Wormwood said:
Aaron,
I don't have time to deal with all the Greek words mentioned above. I will simply look at Romans 1 26-27. The phrase "dishonorable passions" is: πάθη ἀτιμίας
The first word is pathe. It means lust or desire. It is based on a word that means "to suffer" but pathe means passion.
The second word is atimias. Time' means "honor, respect." The a- at the beginning is a negation. For instance, theos means God, or god, wheras atheos means without God, or no God. Thus, atimias means without honor, or dishonorable. Thus, the phrase simply means "dishonorable passions." Just because a phrase can be used to describe something that took place in pagan temples, does not mean it is associated ONLY with that behavior. Yes, the orgies in the temples were the result of "dishonorable passions" but that does not mean that it only refers to idolatrous, pagan behavior.
παρὰ φύσιν means "against nature." Its really that simple. Para is a preposition means - "against, or contrary to" and phusin means "nature." Where are you getting "unconventional" from these two words?
This is just not true. Pais can mean son, boy (or girl) or young servant. It is estimated that about 50% of the Roman Empire was made of slaves/servants. This word is used all the time in reference to young servants and has absolutely NO sexual connotation.
In sum, the things you are posting here are not true. This is grasping at straws. The meaning of Romans 1:26-27 is very clear. It has nothing to do with someone's "natural passions" but someone's passions that are contrary to nature and therefore are dishonorable or ἀσχημοσύνην which means "shameless, disgraceful, or embarrassing." (which is often uses of sexual acts that are deemed to be disgraceful)
If you take any standard KoineGreek course you will find that this is how these words are simply translated. However, today we have people on an agenda to approve of a behavior so they search all kinds of Greek texts to see if one variant meaning can be found, no matter how remote, in an effort to create a loop-hole for the desired behavior or activity. The very plain meaning of these texts is easy to understand and should be accepted as God's instruction on the issue for those who believe the Bible to be of divine origin.
Hi Wormwood, I'm sorry but we'll have to respectfully agree to disagree then, and have to note that we are not Jewish people living in pre-Christian times under Levitical purity laws, or the Torah, but rather, under the grace of Jesus' teachings of love and acceptance.
As well, this is not just 'me' who believes this, but many different entire Christian denominations, consisting of thousands of congregations, and millions of Christians, who agree with what I share with you.
For an excellent and thorough discussion of the terms pais and entimos doulos in these two gospel accounts, see Donald Mader’s article The Entimos Pais of Matthew 8:5-13 and Luke 7:1-10,(Source:
Homosexuality and Religion and Philosophy, Harland Publishing, Inc., New York, 1998).
For Further Study, Books: The Children Are Free: Reexamining the Biblical Evidence on Same-sex Relationships by Rev. Jeff Miner and John Tyler Connoley, clear, and amazingly easy to read, this book does much more than offering loopholes or excuses with regards to the Bible. Instead, the authors combine careful research with a tremendous respect for God's Word, using humor, personal stories, and Biblical examples to make their case." Holy Homosexuals: The Truth about Being Gay or Lesbian and Christian by Rev. Michael S. Piazza. Rev. Piazza makes his case eloquently in a book suitable for lay people and clergy alike. Piazza shows a deep respect for scripture, while educating the reader on context in both Hebrew and Greek society.
Is It a Choice? Answers to the Most Frequently Asked Questions About Gay & Lesbian People, Third Edition by Eric MarcusIs the Homosexual My Neighbor? A Positive Christian Response by Letha Scanzoni and Virginia Mollenkott. This compassionate book examines the meanings and intents of Scripture, but also speaks of real people's lives, and challenges Christians (gay and not) to re-examine their attitudes toward gay and lesbian people.
Rogers Evangelical theologian and former Moderator of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) Jack Rogers observes that today's church is led by many of those who were once cast out: people of color, women, and divorced and remarried people, and he argues that we must interpret the Bible through the lens of Jesus' redemptive life and ministry.
The Bible provides three key pieces of textual and circumstantial evidence. First, in the Luke passage, several additional Greek words are used to describe the one who is sick. Luke says this pais was the centurion’s entimos doulos. The word doulos is a generic term for slave, and was never used in ancient Greek to describe a son/boy. Thus, Luke’s account rules out the possibility the sick person was the centurion’s son; his use of doulos makes clear this was a slave. However, Luke also takes care to indicate this was no ordinary slave. The word entimos means “honored.” This was an “honored slave” (entimos doulos) who was his master’s pais.
Taken together, the three Greek words preclude the possibility the sick person was either the centurion’s son or an ordinary slave, leaving only one viable option: he was his master’s male lover.
