Tag Archives: homosexuality

The Story of King Absalom—
A Man’s Enemies Are the Members of His Own Household

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David’s son Amnon was obsessed with his beautiful sister Tamar. Amnon’s nephew advised him to pretend to be sick. Then he could request a meal to be served to him in bed by his sister. So he did. When Tamar went to Amnon’s bedroom and tried to give him some food, he wouldn’t eat it. Instead, he told her to get in bed with him.

Tamar said she couldn’t do that right now, because that would be foolish and wicked and disgraceful. They should get married first! She was sure their righteous father David would allow his children to marry each other. But Amnon ignored her proposal, raped her, and sent her away. Absalom, another son of David, saw Tamar crying, and he told her to shut up. He said she should stop taking Amnon’s actions so seriously, because he was just her brother.

King David was not happy with what Amnon had done. Two years later, Absalom had Amnon killed. David heard that all his sons had been killed, and he wasn’t happy about that, either. When he found out that only Amnon was dead, he was just slightly more happy. Absalom wasn’t allowed to see his father for two years. Then Absalom set Joab’s barley field on fire, which convinced him to let Absalom visit David.

Absalom became popular (despite his disgracefully long hair) by kissing all the men who came to see King David. Then Absalom was able to get the people to declare him king of Israel. When David heard that his son was trying to overthrow him, he and most of his household ran away. But he made ten of his girlfriends stay behind to take care of his palace.

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A Man’s Enemies Are the Members of His Own Household →
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The Story of David and Jonathan—
The Gay Story

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Saul hates David, Saul’s children love David

After David killed Goliath, women from all over Israel started singing and dancing and claiming that David had slain tens of thousands, but Saul had only slain thousands. This made Saul jealous and angry at David, and they became enemies.

The next day, Saul tried to kill David twice by throwing a spear at him, but he missed both times. Since Saul wasn’t able to kill David himself, he decided to let his other enemies do it for him. So Saul offered to let David marry his daughter Merab if David fought some more Philistines. But David didn’t think he was worthy of becoming the king’s son-in-law, because he wasn’t rich and famous enough.

(Even though women all over Israel were singing his praises. Even though he had been chosen by God to become king of Israel. Even though Saul had promised to give great wealth and his daughter to whoever killed Goliath.)

So Merab married somebody else. But Saul found out that his other daughter, Michal, was in love with David, so Saul offered to let David marry her if he killed 100 Philistines. So David forgot about his supposed unworthiness, and killed 200 Philistines and brought their foreskins to Saul,1 and then David married Michal. Then Saul found out that Michal was in love with David. Again.

But David loved Saul’s son Jonathan more than he loved women. Jonathan loved David too, so he took off his clothes and became one with him. Jonathan informed David (who had already had to dodge Saul’s spear twice) that Saul was trying to get David killed. Jonathan knew this because Saul had told Jonathan to kill David. Then Jonathan told Saul that there was no reason to kill David for no reason, so Saul promised to stop trying to kill David.

Idol threats

But then God sent an evil spirit that made Saul throw a spear at David again, so David ran away from Saul’s house and stayed at his own house. Saul sent men to wait outside David’s house that night and kill him in the morning. When David realized that Saul’s men had come to kill him, he wrote a song about it.2 Then he threatened to kill his wife if she didn’t help him escape, so she lowered him through a window, and distracted Saul’s men with a decoy made from an idol that she had handy for some reason.

Saul went after David so he could capture him and kill him, but when he ran into Samuel and some other men, God made Saul strip off his clothes and lie down with the men and spend the night with them.

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The Gay Story →
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The Story of the Inauguration of Saul—
Your Cattle or Your Eyes

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When Samuel was getting old, his evil sons were next in line to take over the nation. The people of Israel suggested appointing a king to lead them instead. But Samuel didn’t think that was a good idea, so he asked God about it. God didn’t like the idea either, because he thought that meant his people wouldn’t consider him their king. But he told Samuel to do it anyway.

So Samuel warned Israel that their king would steal their property and enslave them. And he said God would never save them by putting an end to the king’s reign. The people said they wanted a king anyway, because all the other nations had kings. When God heard this, he said Samuel should go ahead and give them a king.

