relation to homosexuality. I realize this has been a bit brief (after all there are whole books on these subjects) and I am hoping we can work through the nuances and background in comments.
My questions for Luke:
How certain do you think Christians ought to be of an interpretation if they are going to use it as the basis for exclusionary practices? How about if we are going to withhold full support from an oppressed group?[12]
Luke Geraty’s 2nd Response
I want to start by thanking you, Bill, for participating in this dialogue! I also apologize for not getting to this sooner! As I told you via Facebook, I started two new classes and have been trying to manage being a good husband, father, pastor, and grad student while also keeping up with my responsibilities elsewhere. But I’m back!
Your reason for starting with NT texts makes sense. I don’t even necessarily balk at such methodology as long as that methodology recognizes that in order to properly exegete the NT texts, one has to understand their OT background! Paul’s worldview was shaped by the Hebrew Scriptures. So I’m going to push back against any argument that sounds like Sarah Ruden’s Paul Among the People because it uses such flawed methodology (openly ignoring Paul’s Jewish background!). That’s why I believe including a discussion, at some point, in regards to porneia is vital because I think Thomas Lyons has demonstrated conclusively the importance of that Greek word toward this subject (here, here, and here).
Regarding your thoughts on asenekoitai and malakoi, I would simply point readers to part 5 of my review of Ken Wilson’s A Letter to My Congregation, because I’ve provided several reasons why your three “problems” are really not problematic. For those who are, like me, too lazy to go to my review, I’ll make a few points here…
First, Paul use of arsenekoitai appears to be based on his use of the LXX and, as you noted, a coining of a term that draws back to Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13. There’s no debate that I know of in modern scholarship on this issue. That’s why the OT background matters so much, which I’m sure you agree with. As an aside, I think you’ll find supporting evidence of this from progressives like Loader and conservatives like Gagnon,[13] not to mention Wold, who has extended treatment on this issue. The point is that they almost unanimously agree. Since you are going to address this in the future, I’ll let you address this later.
Second, I agree that we need to do our exegetical and lexical homework regarding the words used in the Scriptures. No arguments from me. You’ll have to provide some serious evidence, however, if you are looking to overturn the overwhelming amount of work that’s been done on these words. In fact, in my reviewing of ALTMC, I read through literally every lexicon and theological dictionary I could get my hands on or that I own and found absolutely zero support to abandon the “traditional” understanding of these words – zero! So again, I’ll let you address this later.
Third, your second problem, in relation to erastes and eromenos raises a good question, though I am not sure it’s completely relevant because those terms were generally used in relation to pederasty in the ancient Greek world (see Dover’s Greek Homosexuality), though, as you noted, not exclusively. But I think you make the very point that I see as crucial. If Paul invented the word, which appears to be highly probable (though it could have been a word used in Jewish circles), why did he not use words that were commonly used to describe pederasty?
Perhaps it was because he wasn’t referring to pederasty but was, based on his understanding of Jewish Scripture, discussing homosexual acts in and of themselves. It’s already been established that Paul would have been aware of same-sex monogamous homosexual relationships, so that argument doesn’t work (see part 5 of my review). In addition to ignoring Paul’s Jewish background, it becomes far too speculative for my tastes and largely ignores Pauline understanding and use of Creation toward his understanding of sexuality. Again, your speculation overlooks, I believe, significant issues that are deeply connected to Pauline theology and has been both challenged and, I think, overturned by the progressive Loader, conservative Gagnon, and a host of other NT scholars.
Finally, I really appreciate your last issue/challenge because, quite frankly, it’s deeply personal and something that I am working through as well. I would, however, want to go into a discussion about discipleship and lordship. Do we both use those words in similar ways? I, for one, do not believe that becoming a follower of Jesus means we become perfect. I believe the NT teaches that sanctification is both an event (we are sanctified) and progressively happens over time (we are being saved).