A second piece of evidence is found in verse 9 of Matthew’s account. In the course of expressing his faith in Jesus’ power to heal by simply speaking, the centurion says, “When I tell my slave to do something, he does it.” By extension, the centurion concludes that Jesus is also able to issue a remote verbal command that must be carried out. When speaking here of his slaves, the centurion uses the word doulos. But when speaking of the one he is asking Jesus to heal, he uses only pais. In other words, when he is quoted in Matthew, the centurion uses pais only when referring to the sick person. He uses a different word, doulos, when speaking of his other slaves, as if to draw a distinction. (In Luke, it is others, not the centurion, who call the sick one an entimos doulos.)
Again, the clear implication is that the sick man was no ordinary slave. And when pais was used to describe a servant who was not an ordinary slave, it meant only one thing: a slave who was the master’s male lover.
The third piece of evidence is circumstantial. In the Gospels, we have many examples of people seeking healing for themselves or for family members. But this story is the only example of someone seeking healing for a slave. The actions described are made even more remarkable by the fact that this was a proud Roman centurion (the conqueror/oppressor) who was humbling himself and pleading with a Jewish rabbi (the conquered/oppressed) to heal his slave.The extraordinary lengths to which this man went to seek healing for his slave is much more understandable, from a psychological perspective, if the slave was his beloved companion.
Thus, all the textual and circumstantial evidence in the Gospels points in one direction. For objective observers, the conclusion is inescapable: In this story Jesus healed a man’s male lover. When understood this way, the story takes on a whole new dimension.
Imagine how it may have happened. While stationed in Palestine, the centurion’s pais becomes ill, experiencing some type of life-threatening paralysis. The centurion will stop at nothing to save him. Perhaps a friend tells him of rumors of Jesus’ healing powers. Perhaps this friend also tells him Jesus is unusually open to foreigners, teaching his followers that they should love their enemies, even Roman soldiers. So the centurion decides to take a chance. Jesus was his only hope.
As he made his way to Jesus, he probably worried about the possibility that Jesus, like other Jewish rabbis, would take a dim view of his homosexual relationship. Perhaps he even considered lying. He could simply use the word duolos. That would have been accurate, as far as it went. But the centurion probably figured if Jesus was powerful enough to heal his lover, he was also powerful enough to see through any half-truths.
So the centurion approaches Jesus and bows before Him. “Rabbi, my . . . ,” the word gets caught in his throat. This is it, the moment of truth. Either Jesus will turn away in disgust, or something wonderful will happen. So, the centurion clears his throat and speaks again. “Rabbi, my pais — yes, my pais lies at home sick unto death.” Then he pauses and waits for a second that must have seemed like an eternity. The crowd of good, God-fearing people surrounding Jesus probably became tense. This was like a gay man asking a televangelist to heal his lover. What would Jesus do?
Without hesitation, Jesus says, “Then I will come and heal him.”
It’s that simple! Jesus didn’t say, “Are you kidding? I’m not going to heal your pais so you can go on living in sin!” Nor did he say, “Well, it shouldn’t surprise you that your pais is sick; this is God’s judgment on your relationship.” Instead, Jesus’ words are simple, clear, and liberating for all who have worried about what God thinks of gay relationships. “I will come and heal him.”
At this point, the centurion says there is no need for Jesus to travel to his home. He has faith that Jesus’ word is sufficient. Jesus then turns to the good people standing around Him, those who were already dumbfounded that He was willing to heal this man’s male lover. To them, Jesus says in verse 10 of Matthew’s account, “I have not found faith this great anywhere in Israel.” In other words, Jesus holds up this gay centurion as an example of the type of faith others should aspire to.
Jesus didn't just tolerate this gay centurion. He said he was an example of faith — someone we all should strive to be like.
Then, just so the good, God-fearing people wouldn't miss His point, Jesus speaks again in verse 11: “I tell you, many will come from the east and the west [i.e., beyond the borders of Israel] to find a seat in the kingdom of heaven, while the heirs [i.e., those considered likely to inherit heaven] will be thrown into outer darkness.” By this statement Jesus affirmed that many others like this gay centurion, those who come from beyond the assumed boundaries of God’s grace, are going to be admitted to the kingdom of heaven. And He also warned that many who think themselves the most likely to be admitted will be left out.
In this story, Jesus restores a gay relationship by a miracle of healing and then holds up a gay man as an example of faith for all to follow. So consider carefully: Who is Lord, Jesus or cultural prejudice?
