(part two)
Some of this has to do with some scholarship about the general patterns of how Moses presented the dictates he brought from Elohim to the wandering Israelites, patterns that reflect the fact that Moses very likely first presented these dictates orally and then retired to his tent to journalize them in writing, not considering it essential to record every bit of the dialogue of his initial oral communications: his written priorities were the Voice of Yah and certain essential clarifications. The general pattern, by the way, is: (a) Major Rule Heading, followed by (b) clarifications, followed by (c) exceptions and exclusions. I have found that this rabbinical assertion can be followed throughout most all of Leviticus, as well as elsewhere. The Major Rule Heading begins in Leviticus 18 (no sex with near kin), and Leviticus 20:13 is located just before another Major Rule Heading begins. Just imagine the conversations that were had when Moses was detailing just what kind of sexual relationships one could and couldn't engage in. We here at this site all know that Leviticus 18 presents some of the most clear inferential indications that polygyny has to have been blessed, because Yah (through Moses) was mentioning exceptions (definitely not a mother and her daughter at the same time, for example, or sisters if the purpose is to vex them). It's not hard to imagine some man (perhaps at the urging of one of his women, wife or daughter) piping up with, "Hey, Moses, what about women having more than one husband? I can't imagine who would do such a thing, but if a woman could convince two men to share her, what does Elohim say about
that?"
To which the response would be, "No two men shall share a bed with a woman; to do so is abhorrent to Elohim and would be punishable by a heinous death that would cause all the violators to lose their blood (e.g., stoning)," which would have been clear enough to end such a discussion.
So, no, I'm not entirely convinced that Scripture contains an ironclad prohibition against all male homosexual behavior. In fact, I believe that
@The Revolting Man presents the best admonition against it I've ever read, and it echoes other thoughts about it I've read and heard from others in the past: two men being together simply doesn't represent the best emulation of the model Yah presents to us as ideal: For each man, one Lord God; for each woman, one lord man (two gay men create a confusion of male headship, but, on the other hand, it also becomes a less-crucial issue, given that they aren't going to have any progeny over which they will need to demonstrate male leadership). However, I don't believe evidence exists that Scripture asserts that everyone has to exemplify or even fully strive for the Ideal in order to be good with God. Not everyone marries. Not everyone who doesn't marry dedicates their lives to service to Yah, and yet many of them are devoted members of the faith Body of Christ. Not everyone who marries has children. Clearly, those people aren't following the be-fruitful-and-multiply commandment, but does that prevent them from salvation or the Kingdom of God?
What I do know is that, at the time the Septuagint was written (which, by the way, was more than 2 centuries prior to Paul and certainly, given his status as a Greek scholar and Pharisee, would have significantly informed his own scriptural scholarship), the Greek culture simultaneously
abhorred sex between two adult men yet
celebrated sex between men and boys; in fact, the legacy of this has
not entirely disappeared, and that dichotomous rejection/acceptance is unofficially alive and well in not only modern-day Greece but in large segments of its near neighbors, especially in certain geographic regions of Italy. I don't know what I'll ultimately discover, but it certainly wouldn't at all surprise me if I could either learn or feel fairly confident inferring that one of the behind-the-scenes agendas of the Septuagint was to specifically pander to the Greeks by replacing a phrase that would indirectly bolster the polygamy the Greeks were already on the march to exterminate with one that prohibited adult male-male anal intercourse while failing to demonize the predominantly oral sex that the Greeks were engaging in between men and boys.
Clearly, within and without Scripture, gay male sex is a tremendous social taboo -- and the blatant promotion of homosexuality in our postmodern mainstream culture hasn't really made a dent in that. It is in the face of that failure to get the middle ground of humanity to
celebrate them that the gay activists rail, flailing with impotence against a wall of general revulsion toward what they practice. I don't doubt the existence of the taboo, but, yes, I do question that Scripture is as blatantly clear as so many are convinced it is. Something
other than Scripture has to be responsible for the intensity with which human beings in our cultures react toward homosexuality. What is addressed in only a relative handful of scriptural passages has, for many generations,
dominated the corporate church community. The Word of God is tremendously more focused on valuing life, and yet our churches have put even greater effort into combatting homosexuality than they have
abortion. We're titillated by news related to transgenderism, but we still get way more exorcised about homosexuality; people are monkeying with the DNA codes established by our Creator in attempts to change gender or to clone chimeric creatures, which should enrage us, but instead we're fixated on where men are putting their pee-pees. I'm not saying homosexuality is the most or even a righteous way to glorify Yah, but certainly it pales in comparison to attempting to alter humanity by subverting genetic coding.
