Homosexuality in the Bible

The topic of homosexuality is one of the major controversies in the Christian church today. Many books have been written from both the affirming and non-affirming views.1 Christians are wrestling with how exactly LGBTQ people fit into the church. There is a long tradition of exclusion and ostracization by the church as a whole. It has really been in the last 50 years that the church in the West has had to take another look at what the Bible has to say concerning homosexuality. There are Bible-believing evangelicals who have come to the conclusions that the Bible really doesn’t address the same situation that is currently going on in the USA concerning things such as gay rights/marriage. There are gay and straight Christians and scholars on both the affirming and non-affirming side. Many of these scholars take the Bible very seriously and try to read it in its original context (though they often come to differing conclusions). Most Christians believe that the Bible condemns many kinds of sexual sin, both homosexual and heterosexual. The real question being asked is “whether two men or two women can date, fall in love, remain sexually pure before their wedding day, and commit to a life-long, consensual, Christ-centered, self-giving, monogamous union… Does the Bible really address— and prohibit—these types of relations?”2 The goal of this paper is to examine the major areas of discussion when looking at homosexuality in the Bible, provide a brief survey of the different approaches used by both affirming and non-affirming scholars, and to make a choice on which arguments seem best.

There has traditionally been three major parts of the Old Testament that are discussed in the conversation of homosexuality and the Bible: Genesis 19:4-11 and the sin of Sodom, Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13.

The traditional stance of the church on this passage has been that Sodom was destroyed (or at least one of the reasons it was destroyed was) because of the homosexual desire of the men in that city who wanted to rape Lot’s guests (who were really angels sent to destroy Sodom). While both affirming and non-affirming scholars agree that consenting, monogamous relationships are not the focus of this story, non-affirming scholars still argue that homosexuality is wrong based upon this passage.

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Author: Andrew Harshman

Keywords: Homosexuality in ancient Rome, Ancient Rome, Immorality, Homosexual, Homosexuality, Gay, Lesbian, Lesbianism, Fags, Sex, Sexual immorality, Fornication, Beastiality, Sexual perversion, Malakos, God hates gays, God hates homosexuals, God hates homosexuality, Improper sex, Immoral sex, Anal penetration, Pervert, Perversion, Sexual deviance, Sexual deviant, LGBT, LGBTQ, Rainbow pride, Perverts, Homos, Faggot, Bi-sexual, Trans gender, Transgender, Bisexual, Transexual, Transvestite, strange flesh, same sex, same sex union, same sex unions, abomination, homosexuality an abomination, sexual sins, sexual sin, queer

Bible reference(s): Genesis 19:5, Leviticus 18:22, Leviticus 18:29, Leviticus 20:13, Judges 19:22, 1 Kings 14:24, Romans 1:26-27, Romans 1:32, 1 Corinthians 6:9, 1 Timothy 1:10, Jude 1:7

Source: Homosexuality in the Bible, 2017.

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