The Christian
[SIZE=10.5pt]Byzantine[/SIZE] [SIZE=10.5pt]emperor [/SIZE]
[SIZE=10.5pt]Justinian the Great[/SIZE] [SIZE=10.5pt]instituted two law novelizations in the 6th century.[/SIZE] Regarding the
[SIZE=10.5pt]Corpus iuris civilis[/SIZE][SIZE=10.5pt], Justinian's novel no. 77 (dating 538) and no. 141 (dating 559) was the first to declare that Sodom's sin had been specifically same-sex activities. His agenda was to create homosexual scapegoats to blame for recent earthquakes and other disasters of his time, but most of all, to enact anti-homosexual laws against political opponents or people for whom he needed to prove as guilty. [/SIZE]
For example, here is one verse that many Christians use to persecute gay people with, (even though Levitical purity laws do not apply to Christians) but don't realize that their Bible has it translated falsely.
Leviticus 18:22 - The translations of this verse found in most English Bibles are not supported by the Hebrew text:
Incorrect translation:
"Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination."(KJV)
The honest and correct translation:
"And with a male, thou shalt not lie down in a woman's bed; it is an abomination."
Below, is a word by word translation of this verse:
ואת זכר לא תשכב משכבי אשה תועבה הִוא
V'et-zachar lo tishkav mishk'vei ishah to'evah hu.
(Transliterated using modern Israeli Sephardic pronunciation.)
V'et - This is two words. First, V', which means and. This word cannot exist by itself, and therefore is attached to the word that comes after it, that is, et. This word means with. So the first two words of this verse are And with.
zachar - This word means male. Hebrew has no indefinite article (a, an), so when the definite article (the) is not used, as in this case, an indefinite article is understood. Therefore, this word translates as a male. The verse so far reads And with a male.
lo - This word is the Hebrew equivalent of our words noand not. It is used in this case to negate the verb that follows it. Because English has a more complicated verb structure than Hebrew, it will take more than one English word to translate the next Hebrew word, and the not will need to go in the middle of those words, so we won't add this word to our translation yet.
tishkav - This is a verb. Unlike English verbs, everything we need to know about tense and person is contained in this one word. No additional pronouns or tense markers are needed.
The root of the verb is the last three letters: sh-k-v, and it meanslie down. The first letter of the word, t, is not part of the root, but indicates person and tense and even gender. To translate tishkav into English will require four words, as well as a parenthetical note to indicate the gender of the pronoun.
The word translates as Thou (male) shalt lie down. The previous Hebrew word, lo, negated the verb, so we have And with a male thou (male) shalt not lie down. mishk'vei - This is a noun. The base form of the noun is mishkav, and it can be seen that the last three letters of the base, sh-k-v, are also the three letters of the verb root above, meaning lie down. This noun means bed. Hebrew nouns have more than one form. In addition to having singular and plural forms, many nouns also have absolute and construct forms. An absolute noun stands alone, with its own meaning. A construct noun is grammatically tied to the noun that follows it. In English it often translates by placing the English word "of" between the two nouns. A good example is the Hebrew Beit Lechem (Bethlehem), which in English translates as House of Bread. This is because the first word, Beit, is in the construct state.Mishk'vei is in the plural construct state, meaning beds of. It would be a good idea here to explain a bit about Hebrew prepositions:
Hebrew has prepositions that correspond to ours, but doesn't always use them the same way. For example, when people leave us, in English we say that we miss them. But in Hebrew, the verb to miss is used with a preposition, and we say that we miss to them. The same works in reverse, that is, sometimes English requires a preposition when Hebrew doesn't. If a preposition can be derived from context, Hebrew will sometimes leave it out. In English, we need it. Therefore, we need to insert the English word in before the words beds of, in order for the sentence to make sense in English.
The verse so far reads And with a male thou shalt not lie down in beds of.
ishah - This is the Hebrew word for woman. Since there is no definite article (the), it is understood to mean a woman.And with a male thou shalt not lie down in beds of a woman.Since this is awkward, we will rephrase it to "in a woman's bed."And with a male thou shalt not lie down in a woman's bed.
(Note: The word mishk'vei only appears three times in scripture: Gen. 49:7; Lev. 18:22; Lev. 20:13. In Genesis, it is paired with the word avicha, which means "thy father," and the phrase is correctly translated in most versions as "to thy father's bed." As in Lev. 18:22, the preposition is derived from context.)
