Darrell Bock: Now you're making a point and
this is where we're going next about well,
in first-century Israel this is not going
to be an issue that comes up.
But if we go to the larger Greco-Roman world
and we think about what's going on in Hellenistic
culture around which the Christians, who of
course early on were mainly Jewish, where
they're coming from; what is the situation
that we're dealing with in the larger Greco-Roman
culture?
Joe Fantin: Generally they would have viewed
things quite a bit different.
I think that's one of the problems that we
actually have here.
They would not have defined things as heterosexual,
homosexual etcetera.
They would have seen it much more as who the
active person is.
Who the passive person is in these types of
things.
Only certain people could be in those particular
roles.
For example, and this would have differed
to some extent in various places, first century,
a Roman.
A Roman male citizen could only be an active
individual, whereas a woman really could only
be a passive individual.
For them to break those molds or break those
roles, that would be very difficult and challenge
really the whole structure of their society.
In addition to women, you could have slaves,
both men and women that could be passive.
And most prominently and probably most difficult
for us to really wrestle with is who could
often be boys as well.
Usually they wouldn't be citizens, especially
in Rome; you would not have had that.
But it would not have been uncommon.
It would have been quite expected in many
case.
And if, go ahead.
Darrell Bock: So this is going on and going
on more or less regularly in certain pockets
of the society.
Is that a fair way to say it?
Joe Fantin: Oh yeah.
Yeah pretty much, if you're looking at a guy
who's got a home with an attractive adolescent
slave boy, chances are it would be likely,
at least in your mind, that they were having
some type of relation in that respect.
This does actually intersect the Gospels a
little bit.
Darrell Bock: Okay.
Joe Fantin: And it has been brought up with
the Centurion who comes to Jesus with his
slave to be healed.
It is quite possible that there would have
been a relationship there.
Because Jesus does not condemn any activities
they're doing it's sometimes suggested that
he's actually affirming one of these same-sex
relationships.
I think that misses a bit of the point of
what's actually going on, but you actually
see this argument on occasion, that Jesus
is more interested in what he's actually doing,
more interested in the personality - or the
welfare of the servant, etcetera.
Darrell Bock: Interesting.
So what we have in Hellenistic culture is
not so much these kinds of hard line categories
about what can be done, because almost anything's
being done in some ways, is that -
Joe Fantin: Certain things aren't.
Again, I guess behind closed doors and nobody
knows about them, sure everything can be going
on.
But this stuff is interrelated with the structure
of society, with honor and shame culture.
With the role of women and really a really
low view of women in light of what we think
of today in many cases.
The patronage system.
This idea of controlling individuals, this
all is tied up; it's not a separate category
of sexuality.
Darrell Bock: So the status is more important
and function is more important than gender,
per say.
Would that be fair to say?
Joe Fantin: Right.
Yes.
Yeah.
Darrell Bock: Okay.
Now having said that and this - I set this
up on purpose is talking about what's going
on with Jews and Judaism and what's going
on in Rome and the Greco Roman world, we come
to Romans 1.
Which is obviously probably the most discussed
text in the New Testament on this topic.
A significant text in which Paul is engaged
in why the nations are in need of the Gospel
in a very generic kind of way.
He'll turn his attention to the Jews in chapter
2.
But in chapter 1 verse 18 down to the end
of the chapter in verse 32, we're in the midst
of a discussion about the state of the world
among the nations and how they have exchanged
the Creator for the creature, and are engaged
in a life and in elements of lifestyle that
show their distance from God.
It's very, very important that in all these
discussions that having the presence of God
and the honoring of God are very much in the
background of all these passages.
We do not live in a secularized world in which
God is an optional player.
He's very much present and how we interact
with him is a part of this discussion.
Jay why don't you take us through these key
verses in Romans and let me get them before
people before we start.
I'm going to get this on the iPad so I can
read it and then we'll discuss these verses.
I'm going to start in verse 24.
