this post was submitted on 08 Nov 2023
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Nope. I’ve written about this at length, as it’s one of many things in scripture that requires a significant amount ignorance and/or bad faith to mistranslate as “gay is bad”.
In Leviticus there is a part of a laundry list of household incest laws that reads “A man shall not lay with a male as with a woman.” The phrasing is extremely specific and particular. Why “male” and not just “man”? Why is “as with a woman” added when the command would be perfectly clear without it? What does that addition mean? Why is there no mention of women and women?
This is easy: this command was never intended for us (gentiles living thousands of years later in dramatically cultures), so we can easily miss a massive amount of important context. In the middle east thousands of years ago, if you - a man - wanted a bride or a concubine, you BOUGHT one. You owned her. If you already owned a female slave, you could freely rape her or force her into marriage or concubinage. The prohibition is not a blanket statement on consensual equal gay relationships, it was about not being allowed to rape your male chattel slaves, who had more inherent rights than the female ones.
It’s also important to point out that these laws were handed only to the Israelites who had left Egypt and wandered the desert, ostensibly (according to YHWY, per the same scripture) to guarantee the tribes survival until they could establish a new homeland.
Paul also writes about this once, using a greek colloquial term that translates literally to “male-bedders”, making it parallel to Leviticus in terms of meaning. This appears to be condemnation of pederasty as well, not a condemnation of consensual equal gay relationships.
And yes, the historical circumstances surrounding all that is no heinous to any modern audience… but for different reasons than modern Xtians paint.
P.S. This is not a defense of many awful, gut-churning stories in scripture - merely an explanation of this one specific topic within it’s own social, cultural, and historic context and scope.
Yeah except it commands that both be put to death which wouldn't make sense if it was raping a boy. Especially since the Bible also says not to kill someone raped.
Secondly the exodus didn't happen.
Third Paul condemns it twice and no matter what games you play with the translation it still comes out to don't be gay.
Fourth if it was a bad on child molestation why not just say it? There are words in Hebrew and Greek for child.
I am not defending the ethics of the context, as I said before.
Consent has no place in Levitical law. It simply not a variable. Rape your daughter-in-law or consensual sex… doesn’t matter, death to both. Rape or consensual sex with an aunt? Death to both. Screw an animal? Also death to both. Force one of your male slaves (of any age) to have sex with you the way you would freely do with a female slave (which would be your right)… death to both of you. These are “household” crimes and the household pays the price.
None of this is based on your modern morality, ethics, or sense or fairness or justice. It was written for you.
The framework for all this is actually clarified earlier, in Lev 19:20… in which crimes against someone else’s household (i.e. slaves) does NOT result in death.
I also already addressed Paul in my previous comment. Your assertion is incorrect.
Didn't acknowledge what I said about the Exodus
You haven't even attempted to mention what neighboring tribes said about the same thing or what people who lived under these rules had to say
Didn't acknowledge what Paul said. Very clear that he was upset about people being gay. Even if you say it was added on that wouldn't change anything from the Christian perspective since about half the letters are fraudulent.
Didn't acknowledge that Hebrew and Greek both have words for child
Sigh. Consent isn't in there? You sure?
I am sorry your holy book is homophobic. Maybe spend the time learning the languages it is written in if you want to follow it.
Are you confusing me with a different conversation?
How in the fuck does it take a significant amount of mistranslation or ignorance to read that as "gay is bad"? You can speculate all you want about temporal context, but there is not a scholar alive that actually knows what the actual context was. Sure, we can assume contextual clues, but that is about it.
I hate to say this, but your analysis about "male" vs "man" and the silly confusion about "as with a woman" is just odd. I understand breaking down the meaning of a sentence into ultra-fine components, but damn...
"If someone with a dick tries to fuck another person with a dick like a woman (put it in the butt), it bad. You die." -- Today, in our context, that is what it means.
Books like the bible are written like an extended Nostradamus prophecy so they can be interpreted in any way that "scholars" see fit. Especially in this day and age, some things have to be taken literally.
Because it is bullshit. The text is very clear what the rules were. The whole Mankind vs man thing is only an issue for people who haven't bothered learning the language.
Not only do we clearly know the context, I explained it.
If you want to talk about how morally and ethically repugnant that context is by our modern standards, be my guest. I agree with you.
But Jewish and Christian scripture is not nearly as ambiguous as it’s portrayed to be by those who want to twist it for their own ends.