Four Myths of Pro-Homosex Propaganda: A
Response to Tex Sample’s “What Do Bible, Tradition Say About Gay
Marriage?”
Robert A. J. Gagnon, Ph.D.
Associate
Professor of New Testament, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary
gagnon@pts.edu
October
2003
On Aug. 12, 2003, the
United Methodist News Service posted a commentary by Tex Sample, emeritus
professor of church and society at Saint Paul School of Theology in Kansas
City, Mo (go
here). In the commentary Sample attempts to make a case for same-sex
marriage from Scripture and tradition. One can find a thorough rebuttal of
every one of Sample's claims in my book The Bible and Homosexual
Practice—a book published by the United Methodist publishing house
(Abingdon Press) a full two years ago and only a year or less after Sample
himself published a book on homosexuality with the same press. Yet Sample
writes as if he were totally unaware of the arguments employed therein. I
honestly wonder if Sample was put off by the 467 pages of heavily
documented text. If so, he can now read a shorter, 52-page essay of mine
entitled "The Bible and Homosexual Practice: Key Issues" in
Homosexuality and the Bible: Two Views (Fortress Press, 2003),
co-authored with Dan O. Via (see also my six-page response to Via in the
same book, as well as online notes [pdf
or
html], and a rejoinder to Via’s response [pdf
or
html]). Even Via makes no attempt to rebut my arguments for a
pervasive, absolute, and strong opposition in Scripture to all same-sex
intercourse. In addition to these materials, Sample can read a 50-page
essay of mine entitled "Does the Bible Regard Same-Sex Intercourse as
Intrinsically Sinful?" in an edited volume, Christian Sexuality
(ed. R. Saltzman; Minneapolis: Kirk House, 2003), 106-55 (again, with
online notes here [pdf
or
html] and companion material here [pdf
or
html]). This Christian Sexuality essay addresses not only the
question raised in the title but also "the male-female prerequisite in the
Genesis creation stories" (pp. 106-22) and "why the sexual orientation
argument does not work" (pp. 136-48).
In his comments Sample
perpetuates four myths.
Myth #1: Because
the biblical authors had no concept of sexual orientation or
homosexuality, the biblical witness against same-sex intercourse is not
binding on the church's deliberations today.
Reality Check #1:
So far as the Bible's critique of same-sex intercourse is concerned, a
sexual proclivity to homoerotic practice is not particularly new
information and, in any case, is quite beside the point.
Here are some facts to
keep in mind.
On the creation
stories and male-female structural complementarity. The reason for the
Bible's condemnation of same-sex intercourse has to do with the
structural discomplementarity of homoerotic attempts at sexual merger
(anatomical, physiological, interpersonal). Issues concerning loving
disposition and the exclusive direction of one's erotic desire are as
irrelevant to the condemnation of same-sex intercourse as they would be to
man-mother union and a sexual relationship between an adult and
prepubescent child. Genesis 2:18-24 portrays an originally binary human
split down the side into two sexually differentiated counterparts.
Clearly, marriage is imaged as a reconstitution, into "one flesh," of the
two constituent parts, male and female, that were the products of the
splitting. One’s sexual “other half” or "counterpart" can only be a person
of the other sex. Men and women are complementary sexual beings whose
re-merger brings about sexual wholeness in the sphere of erotic
interaction. This is so obvious a point that it is ludicrous to deny that
the author of Genesis 2 had no clue about the negative import of this
story for same-sex intercourse—and all the more ludicrous in view of the
Ham and Sodom narratives in the same literary corpus. Does Sample really
believe that, historically speaking, the absence of the missing sexual
complement in same-sex erotic unions would have been inconsequential to
the author of Genesis 2? The one prerequisite most stressed in the
narrative is the other-sex dimension. Aristophanes’ myth of human origins
in Plato’s Symposium (191e-193c) tells of the splitting of primal
male-female, male-male, and female-female humans and its effect on
same-sex and opposite-sex pairing (see The Bible and Homosexual
Practice, 353-54). Paul echoes Genesis 1:26-27 and 2:24 in his
critiques of same-sex intercourse in Romans 1:24-27 and 1 Corinthians 6:9
(see 6:16). Obviously, then, the ancients were capable of conceiving of
the implications of the kind of account given in Genesis 2:18-24.