"Therefore God gave them over in the desires
of their hearts to impurity, to dishonor their
bodies among themselves.
They exchanged the truth of God for a lie
and worshiped and served the creation rather
than the Creator, who is blessed forever!
Amen."
"For this reason" verse 26.
"God gave them over to dishonorable passions.
For their women exchanged the natural sexual
relations for unnatural ones, and likewise
the men also abandoned natural relations with
women and were inflamed in their passions
for one another.
Men committed shameless acts with men and
received in themselves the due penalty for
their error."
"And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge
God, God gave them over to a depraved mind,
to do what should not be done.
They are filled with every kind of unrighteousness,
wickedness, covetousness, malice.
They are rife with envy, murder, strife, deceit,
hostility.
They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God,
insolent, arrogant, boastful, contrivers of
all sorts of evil, disobedient to parents,
senseless, covenant-breakers, heartless, ruthless."
And we've gone on to read, because the point
here is the entirety of the condition of sin
in the nations.
And then verse 32.
"Although they fully know God's righteous
decree that those who practice such things
deserve to die, they not only do them but
also approve of those who practice them."
So that's our passage.
What does it tell us?
Jay Smith: Well the final section that you
mention there tells you this is pretty serious
because they're worthy of death.
So this is not a casual offense or set of
problems.
So it's very serious and in some way mimics
what was going on in the Old Testament when
we had the capital offense.
But, probably more to the point is up around
verse 26.
Here it looks like divine judgment for idolatry.
In verse 25 they exchange the truth of God
for a lie and worshipped and served the creature
rather than Creator, and therefore as a consequence
or for this reason God gives them over to
these degrading passions.
Exchanging normal, if I can use the word normal,
heterosexual relations for same-sex relations.
So this is a part of the divine judgment for
idolatry.
Darrell Bock: So this becomes an illustration
of one sin among many sins that leave the
nations culpable before god.
Jay Smith: Exactly.
Darrell Bock: When we come to verse 32 and
we say, "Those who practice such things deserve
to die" it wouldn't be fair to say we're only
talking about what's discussed in verse 27.
We would be saying no, Paul's condemnation
extends to the entirety of the list because
in part he's building the case on why everyone
needs to have their relationship with God
restored, as opposed to only certain people
who engage in certain particular practices.
Would that be fair?
Jay Smith: I think it would be fair.
He does, it's a little expansive there when
he talks about same-sex relations but I'm
not sure one can probably make a big distinction
in terms of one's ultimate culpability before
God in terms of the other sins.
You know malice, and gossip, and slanders,
and haters, those are all, make one culpable.
So I'm not sure you can list these sins as
one more grievous than the other.
They're all damning if you will.
But anyway, the penalty I think would extend,
that is of deserving death, would include
the whole list all the way from verses 24
-
Darrell Bock: And we're talking about a backdrop
in which the deserving of death talks about
being spiritually separated from God and having
the need now to come into a restored life,
which of course the rest of the book is about.
And talking about how what Jesus has done
and the sacrifice that he's done covers all
these sins, can remove the guilt and the culpability
before God and can bring us into a state where
we're reconciled with God.
Would that be fair?
Jay Smith: Exactly right.
Exactly right.
Darrell Bock: Now let's go back up to the
passage in question and say, are there any
limitations on what's going on here?
Or is - well let me ask one previous question.
Is there any doubt about what's being described
here?
Jay Smith: I don't think so.
I think there is a, some sort of a same-sex
relation.
Occasionally there's some talk that what Paul
has in mind is some sort of a degrading or
exploitive relationship, particularly with
men with boys and that's what he's opposed
to.
But then when he talks about women with women,
he seems to be, it's a broader category.
It's not just an exploitive relationship with
an adult male and an underage boy.
It would certainly include that, but I don't
think you can restrict it to that.
As soon as he starts talking, he brings women
in - you can see that his purview is a little
wider than just exploitive relationships.
