Gay person in the bible

What Does the Bible Say About Homosexuality?

What Does The Bible State About Homosexuality?

Introduction

For the last two decades, Pew Explore Center has reported that one of the most enduring ethical issues across Christian traditions is sexual diversity. For many Christians, one of the most frequently first-asked questions on this topic is, “What does the Bible declare about attraction to someone of the same sex?”

Although its unlikely that the biblical authors had any notion of sexual orientation (for example, the word homosexual wasn't even coined until the late 19th century) for many people of faith, the Bible is looked to for timeless guidance on what it means to honor God with our lives; and this most certainly includes our sexuality.

Before we can jump into how it is that Christians can maintain the authority of the Bible and also affirm sexual diversity, it might be helpful if we started with a brief but clear overview of some of the assumptions informing many Christian approaches to understanding the Bible.

What is the Bible?

For Christians to whom the Bible

Has 'Homosexual' Always Been in the Bible?

Reprinted with permission from The Forge Online

The word “arsenokoitai” shows up in two different verses in the bible, but it was not translated to indicate “homosexual” until

We got to rest down with Ed Oxford at his home in Long Beach, California and talk about this ask.

You contain been part of a research team that is seeking to understand how the decision was made to put the pos homosexual in the bible. Is that true?

Ed: Yes. It first showed up in the RSV translation. So before figuring out why they decided to use that word in the RSV translation (which is outlined in my upcoming novel with Kathy Baldock, Forging a Sacred Weapon: How the Bible Became Anti-Gay) I wanted to view how other cultures and translations treated the identical verses when they were translated during the Reformation years ago. So I started collecting old Bibles in French, German, Irish, Gaelic, Czechoslovakian, Polish… you name it. Now I’ve got most European major languages that I’ve calm over time. An

Should a Christian have gay friends?

Answer



In considering whether a Christian should have gay friends, we depend on to ask ourselves whether Jesus would have gay friends. The New Testament nowhere identifies any specific individuals as homosexuals. So, there are no records of Jesus interacting with a lesbian. We know from the gospels, however, that Jesus loved everyone He encountered. He did not consider one group of people less deserving of the gospel than any other. In evidence, He went out of His way to deliver a demon-possessed man (Mark –20) and carry hope to an immoral female from a despised ethnic background (John 4). He healed lepers (Luke –19), pardoned an adulteress (John –11), and ate with tax collectors (Mark )—all of whom were considered unfit for the company of righteous people. We can assume Jesus would have spent time with homosexuals as well.

Homosexuality was a sin in Jesus’ day, and it is a sin now. God’s standards of human sexuality possess not changed. However, Jesus came to seek and to rescue the lost (Luke ). We learn from the gentle way H

Leviticus

“You shall not be situated with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination.”[1] It is not a surprise that this verse seems to say that male lover male sex is forbidden in the eyes of God. The dominant view of western Christianity forbids same-sex relations. This verse is one of the clobber passages that people cite from the Bible to condemn homosexuality. This essay first looks at the various ways the verse is translated into the English Bible and then explores some of the strategies used to create an affirming perception of what this corridor means for the LGBTQ community. More specifically, it presents the interpretation of K. Renato Lings in which Lev. refers to male-on-male incest.

While Lev. is used to condemn homosexuality, we must realize that the term “homosexuality” was only recently coined in the English language. So did this term remain in ancient Israel? Charles D. Myers, Jr. confirms that none of the prophets in the Hebrew Bible mention homosexuality.[2] He also contends that in ancient Israel same-sex relations were viewed as an ancient Near East difficulty. The anc