I believe the call of the gospel is for all people, regardless of their sexual orientation, to live their lives under the lordship of Jesus. When we become followers of Jesus, our identity shifts, or should be shifting, or will be shifting, toward him. But I have no doubt that there are people who are “saved” (for lack of a better word) that are living in ways that are outside of the prescribed will of God. I’m a living testimony to that. However, I don’t need to change God’s prescribed will (revealed in Scripture) in order to justify my actions/thoughts, do I? I certainly don’t think so, which is why I think it rather important to understand Scripture’s teaching on this subject because if we are right or wrong matters a lot.
You ask me two questions, which I’ll answer with some nuance and caveats.
“How certain do you think Christians ought to be of an interpretation if they are going to use it as the basis for exclusionary practices?”
It think it all depends on what is being addressed as well as what “exclusionary practices” mean. Bill, every orthodox Christian is exclusionary! You exclude people if you hold to any sort of orthodoxy. Would you support allowing someone to pastor in the church you attend if they denied that Jesus was God? How about a man who was living with a woman he wasn’t married to and they were having a sexual relationship? This is to say that I really think the rejection of “exclusionary practices” needs to be nuanced far more than it is because it’s hard to take anyone serious when they use it unless they acknowledge that all orthodox Christians do it.
Furthermore, what exclusionary practices are we talking about? I don’t know any churches in the denomination I am a part of that would exclude people from attending their gatherings. Additionally, most of the churches I know would have no problem with most areas of participation, including sacraments. The “exclusion” comes in specific areas (leadership roles, etc.), not across the board.
But to answer your question, Christians should be fairly certain if they are going to exclude people who participate in certain practices. I’m not sure if you are looking for a percentage here though, so I hope “fairly certain” is sufficient, ha ha!
“How about if we are going to withhold full support from an oppressed group?”
This begs the question of what “full support” is and what equates to an “oppressed group.” But alas, I believe that I can argue for the civil rights and social justice of the LGBTQ community without having to offer my agreement with their sexual activity. I do that for unmarried singles who are living out sexual relationships all of the time, which I find statistically way more of a challenge than homosexuality!
Bill, I hope these answers address the issues you are raising. If not, let me know and I’ll do my best to explain further.
My concluding questions, which you could either answer in the comments if you aren’t planning on addressing more detail, are how you believe Christians can live out the “B” in your “LGB.” What does a “B” sexual relationship entail? Is there monogamy? Is it lifelong? Furthermore, what about the “T”?
Endnotes
[1] Romans 14, 1 Corinthians 8, Revelation 2:14
[2] “Malakoi” only shows up in the 1 Corinthians passage.
[3] Both passages are attributed to the apostle Paul.
[4] Please correct me if I am wrong about this Luke!
[5] The prohibition of marriage or ordination comes to mind.
[6] I am not aware of any extra-Pauline uses of the word prior to the completion of the N.T.
[7] I recognize that Paul may have coined arsenekoitai based on a translation in the Septuagint and I propose to address that point when we deal with OT texts.
[8] This is the usage by Homer, Herodotus, Plato, and Artistotle; also the dominant way it is used in the Bible – Matthew 11:8 and Luke 7:25
[9] While these terms could refer to the two parties in a pederastic relationship, they were also used to describe more egalitarian gay relationships. For instance, these terms are used in Plato’s Symposium in reference to the relationship between Patroclus and Achilles wherein Achilles represents the Eromenon.
[10] All of the relevant terms, both Greek and Latin, are male specific. Both cultures were aware of lesbianism but the terms and cultural associations were wildly different because well….the patriarchy.
[11] Notice that the terms appear on a lists of types of people acting in a specifically unloving way: thieves, murderers, parricides and matricides, greedy, and adulterers. If arsenekoitai and malakoi are used as Greek translations of the Latin concepts over and against the native Greek concepts, they become a far better thematic fit in the context of the relevant passages.
[12] I genuinely expect that there are different answers to these two questions. I know there are in my mind.
[13] I fully acknowledge that Gagnon’s public engagement on this issue is often controversial and not how I would and have engaged this issue. However, his scholarship on the subject is extremely relevant and convincing.
