We concluded last time that the appropriate definition of sodomy is this:
sod.om.y n. 1. Pride. 2. Excess of food, wealth. 3. Apathy, esp. in respect to the poor and needy. v. (to sodomize) 1. To pass over the poor in an unconcerned manner. 2. Having an excess. Antonyms – see “thanksgiving”
There are two directions that we could take based on this observation. The first to wonder what role homosexuality plays in the Bible. Almost all Evangelicals consider it silly to undertake such a venture, for the answer is supposedly obvious. I would remind such people that it is/was also “obvious” to almost all Evangelicals that Sodom was destroyed because of its incessant sodomy (the old, incorrect definition). This is flatly disproved by Ezekiel. Therefore, if that assumption has been totally obliterated by making some very basic Scriptural observations, it’s necessary to wonder how many other “obvious” ideas about homosexuality need to be re-thought.
I want to take up that line of thinking later in the year, but for now, I want to go in the other direction, and let myself be amazed that God would be so harsh in response to the sin of apathy in regard to the poor. Does God really take this attitude seriously enough to destroy a civilization and a way of life over it? The answer, if you can believe Ezekiel, is yes. Perhaps shockingly, there are said to be over 2000 verses dealing with the topic of God’s attitude toward poverty (which is often then contrasted with ours). I haven’t counted myself, but a brief read-through of the Bible makes this believable. In fact, I would be willing to bet that this topic is discussed two, three, or four times more frequently than any other topic (with the possible exception of idolatry).
How could this fact escape the Evangelical world? Consider one of the classics of Evangelical Christianity, The Pursuit of Holiness by Jerry Bridges. I finished it the other day, and it is on everyone’s favorite book list for good reasons. Jerry Bridges is a great man and The Pursuit of Holiness is a great book, so I want to be careful not to throw out the baby with the bathwater, for that would be both unwise and arrogant. But we cannot sugarcoat the truth here. The truth is that Bridges’ book-length treatment of holiness includes many examples and gives many practical recommendations, but not one of them has anything to do with poverty or social justice. In the final chapter, he even goes so far as to quote James 1:27 this way: “Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this…to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.” What’s in the “dot, dot, dot”? Only that pure and faultless religion is first of all described as looking “after orphans and widows in their distress”. Given the great weight the Scriptures place on economic and social justice, it does not seem possible to even begin a discussion of holiness while ignoring this topic. To attempt to re-cannonize the Bible this way (as the Gideons seem to have pulled off successfully) is several steps beyond ridiculous, and it is certainly un-Evangelical.
1.17.2007
1.10.2007
What is 'sodomy'?, Part I
My question, of course, is not what the given dictionary definition is; rather, I mean to ask what the meaning of ‘sodomy’ should be by challenging its etymology. The word itself is the namesake of the infamous ancient city of Sodom. The most detail we ever get about daily life in Sodom comes from Genesis 19, when Lot takes in two visitors (angels). Upon learning of Lot’s guests, the men of the city come to rape them, and the story just goes downhill from there. Later in the chapter Sodom was destroyed along with Gomorrah because God had heard “the outcry against its people” (v. 13). Over time, homosexual male sex was labeled as “sodomy”, apparently in order to serve as a reminder of the moral lesson we were supposed to draw from the judgment of that city.
But did we get the correct lesson? What was it exactly that angered God to the point of destroying the city? In Genesis 19, there is no description of the offending sin or sins, so we had to wait for the prophet Ezekiel to name the sins in detail:
“As I live, declares the Lord, your sister Sodom and her daughters have not done as you and your daughters have done. Behold, this was the guilt of your sister Sodom: she and her daughters had pride, excess of food, and prosperous ease, but did not aid the poor and needy. They were haughty and did an abomination before me. So I removed them, when I saw it” (Ez. 16:48-50, ESV).