Punctuation as we know it was not part of the original text. Even modern Hebrew Bibles contain only one punctuation mark, which looks like a colon ':', and serves only to point out the end of a verse (but not necessarily the end of a sentence). English is very difficult to read without punctuation marks, so we insert them as we translate. After the word woman, we may insert either a semicolon, or a period, to indicate that the following words are not part of the first phrase, but simply offer further information about it. And with a male thou shalt not lie down in a woman's bed;
to'evah - This is a noun. It translates as abomination. Without a definite article, it translates as an abomination. Hebrew word order often varies from ours, and this is one case where this is true. In English, this will be the last word in the sentence, so we will hold off on adding it to the translation until we have finished with the next word.
hu - This little word serves so many purposes, not only for readers of the Hebrew text, but also for those today who wonder about the accuracy of the Hebrew text. You see, this word is a grammatical error made by Moses. Moses was well schooled in the arts and sciences of ancient Egypt, but not in the tongue of his own people. Although he evidently spoke Hebrew well enough to be understood, like so many today, he did not always use proper grammar. His meaning remained the same, but the grammar was wrong.
I want to repeat that: His meaning remained the same, only the grammar was wrong.The word הוא hu means both he and it. It means it when applied to masculine nouns. But to'evah is a feminine noun, so Moses should have used the word היא hi, which means she and it. It means it when applied to feminine nouns. (All Hebrew nouns are either masculine or feminine; there is no neuter gender. This gender concept is grammatical in nature only, and has nothing to do with men or women, per se. For example, in Hebrew a table is masculine, whereas in the Romance languages, it is feminine. It has nothing to do with the nature of the table; it's simply grammatical.)
The next point of grammar involves the present tense forms of the verb to be. In English these forms are am, art, is and are. Hebrew has such forms, but almost never uses them, except in reference to God, or when absolutely necessary for context.
The reason for this may be that the forms are too close to God's name in Hebrew. While this may seem awkward to us, there are many other languages that don't use the present tense of the verb to be. For example, Russian has become so used to ignoring the forms, that some of them are completely obsolete. The Russian equivalent of am can't even be found in a dictionary or grammar book any more. They get along fine without it, and so does Hebrew. But English can't, so we have to insert the appropriate forms when translating: And with a male thou shalt not lie down in a woman's bed; it is
Finally, we put in the words an abomination: "And with a male thou shalt not lie down in a woman's bed; it is an abomination."
This is the correct translation of Leviticus 18:22. It can be seen that, rather than forbidding male homosexuality, it simply forbids two males to lie down in a woman's bed together, for any reason. If anyone finds that hard to believe, God also forbid anyone to wear clothing made of 2 different mixed fibers (such as wool and linen, or polyester and cotton today), and listed such as an 'abomination' as well.
The problem is that just because people see a nicely bound 'Bible' in the millions at many churches, it doesn't mean it's a good translation. A bible only sells, if people want to purchase it. There are 'many' different types of English Bibles that say many different things. They are far from infallible.
'Masturbators'. At the time of Martin Luther, "arsenokoitai" was universally interpreted as masturbator. But by the 20th century, masturbation had become a more generally accepted behavior. So, new translations abandoned references to masturbators and switched the attack to homosexuals. The last religious writing in English that interpreted 1 Corinthians 6:9 as referring to masturbation is believed to be the [Roman] Catholic Encyclopedia of 1967.
Leviticus 18:22
KJV: (King James Version, 1611): Thou shalt not lie with mankind as with womankind: it is abomination.
LB: (Living Bible, 1971): Homosexuality is absolutely forbidden, for it is an enormous sin. (Notice the clear, unjustified extension of the verse to include lesbians; lesbian behavior is entirely absent from the whole of Hebrew scriptures.)
NIV: (New International Version, 1973): Do not lie with a man as one lies with a woman; that is detestable.
MSG (The Message, 1993): Don't have sex with a man as one does with a woman. That is abhorrent.
NLT: (New Living Translation, 1996): Do not practice homosexuality; it is a detestable sin. (Again, a clear, unjustified extension of the verse to include lesbians.)
NET (New English Translation, 2005): You must not have sexual intercourse with a male as one has sexual intercourse with a woman; it is a detestable act.
It is hard to avoid the conclusion that the term 'abomination' was an intentionally bad translation, given how far it differs from the meaning of the original Hebrew. It is used with a set of many different situations in the King James Bible.
The Living Bible and its revision, the New Living Translation, by using the word 'homosexuality' (for which there was no linguistic or cultural equivalent in Hebrew times) add two further errors. First, they add lesbians to the condemned group with utterly no justification for doing so. Second, since 'homosexuality' includes not just homosexual acts but also the mere fact of being oriented toward the same sex, the translations condemn both. These two translations say that it is a sin to be the way God created gays.