Jumping on in! I’m sorry if my questions were a little too vague (fair catch) and I actually pretty much agree with your reflections on the varieties and uses. And I agree that pretty much all Christian denominations are exclusionary (whether by necessity or tradition I’m not sure but that is probably another conversation) and I really don’ t have a huge problem with that. I am perfectly comfortable saying that there are acts which (when not repented of) ought to exclude a persons from full participation – leadership is a good example -in Church life.
So when I said “exclusionary practices” I did not mean to be taking a pot shot at exclusionary practices. I do, however, think that we need to be pretty darn sure (is there a way to get mathematical about certainty really) that an act or choice genuinely merits exclusion before we make it a boundary given that our general posture ought to be one of inclusion as often as possible. I hope that clarifies a little.
On my second question, by “full support” I think you were jiving with me. If people here didn’t already really like you this would be a good place to point out that, at least as far as I can tell, you advocate a tremendous approach to practically love people whom you believe to be sinful (as we all are), but then they already do seem to realize that you are a pretty rockin’ guy so I suppose there is little need for me to say it.
I think I can also make a fairly quick reply to your questions for me right here (posting in separate comments so that the discussions can have their own threads).
The “B” in LGB in my opinion essentially flies or falls with the LG question, which is why I include it. I think the misconception that bisexual people are actively trying to have some sort of constant triad sexual relationship with a man and a woman is waning but for the sake of clarity, a bisexual person is attracted to people of both sexes. Some bisexual people are quite contentedly in straight marriages while others are in same-sex marriages. I think I basically agree with David Gushee about the overall ethics on the topic of what any same-sex marriage ought to look like – http://baptistnews.com/opinion/columns/item/29194-toward-covenant-the-lgbt-issue-part-14
The T is way more complex and probably deserves its own conversation. The really short version is that I see transgender issues as issues of gender rather than issues of sexuality (though once the gender issues are understood they certainly raise questions regarding sexuality) I know that transgender people identify along the same sexuality spectrum as cisgender people and that they see the two questions “what is your gender identity” and “what is your sexual orientation” as distinct. I actually think it is really unfortunate that many evangelicals seem to have decided that “the transgender question” must stand or fall with “the gay question”. I don’t think that is warranted at all.
Bill, yes, this helps and I think is important because far too many, in my opinion, are taking pot shots at exclusionary practices while, ironically, excluding people. It’s enough to drive me crazy!
And I’m not sure how to get mathematical on the certainty issue but I think you are onto something by raising that question 🙂
Thanks, Bill. I do hope that we can all love people regardless of whether we agree or disagree or are unsure. It bothers me in how unloving people can be with “generalizations” and “statistics,” something I’m sure I’m guilty of at times too.
But when you are dealing with people who are in process and who are searching and struggling and questioning and growing and learning… it’s a lot more human.
I’ll keep thinking on this. I think the “B” and the “T” are certainly challenging for the church to work through, so I’m still in “reflection” mode. I can see their being similarities but also seem to think there are some differences. So I’ll keep thinking!
Is it just Evangelicals that see that connection? I seem to see that connection laid out by non-evangelicals all of the time, including many non-Christians… for example, many organizations that are working toward sexual freedom/support tend to lump them all together.
That, of course, has little to do with the actual point you are making… which I’m still also reflecting on 🙂
Once the goals of the B crew are clear, I think they essentially align with L/G. Bisexual folks want to have same-sex marriage recognized, blessed etc… because many of them fall in love with people of the same sex and many who are, as yet, single maintain that they may begin a same sex relationship in the future.
So I think an important distinction here is between pragmatic/legal association and philosophical/moral/theological association. The transgender community does work closely with the LGB community and certainly many institutions other than the evangelical church have conflated them. My point is simply that the question “Does God proscribe all gay sex?” is a separate philosophical/moral/theological question from “Does God proscribe recognition of a persons perceived gender identity when it diverges from the sex of the body they were born with?”