The specific causes of Sodom’s condemnation mentioned are 1) pride, 2) excess of food and 3) prosperous ease, combined with 4) an unwillingness to aid the poor and needy. Whatever else was wrong with Sodom (socially acceptable gang rape?!?!?!) didn’t make the list in a specific form. I don’t know if it’s possible to overstate the implications of Ezekiel's words. The next few posts (largely unplanned, at this point) will be my attempt at making some cultural observations based on these verses. But for now, my proposed amendment to the dictionary:
sod.om.y n. 1. Pride. 2. Excess of food, wealth. 3. Apathy, esp. in respect to the poor and needy. v. (to sodomize) 1. To pass over the poor in an unconcerned manner. 2. Having an excess. Antonyms – see “thanksgiving”
But did we get the correct lesson? What was it exactly that angered God to the point of destroying the city? In Genesis 19, there is no description of the offending sin or sins, so we had to wait for the prophet Ezekiel to name the sins in detail:
“As I live, declares the Lord, your sister Sodom and her daughters have not done as you and your daughters have done. Behold, this was the guilt of your sister Sodom: she and her daughters had pride, excess of food, and prosperous ease, but did not aid the poor and needy. They were haughty and did an abomination before me. So I removed them, when I saw it” (Ez. 16:48-50, ESV).
The specific causes of Sodom’s condemnation mentioned are 1) pride, 2) excess of food and 3) prosperous ease, combined with 4) an unwillingness to aid the poor and needy. Whatever else was wrong with Sodom (socially acceptable gang rape?!?!?!) didn’t make the list in a specific form. I don’t know if it’s possible to overstate the implications of Ezekiel's words. The next few posts (largely unplanned, at this point) will be my attempt at making some cultural observations based on these verses. But for now, my proposed amendment to the dictionary:
sod.om.y n. 1. Pride. 2. Excess of food, wealth. 3. Apathy, esp. in respect to the poor and needy. v. (to sodomize) 1. To pass over the poor in an unconcerned manner. 2. Having an excess. Antonyms – see “thanksgiving”
1.07.2007
Reading the New Testament in 2007
I’ll take a break from my heresy for some orthodoxy…
Take the number of days in the year (365), and multiply by 5/7, which roughly equals 260. Take the number of chapters in the New Testament (260), and you get a nice formula: read one chapter each work-day in 2007 and you’ll get through the entire New Testament by the end of the year. That gives you the weekends to consult the Greek, pray, memorize, reflect, etc. on what you read the week before. Since you’ve already missed Matthew 1-5, you should get going.
I also like the idea of picking a theme to focus your reading. For instance, I am looking at all the passages that deal with the question of what it means to be righteous. Maybe someone in the course of their reading could find those phantom passages that talk about hell for non-believers (see previous posts). My leading theory right now is that they are somewhere out there, hidden next to all of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction.
Take the number of days in the year (365), and multiply by 5/7, which roughly equals 260. Take the number of chapters in the New Testament (260), and you get a nice formula: read one chapter each work-day in 2007 and you’ll get through the entire New Testament by the end of the year. That gives you the weekends to consult the Greek, pray, memorize, reflect, etc. on what you read the week before. Since you’ve already missed Matthew 1-5, you should get going.
I also like the idea of picking a theme to focus your reading. For instance, I am looking at all the passages that deal with the question of what it means to be righteous. Maybe someone in the course of their reading could find those phantom passages that talk about hell for non-believers (see previous posts). My leading theory right now is that they are somewhere out there, hidden next to all of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction.
1.04.2007
Hell in the New Testament - Part II, Paul
(We left this conversation last time by observing that the few times Jesus mentions hell it is in a metaphorical context.)
Q: Well, Paul advances most of the straight-forward Christian doctrine. When he talks about hell, that can’t be taken as metaphorical, right?
A: Paul never talks about hell.
Q: Really?
A: Yes, really. He talks about judgment but not hell.
Q: Well, maybe he just never got around to mentioning it.