It is worth pointing out that women and women
would have been a big taboo generally speaking.
Now again it probably happened.
There's some things out there, but generally
the sources don't talk as much about it in
a, not definitely not in the same way as you
have it with men with adolescents and younger
boys.
But, so that would be right there something
that probably most everyone would have agreed
with at that point.
Maybe that's a way of him getting into the
argument.
One of those things that people will accept.
Darrell Bock: So he's starting with, in some
ways, the most grievous category, or the one
that everyone accepts as a taboo and then
works his way to the places that might be
more culturally debated.
Jay Smith: Yeah because women with women would
mean somebody would have to take a role of
the man.
Darrell Bock: So, I look at this passage in
verse 26 where it says for the women exchanged
natural sexual relations for unnatural ones.
That kind of removes any doubt about what
it is that we're talking about.
Is that fair to say in terms of we're dealing
with same sex scenarios.
Jay Smith: Yes.
But I will say that some of the arguments
that are brought up about this would be, well
what is natural.
Then it goes to this idea, yes it's true.
It's natural for you who are attracted to
women to be attracted to women.
It would be unnatural for you to be attracted
to a man.
But for somebody who is actually a male attracted
to other males that's perfectly natural.
Then with that type of a situation it would
actually be unnatural for a guy with desires
for other men to actually try to have relations
with a woman in that case.
I just find that's a little bit too complicated
for a first century audience.
It does seem to be dealing with acts.
Robert Chisholm: Can I ask a question, in
those discussions and I'm going to be very
delicate here.
Does physical design, anatomical design enter
into that discussion in terms what's natural
and what isn't?
Joe Fantin: To some extent yes.
But it's actually quite fascinating and it's
rather complicated too.
We can make a distinction between sexuality,
which is my desire for a specific person;
and then gender identity, which is what I
choose to be.
So foreseeably I was going to say you, but
let's just say a particular man could identify
himself gender-wise as female.
And that particular man may, if he's attracted
to women, he is actually expressing lesbian
desires.
So it's very complicated.
I just can't impose that type of a system
upon the ancient world.
Darrell Bock: What you're saying, just to
be clear, is the way this conversation comes
across in modern conversation about the situation
has more, it's working with more categories
and more ways to think about it from a psychological
point of view, etcetera.
And to think that that would be something
that would enter into the mind of someone
who's writing in the first century, who's
writing about these things, is unlikely.
Joe Fantin: There's some philosophical discourse
going on with the way people were created
and split apart and these desires actually
happening.
But, again you know, for that on a more common
level would to me seem very difficult to sustain.
Darrell Bock: Would it be fair to say that
in the ancient world - this is a generalization,
but we'll go for it and see what happens.
Would it be fair to say that generally speaking
ancients thought more concretely about some
of these issues in the sense of the way in
which we are physically designed is designed
to be a picture of the way we're to think
about the Creation?
Joe Fantin: Yeah, as long as we keep it in
that context that they aren't working off
our paradigm.
For them the active and passive is what's
important.
The roles are what's important.
But again, concrete may seem to imply they
weren't into as much abstract thought.
But the way this is worded, women with women,
men with men, they might not have been thinking
specifically the acts as in the forefront.
Maybe they were, but they also would have
been thinking, well women with women, that
breaks social convention.
So, if that's what you mean by concrete, yes.
Darrell Bock: Well actually no, that's not
what I mean by concrete.
What I'm suggesting is a very anatomical design.
The idea that says that there are some people
who are designed one way and some people who
are designed another and so, I'm trying to
do this delicately, the coupling reflects
the oneness.
In very concrete terms that's natural.
That's designed.
Joe Fantin: It breaks down though because,
me as a citizen male, I can only be active.
But a male slave can be passive.
Darrell Bock: So in other words the function,
you can think about functioning in a different
role, but - one more question then.
Was this seen, let's take right or wrong out
of it and put it in another form.
Was it seen to be a different kind of relating,
if I can say it that way?