Hey, guys! I am interested but not as educated as you on Paul, so I have a question for both of you: did Paul speak Greek or Roman? How educated was he? And Luke, could you clarify what you mean by your assertion that Bill’s understanding of the translations are incorrect? Why do you believe so? Is it simply because his meanings have not been brought to the table before, or is it because his ideas have already been challenged and found lacking somehow? If so, could you put forth those counter arguments?
Nichole, thanks for the questions (this is what we were hoping this conversation would get to!)
Paul definitely spoke Greek and (so far as I know) may have spoken the Latin of the Roman empire. He was really well educated, particularly in issues of Hebrew history and law, though he also shows evidence of familiarity with at least some classical Greek thinking and contemporary Roman law. We know he was a Roman citizen and that suggests that he would have at least had access to a fairly high-end Roman education.
Luke, please correct me if I am wrong on any of that info. and since the rest of the questions are directed to you: have fun buddy!
For instance (continuing the second paragraph below), I have no idea what your answer to the question “Does God proscribe recognition of a person’s perceived gender identity when it diverges from the sex of the body they were born with?”
I am nearly done with the next post (huzzah!) and it is already abundantly apparent that I will not be able to keep the length of these posts manageable and respond to the issues you raised so I will toss my rejoinders in here.
Luke said:
“In fact, in my reviewing of ALTMC, I read through literally every lexicon and theological dictionary I could get my hands on or that I own and found absolutely zero support to abandon the “traditional” understanding of these words – zero! So again, I’ll let you address this later.”
O.K. so my response to this is that there really is no clear “traditional” understanding of these words at all. The traditional interpretation of the passages as a whole has been to see them as condemning whatever the readers/translators of the time conceived of as the “man-sexers” and the “soft” (as close as I can find to literal translations of the term). The term and concept of homosexuality is only a few hundred years old and older translations of the Bible into English use terms like “Sodomite” and “Buggerer” to translate arsenekoitai which would technically restrict them to anal sex with either gender. Today’s translations are also pretty varied though most of them do touch on something to do with homosexuality. I am not trying, therefore, to overturn the traditional interpretation of either arsenekoita or malakoi but to nuance them, just has they have been nuanced time and again as they are translated into different languages with correspondingly different conceptualizations of sexuality. I do think it is a stretch to claim that the terms could map directly on to our contemporary models of human sexuality.
Luke: “But I think you make the very point that I see as crucial. If Paul invented the word, which appears to be highly probable (though it could have been a word used in Jewish circles), why did he not use words that were commonly used to describe pederasty?”
So here I want to point out that the Greek words which were commonly used to describe pederasty also included the possibility of a same sex-relationship which was neither abusive nor exploitative (e.g. the example of Patroclus and Achilles) but contained at least an element of love. If my Greek sources are correct, erastes and eromenos both have eros (romantic and physical love) as their root. It seems quite reasonable to conclude that Paul did not want to use words which allowed for the possibility of love because love isn’t what he was talking about.
Luke: “Perhaps it was because he wasn’t referring to pederasty but was, based on his understanding of Jewish Scripture, discussing homosexual acts in and of themselves. It’s already been established that Paul would have been aware of same-sex monogamous homosexual relationships, so that argument doesn’t work (see part 5 of my review).”
Of course that is a possibility but I think it far less likely than my conclusion. I grew up speaking Turkish and English and in my experience the most common reason to coin a word is when a foreign language contains a concept which is not available to the language one is speaking. Roman, Latin culture contained the concepts of entirely offensive gay relationships without the connotation of love. Greek didn’t and so it would have been most natural for Paul, writing in Greek and familiar with the Latin cultural context, to coin and adopt appropriate words. One does not generally coin a word without defining it unless the meaning would be readily available to one’s audience. The Latin model of gay relationships fulfills that role quite nicely.
As far as Paul’s awareness of “monogamous homosexual relationships”, I will be writing about this in the next post but I do think that the claim that Paul was aware of what we might define as “marriage equivalent, homosexual relationships” are far weaker than they are generally made out to be (point me at your research if you disagree, I haven’t been able to find it in the posts you linked) and is usually a disguise for a straw man claim that “Paul would have heard of a few exceptional instances where two men were married”. Yes he probably had but a few exceptional instances (especially when one of them is the mad emperor Nero) do not a cultural awareness make.
