Premarital Sex and the Bible Peer Reviewed Articles
The Bible's Contradictions Most Sex
BU theologian: the skillful volume is not a rule book
It is easy to label Jennifer Knust, the writer of Unprotected Texts: The Bible'south Surprising Contradictions Almost Sexual activity and Want, a theological renegade. And she does say the sorts of things in this book—nearly premarital sex and abortion and gay spousal relationship—that make conservatives shudder. But in ane respect at least, Knust, a School of Theology assistant professor, is a throwback.
Long ago and in a identify far abroad, Christians used to really fear God. They saw a yawning gap between their limited intelligence and the heed of God. And then they were exceedingly conscientious nearly presuming what God had to say about almost annihilation. "He who would acquire astronomy, and other recondite arts," wrote the Protestant reformer John Calvin, "he should become elsewhere" than the Biblical text.
Today many supposedly conservative Christians have no trouble pontificating on what Jesus would do most the deficit or what the Bible says about state of war and peace or sex and the solar system. Knust, who is an ordained American Baptist pastor, thinks that this confidence is non only preposterous, but perchance idolatrous as well.
We sat down a few days ago, as people increasingly sit downwards present (in front of our respective computers), to discuss her new book.
Prothero: Why another book on the Bible and sex? What does your book have to tell us that we don't already know?
Knust: Considering the Bible continues to be invoked in today's public debates as if information technology should have the last word on contemporary American sexual morals. The only way the Bible tin can exist a sexual rulebook is if no one reads it. Unprotected Texts seeks to offering a comprehensive, accessible word of the Bible in its entirety, demonstrating the contradictory nature of the Biblical witness and encouraging readers to take responsibility for their interpretations of it.
Only everybody knows the Bible is against abortion and gay union and premarital sex. Is everybody really wrong?
Yes. The Bible does not annotate on ballgame and gay marriage. Some Biblical writers contend against premarital or extramarital sex, especially for women, but other Biblical writers present premarital sex as a source of God's blessing.
Actually? Where does the Bible give a green light to premarital sex?
Perhaps the most striking example is in the story of Ruth, though there are other examples as well. According to the Volume of Ruth, when the recently widowed Ruth and her mother-in-police force Naomi were faced with a famine in Ruth'southward homeland Moab, they returned to State of israel impoverished and with little promise of survival. Ruth took to gleaning in the fields to detect food for herself and Naomi. The owner of the fields, a relative of Naomi named Boaz, saw Ruth and was pleased by her. When Naomi heard most information technology, she encouraged Ruth to adorn herself and approach Boaz at night while he was sleeping to see what would happen. Ruth took this advice, resting with him until morning after beginning "uncovering his anxiety" (in Hebrew, "anxiety" tin can exist a euphemism for male genitals). The next 24-hour interval, Boaz goes to town to notice out whether he tin can marry her, and, luckily, some other human with a claim to Ruth agrees to release her. They exercise marry and together they produce Obed, the grandfather of King David.
None of this would have been possible if Ruth had non set out to seduce Boaz in a field, without the benefit of marriage.
You say the Bible tin can't be used as a sexual rulebook. Can it exist used as a rulebook for anything? Are Christians left to brand moral choices without whatsoever guidance from Biblical sources?
We can certainly plough to the Bible for guidance on moral issues, but nosotros should not wait to find uncomplicated answers to the moral questions we are request. Sometimes Biblical conclusions are patently immoral. Sometimes they are deeply inspiring. In either case, we are left with the responsibility for determining what nosotros volition believe and assert.
OK, just what virtually Jesus? Can nosotros appeal to him on these questions? Wasn't he opposed to divorce, for example? And what does his decision not to marry tell usa today?