A tall, handsome young man named Saul came to Samuel to see if the prophet could tell him where his father’s lost donkeys were. Before he could ask him, Samuel told Saul that the donkeys had already been found while he was away looking for them.

Then Samuel took Saul home with him and kissed him and oiled him and told him God had made him the ruler of his people. Saul hid, but when the people of Israel found out that he was to be their king, they got God to find him for them. And they dragged him out and made him their king.

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Your Cattle or Your Eyes →
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The Story of the Levite’s Concubine—
The Most Pointlessly Evil Story in the Bible

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A Levite man’s girlfriend broke up with him and went back to live with her parents. But then he followed her to her parents’ house and took her back. On the way back to the man’s home, they stopped for the night in Gibeah, a city of the tribe of Benjamin, and stayed in an old man’s house.

Some of the Benjamite men from that city came and surrounded the house. They told the old man to send the Levite man out so they could have sex with him. The old man said he couldn’t let them have sex with his guest, because that would be outrageous and vile. So he offered to let them rape his daughter and his guest’s girlfriend instead.

The Levite man thought that was a good idea, so he sent his girlfriend outside. The men of Gibeah spent the whole night gang-raping her to death. Then the man went home, and he chopped up his girlfriend into a dozen pieces and had them distributed all over the country.

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The Most Pointlessly Evil Story in the Bible →
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Marriage partners the Bible doesn’t forbid

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I’ve previously published a list of people the Bible doesn’t say you can’t have sex with. Since it’s possible to have marriage without sex and vice versa, I’m now also making a separate list of some of the people the Bible doesn’t say you can’t marry.

As before, please keep in mind that by including something on this list, I am not necessarily saying it should be forbidden, nor am I necessarily saying it should not be forbidden. I am including both acceptable matches and unacceptable matches in this list.

As far as I can tell, there are no rules in the Bible1 against marrying…

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The Story of Sodom and Gomorrah—
Lot's Family's Mostly Unsuccessful Attempt to Avoid Being Raped and Killed

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Abraham’s nephew Lot was a righteous man. He lived in the city of Sodom, where nearly everyone was so wicked that God decided to kill them all.1 So God sent two angels (who looked like men) to Sodom. Lot met them and convinced them to spend the night at his house.

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Lot's Family's Mostly Unsuccessful Attempt to Avoid Being Raped and Killed →
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Homosexuality in the Bible

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What does the Bible say about gay men?

The Bible describes sex between two men as a wicked, detestable, vile, outrageous, shameful sin.1 It says any men who do this have to be killed, and will not be allowed into the kingdom of God.

Does it really say that?

I’m pretty sure it does. Some people say the Bible isn’t as anti-gay as it seems, but I’m not convinced.

Some say the law against gay male sex can’t be about gay sex in general because that’s too private for the law to be enforceable, since there aren’t likely to be multiple witnesses. So they say that law must really only be about public acts of temple prostitution. But by that logic, you would have to conclude that none of the Bible’s rules about sex apply to acts done in private. Not even the laws that specifically say nobody else is around. I doubt that’s what was intended.

Some say Paul was only specifically condemning the practice of pederasty, but that’s not what he said. The word he used translates literally to “man-bed”. Why wouldn’t he use a word that specified boys or teenagers, if that was what he meant? And nobody thought it was wrong for adults to have sex with teenagers back then, so even if Paul was talking about pederasty, the age issue is probably not the part he would have objected to.

Some say the Bible implies that if you’re a man who sleeps with men or a woman who grinds with women, you have a 50% chance of being raptured into heaven, while for the rest of us who try to enter through the straight gate, the chance of being saved is much lower. But does the Bible actually say those people who are being taken are going to heaven? According to one of Jesus’s parables, the first people who will be taken away at the end of the age will be sinners being taken to hell.

There are more passages in the Bible that could be seen as vaguely pro-gay,2 but interpreting them that way is a bit of a stretch, especially considering how much more straightforward and clear the other passages are that say gays must be killed, etc.

But why?

What’s so bad about homosexuality, that it would deserve that kind of punishment? Nothing at all, as far as I can tell. I haven’t heard any good reasons to think gay sex is immoral. I’ve heard some bad ones though…

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