Finally though, yes, at the end of the day, I am speculating. My larger point here is that we are forced to speculate by the simple fact that Paul had ready made terms for active and passive gay partners and rejected them. Therefore it is, I hold, unwise to use these passages as support for any conclusions regarding the rightness or wrongness of all forms of gay sex since all interpretations will have to be built on speculation.
Luke: “Finally, I really appreciate your last issue/challenge because, quite frankly, it’s deeply personal and something that I am working through as well. I would, however, want to go into a discussion about discipleship and lordship. Do we both use those words in similar ways? I, for one, do not believe that becoming a follower of Jesus means we become perfect. I believe the NT teaches that sanctification is both an event (we are sanctified) and progressively happens over time (we are being saved).”
I completely agree with you on this, we definitely don’t become perfect the moment we become followers of Jesus (or anytime prior to death so far as I can tell). But if we refuse to change our harmful (to ourselves or others) actions we do bog down the process of sanctification – that is we carve out aspects of our lives where we are not living “in the Kingdom of God”. I don’t think that description applies to LGB Christians.
My last response here:
Luke: “However, I don’t need to change God’s prescribed will (revealed in Scripture) in order to justify my actions/thoughts, do I?”
Definitely not. But “change[ing] God’s prescribed will (revealed in Scripture)” is not what contemporary, evangelical, side A Christians are doing. We believe that God’s will (revealed in Scripture) has been misinterpreted on this topic.
Nichole,
Thanks for the questions! I apologize for being slow to respond. Been buried, as usual, with other pressing issues.
I believe Bill’s ideas concerning arsenekoitai and malakoi because, quite frankly, the most convincing scholarship has effectively argued against the proposal he is making.
For example, consider William Loader’s The New Testament on Sexuality. Loader, a “progressive” or “liberal” or “revisionist,” acknowledges the following:
Now to be fair, Loader does not believe the word “homosexual” is the best translation. That’s fine by me. Even Gagnon acknowledges that “for translation of 1 Cor 6:9 and 1 Tim 1:10 greater precision is advisable” (I believe Fee concedes this too, and he’s “traditional” and one of the foremost NT scholars in the world!). But make no mistake, Loader clearly states that Paul meant consenting and non-consenting homosexual sex because, again, Paul’s understanding was shaped by the Old Testament. In fact, previous to the aforementioned quote, Loader builds on Dover and writes:
So yes, Bill’s arguments are pretty novel when it comes to NT scholarship. Again, Loader is not a conservative and does not hold to a traditional position on sexuality. His way of “getting around” St. Paul is that he simply thinks Paul is wrong. Loader confirms the same ideas that Robert Gagnon, a conservative, makes in The Bible and Homosexual Practice. It has also been confirmed in numerous other books on the subject. And for a good understanding of the Old Testament background, which I think should be the first place to start when trying to understand what the Bible teaches on sexuality, look to Richard M. Davidson’s Flame of Yahweh.
I understand you believe this, Bill. The issue is that scholars, both “liberal” and “conservative” and “unknown” all disagree with you. Using Scroggs or Boswell is not advisable because they have been overturned by far too many.
Nuance away… but you can’t nuance away the fact that the OT background prohibited any and all homosexuality and Paul held the same view 🙂 See my response to Nichole with several sources that demonstrate that.
I appreciate you acknowledging that you are speculating. I don’t really have a response to that because I’m trying my best not to speculate! Ha ha!
Seriously, I’ve been asked to speculate on percentages on how I think Paul thought, but I want to avoid that at this point. I’d rather just weigh the evidence. The evidence is strikingly pointed against a revisionist reading of the texts though.
I do, however, think that we should nuance our approach and interaction, so we likely agree on that!
Yes. I understand you do not believe this applies to LGB Christians. For me, it applies to all Christians regardless of how they self-identify or have struggled or have lived. The Lordship of Jesus is, at the heart, a serious concern I have and that goes for everyone, not just LGBTQ people. In fact, I think the Church has deeply sinned in making that the defining issue!