Would there be a distinction made in what
was going on or would it simply be taken on
equal terms.
Again remembering that we're talking about
how Romans think about this.
Joe Fantin: Definitely and that's probably
worth bringing up.
Jay Smith: Yes.
Joe Fantin: On one hand you could be, again
hypothetically, and again I want to make it
clear that if you were going to talk about
Athens four centuries earlier it would be
slightly different if you talked about different
things, but generally speaking, I'm trying
to go with the first-century Roman idea; that
you would go and as long as you were doing
what your function and in the way you function
that was acceptable.
Trying to think how I would want to word that
in another way.
Darrell Bock: Let me take it this way.
But a Jewish person looking at that, would
they look at it the same way?
Joe Fantin: No, and I think Paul's using the
Jewish polemic here.
Jay Smith: He's talking about the Creator
and the creature.
I mean, there's a divine intent here.
There's a Genesis overlay, I think, to what
Paul's doing.
Robert Chisholm: Or Leviticus overlay.
Joe Fantin: A Torah overlay.
Jay Smith: When he talks about something being
against nature I think it means, or in line
with nature, it's in line with the Creator's
intent.
Genesis 2 kind of intent.
Now a Roman might say that I have a underage
boy and that he's the passive partner.
That's not against nature the way we define
it.
Joe Fantin: Let me go back.
I think I know what I want to answer now that
question.
A person could be, let's say he's a 20 year
old and he's interested, or maybe 25 year
old, interested in young boys, or going, let's
say young adolescent type boys.
But that does not preclude that he's gonna
get married and have what we would consider
relations, heterosexual relations from here
on out.
They seem to be able to separate maybe what's
involved in marriage and what they're going
to do and what a good citizen does and what
maybe they do before marriage, etcetera.
Darrell Bock: So the point here is, and we
have spent a lot of time on this on purpose,
not to park here but really get the cultural
elements of what's going on.
This is culturally very much a cross-cultural
engagement to a certain degree.
You've got something going on in Rome and
in Hellenism on the one hand that is culturally
structured one way.
You've got something going on in the Jewish
world and theologically that's constructed
in a different way and you are seeing them
run into each other in this passage.
Is that a, would that be fair to say?
Joe Fantin: Yeah.
In fact I think that's why this is so important.
This passage is so important for me.
This is the one passage I think that really
makes the point.
Because it's easy when you're looking at something
and everything's going one particular way
in the culture for somebody to just affirm
it and go on.
It's hard to say whether or not there's a
critique going on.
But in the Roman culture, men with other males
was an accepted thing.
So for Paul to actually be drawing upon this,
he's not just taking some, oh I've just grown
up as a heterosexual if you will, and I know
everything else is wrong, like we might do
today.
He was in a culture that was dominated by
this active-passive; males could be with males,
etcetera in certain situations.
Then he applies this test or a Jewish idea
to this.
We know Paul is not necessarily opposed to
going against Jewish tradition in many things.
Darrell Bock: That's right.
Joe Fantin: But here he does affirm it.
So to me this is a strong, strong evidence
that what Paul's saying here, one it's kind
of cultural.
At least to a Roman audience, and gives it,
I think, a lot more staying power if you will
in this argument.
Darrell Bock: So your point is that by appreciating
the openness of the Roman culture and how
free-wheeling it was, if I can say it this
way, it actually makes more of this passage
than if it were like, well this is - everyone
without thinking and blinking says, oh yeah
that's just unnatural.
Joe Fantin: Yeah and to take an analogy with
food.
If Paul came from a Jewish background and
he doesn't eat pork, he has no problem with
saying we can eat various other things now.
But if he took a passage and said, eating
pork demonstrates that the Roman world is
corrupt, it would seem to be that there's
something important there.
Because he knows that everybody can go and
get pork.
Darrell Bock: Just to drive the point home.
The point that you're making in the end is
that even though we're dealing with a cultural
clash the point that Paul is making is designed
to be transcultural.