Moreover, would Sample have us believe that the author(s) of Genesis 1—in
a chapter that gives special attention to issues of structural congruity
or "kinds"—failed to notice that there is anything structurally essential
to an other-sex union? "In the image of God he made the adam
[human]; male and female he made them" (1:27)—as complementary sexual
beings. Humans are angled or faceted expressions of the image of God,
"male and female." They have integrity as God's image independent of
sexual activity. Yet, when they engage in sexual activity, they
engage another in their particularity, as an incomplete part of a
two-faceted sexual whole. Ignoring this particularity by finding one's
"sexual counterpart" in a sexual same, effaces that part of the divine
image stamped on human sexuality rather than enhances it. Persons who
desire to merge sexually with a member of the same sex are erotically
stimulated by what they are as sexual beings. This is sexual narcissism
and/or sexual self-deception: an erotic desire either for oneself or for
what one wishes to be but, in fact, already is. For further discussion
see: "Intrinsically Sinful?," 106-22; Homosexuality and the Bible,
61-62, 78, 90-91; The Bible and Homosexual Practice, 56-62, 289-97.
On word, heart, and
act. Like many, Sample thinks that it is significant that the word
"homosexuality" was not coined until the 19th century. There
are countless other words for which there is no precise Greek or Hebrew
equivalent in the ancient world, including: incest, bestiality,
necrophilia, pornography, alcoholism, kleptomania, paranoia, and
addiction. So what? The absence of a particular word tells us little or
nothing about conceptual continuity. Sample also suggests that the Bible's
prohibition of homosexual practice is deficient because it does not make
distinctions based on the intensity, exclusivity, or entrenched character
of sexual desire or "orientation." This is akin to arguing that the
Bible's prohibition of man-mother sex is deficient because it considers
only the act. It is enough to prohibit the act because the act is never
good and always structurally incongruous, regardless of the loving
disposition or orientation of consensual participants. But Sample can rest
assured that homoerotic desire, whenever it is actively entertained, falls
under the same strictures as Jesus' warning against "adultery of the
heart."
On the sexual
orientation argument. Sample thinks that the concept of a "homosexual
orientation" is such a radically new thing that the biblical witness
against homosexual practice can be discarded. Sample "knows" that Paul
thought of homoerotic desire only as excess heterosexual desire. Had
Sample read pp. 380-95 in The Bible and Homosexual Practice he
might have realized how weak his argument is. In the ancient world the
label "excess passion" was often a way of demeaning a desire that on other
grounds had already been evaluated as abominable; otherwise, how would one
know to characterize the passion as excess? Certainly nothing in the
language of Romans 1:24-27 suggests that homoerotic desire is a chosen
condition of constitutional heterosexuals. The "exchanged" and "leaving
behind" in 1:26-27 refer to a choice of homosexual behavior (not desire)
over the transparent witness of male-female complementarity in nature. The
combination of these terms with the expressions "God gave them over" and
"inflamed with their yearning" suggests passions that are preexisting,
controlling, and exclusive.
In
addition, there were many theories in the Greco-Roman world about a
congenital basis for at least some homoerotic attraction. Even prohomosex
scholars of early Christianity such as Bernadette Brooten and William
Schoedel acknowledge that views akin to "sexual orientation" existed in
antiquity and probably would not have made a difference to Paul's
critique. Quite simply, many in the ancient world attributed some forms of
homoerotic practice to an interaction of biology and nurture, and believed
that homoerotic impulses could be very resistant to change. Yet many of
the same persons could still refer to the desire of some men to be
penetrated by men as "contrary to nature"; that is, as at odds with their
essential sex. Paul was probably aware—as was Philo of Alexandria—of the
existence of a lifelong homoerotic proclivity, certainly among some men
who desired to be penetrated by other males (so the malakoi in 1
Corinthians 6:9). As with some Greco-Roman moralists and doctors, Paul
undoubtedly could have made a distinction between conditions given "by
nature" (e.g., disease, various sinful impulses) and conditions
constituted "according to nature." Even exaggerated claims about
"homosexual orientation" are compatible with Paul's view of sin as
congenital in Romans 5 and 7. For Paul understood sin to be (1) an innate
impulse, (2) operating in the members of the human body, (3) passed on by
an ancestor figure, and (4) never entirely within human control. See
further "Intrinsically Sinful?," 136-48.