However, when translated exactly word for word into English, it says: 'And with a male you shall not lie [in the] beds of a woman,'which is to say that if two men are going to have sex, they cannot do it in a bed belonging to a woman, i.e., which is reserved only for heterosexual intercourse.
Both this verse and the other from Leviticus (see below) appear in a holiness code that applied to Israel rather than to gentile Christians in an age of grace. Both occur in the clear context of opposition to the practices of the local fertility god Moloch; verse 21 sets the stage for this one by forbidding people from allowing their children to be burned in sacrifice to Moloch, verse 23 prohibits intercourse with animals (the idol of Moloch was in the form of a bull with a man's head and shoulders, so this verse too may refer to idol worship). At the time, in order to get a conviction, Jewish law required four (male) witnesses, so whatever the action condemned in Leviticus was, it was likely a public event (there are no instances recorded in the Talmud of anyone being brought before the Sanhedrin and charged with homosexual activity). Worship of other gods provided a context where sex is very public, and there are 59 other places in the Bible where the worship of other gods is called an abomination (in the KJV). How could these two verses not apply to temple prostitution?
The probability that ritual prostitution is the context of these two verses is underlined by a later mistranslation of the Hebrew word qadesh, which appears in Deuteronomy (23:17), 1 Kings (14:24, 15:12 & 22:46), and 2 Kings (23:7). Literally the word means 'holy one'; it is clearly used in these verses to refer to a man that engages in ritual (pagan) temple prostitution in order to encourage the god(s) to make the earth and its creatures more fertile. By analogy many scholars interpret the verses in Leviticus as specifically referring only to sexual activities in a pagan temple ritual.
In the King James Version the word qadesh was translated for the first time as 'sodomite,' a word that at the time generically referred to any person who engaged in 'unnatural' sexual acts of any type. The New King James and 21st Century King James translations inaccurately retain the word 'sodomite' even though today it refers specifically only to males who engage in anal sex; most other Bibles more accurately translate it as cult, shrine, or temple prostitute.
Translators face a choice between alternative prohibitions of:
-homosexual behavior by either sex
-sexual behavior between two men
-sexual behavior between a man and a married man (or perhaps three people, including at least one man and one woman)
-just anal sex between two men
-just pagan temple ritual sex (between two men?)
sexual activity between two men in a woman's bed
Be aware that post-King James translations fixate on the first two. This has had a self-perpetuating effect; a Bible that strays significantly from this hate message won't sell, which means it won't get published. Deviating from traditional interpretations would certainly generate a lot of media hype, which would temporarily boost sales because of the publicity generated, but it would also block the use of the translation by many if not most purchasers of large numbers of Bibles.
The fact that for the first 300 years of Christianity, there is evidence of men marrying each other, and that there was no rejection or persecution of homosexuality shows something went very wrong when the bishops at the time finally gained the ear of an emperor, whose word was law. After all, it had been recognized as 'normal' human behavior for thousands of years at the time Christianity burst onto the scene, and they wouldn't have made many converts if they were going to attack or kill (homosexual) people who the majority at the time found perfectly natural.
I begin first with the birthplace of our Western civilization... which is Greek and Roman civilization, and after that, go into a detailed history of the Church on this subject:
The first speech in Classical history praising male-male relationships is that of Phaedrus. ThePhaedrus (
/ˈfiːdrəs/;
Greek: Φαῖδρος), written by Plato, is a dialogue between Plato's main protagonist, Socrates, and Phaedrus, an interlocutor in several dialogues. (The Phaedrus was presumably composed around 370 BC, around the same time as Plato's Republic and
Symposium.) Phaedrus cites as the ultimate in love and commitment the maxim that "love will make men dare to die for their beloved; and women as well as men."' He goes on to provide as one example of this sacred commitment Alcestis' willingness to die for her husband Admetus, and as another Achilles' willingness to die for his lover Patroclus.
Pausanias next spoke, delivering an impassioned defense of companionate same-sex relationships:
“Those who are inspired by this love turn to the male, and delight in him who is the more valiant and intelligent nature; any one may recognize the pure enthusiasts in the very character of their attachments. For they love not boys, but intelligent beings whose reason is beginning to be developed, much about the time at which their beards begin to grow. And in choosing them as companions, they mean to be faithful to them, and to pass their whole life with them, and be with them ..”