Certainly Christians should try to understand how Jesus might answer to a business or trouble they are facing. Merely Jesus' words exercise non come to us united nations-interpreted. Preserved inside Gospels written several decades after his death, they have been reshaped in low-cal of the experiences of the Gospel writers. Also, those who have transmitted these sayings to us accept left their ain marking, sometimes editing and changing Jesus' words. This is specially truthful when it comes to Jesus' teachings on divorce. As I show in my book, Jesus' sayings on divorce were presented in diverse, contradictory ways, though remarriage was universally forbidden. The prohibition against remarriage, however, makes sense when it comes to the Gospels. All the Gospel writers believed that Jesus would soon return to bring the kingdom of sky, making union irrelevant.
In my book Religious Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know—and Doesn't I argue that American politicians often use the Bible without knowing what it really says. Is Biblical illiteracy a problem in U.Due south. politics in your view?
Yes. In political contexts, the Bible is repeatedly invoked equally if it tin back up one particular view, though upon a closer exam, it is quite clear that the passages mentioned (if any are mentioned) say petty to zilch well-nigh the topic at paw. The about egregious case is the citation of the Epistle to the Ephesians equally a support for "Biblical marriage," which supposedly means marriage between i man and one adult female for the purpose of procreation. Ephesians just does not endorse this form of marriage. Instead, Ephesians recommends that a human love his wife and children and be kind to his slaves. In a earth where slaves could not marry and where their ain sexual lives were entirely adamant past their masters, this pedagogy endorses a hierarchical household where merely sure men accept admission to the privileges of wedlock, (human) property, and children.
When it comes to the Bible and sexual activity, who in your view gets information technology almost wrong? And who gets it virtually right?
I'grand not interested in judging who gets things incorrect or right. Instead I would like to convince all of u.s. to take responsibility for the interpretations nosotros are promoting. I would like us to terminate pretending that the Bible has been dictating our conclusions to us and then that we can evaluate the implications of what nosotros are defending. The question for me is non whether an estimation is valid, merely whether it is valuable, and to whom.
Why in your view are Americans so obsessed about sex? Why does faith collapse so readily into morality and morality into bedchamber issues?
I wish I knew! Perhaps focusing on morality, especially morality in the bedroom, makes it possible for united states of america to avoid facing other, more than intractable problems. Perhaps speaking incessantly nearly sexual morals allows some to affirm a position of moral superiority, thereby promoting their ain make of righteousness at the expense of someone else's. Or maybe people are simply longing for certainty nigh a topic that impacts everyone, since every human person desires to be touched and loved. Every human body is vulnerable and sexual difference is one of the primal ways in which we experience being human. Absolute certainty almost these matters would therefore be nice, if information technology were available. As even the Bible tin can teach u.s.a., it isn't.
You desire u.s.a. to "take responsibility" for our interpretations. Simply isn't that precisely the rub in this fence? People who cite the Bible practice and then to call down the authority of God on their behalf. They are asking God to take responsibleness for their interpretations, because they believe that those interpretations come up from God. What makes you lot so sure they are incorrect?
Because nosotros are human beings, not God. By claiming that we tin can exist sure most matters that we merely partially understand, we are placing ourselves in the role of God. From a Christian perspective anyway, this is a serious sin. Certainty is non granted to us. Every bit an American Baptist, an heir to both the radical Reformation and abolitionist American Protestantism, I would assert the interpretive perspective adopted by antislavery activists in the 18th and 19th centuries and insist that loving one's neighbour is God'southward principal requirement. I would defend this principle vigorously, and I deeply value its implications. Still, I cannot claim that the Bible made me accomplish this conclusion. Some biblical passages can back up my bespeak of view. Others do not. So, equally firmly as I believe that "dearest your neighbor" can capture God's point of view, I cannot exist certain that I am right.
Jennifer Knust volition talk near her new book, Unprotected Texts: The Bible's Surprising Contradictions Most Sex and Desire, at vii p.k. today, Feb 16, at Barnes & Noble at BU, level five Reading Room, 660 Buoy St., Kenmore Foursquare.
Stephen Prothero, a College of Arts & Sciences professor of faith, can be reached at prothero@bu.edu.
This article originally appeared on the Huffington Post.
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Source: https://www.bu.edu/articles/2011/the-bibles-contradictions-about-sex/
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