Can someone explain the Bibles inconsistent stance on SEX

by jwfacts 8 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  jwfacts

  I am trying to define what is acceptable sexual practice and find that using the Bible as a guide is quite confusing and contradictory. Looking at the history of sexual encounters in the Bible seems to indicate that multiple sex partners is acceptable, provided you can afford it, yes even in sex the rich have a different set of rules to the poor. However Adultery seems to consistently be thought of as wrong.

  Adam and Eve - No rule is given, just that a man should stick with his wife. This does not say he can not have others on the side.

  Prior to Moses - People like Abraham have relations with his servant to bear a child. He made no marriage commitment to her, and later kicked her out. Joseph avoids Potifers wife, showing a stand always existed against adultery

  Mosaic Law - Lots of things that you can not do with others, lots or reasons to be unclean, but still polygamy is allowed, such as the case of when you sister in laws husband dies. David, Solomon have many wives and still considered the most righteous of men.

  Christian times and fornication is condemned. However the statement that an elder was to be "husband of one wife" does not mean there can be no single elders, so indicates that there were Christians that were husbands of more than one wife.

  The above seems to indicate that polygamy is quite acceptable to God, as long as you can afford to provide for your family, and did not leave your wife on a whim. So what is God's view on sex?

  • Are multiple sexual partners ok?
  • Does there have to be commitment, such as a marriage document, or are random sexual encounters acceptable?
  • Why does it say fornication is wrong, when it seems quite natural behaviour prior to marriage?
  • Are open marriages allowed for, provided both mates agree to it?
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  Zone

  Laws on sex were changed from the OT to the NT.

  In the OT, Poligimiy was accepted. In the NW (now), it isn't.

  You really have to read the Bible, in order, to get the full grasp on the sex laws, I stopped at Solomon on Monday, and Im im not mistaken, that dude had 700 wives, and Jehovah was OK with it.
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  hambeak

  Not really therefore the reason for so many interpretations and religions and cultures I believe it all boils down to two individuals being faithful to one another. Multiple partners will always cause some strife somewhere especially where children are involved.
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  V

  It all becomes clear when you realise that, in the Bible, women are property.

  That's why men could have multiple wives, but women could not have multiple husbands.

  That's why it was wrong to have sex with a married woman, she was owned by another man.

  This isn't "morality"--it is property rights.
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  M.J.

  Polygamy doesn't seem to be condemned outright. But I may venture to say monogomy was a base assumption in the NT when Jesus said,

  (Matt 19:4-6) And He answered and said to them, “Have you not read that He who made [ a ] them at the beginning ‘made them male and female,’ [ b ] and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, andthe two shall become one flesh’? [ c ] So then, they are no longer two but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let not man separate.”
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  jwfacts

  This isn't "morality"--it is property rights.

  That seems to shed some light on it, including why fornication was wrong. It is not sex that was wrong, but the taking of the virginity of a woman who you had not committed to. There was nothing wrong with multiple partners, as long as there were the propterty rights through a formal commitment.

  For the Christians, how do you account for the contradication.

  For the non Christians, how do you define your current boundaries?
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  Narkissos

  Imo there are basically two sources for the OT sex prohibitions -- one being the civil, i.e. property law as V pointed out; the other being the sacral or priestly symbolic separation of cleanness and uncleanness. Prohibition of homosexuality, bestiality, intercourse with one's wife during her periods, or the various degrees of "incest" (which go further than blood relatives) have little to do with property rights. Sometimes the two overlap, as in the case of adultery which can be condemned as both theft (from the civil standpoint) and defilement (from the sacral standpoint). The notion of "sin" originally belongs to the sacral vocabulary (cf. the "sin" or "uncleanness" attached to birth, as to completely amoral issues like leprosy in Leviticus). Another aspect is that in the pre-biblical stage there was a "sacred" approach to sex, e.g. with temple prostitution (temple prostitutes being "holy ones" in Hebrew) which was later rejected.

  More generally, I think the Bible texts deal with sex according to the conceptions of their socio-cultural contexts: for obvious economical reasons polygamy was rarely widespread in the population, it was the privilege of rulers or wealthy subjects. In the Hellenistic and Roman world monogamy became a moral ideal beyond the Jewish and Christian spheres. Interestingly, "husband of one wife" is also found in funeral inscriptions as an expression of moral virtue and domestic piety -- so this formula per se does not imply that polygamy was a common case in early Christianity.
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  JWdaughter

  I have figured out the prohibition against sex during certain times of a womans cycle. Some OT dude figured out that the most effective way to get pregnant was 2 weeks after the beginning of a period-which usually lasts about 5 days. A week after that puts a woman(most of them) at the beginning of her most fertile time. As children were considered riches, and benefitted the community as a whole, my reckoning is that the prohibitions were to increase fertility and focus more intense sexual activity when it is most effective.
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  jwfacts

  Interesting concept JWdaughter. So much of it was about increasing the population. I think that is why in the OT polygamy was accepted. There was an overabundance of women due to the men dieing in war.