Yes. And I would say, “I understand your intention and your believe. However, here is why you are wrong” and then I point them to the mountain of scholarship and evidence 🙂 ha ha ha ha!
Luke, thanks for your response, but I am still unclear on your opposition. I think I would like more supporting evidence. I read, “That argument doesn’t work” but I don’t follow the logic in how you arrived at that conclusion. Could you lay it out for me — premise, and so on? I would also like the evidence in “the evidence is against it” to be laid out. To what evidence do you refer? I am unfamiliar on the subject.
I am very unclear on your response to my question. How can you claim Bill’s ideas are novel while simultaneously claiming that they have already been weighed and judged lacking?
I am afraid I am not as familiar as you on this subject. Do you have a Bibliography for the authors you mentioned?
Finally, I issue you a challenge to find a better argument than an appeal to authority. If Bill’s ideas are novel, or even if they are not novel but contested, does not automatically mean that he is wrong. This would have meant Galileo was wrong, but we now know he wasn’t!
Nichole, the supporting evidence can be found in the links to amazon books that I listed above. I wish I had the time to unpack the nearly 2,000 plus pages of reading I’ve done but I simply don’t have that time. The previously quoted sections of Loader as well as reference to Davidson, Dover, Gagnon, etc. I think are good places to start, as well as other locations that can be found in previous posts I’ve done in review of ALTMC.
An idea can be understood as “novel” in a variety of ways. In my use, I’m simply saying that his argument against the standard way that NT lexicons and NT scholars address these Greek words are somewhat peculiar. Even those who would agree with his “open and affirming” position will acknowledge that St. Paul would not have held to an “open and affirming” reading of the texts (again, see Loader).
So I would recommend that if you are interested in understanding these issues better, it would be far more helpful if you’d take the time to read through three books: Davidson, Loader, and Gagnon (and throw in Dover or Brooten or Williams for good measure). Oh… and maybe William Webb’s book on trajectory hermeneutics too.
And finally, I disagree about appealing to authority, obviously. I first appeal to Scripture as authority and then secondly I would point to authorities that have made the convincing arguments I hold to. If I had the time I could walk you through their arguments but generally speaking that’s now how a scholarly interaction takes place. Of course, this isn’t necessarily a scholarly interaction as Bill and I are just having a conversation. That being said, I just don’t have the free time to type out each of the arguments 🙂 Plus, Bill and I are trying to keep these relatively concise (trying!!!).
Thank you for clarifying your use of the word “novel.”
I am used to reading scholarly works yet can’t find any specific references in your blog. I am missing direct links and don’t see a consistent way of citing works. A list of authors’ last names aren’t helpful unless there is a previous reference to them, which I apparently have missed. I am wanting to know their first names, the titles of the works, publication dates, publishers, page numbers, etc. Where can I find those? Just because I am unfamiliar with a certain subject and who the authorities might be, doesn’t mean I can’t familiarize myself; that is what citation is for!
I also disagree with you about the way a scholarly discussion is supposed to be conducted. Persuasive essays completely rely on supporting evidence. To say, “Nuh-uh! So-and-so says you’re wrong!” isn’t a real argument. (It is actually a logical fallacy.) At the very least, you must state why you appeal to your authority. That is, why do you believe his argument is sound (logical)?
I hope that in the spirit of gaining a participatory audience, you will be more open and engaging in the future. I can’t speak for others but I’m quickly losing interest in this discussion. You maybe have one more chance to convince me of something!
So the links provided in my first response to your first comment aren’t legit? If you click on the links provided, they take you to Amazon pages that not only provide way for you to order the aforementioned books but they also provide the full name of the authors.
Ummmm. Okay?
How about any of the links referenced in the actual response to Bill? There are links to works published here on the use of porneia as well as a review (that connects to other reviews) of ALTMC.
I guess we’re both losing interest because it’s kind of hard to take your comments seriously when you say you are missing direct links. They are standard HTML formatted hyperlinks that are in a different color than the other text surrounding them.
