by PopeOfEruke 50 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
Paul doesn't single out homosexuals from the rest of "pagan sinners".
Very true, Nark.
I guess that lends itself to another topic thread( one that's no doubt been been created before)...
Does the NT( as a cohesive work, which I realize is a stretch) characterize homosexuality as more "sinful" than other forms of porneia?
*raises hand*
I wanna be kept for unnatural purposes!
*goes to find his gag*
Does the NT( as a cohesive work, which I realize is a stretch) characterize homosexuality as more "sinful" than other forms of porneia?
Indeed, I don't think so.
Imo Paul, like many of his Jewish contemporaries, did not understand (or did not want to understand) homosexuality, which had certainly existed in Israel (cf. David/Saul-Jonathan) but had been officially repressed by the Torah centuries before.
I find it characteristic, in particular, that in Romans 1 it is described not as the "sin" but as the "symptom," or even punishment. Because they (Gentiles) have not kept God in true knowledge (idolatry is the real "sin") God delivered them to 'such gross misbehaviour'. It is so "unthinkable" to him that it must be construed as the sign of a divine curse, because of a basic "flaw" in pagan culture (idolatry).
Not that far from Ahmadinejad when he says that "there are no homosexuals in Iran" (I have personally seen transvestite prostitutes in a park in Tehran a few years ago, they just have to watch for the police pretty good). He simply does not want to see them, and those who get caught are discounted as pathological aberrations.
I always thought that beng kept for unnatural purposes was not a volitional act on the part of the person who is being kept for unnatural purposes. This means that, if a person is being kept celibate by the Watchtower Society for the purpose of getting more work out of that purpose, that means the person is being kept for unnatural purposes and will not inherit God's Tyranny. Another instance where God is not fair and will punish people for things they have no volition on, and that are within someone else's control.
I always assumed it was intended to refer to homosexuals but wouldn't all of that be covered by "men who lie with men?" Maybe men kept for "unnatural purposes" refers to gladiators and stuff?
WTWizard and mrk,
Your respective readings (which could definitely not happen in the Greek text) are very good examples of how the convoluted NWT loses its readers...
Wouldn't the person who kept this catarast be more reprehensible for enslaving a fellow human being?
changeling
Yes, please. Two, if it isn't too much of a bother. Perhaps I should specify gender and general attractiveness ... which columns do I use on the order form, Eff?
That depends on if you're using the Volunteer or Request form....
Men kept for unnatural purposes ...
I don't have access to my Watchtower CD at this moment but I recall that the "men kept for unnatural purposes" refers to trial lawyers.
Rub a Dub
The allegorical interpretation of purity laws in Barnabas 10:6 is curiously graphic: "Furthermore, it says, 'You shall not eat the hare.' Why? Do not become, he means, one who corrupts boys (paidophthoros), or even resemble such people, because the hare grows another anus every year, and thus has any many orifices as it is years old". There is a very similar passage elaborated in Clement of Alexandria, Paidagogicus 2.10. There is no English translation of this passage on the internet because the (now) public domain Ante Nicene Fathers decided to give it only in Latin, keeping the offensive material restricted to scholars rather than the general public.
VM44....Here is a list of translations for malakoi and arsenokotoi in 1 Corinthians 6:
Vulgate, c. 385: neque molles neque masculorum concubitores
Wycliffe, 1388: nethir letchouris ayen kinde, nether men that seruen mawmetis
Tyndale, 1526: nether weaklinges nether abusars of them selves with the mankynde
Luther, 1534: noch die Weichlinge noch die Knabenschänder
Zurcher, 1574: noch Lustknaben noch Knabenschänder
KJV, 1611: nor effeminate nor abusers of themselves with mankind
Martin, 1744: ni les efféminés, ni ceux qui commettent des péchés contre nature
Elberfelder, 1871: noch Weichlinge, noch Knabenschänder,
Darby, 1884: nor those who make women of themselves, nor who abuse themselves with men
Darby French, 1885: ni efféminés, ni ceux qui abusent d'eux-mêmes avec des hommes
Rotherham, 1897: nor effeminate, nor sodomites
YLT, 1898: nor effeminate, nor sodomites
Weymouth, 1903: nor any who are guilty of unnatural crime
Segond, 1910: ni les efféminés, ni les infâmes
Goodspeed 1923: or sensual or given to unnatural vice
Moffatt 1926: catamites, sodomites
Lamsa, 1933: nor the corrupt, nor men who lie with males
Knox, 1945: the effeminate, the sinners against nature
RSV, 1946: nor homosexuals
NWT, 1950: nor men kept for unnatural purposes, nor men who lie with men
NEB, 1961: none who are guilty of homosexual perversion
Bible de Jerusalem, 1961: ni depraves, ni gens de moeurs infames
NASB, 1963: nor effeminate, nor homosexuals
JB, 1966: catamites, sodomites
NEB, 1970: guilty of ... homosexual perversion
RSV, 1971: nor sexual perverts
Byington, 1972: nor any who practice sodomy or submit to it
TEV, 1976: or homosexual perverts
Revised JB, 1985: self-indulgent, sodomites
Revised RSV 1989: male prostitutes, sodomites
La Biblia, 1990: ni los afeminados, ni los homosexuales
La Sacra Bibbia, 1984: ne gli effeminati, ne i sodomiti
NAB, 1990: nor boy prostitutes nor practicing homosexuals
Robertson/Plummer, 1999: sensualists, sodomites