On science. At the
same time we should not exaggerate what scientific and socio-scientific
data tell us. Congenital factors in homosexual development are not
determinate. At most they are indirect and heavily contingent upon
macrocultural and microcultural shaping. Contrary to what Sample
apparently thinks, no one is born homosexual (see The Bible and
Homosexual Practice, 395-429; also "Theology, Analogies, and Genes,"
9-12, online
here).
On theo-logic.
Sample never bothers explaining to readers why the existence of an alleged
"orientation" should make any significant difference in the moral
valuation of sexual behaviors. Pedophiles have a "sexual orientation"
aimed at children, some exclusively so. Should that have any bearing on
the question of societal approval, given that some children grow up
asymptomatic in terms of negative effects? Would Sample want to sanction a
man-mother or adult brother-sister union if it could be established that
an "orientation" was involved? A recent massive cross-cultural study by
evolutionary psychologists, published in the July 2003 issue of the
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, indicates that men have
a much stronger desire for multiple sex partners than do women (what would
we do without experts?). Given this, should we sanction a certain amount
of infidelity for men? Since when did the church decide that the intensity
of fleshly impulses should determine what is moral and what isn't?
According to the Scriptures God is in the business of recreating us in the
image of Christ, usually in ways that are at odds with our fleshly
impulses. Christ is Lord, not any constitutional predisposition that we
might have.
Myth #2:
Same-sex intercourse is only a minor concern of Scripture and the few
texts that speak about it are ambiguous.
Reality Check #2:
The biblical proscription of same-sex intercourse is pervasive, absolute,
and strong, and it is all those things in opposition to the more
"tolerant" milieus out of which Scripture emerged. The biblical witness
against same-sex intercourse is as clear as the biblical witness against
man-mother sex and bestiality.
Consider the following
facts.
On Sodom, Gibeah, and
Ham. Contrary to what Sample alleges, the stories of Sodom (Genesis
19:4-11) and the Levite at Gibeah (Judges 19:22-25)—and to these we can
add the story of Ham's incestuous, same-sex rape of Noah (Genesis 9:20-27;
see The Bible and Homosexual Practice, 63-71)—are not condemning
only coercive forms of male-male intercourse. These are "kitchen sink"
stories of ultimate depravity that include a critique of treating males as
though they were females with an orifice for sexual penetration. How do we
know this? It is self-evident when the Sodom narrative is read
contextually—that is, in the light of an array of literary concentric
circles that fan out from the text itself: (1) other material in Genesis
through Numbers by the same author (including Genesis 2:18-24); (2) other
material in early Israelite literature (note, for example, the ideological
link between the Ham story in Gen 9:20-27 and sex laws in Leviticus 18 and
20; also, the Deuteronomistic Historian's repugnance for the homoerotic
associations of the qedeshim or "male cult prostitutes" in Deut
23:17-18; 1 Kings 14:24; 15:12; 22:46; 2 Kings 23:7; compare Job 36:14;
Rev 21:8; 22:15); (3) other material in the ancient Near East, which often
disparage males who willingly play the role of females in sexual
intercourse; and (4) the subsequent history of interpretation, including
Ezekiel 16:49-50 (which reads the Sodom narrative through the lens of the
Levitical Holiness Code) and Jude 7 and 2 Peter 2:7, 10 (which emphasize
the sexual desire of the inhabitants). For the documentation behind the
claims made above, I refer readers to The Bible and Homosexual Practice,
43-110 (esp. 63-110) and Homosexuality and the Bible: Two Views,
56-68. For the narrators of the stories of Sodom, Ham, and Gibeah the
difference between consent and coercion as regards the penetrated partner
in male-male intercourse is the difference between a man who willingly
dishonors himself and a man who is forcibly dishonored by others.
On Counting and
Scripture's Pervasive Opposition. The constellation of texts that one
can bring to bear on the interpretation of Ham, Sodom, and Gibeah stories
underscores an important point. The Levitical prohibitions of male-male
intercourse are not isolated texts but cohere with a broad-based
opposition to same-sex intercourse in Scripture. Texts that implicitly
reject homosexual unions run the gamut of the entire Bible, including
not only the creation stories in Genesis 1-3, the Apostolic Decree in Acts
(15:20, 29; 21:25) and other porneia (“sexual immorality”) texts,
and texts that reject overt attempts at blurring sexual differentiation
(e.g., cross-dressing in Deuteronomy 22:5 or hairstyles in 1 Corinthians
11:2-16), but also the whole range of narratives, laws, proverbs,
exhortations, metaphors, and poetry that presume the sole legitimacy of
heterosexual unions. Nowhere is there the slightest indication of openness
anywhere in the Bible to homoerotic attachments, including the narrative
about David and Jonathan. To assert, as Sample does, that same-sex
intercourse was only a minor concern to the authors of Scripture is
ridiculous. The truth is that, so far as extant evidence indicates, every
biblical author would have been appalled by any same-sex intercourse
occurring among the people of God. And we have not yet touched on the
unequivocal witness of early Judaism (The Bible and Homosexual Practice,
159-83).