A: That doesn’t seem like a likely explanation. Paul had lots of great chances to mention or describe hell if he indeed believed in it, but he consistently passed up the opportunity. For example, consider Romans 6:23: “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” This verse is strikingly asymmetrical. If Paul believed in hell, he probably would have said “For the wages of sin is eternal death, but the gift of God is eternal life…” Or possibly: “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is life…” But Paul chooses to leave the passage without any symmetry. Since the idea that people are going to be tortured for eternity is such a dramatic belief, I would think Paul would bring it up every chance he got. But since his prolific letter-writing that never mentions hell, we simply can't use Biblical grounds to say that Paul thinks non-believers are going to hell.
Q: Can’t we simply combine the New Testament teachings about faith with Jesus’ metaphorical descriptions of hell?
A: I don’t think that cherry-picking like that a very genuine way to approach a text, because it leaves too much room for the interpreter to say whatever he or she wants. As a result, these observations create a hermeneutical paradox for a conservative theologian. If she believes that righteousness is conferred simply by the ‘sinner’s prayer’, then she evidently must explain away the preponderance of passages which say that works are the determining factor for final judgment, like in Matthew 25, when Jesus says that the goats are going to eternal fire BECAUSE they did not help the poor. But after she explains away these verses as not being literally true (or whatever the explanation is), she has no more verses in the entire Bible that talk about a hell!
Q: What about philosophical or theological arguments against hell?
A: Some folks, such as Brian McLaren, try to argue against the existence of hell (as a destination for people) by saying that it is not in God’s character to send people there, or that “gehenna” was just a burning trash heap outside of Jerusalem, etc, etc, etc. These arguments may be good ones, but it really doesn’t matter. It should be enough for Evangelicals to disbelieve in hell for non-believers simply because it is not a Biblical belief.
Q: Well, Paul advances most of the straight-forward Christian doctrine. When he talks about hell, that can’t be taken as metaphorical, right?
A: Paul never talks about hell.
Q: Really?
A: Yes, really. He talks about judgment but not hell.
Q: Well, maybe he just never got around to mentioning it.
A: That doesn’t seem like a likely explanation. Paul had lots of great chances to mention or describe hell if he indeed believed in it, but he consistently passed up the opportunity. For example, consider Romans 6:23: “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” This verse is strikingly asymmetrical. If Paul believed in hell, he probably would have said “For the wages of sin is eternal death, but the gift of God is eternal life…” Or possibly: “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is life…” But Paul chooses to leave the passage without any symmetry. Since the idea that people are going to be tortured for eternity is such a dramatic belief, I would think Paul would bring it up every chance he got. But since his prolific letter-writing that never mentions hell, we simply can't use Biblical grounds to say that Paul thinks non-believers are going to hell.
Q: Can’t we simply combine the New Testament teachings about faith with Jesus’ metaphorical descriptions of hell?
A: I don’t think that cherry-picking like that a very genuine way to approach a text, because it leaves too much room for the interpreter to say whatever he or she wants. As a result, these observations create a hermeneutical paradox for a conservative theologian. If she believes that righteousness is conferred simply by the ‘sinner’s prayer’, then she evidently must explain away the preponderance of passages which say that works are the determining factor for final judgment, like in Matthew 25, when Jesus says that the goats are going to eternal fire BECAUSE they did not help the poor. But after she explains away these verses as not being literally true (or whatever the explanation is), she has no more verses in the entire Bible that talk about a hell!
Q: What about philosophical or theological arguments against hell?
A: Some folks, such as Brian McLaren, try to argue against the existence of hell (as a destination for people) by saying that it is not in God’s character to send people there, or that “gehenna” was just a burning trash heap outside of Jerusalem, etc, etc, etc. These arguments may be good ones, but it really doesn’t matter. It should be enough for Evangelicals to disbelieve in hell for non-believers simply because it is not a Biblical belief.
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