That he's dealing with something that from
the standpoint of God applies to cultures
no matter what and so this is part of the
culpability that people have because they
have this kind of approach to things.
Joe Fantin: Yeah, and Paul's probably utilizing,
you know he uses men and women here, uses
the adjectives would probably go back to Genesis
to allude there.
He doesn't say husband and wife.
He says male and female, and again that should
echo at least in some reader's ears of that
original creation -
Robert Chisholm: If I can second what Joe
said, I think I'll try to.
I don't think Paul defines this idea of functioning
according to nature or not according to nature
culturally.
He's defining that in terms of the Old Testament.
In terms of Genesis.
That determines what's contrary to nature
and with nature.
Darrell Bock: So according to Creation if
you want to think of it that way.
Robert Chisholm: Yes.
And he also doesn't define it, which I think
we do more commonly today, psychologically.
Psychologically I am a woman caught in a man's
body or something.
I don't think Paul's defining functioning
naturally in terms of psychological terms.
Where we might say, well it's against my nature
to play the role of a male, because I'm really
a woman.
I need - it's against nature for me to do
that.
I don't think Paul's thinking in terms of
psychological categories.
He's thinking in terms of creative categories
and God's original intent.
Not in terms of how I view my makeup or my
gender identity or sexual identity.
Darrell Bock: Okay I think we've worked our
way through that passage.
Let's go to the others.
I'm going to pair a couple of passages because
we're running long on time.
The two passages I want to pair are 1 Corinthians
6:9 and then 1 Timothy 1:10.
What these two passages share is they both
discuss issues in relationship to the presentation
of vice lists of one kind or another.
I think we can pair them together and move
in this kind of a way.
I would say after the Romans passage the second
most cited text that we get in this discussion
out of the New Testament is this 1 Corinthians
6:9 text.
Again I will read it out of the NET Bible
and starting with verse 9.
"Do you not know that the unrighteous will
not inherit the kingdom of God?
Do not be deceived!
The sexually immoral, idolaters, adulterers,
passive ..."
And I'm going to pull the word homosexual
here.
It says homosexual partners, but "... passive
partners, and practicing partners ..." I'll
read it that way, the active partner "...thieves,
the greedy, drunkards, the verbally abusive,
and swindlers will not inherit the kingdom
of God.
Some of you once lived this way.
But you were washed, you were sanctified,
you were justified in the name of the Lord
Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God."
And then it goes on.
Now we've got again a vice list.
I think it's fascinating that we always find
this discussion not in isolation but always
tied to other conversations about other kinds
of sin.
And what we have here are two terms that I
think we're going to have to talk about, malakos
and arsenkoites.
So we've got two words here, one of which
translates, I want to be very literal, "soft"
if you want to think of it that way.
And the other of which literally is the combination
of two words, male and bed.
Just to show you the difference between the
terms.
I actually think that in this case, thinking
literally about what the word pictures are
helps you to understand sort of what the words
are getting at.
In one case, in the picture of the soft I've
got what is translated oftentimes as passive.
The person who is not the active player.
And in the other case we've got the active
or the dominant figure that's being described.
So with that as the background what does this
passage have to tell us, and you teach 1 Corinthians,
Jay, so you get this one since we picked on
Joe last time.
And tell us what's going on here.
Jay Smith: The first thing I would want to
mention is what you'd said.
You have another list.
Interestingly I think for the third time in
the list you get a very severe punishment
or threat.
He will not inherit the Kingdom of Heaven,
or is it the Kingdom of God.
Joe Fantin: Of God yeah.
Jay Smith: But at any rate the point still
stands.
I mean violators, this is very serious.
Part of the second thing I would say is this
is in a list, oftentimes the discussion goes
about inclination or psychological makeup.
These terms are in a passage where there's
a lot of behavioral active sort of phenomena.
You're a drunkard, you're a covetor, you're
vile, or you're a swindler.