Sample
not only miscounts when he refers to "only five passages" as evidence of
same-sex intercourse being a "minor issue," he also misconstrues frequency
of mention with importance. A form of sexual behavior regarded as even
more extreme than male-male intercourse is mentioned less in
Scripture: bestiality (Exodus 22:19; Leviticus 18:22; 20:15-16;
Deuteronomy 27:21; not at all in the New Testament). Does Sample want to
argue that sex with an animal was also a "minor concern" to biblical
authors? How about incest, particularly man-mother incest? Texts pertinent
to this issue are no more numerous than those having to do with same-sex
intercourse. Indeed, if not for the case of a Corinthian believer having
intercourse with his stepmother, there would not be a single mention of
incest in all of the New Testament. I suppose that we can be grateful for
the occurrence of this act at Corinth. Without it Sample and others might
be contending that Scripture treats consensual adult incest as a minor
matter. What Sample and those who share his views do not stop to think
about is that some acts in ancient Israel and early Christianity were
regarded as so heinous, with the incidence of violation among God's people
so rare, the degree of societal consensus so great, and the scriptural
stance so unequivocal that it was not necessary to give frequent
expressions of disapproval. Same-sex intercourse was one such act. See
further: The Bible and Homosexual Practice, 432-41.
On Leviticus 18:22 and
20:13. Sample dismisses the Levitical prohibitions too easily by
noting their placement within the Holiness Code. The case is actually
quite strong that these prohibitions remain relevant. First, as noted
above, they are part of a broader Old Testament witness. Second, they are
grouped with prohibitions of other sex acts that largely remain in force
today. Third, they treat male-male intercourse as a first-tier sexual
offense, unlike some of the now defunct elements of the Holiness Code.
True, we no longer treat male-male intercourse, adultery, incest, and
bestiality as capital offenses. We do not, however, discard the emphatic
prohibition. Fourth, these prohibitions contain an implicit rationale that
is compatible with creation accounts: a man shall not lie with a male "as
though lying with a woman." In other words, a man must not do with the
same sex what God has designed to be done with the other sex—have sexual
intercourse. Fifth, Sample seems not to understand the important role that
purity taboos play in curbing illicit sexual behavior. Sixth, these
prohibitions are clearly picked up in various ways in the context of
Romans 1:24-27, 1 Corinthians 6:9, and 1 Timothy 1:10—not the least of
which is the formation of the word arsenokoitai ("men who lie with
a male") from the Levitical prohibitions. The unqualified and absolute
character of Lev 18:22 and 20:13 make it difficult to restrict the
biblical witness only to certain exploitative forms of male-male
intercourse, as Sample would like to do. See further: The Bible and
Homosexual Practice, 111-46; Homosexuality and the Bible,
62-68.
On 1 Corinthians 6:9
and 1 Timothy 1:10. Sample dismisses the references to participants in
male-male intercourse in 1 Corinthians 6:9 and 1 Timothy 1:10 as ambiguous
and as targeting only particularly exploitative forms. Nothing could be
further from the truth. The evidence is overwhelming that the combination
of malakoi (literally, "soft men," i.e., effeminate men who play
the sexual role of females) and arsenokoitai (see above) is
correctly appropriated for our contemporary context when applied to every
conceivable type of male-male intercourse (an indictment of female-female
intercourse is implied). Ample grounds for this conclusion can be found in
The Bible and Homosexual Practice, 303-36 and now also in
Homosexuality and the Bible, 81-88 (with online notes). Sample's
dismissal runs up against the specifically Judeo-Christian formation of
the word
arsenokoitai from the
absolute
prohibitions of Lev 18:22 and 20:13 (note too that the term in 1 Tim 1:10
appears within a vice list explicitly formulated from "the law"). It finds
no justification in extant usage of the word
arsenokoites
and related forms in antiquity, nor in the fact that the term
malakoi and related words were applied to consenting adults with a
predisposing condition and without connection to prostitution or to cultic
activity. It ignores what Paul finds wrong about same-sex intercourse in
Rom 1:24-27 (i.e., its same-sexness). It overlooks the analogue with the
case of the incestuous man that dominates 1 Cor 5-6—a form of sexual
immorality that likewise involves structural incompatibility due to too
much sameness, regardless of degree of consent and commitment. It
disregards the other-sex requirement for sexual behavior enunciated in Gen
2:24, which Paul cites in the immediate context (6:16). Finally, it
sidesteps the relevant discussion of marriage in very next chapter (1 Cor
7), which presumes, as everywhere in Scripture, the sole legitimacy of
other-sex marriage.