The consensus among modem historians is that republican Rome, like classical Greece, was tolerant of same-sex relationships. Moreover, the Romans accorded some same-sex unions the legal or cultural status of marriages. To take one early example, Cicero, the great Roman lawyer and orator, persuaded Curio the Elder to honor the debts that Curio's son had incurred on behalf of Antonius, to whom the son was, in Cicero's words, "united in a stable and permanent marriage, just as if he had given him a matron's stola." (The stola was garb distinctively reserved for a married Roman woman. "Te a meretricio quaestu abduxit et, tamquam stolam dedisset, in matrimonio stabili et certo collocavit.")
Cicero's legalistic advice suggests that same-sex relationships were not only socially accepted among Roman society, but that they also potentially carried with them legal obligations and consequences, and hence were marriages as we understand the term. Records describing Roman social customs during the imperial period survive in far greater number, at least in part because many, if not most, of the emperors enjoyed well-documented relationships, some of them legally sanctioned marriages-with other men. The evidence suggests that during the same general time frame when companionate long-term marriages were being institutionalized for different-sex couples, they were likewise becoming more common for same-sex couples, who were entering into relationships akin to those discussed in Plato's Symposium.
By the time of the early Empire the stereotyped roles of [sexually active] "lover" and [sexually passive] "beloved" no longer seem to be the only model for homosexual lovers, and even emperors abandoned traditional sexual roles for more reciprocal erotic relations. Many homosexual relationships were permanent and exclusive. Among the lower classes informal unions like that of Giton and Encolpius may have predominated, but marriages between males or between females were legal and familiar among the upper classes.... By the time of the early Empire references to gay marriages are commonplace. The biographer of Elagabalus maintains that after the emperor's marriage to an athlete from Smyrna, any male who wished to advance at the imperial court either had to have a husband or pretend that he did.
Martial and Juvenal both mention same-sex public ceremonies involving the families, dowries, and legal niceties. It is not clear that only aristocrats were involved: a comet player is mentioned by Juvenal. Martial points out that both men involved in one ceremony were thoroughly masculine ("The bearded Callistratus married the rugged Afer") and that the marriage took place under the same law that regulated marriage between men and women. Nero married two men in succession, both in public ceremonies with the ritual appropriate to legal marriage. At least one of these unions was recognized by Greeks and Romans, and the spouse was accorded the honors of an empress .... One of the men, Sporus, accompanied Nero to public functions, where the emperor would embrace him affectionately. He remained with Nero throughout his reign and stood by him as he died.
Same-sex unions were noted in popular Roman culture and literature as well. The novel Babylonica, an early version of the pulp romance, had a subplot involving the passion of Egypt's Queen Berenice for the beautiful Mesopotamia, who was snatched from her. After one of the Queen's servants rescued Mesopotamia from her abductors, "'Berenice married Mesopotamia, and there was war between [the abductor] and Berenice on her account.' " Of even greater renown, the Emperor Hadrian's love for Antinous attained the status of legend, acclaimed for generations in sculpture, architecture, painting, coins, and literature.
The popularity of Hadrian and Antinous as a couple, may have been due in some part to the prevalence of same-sex couples in popular romantic literature of the time. Everywhere in the fiction of the Empire-from lyric poetry to popular novels-gay couples and their love appear on a completely equal footing with their heterosexual counterparts.
Homosexuality flourished for over 1,300 years within the Greek culture, and for almost 900 years of Roman culture without causing any 'downfall' of civilization as some people today claim will happen if gay couples are allowed to marry each other. Yet, within a little over 100 years after Christians gained political dominance in Rome, the entire civilization collapsed... not from the barbarians, but instead after they had forbade freedom of religion under pain of death, freedom of thought, shut down the Olympics, the theaters, the gymnasiums, and schools of learning. Knowledge of realistic artwork and sculpture was lost, scientific knowledge and civic engineering withered and died. They basically killed civic culture and classical civilization.The public libraries were either closed or abandoned since within only 2 generations the majority of the people had lost the ability to read.. after all, you were told the world was going to end at any moment, and that you only needed to know what your priest or pastor told you to believe, you were told that interest in secular subjects was no longer advisable.
'Let us Christians prefer the simplicity of our faith to the demonstrations of human reason ... For to spend much time on research about the essence of things would not serve the edification of the Church.' – St Basil.
"What purpose does knowledge serve – for as to knowledge of natural causes, what blessing is there for me if I should know where the Nile rises, or whatever else under the heavens the 'scientists' rave about?" - Thus wrote Lucius Lactantius the first Latin 'theologian' and propagandist for the newly Christian emperor Constantine. Appointed tutor to the emperor's son Crispus – a job he lost when Constantine had his son executed for adultery with his stepmother.