Ooops. I did lose interest. Hope those links that you seem to have missed work out though. They are great books.
But I don’t want to buy books on Amazon and read whole *books* and become just as an expert in order to get what you are saying. That’s not really how a presentation to a general audience works. The references in your first comment (with the page numbers) were more proper. Sorry if it sounded like you didn’t provide anything. It’s just not consistent throughout so it’s hard to follow when your argument relies so heavily on these citations. The point of proper citation is so your audience can follow along. That is what I am trying to say.
I also didn’t mean to sound rude when I said I was losing interest and create a contest to see who would first. I am being honest when I say I feel like you don’t seem open and engaging. I honestly feel marginalized and like you are being dismissive. Case in point, your comment above. Peace out and good luck to you both!
OK, I guess I was unclear there. Sorry. I do think it applies to LGB Christians just as it applies to all Christians. I just don’t think it applies to LGB Christians because of their being LGB.
Of course, neither of us like to speculate, but my argument is that speculation is unavoidable here. Do you see a distinction between my “speculation” based on relative likelihoods (which I have tried to show are based on as much evidence as I can gather) and your “weigh the evidence”? When the evidence is inconclusive we are left with speculation.
Haha, so I think this line of conversation fairly clearly establishes a case that these terms in themselves are not going to be convincing on one side or the other until we break down Romans, Leviticus and the relevant cultural views. All to come!
Hi, Bill, I’ll take the bait even though we are thinking about it elsewhere 🙂
I think your question ‘Does God proscribe…’ is an interesting one. However, I think it betrays a ‘hyper-cognitive’ bias, which is facsinating. I’m not sure we can place the mind over the body as you are implying – I would want to give the Creator the priority. If someone who has this question about themselves suddenly ends up in a coma, with a ‘female’ body and a ‘male’ mind, what gender are they? I don’t think the mind has nearly as much ultimate import as we in the West like to think it does. I think the body is a lot more important than we give it credit for.
Obviously the Intersex question goes somewhere else, but lets park that, as we are discussing it elsewhere 🙂
I’m just wondering, Bill – will you be dealing with loader/Davidson and the words, etc? You keep saying the evidence is inconclusive, but I think you’ll find Loader is pretty damning to your case about the meaning of certain greek words….
I don’t really have a problem with my arguments being novel – though I am not sure that they really are – so long as they are valid. That said, these are all fantastic resources on this subject (though I have to admit to some real difficulty reading Gagnon if only because he tends to come across as kind of a jerk).
Reading through your answer to Nichole though, I think I see a place that you (Luke) and I might be missing each other. I don’t mean to suggest that asenekoitai and malakoi do not represent consentual relationships but that they may not represent loving, healthy, committed, and certainly not covenant, relationships. Specifically I am suggesting that love – certainly not the same thing as consent if the sexual revolution is any indication – was exempt from the terms. I don’t see that this contradicts Loader, Dover, or Fee. I’m fairly certain it would cause Gagnon to call me names but…. he does that to just about anyone who disagrees with him.
I didn’t set out to deal with any of the scholars directly, not because I don’t think they are relevant – they are incredibly important – but because I have been approaching this conversation as a popular, rather than scholarly discussion. I actually don’t think Loader is as damning to my case as you might though.
Also the comments section is a perfectly fine area to go hyper scholarly so I am not trying to shut the conversation down, just heads up that my approach will remain vulgar (in the old sense) in upcoming posts.
I think I have a conditioned reluctance to bring up questions of mind-body dualism in public because it only takes 10 seconds for people to start yelling “gnosticism” at one another :).
I also still like my question, could you talk more about the “hyper-cognitive bias”? How does the bias work specifically and does it make you unable to answer the questions by committing your to an untenable premise (am I committing the complex question fallacy) or do you, at the end of the day, have an answer? “Yes, no, or in some situations”
I don’t love the coma question because I think it brings in more complication than it potentially solves – “what is going on with consciousness while someone is unconscious”. One could rather ask, “does a corpse have gender” and I suppose I don’t think it does, though for the sake of clarity I don’t think that our post-resurrection bodies, which are necessary for our continuation as complete persons, are materially dependent on our pre- resurrection bodies.