On Romans 1:24-27 and
idolatry. Sample holds to the nonsensical assertion that the only kind
of homosexual practice that Paul rejects in Romans 1:24-27 is the kind
that "grows out of idolatry." In The Bible and Homosexual Practice
I specifically address the question "Did Paul think only idol worshipers
could engage in same-sex intercourse?" (pp. 284-89). The obvious answer is
"No." If we follow Sample's reasoning we would have to conclude that the
rest of the vice list which is filled out in Romans 1:29-31, as well as
the vices contained in other Pauline vice lists (including 1 Corinthians
6:9-10), refer only to actions perpetrated by persons who worship statues
of pagan gods—a point that Paul emphatically denies in Romans 2:21-24. In
Romans 1:18-32 Paul is speaking in terms of collective entities, not
individuals, and in terms of the widespread effect, not origin. Sin is
more likely to be rampant in cultures that do not profess the one true
God—obviously—but that does not preclude the same sinful impulses from
operating among God's people. Later in Romans 6:19 Paul warns Christian
believers—not just pagan idolaters—against returning to a life of slavery
to "sexual uncleanness." This is an obvious back-reference to the "sexual
uncleanness" of such things as same-sex intercourse in 1:24-27. Paul knew
full well that rejecting Christ for idols was not a necessary prerequisite
for desiring and engaging in same-sex intercourse. The whole presumption
of the discussion regarding the incestuous man in 1 Corinthians 5-6 is
that confessing Christians are quite capable of acting on immoral sexual
impulses—including impulses to have sex with close kin, someone other than
one's spouse, a person of the same sex, or a prostitute.
On Romans 1:24-27 and
exploitation. Sample thinks that Paul was not opposed to same-sex
intercourse per se but only to forms of same-sex intercourse with
an added exploitative dimension such as idolatry, prostitution, or "some
kind of economic exploitation." All that Sample has to do is read
carefully Romans 1:26-27 in context to discern that what bothers Paul
about female-female or male-male intercourse is the absence of a gender
complement and the narcissistic and/or delusional attempt at merging with
a sexual same. Both here and in 1 Corinthians 6 the creation stories are
the subtext. Paul was not just looking at how well or poorly same-sex
intercourse was done in his cultural environment but at God's prescriptive
norm for male-female sexuality in Genesis 1-2. The nature argument that
Paul employed is of the same order: Even "pagans" who do not have access
to the Scriptures of the Jews have enough evidence of male-female
complementarity in material creation to realize that God intended sexual
unions to be other-sex pairings. Sample also operates on the assumption
that the ancient mind could not conceive of non-exploitative homoerotic
unions. This is patently false. Had Paul wanted to endorse a
nonexploitative form of same-sex intercourse, he could have chosen from a
range of options available to him in his cultural environment. Sample
seems to be confusing the position of Paul, and of early Christianity
generally, with the positions of some Greco-Roman moralists sympathetic to
one or more forms of homoerotic behavior. See further: The Bible and
Homosexual Practice, 254-97, 347-60, 369-80; Homosexuality and the
Bible, 76-81.
Myth #3: Jesus'
citation of Genesis 1:27 and Genesis 2:24 in the context of discussing
divorce and remarriage in Mark 10:6-7 tells us nothing about Jesus' views
on same-sex intercourse. Indeed, we cannot know whether Jesus was opposed
to homosexual practice because he did not speak to it directly.