The ancient world had been a relatively tolerant place in the world of religion. There were occasional bursts of persecution of this or that sect but as a rule many religions existed side by side. During the years 342 CE to 390 CE all this changed when Christianity established itself as the only religion in the Roman Empire and launched an all out campaign of religious terror against all other beliefs. Even though Christians had suffered from persecution from time to time, this does not justify what they did upon coming to political dominance, and had gained the ear of an emperor, whose word was law.
It was not until the Roman world was forcibly converted, and succumbed to an unforgiving and dictatorship-like form of Christianity (completely unlike the earlier peaceful and loving form of Christianity), that we began to embark upon the Dark Ages.
On December 16, 342 AD, the Christian emperors Constantius II and Constans, under advice from their bishops, had issued the following edict.. a law specifically outlawing marriages between men, which had previously been legal and allowed, which reads as follows:
"When a man marries in the manner of a woman, a woman about to renounce men, what does he wish, when sex has lost its significance; when the crime is one which it is not profitable to know; when Venus is changed into another form; when love is sought and not found? We order the statutes to arise, the laws to be armed with an avenging sword, that those infamous persons who are now, or who hereafter may be guilty, shall be subjected to exquisite punishment." (Theodosian Code 9.7.3)
Then, 48 years later, Christian emperors Theodosius and Arcadius on Aug 6, 390, under the advice of their bishops, issued the following edict.. an edict that would begin an evil persecution towards gay people that would last well over a thousand years: "All persons who have the shameful custom of condemning a man's body, acting the part of a woman's to the sufferance of alien sex (for they appear not to be different from women), shall expiate a crime of this kind by being burned to death in the public sight of the people." -Codex Theodosius IX. Vii. 6
I post this so that Christians who desire to persecute or condemn gay people over the way they are born can see the errors of their way on this, and to realize that we as Christians have a lot to atone for all the violence and murder done in Christ's name to homosexual people over the past 1600 years.
For the first 300 years of Christianity, gay people were not persecuted, but instead were welcomed as brothers and sisters in Christ... but as soon as the bishops in the early 300's gained political dominance, look how quickly and brutally things changed.. this is why our Founding Fathers wisely chose to separate Church and State:
305-306 – Council of Elvira (now Granada, Spain). This council was representative of the Western European Church and among other things, it barred homosexuals the right to Communion.
314 – Council of Ancyra (now Ankara, Turkey). This council was representative of the Eastern European Church and it excluded the Sacraments for 15 years to unmarried men under the age of 20 who were caught in homosexual acts, and excluded the man for life if he was married and over the age of 50.
342 – Under advice from their bishops, the first law against same-sex marriage was promulgated by the Christian emperors Constantius II and Constans.
390 – Under advice from their bishops, Christian emperors Valentinian II, Theodosius I and Arcadius declared homosexual sex to be illegal and those who were guilty of it were condemned to be burned alive in front of the public.
498 – In spite of the laws against homosexuality, the Christian emperors continued to collect taxes on male prostitutes until the reign of Anastasius I, who finally abolishes the tax.
529 – The Christian emperor Justinian I (527–565) made homosexuals a public scapegoat for problems such as "famines,earthquakes, and pestilences."
589 – The Visigothic kingdom in Spain, is converted from Arianism to Catholicism. This conversion leads to a revision of the law to conform to those of Catholic countries. These revisions include provisions for the persecution of gays and Jews.
693 – In Iberia, Visigothic ruler Egica of Hispania and Septimania, demanded that a Church council confront the occurrence of homosexuality in the Kingdom. The Sixteenth Council of Toledo issued a statement in response, which was adopted by Egica, stating that homosexual acts be punished by castration, exclusion from Communion, hair shearing, one hundred stripes of the lash, and banishment into exile.
1120 – Baldwin II of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, convenes the Council of Nablus to address the vices within the Kingdom. The Council calls for the burning of individuals who perpetually commit homosexual acts.
1179 – The Third Lateran Council of Rome issues a decree for the excommunication of homosexuals.
1232 – Pope Gregory IX starts the Inquisition in the Italian City-States. Some cities called for banishment and/or amputation as punishments for 1st- and 2nd-offending homosexuals and burning for the 3rd or habitual offenders.
1260 – In France, first-offending homosexuals lost their testicles, second offenders lost their member, and third offenders were burned. Women caught in same-sex acts could be mutilated and executed as well.
1265 – Thomas Aquinas argues that homosexuality is second only to murder in the ranking of sins.