Funny thing is that I also think the body is a lot more important than we give it credit for. But if you will concede that there is some aspect of a human person which is incorporeal, and that (to reference our off-site discussion) gender is a real thing, then we are forced to conclude that either the body or the incorporeal part (the soul?) or some mix of the two must determine a person’s gender. If I say that it is the incorporeal part rather than the body (which does get to determine sex after all) I don’t think I am necessarily downplaying the body any more than I would be downplaying the importance of hands when I point out that it is the heart which pumps blood.
Hi guys!
Thanks for this conversation. Really excited see a nuanced, respectful, and diligent effort at tackling this issue. I’m sorry I’m late to the party, but I do have couple responses and questions for Bill:
1. I’m not convinced malakoi didn’t (sometimes) have a sexual connotation in the rest of Greek. I did a brief study on Perseus, and the first occurrence of malakos I happened upon (Plutarch, Lacaenarum Apophthegmata 2) uses it with pretty clear overtones (though not denotation) of sexual passivity: “When a foreigner made advances in a mild and leisurely [malakos] way, she pushed him aside, saying, ‘Get away from here, you who cannot play a woman’s part either.'” No idea how representative that is, but it wasn’t hard to find. How certain are you that malakos didn’t carry connotations of a passive sexual role?
2. I think it’s a bit of a stretch in wrapup point 2 to say eromenos and erastes indicate “loving, mutually supportive relationships.” Some pederastic relationships may have been loving and mutally supportive, and the terms may sometimes have meant non-pederastic relationships, but I don’t know that that’s the dominant association. (Would need to research this, though.) Do you have any support for this view besides Phaedrus’s very idealized (and rather iconoclastic) description of Achilles and Patroclus’s relationship?
3. Do you have references on Greek vs. Latin male-male relationships? I’m not familiar with the strong divide in ethos and your argument depends heavily on it. Would like to read up further if there are good (fairly introductory) sources available on this.
Apologies in advance if I’m betraying an obvious lack of familiarity with the broad strokes of this issue in ancient literature. I’m pretty unfamiliar with the broad strokes of this issue in ancient literature. Sigh.
Cheers!
Ben
Heya Ben, Thanks for the questions. Here is the best I’ve got:
1. I didn’t claim that malakoi never had a sexual connotation, it most certainly did. Beyond that, it most likely was used to refer to the receptive partner in gay sex. My point was that these uses account for a relatively small percentage of the word’s overall use and the fact that we find it on a vice list and not in the sort of context which would enable greater confidence certainty regarding which meaning of the word Paul might have been interested in (it also is used for the morally pliable or weak – which would fit the context as well) makes the assertion that it must be translated “effeminate” or “homosexual” problematic. So I would say that it is possible but not at all certain that Paul was using it in a sexual connotation. It is somewhat less likely that he was using it in a homosexual connotation, but again not impossible. I hope I have shown that even if Paul was using it in it’s (potential) “homosexual receptive partner” connotation, it does not thereby imply that Paul was condemning all instances of gay sex – more on that in the next post.
2. Again I think you are overstating my claim there. I pointed out that love etc. was within the lexical scope of eromenos and erastes not that those terms always indicated a loving relationship. They were certainly used to refer to pederastic relationships which would have been exploitative and non-loving. The point is that those terms could have implied the possibility of a loving etc. relationship and I think it is at least possible that Paul choose a neologism specifically in order to avoid the connotation of the possibility of love. In terms of sources I would additionally point you to the sacred band of Thebes as an example of loving, committed relationships in the classical Greek world.
3. My major sources for the distinction between Greek and Roman culture in relation to homosexuality were Freir and expecially Luis Crompton’s work “Homosexuality and Civilization”.
Heya Tom, just wanted to mention I have started a series on this question over at http://www.heavenandearthquestions.blogspot.com