Reality Check #3:
Jesus' reference to a prescriptive male-female norm at creation, combined
with other sayings of Jesus interpreted in their cultural context, provide
overwhelming evidence that Jesus was opposed to all same-sex intercourse.
Although Jesus in Mark
10:2-12 focused on the indissolubility of marriage, he clearly
presupposed as the one essential prerequisite that there be a
male and female, man and woman. The wording of Genesis 1:27 and 2:24 make
this quite obvious: "Male and female he made them" and "For this
reason a man . . . shall be joined to his woman/wife and the
two shall become one flesh." Only a "man" and a "woman" are structurally
capable of becoming "one flesh" through a sexual union because, as we
noted above, the creation stories depict gender differentiation as the
only differentiation created by the splitting of an original sexual
whole. On the level of erotic intimacy, sexual wholeness requires the
restoration of the constituent parts. The fact that Jesus cites Genesis
1:27 and 2:24 back-to-back suggests that Jesus understood the "for this
reason" introducing 2:24 as alluding to the gender differentiation
established in 1:27. For this reason—namely, because God made them
male and female, complementary sexual beings (1:27)—man and woman may be
joined in a permanent one-flesh union (2:24). For Jesus, then, the Creator
ordained marriage—it is not just a social construct—as a lifelong union of
one man and one woman for the purpose of forming an indissoluble sexual
whole. Both the Scriptures that Jesus cited with approval and the audience
that Jesus addressed—indeed the whole of early Judaism so far as extant
evidence indicates—presumed the male-female prerequisite. Jesus clearly
agreed.
Sample expects us to believe that Jesus
picked up from Genesis 1-2 inferences regarding monogamy and permanence
but nothing regarding the sex of the participants. This is historical
lunacy.
When Jesus
cited Genesis 1:27 and Genesis 2:24 to address the issue of divorce, he
was not divesting them of their implicit proscription of all homoerotic
behavior. He was narrowing further an already narrowly defined
understanding of normative sexuality, drawn in part from these creation
stories, to mandate the indissoluble character of marriage as well. Jesus
was not making lifelong monogamy a more important consideration for sexual
relations than the heterosexual dimension. The latter remained for Jesus
the unshakeable prime prerequisite for all considerations of fidelity and
longevity. Certainly no reasonable person would argue that Jesus
prioritized monogamy and permanence over the intra-human and
non-incestuous character of normative sexual relationships. Because Jesus'
conviction about a male-female prerequisite at creation was shared
throughout early Judaism, he could focus on other facets of sexual
relationships over which disputes existed in his cultural context.
Sample
thinks that, because Jesus left his parents for a celibate life rather
than for married life, Christians today "must be open to other possible
options." This is a bad analogy. Genesis 2:18-24 does not treat singleness
as sin. A structurally incompatible relationship is not formed by a life
of sexual abstinence. But the biblical witness is eminently clear that
same-sex intercourse is sin. Had Jesus thought that he was
violating Genesis 1:27 and 2:24 by remaining celibate, he would have
undermined his entire position before the Pharisees. His whole argument is
predicated on the line "But from the beginning of creation . . ." (Mark
10:6). In other words, precedent established by God at creation trumps
everything else. Jesus rightly understood the creation texts to be saying,
"If sex is to be had, this is how it is be done: a man and woman in
lifelong monogamous union." Anything else is sin.
If space permitted, we could extend the
discussion further to demonstrate Jesus' opposition to same-sex
intercourse by pointing to:
·
The univocal
and intensely strong rejection of same-sex intercourse in the Hebrew
Bible, early Judaism, and early Christianity—including by Paul, who was a
far more vigorous critic of the law of Moses than Jesus.
·
Jesus' view of the law of
Moses generally, in which Jesus prioritized "the weightier matters,"
amended the law to close loopholes, and intensified many of its demands,
without abrogating any portion thereof (Matt 5:21-48; 23:23).
·
In particular, Jesus'
general intensification of sexual ethics, including divorce and remarriage
(Mark 10:2-12; Matt 5:32 and Luke 16:18; 1 Cor 7:10-11) and adultery of
the heart (Matt 5:27-28), and the application of the saying about cutting
off offending body parts to sexual behavior (Matt 5:29-30).
·
Other sayings of Jesus that
implicitly forbid same-sex intercourse: sayings on "sexual immoralities" (porneiai;
Mark 7:21-23); on the Decalogue command against adultery (Mark 10:17-22);
on Sodom (Luke 10:10-12 and Matt 10:14-15); and on not giving what is holy
to the "dogs" (Matt 7:6).