1283 – The French Civil Code dictated that convicted homosexuals should not only be burned but also that their property would be forfeited.
1370s – Jan van Aersdone and Willem Case were two men executed in Antwerp in the 1370s. The charge against them was same gender intercourse. Aersdone and Case stand out because records of their names have survived.
1432 – In Florence the first organization specifically intended to prosecute homosexuality is established, the "Night Officials", which over the next 70 years arrest about 10,000 men and youths.
1451 – Pope Nicholas V enables the papal Inquisition to persecute men who practice homosexuality.
1475 – In Peru, a chronicle written under the Capac Yupanqui government describes the persecution of homosexuals with public burnings and destruction of homes (a practice usually reserved for conquered tribes).
1483 – The Spanish Inquisition begins. Homosexuals were stoned, castrated, and burned. Between 1540 and 1700, more than 1,600 people were prosecuted for homosexuality.
1532 – Holy Roman Empire makes homosexuality punishable by death.
1533 – King Henry VIII passes the Buggery Act 1533 making anal intercourse punishable by death throughout England.
1620 – Brandenburg-Prussia criminalizes homosexuality, making it punishable by death.
1721 – Catherina Margaretha Linck is executed for lesbianism in Germany.
1836 – The last known execution for homosexuality in Great Britain. James Pratt and John Smith are hanged at Newgate prison, London after being caught together in private lodgings.
1895 – The trial of Oscar Wilde results in his being prosecuted under the Criminal Law Amendment Act 1885 for "gross indecency" for having sex with other males, and is sentenced to two years hard labor in prison, ruining his health.
1903 – In New York on 21 February 1903, New York police conducted the first United States recorded raid on a gay bathhouse, the Ariston Hotel Baths. 26 men were arrested and 12 brought to trial on sodomy charges; 7 men received sentences ranging from 4 to 20 years in prison.
1945 – Upon the liberation of Nazi concentration camps by Allied forces, those who were interned for homosexuality, and who miraculously survived.. are not freed, but required to serve out the full term of their sentences under Paragraph 175.
1954 – June 7th –Mathematical computer genius and WW2 hero Alan Turing commits suicide by cyanide poisoning, 18 months after being given a choice between two years in prison or libido-reducing hormone treatment for a year as a punishment for homosexuality.
I list this shameful history, so that we as Christians, never again indulge in such evil and murderous persecution of gay people again, merely over how God created them, and who they love.
Just so that people do not think it is only 'me' who believes this to be the truth, it is not just myself. These are the many entire denominations consisting of thousands of churches, and millions of Christians, who agree with what I share with you concerning this subject.
North America
• Affirming Pentecostal Church International
• Anointed Affirming Independent Ministries
• Anthem Phoenix & Family of Churches
• Association of Welcoming and Affirming Baptists
• Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)
• Community of Christ
• Ecclesia Gnostica
• Ecumenical Catholic Church
• Ecumenical Catholic Communion
• Episcopal Church (United States)
• Evangelical Anglican Church In America
• Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
• Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada
• The Evangelical Network
• Friends General Conference
• Friends of Jesus Fellowship
• Global Alliance of Affirming Apostolic Pentecostals
• Inclusive Orthodox Church
• Metropolitan Community Church
• Old Catholic Church
• Presbyterian Church (USA)
• Progressive Christian Alliance
• Reformed Anglican Catholic Church
• Restoration Church of Jesus Christ (Salt Lake City, Utah, USA) — a Latter Day Saint denomination
• United Church of Christ
• United Church of Canada
• Unity Church
Europe
• German Lutheran, reformed and united churches in Evangelical Church in Germany
• German, Swiss, Austrian and Dutch Old Catholic Church
• Austria, Belgium, Netherlands, Poland, Ecumenical Catholic Communion
• Swiss reformed churches in Swiss Reformed Church
• Protestant Church in the Netherlands
• Church of Denmark
• Church of Norway
• Church of Sweden
• Church of Iceland
• United Protestant Church in Belgium
• Portugal - Affirming Pentecostal Church International
• British Quakers
• Wales - Affirming Pentecostal Church International
• Albania - Affirming Pentecostal Church International
• Evangelical Lutheran Church in Italy (CELI)
• Poland - Christian United Church in Poland
• United Kingdom - United Ecumenical Catholic Church
Central and South America
• Brazil - Affirming Pentecostal Church International
• Colombia - Affirming Pentecostal Church International
Australia
• Baptist Affirming
• Uniting Church in Australia
• Anglican
• Metropolitan Community Churches
• Ecumenical Catholic Communion
• Pentecostal Reformed