No,
@FollowingHim, I'm not sure that the translation of Lev. 20:13 is correct . . . and I'm not sure it's incorrect, either. What I am convinced of is that, in general, as human beings, we let our
uncomfortableness with certain things (an emotional reaction) far too greatly inform our interpretations, and the general derision directed toward male homosexuality is a perfect example. We have let it distract us, and I further believe that the ruling classes (which, in my humble opinion include the majority of the leaders within organized religion) have very purposefully used it as a deflection. As all of fundamentalist Christianity and the majority of mainstream Christianity were wasting years organizing against giving the privilege of begging at the trough of the State for licensing of their relationships to homosexuals (as if it were somehow devolution for gays to be committed to each other rather than just engage in uncommitted, casual sexual relationships -- does that sound at all familiar to this audience?), our general rights and freedoms were systematically being stripped from the rest of us, our children were being indoctrinated to become woke snowflake cogs in a totalitarian state, and the strength of family structures was being purposefully degraded. But, hey, we kept those durn gays from having marriage ceremonies for a dozen or so years, right? Of all people, those of us in this organization should have been paying attention to the general hysterical warnings that were being broadcast from pulpits all across America about the impending disintegration of the culture if we didn't stop gays from licensing their unions: the most common one was that, if we let
that happen, it would only be a matter of time until . . .
. . . polygamy would be legalized.
We have spent the last year watching our betters demonstrate that they've already prepared the populace to bend over, grab its collective ankles and say, "Just let me know when you're done," (I use this imagery very much on purpose) -- with every excuse pulled out to justify creating the next thing to martial law -- over what amounts to a minor seasonal flu, and we remain distracted by the same bogeymen. The April/May issue of
Imprimus features an adaptation of a speech Mark Steyn delivered to a Hillsdale College seminar in April, and he illustrates the folly of falling prey to such distractions:
"It is not at all clear to me that many of America's conservative politicians understand the seriousness of all this. You can see it in the fact that they go around trying to scare people with the specter of a 'radical socialist agenda.' For well over a year now, we have been living in a world in which it's accepted as normal the the state has essentially unlimited power -- and in which our freedom to decide for ourselves has been diminished almost to invisibility. Why do these conservative politicians think the words 'radical socialist agenda' still scare anyone in a time when the state can tell us whether we can have Aunt Mabel over for Christmas? They are completely out of touch. Over the same period as the pandemic lockdowns, we have seen an escalation of so-called wokeness. And if you look at one of the most startling manifestations of this, transgender fanaticism -- which involves, after all, the abolition of biological sex and, I'm sorry to have to say it, the physical mutilation of children -- one notices that America is farther down this road than any other country in the Western world. In other words, at this moment of crisis for Western Civilization, or for what we used to call Christendom, the leading country of the free world is pulling the wrong way."
Steyn goes on to mention the near-complete transformation of our public school systems into indoctrination camps; successes (including the neutering of our southern border) racked up by one-world-government forces, almost without any attention being paid to them; and the degree to which China, Big Tech, Big Sports and Big Entertainment are in collusion to eliminate civil liberties on the way toward world domination. These are all
real threats. We don't have to
wonder if they're coming for our children. They
already have their hooks in them.
But, with insufficient evidence, we're beating the drum of Heinous Homo Hegemony, convincing ourselves that hordes of homos equipped with special powers Black Widow would be envious of are just over the horizon, waiting to turn all of (especially) our (male) children into fellow bone smugglers.
I say wake up. The annoying members of the Queer Choir are only one sliver of the gay male population in our cultures. Within the camp of actual freedom fighters who predominantly agree with most of us here politically, cultural and even theologically exist many homosexual men, some who privately act on their sensual desires and some who choose not to. Those people are not coming for your children; they're working to keep them free from tyranny after you're gone. Instead of demonizing such men, we should be embracing them -- in a figurative sense, of course.