For elaboration of these points
I refer readers to The Bible and Homosexual Practice, ch. 3 (pp.
185-228) and Homosexuality and the Bible: Two Views, 68-74. When
referring to the "silence" of Jesus regarding same-sex intercourse,
"silence" has to be put in quotes because, in so many ways, Jesus was not
silent about same-sex intercourse—any more than he was silent about incest
or bestiality.
Myth #4:
"The ends of marriage as understood in the tradition of the church are
ends that homosexual marriage can fulfill"; namely, procreation (loosely
defined), fidelity, and, chiefly, "loving companionship."
Reality Check #4:
The purposes of marriage cited above apply only after the prerequisites
for marriage are met: prerequisites regarding age, degree of kinship,
number of partners, and, most of all, the sex or gender of the
participants. The chief end of marriage is to find sexual wholeness, on
the level of erotic intimacy, through re-merger with one's sexual
"counterpart" or "other half."
Sample and others would
have us believe that the church over centuries held a view of marriage
that involved no structural prerequisites—from Augustine to the great
Reformers and down into our own time. This is manifestly false. The church
has always believed that certain prerequisites had to be met before aims
such as "loving companionship" could come into view. Chief among
these—apart from the non-bestial aspect—has been the other-sex
prerequisite. Does Sample really think that, when John Wesley looked at
human sexual relationships, he viewed the sex of the participants as
irrelevant to the aims of marriage? Obviously, Augustine, Luther, Calvin,
Wesley, Barth, and all the great figures of the church down through the
ages thought that the male-female dynamic was an inviolable element of all
legitimate sexual unions.
A
sexual relationship is about much more than intimacy in the context of
lifelong commitment. It is about merging (interlocking, fusing) with
another who is structurally complementary (congruous, compatible),
“becoming one flesh” through a sexual relationship, and learning to
integrate holistically with another who is neither too much like oneself,
nor too much unlike, on a structural level. Intimacy with one’s
parent, child, a wide circle of friends, or even beloved pet is a
wonderful thing. Adding sex to the mix, however, changes completely the
dynamics of such relationships. It is not just a matter of more intimacy.
An erotic element turns intimacy into a desire to merge sexually.
When Sample
tells us that homosexual unions can fulfill all the ends of
marriage—"raising children for the kingdom of God," "fidelity," and
"loving companionship"—he appears oblivious to the fact that a consensual
adult relationship between a man and his mother is also capable of
fulfilling all these ends. The same applies to an adult brother-sister
union and a sexual union of three persons or more. It could even be
stretched to include some adult-child and human-animal unions. This
underscores the absurdity of maintaining that the purposes of marriage
outlined by Sample can be isolated from a number of structural
prerequisites. Like most pro-homosex arguments, this one completely
unravels in the face of applying apt analogies. The extent to which Sample
does not view the reconstitution of male and female into a sexual whole as
the central, indispensable feature of “becoming one flesh” is the extent
to which Sample deviates from the creation texts, the entire witness of
Scripture, and two millennia of church tradition.
Conclusion. When
Sample and others claim that homosexual marriage "is not in violation of
Scripture or tradition," they foist a monumental lie on the church.
"Homosexual marriage" is a gross violation of Scripture and church
tradition—to say nothing of being a structural oxymoron. No appeal to
"sexual orientation" can change this. The bottom line is: Sample has not
done his homework well. Appended to his comments is the note that he is
"indebted to the work of Daniel M. Bell, Jr." (I presume, from an internet
search, he is referring to an assistant professor of theological
ethics—not biblical studies—at Lutheran Theological Southern Seminary.) My
advice to Dr. Sample is to read a bit more widely and more critically
before he passes himself off to others as someone with the expertise to
state that same-sex intercourse is "not in violation of Scripture or
tradition." He especially needs to examine carefully the most recent
literature in biblical studies on the pro-complementarity side. If he is
not capable of mustering solid arguments to rebut that position, it is
probably best that he acknowledges the severe limitations of his viewpoint
rather than misrepresent to others the biblical witness. The one and only
position of Scripture remains: Love the person with homosexual temptations
by reaching out in supportive friendship and caring enough to warn of the
eternal risk of serial, unrepentant homoerotic behavior.
© 2003 Robert A. J. Gagnon