It's in a list of actions.
I'm not sure Paul is really talking about
some sort of psychological makeup of individuals.
Darrell Bock: I think it's interesting that
the word that comes before the two terms that
we're discussing is the word adulterer.
I know that in some of the blog exchanges
I've had on this issue with people, who are
defending same-sex lifestyle in one way or
another, and they're making the psychological
point, well I'm made this way or I have an
inclination in this direction.
I like to make the point; well I may have
an inclination that I'm quite capable of thinking
about having sex with other women.
I may have that inclination but that doesn't
mean I act on that inclination and that I,
or that that gives me the right to act on
that inclination.
This is a case where I think the nature of
the list may help us think through what it
is that's being dealt with in the Scripture.
And what's being dealt with in the Scripture
is playing out on the inclination or acting
on the inclination as opposed to simply being
in a certain place emotionally, or having
a certain kind of proclivity.
I think many of us have proclivities.
I think of Jesus' passages on the Sermon on
the Mount where he talks about it's not adultery,
it's lust that's the problem.
Well that nails most of us.
What he's showing is the standard that says
the heart that is really aligned with God
does so in a way that doesn't just simply
say well I have this inclination so I have
the right or the entitlement to go there.
But it thinks through how I deal with inclinations
that I may have.
Joe, do you have anything you want to add
to the 1 Corinthians 6 passage?
Joe Fantin: Again I think it's real difficult
to pinpoint what terms mean in these types
of lists.
Romans 1 is so much easier because there's
description going on.
But again, I think sometimes our translations
will seem like they're coming again, from
our modern perspective of hetero/homosexual
breakup and they'll see passive with the malakos.
Passive receptors to and then active on the
other term.
I just wanted to add a couple of things.
One, I think from the ancient perspective
it might be a little easier to see the soft
translation.
I like the effeminate translation because
the Romans were very, very opposed to men
who would do things that looked like a woman.
That was very negative.
And of course, that would include taking a
passive role.
But it was more than that.
Darrell Bock: So this is a broad term is your
point?
Joe Fantin: Right.
Right.
Darrell Bock: Just like when we - the analogy
I like to use here is the term "porne" is
a broad term for sexual immorality.
It can cover a lot of things, but it covers
adultery.
But it's more than that.
Jay Smith: I might push back a little bit.
Darrell Bock: Okay.
Okay.
Joe Fantin: Well let me finish here.
But I also like this translation a little
bit better too, because if you say passive
homosexual, again passive same-sex partner,
you're primarily talking about you know, younger
people.
Younger boys.
Again boys about the start of adolescence
to a little bit - up to - start of puberty
up to adolescence.
Darrell Bock: You're certainly including that
group.
Joe Fantin: That would be the - what you would
be thinking of I would think normally when
you're talking about this group of individuals
and I just don't see, in that case as well
as them really being able to have much to
do in some of these cases.
Especially if they were a slave boy or something
like that.
So a category that is primarily directed at
a powerless group I find to be problematic.
Again I think from the perspective of the
ancient world that would have been a little
bit more understandable, because they aren't
making both those distinctions like we are.
Darrell Bock: Jay?
Jay Smith: Well yeah, I appreciate that.
I'm just in being paired with the two terms,
the malakos the soft and the arsenokoites,
the man bedder, I tend to think them, it's
likely in my thinking, they're being used
together.
Joe Fantin: They're paired?
Jay Smith: They're paired.
Now perhaps not, but I kind of favor some
of the recent translations that will not define
those two terms individually but will translate
them something like men who have sex with
men.
They're not isolating the two terms.
Darrell Bock: They're rendering both of them
with that phrase?
Jay Smith: Yeah.
Joe Fantin: Again I see this as a natural
homosexual heterosexual distinction way to
translate it.
Because we're coming from and that's the way
we're viewing this thing.
So yeah, naturally how do these fit and then
it comes - and again I don't see that as valid
in the ancient world.
I will note that that other word is really
difficult to translate.
Men bedders.
In fact, I just want to clarify because it's
easy for us to be accused of an etymological
fallacy or something here -
Darrell Bock: Yes very much so.
Joe Fantin: - you know, pitting it - "understand"
has nothing to do with understand, has nothing
to do with stand.
Butter fly.
But in this case I would like to defend the
translation.
Although it might be intentionally ambiguous
that we don't know if it's active or passive
by men bedders.
We assume it's active, but it could be both
ways.
It's not a very commonly used word.
It first appears around this time, some may
even think it first appears by Paul, but again
with limited data we don't know.
But, in light of that limited data and in
light of these types of terms, like man and
bed bringing them together, I do think there
is some justification for doing this type
of thing methodologically despite the fact
that I think we need to be careful and sensitive
to issues of exegetical fallacies if you will.
Darrell Bock: I think it's interesting to
note that the NET Bible in translating this
in particular has managed to put notes for
each one of these terms.
So, it shows you the nature of the issue.
I think that it's important again to put this
in the context of the larger point.
This is part of a larger vice list in which
many things are being mentioned.
All of them are acts that are being sanctioned
and critiqued and rebuked by Paul in this
context.
Jay Smith: And given hope for too.
In verse 11 "... and such were some of you,
but you were washed, you were sanctified,
you were justified ..."
Darrell Bock: The whole point is that again,
as we saw in Romans if we were to have read
on in Romans, this can all be overcome and
transformed and impacted by what it is that
Jesus is able to do for us.
Okay, let's go to the first Timothy passage.
1 Timothy 1 and then we have one more passage
after that.
1 Timothy in verse 10, and again we've got
our terms here.
Let me get this in context.
It says in 1:8, "But we know that the law
is good if someone uses it legitimately, realizing
that law is not intended for a righteous person,
but for lawless and rebellious people, for
the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and
profane, for those who kill their fathers
or mothers, for murderers..."
This has been rendered "sexually immoral people,"
the terms here and the term here that we've
got is a fused term, if I can say it that
way.
Well, "sexually immoral people, practicing
homosexuals, kidnappers, liars, perjurers
- in fact, for any who live contrary to sound
teaching.
"
So we have the immoral in general to start
off verse 10 and then we have our term coming
back that we saw in 1 Corinthians 6:9, the
second term of the two that we were talking
about earlier when we had the soft and then
whatever we do with the male bedders to keep
the term fairly literal here.
Jay Smith: You know, if I can jump in real
quick, those are the two terms.
I mean those two terms that have been combined
here are the two terms used in the two Leviticus
texts -
Joe Fantin: In the Greek, yeah.
Jay Smith: But they're separated in Leviticus.
Now I say, of course Leviticus is written
in Hebrew, but when it's translated -
Joe Fantin: Translated into Greek.
Darrell Bock: The Septuaginta, what we call
the Septuaginta, the Greek Old Testament translation.
Jay Smith: Which is an ancient translation,
and it uses those two words separately.
Both times it uses them in Leviticus 18 and
it uses them both again in Leviticus 20.
Then in the Corinthians text and then in the
Timothy text they're combined.
They're pulled together.
Darrell Bock: So your point, I take it, is
that it could well be that the term that we're
getting here for the actions being described
is alluding back to Leviticus 18 and Leviticus
20?
Jay Smith: I think almost certainly.
Darrell Bock: This seems to be - Paul likes
to - Dr. Fantin over there is
Joe Fantin: I'm not saying anything.
Jay Smith: But Paul loves this section of
Leviticus and he likes to use it and this,
by most people's count this is the first time
this one particular word's used.
A lot of people propose and I think with some
fairness that Paul's coined the term here.
Coming out of Leviticus he's pulled these
two terms together and coined a new phrase
based on the use of it in Leviticus.
Darrell Bock: And we see him using it in 1
Corinthians and then we see him using it in
1 Timothy and we will get into a podcast on
who the author of 1 Timothy is - because some
people would say well this isn't Paul.
This is a school or whatever, but we're aware
of that.
There's no doubt that this is the same term
being used in a fairly similar kind of way
really in relationship to 1 Corinthians, whatever
you're going to do with 1 Corinthians 6 is
likely what you're going to do with 1 Timothy
1.
We're in a vice list.
We're in the same kind of situation.
We're in a law righteousness contrast context,
etcetera so we're doing much of the same things
in the two passages.
Fair?
Jay Smith: Yeah, definitely.
Joe Fantin: Okay.
Darrell Bock: One more passage.
This is outside of Paul.
Now we're in Jude chapter 7.
I guess it's appropriate to end up here in
many ways because it takes us, by going to
Jude we're going to go back to Sodom at the
same time.
So we get to kind of circle the wagons in
our discussion.
Jude 7 is in a context of which a list of
sins that God has judged are being presented.
Verse 5, Jude.
"Now I desire to remind you (even though you
have been fully informed of these facts once
for all) that Jesus, having saved the people
out of the land of Egypt, later destroyed
those who did not believe.
You also know angels who did not keep within
their present domain but abandoned their own
place of residence; he has kept in eternal
chains in utter darkness, locked up for the
judgment of the great Day."
That's the second sin, now we come to the
Sodom and Gomorrah.
"So also Sodom and Gomorrah and the neighboring
towns, since they indulged in sexual immorality
and pursued unnatural desire in a way similar
to these angels, are now displayed as an example
by suffering the punishment of eternal fire."
And the description here is actually rather
generic in terms of the language that's use.
So really all we're doing is alluding to Sodom
and Gomorrah and basically saying, well whatever
was wrong and what happened at Sodom and Gomorrah
that's what God judged and dealt with.
That was the situation when we discussed it
that we said well this is actually a complicated
situation.
This is a forced rape situation and so it's
not quite in the same category as some of
these other passages that we've ended up talking
about.
Fair?
Jay Smith: Yeah, I hate to say it but I kind
of like the, what the Queen James does here,
a little bit.
Darrell Bock: Uh-huh?
Jay Smith: Not necessarily the translation,
but I see a similarity with what Hebrews does
with some of the Old Testament passages.
I don't think this is necessarily a grammatically
historical discussion of the Genesis text
like you would have done.
But just as Hebrews notes that Abraham is
going to offer Isaac but believes he's going
to be resurrected, which you can't really
get from the Hebrew text very well, I think
here he uses just this other flesh.
Readers would know that these individuals
were angels and therefore maybe what's - what
they were looking back at was this relationship
where almost species-crossing taking place
here.
I don't think the text itself is necessarily
always been used in the same sex context anyway.
Darrell Bock: So this is another one we've
gone through passages and we've said well
Genesis 9 really doesn't belong in the database
in this discussion in many ways.
The Genesis 19 operates on the edge because
it's a particular kind of forced situation.
Here Jude is just alluding back in a general
way to that and he's using the cross-species
development as a part of the equation, so
that ends up being a complicated text as well.
When we boil it all down what we end up with
are three or four central passages on this
particular conversation, and that would be
the Leviticus 18:22, the Leviticus 20:13,
the Romans 1:26-32 and the 1 Corinthians 9
passages.
Those are really the four texts out of the
eight that relate to this conversation in
a way where the other factors aren't so complicated
that we can't know whether those texts relate
to the conversation or not.
Fair enough?
Joe Fantin: Fair enough.
Darrell Bock: Well gentlemen we've certainly
spent some time in these texts and we hope
that the walk through these passages has been
helpful in using the backdrop of how someone
coming at it from a completely different angle
would engage the topic as being a helpful
way to think about how to talk about these
passages.
We appreciate you all listening in with us
and listening to the passage and we thank
you for being at the table with us again.
We hope to have you back soon.
Thank you.
