The Truth Sets You Free

However, questions remain regarding the source of Paul’s term. As Mendell points out, anyone wishing to explain Paul’s meaning must answer three questions: First, where does he get the word? Second, why does he use such an arcane word? Third, if the word is as ambiguous as Boswell claims, how can Paul expect that he will be understood?

The evidence suggests that Paul coined the term, based on the juxtaposition of the two words arsenos and koiten in the LXX of Leviticus 20: 13 (cf. similar phraseology in 18: 22). We cannot prove this supposition, but style, practice, familiarity with the LXX, and literary context make this theory very plausible.

Scholars have long pointed out words that seem to originate with Paul. Some 179 words found in his writings are seen nowhere else in pre-Christian Greek literature. Of these, eighty nine occur only one time. For example, in 1 Timothy 1: 3 and 6: 3 he uses the term heterodidaskaleo, “to teach a different doctrine,” which cannot be found in any extant writing from an earlier period. Only Ignatius is known to have used it later, in “To Polycarp” 3: 1. If he also coined arsenokoitai, then Paul likely designed two new terms within seven verses to advance his argument (1 Timothy 1: 3, 10).

In addition, Paul displays considerable dependence upon the LXX. He quotes more frequently from the LXX than from the Hebrew Old Testament. When E.E. Ellis classified Old Testament quotations in Paul’s writings, he identified the LXX as the source for fourteen and the Hebrew Scripture as the source for four. Obviously Paul was familiar with, and preferred to use, the LXX.

The New Testament particularly draws on Leviticus 18-20. The structure and content of these chapters mark them as special. Often identified as the Holiness Code, these chapters — unlike the remainder of Leviticus — are universal in scope. In this respect, they are on par with the treaty form of the Ten Commandments of Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5. The Jews held Leviticus 19 to be a summary of Torah, making it a central chapter in the Pentateuch. This sense was carried over to the writers of the New Testament. Christ, Paul, Peter, and James cited the section. “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” is Leviticus 19: 18. Paul alludes to 19: 19 in 2 Corinthians 6: 14 to illustrate why believers must not become unequally yoked with unbelievers. Here he uses heterozygountes, another word found nowhere before him, though an adjectival form of heterozygeo occurs in the LXX at 19: 19. It seems likely that the LXX suggested the coinage to Paul.

Literary Contexts

Most important, an examination of both literary contexts where arsenokoitai occurs suggest that Paul is thinking of the Levitical “code of holiness.” First Corinthians 5-6 includes several allusions to Leviticus 18-20. The theme is moral separation to God, as in Leviticus. Topics include distinction from the Gentiles (5:1; cf. 6:1-6; Leviticus 18:3, 24-30; 20:23) and future inheritance (kleronomeo, 6:9, 20; Leviticus 20: 23-24). The law of loving your neighbor as yourself (Leviticus 19:18) is reflected in 6:8. Of the ten vices in 6:9-10, only drunkenness is not found in Leviticus 18-20.

In addition, the literary pattern of incest (1 Corinthians 5:1-13) followed by homosexuality (6:9-10) and prostitution (6:12-20) parallels the pattern of incest and homosexuality in Leviticus 18 and 20, which in turn reflects the account of incest and homosexuality committed by Ham in Genesis 9.

Further connections with Leviticus are found in Paul’s call for discipline of immoral persons — specifically the one who has committed incest. By implication, Paul includes all the others in the lists of vices, including homosexuals, in his mandate for church discipline (1 Corinthians 5:1-11; 6:9-10). If the church fails to exercise discipline, Paul will deliver the immoral person to Satan for destruction of the flesh. Paul’s intention is to save his spirit (5:5) and to remove the contamination from the church (5:6-8). The mode and goals of discipline strongly reflect the karat idea expressed in Leviticus 18:29, whereby immoral persons, including those guilty of incest and homsexuality, were to be delivered over to God for present and future judgment.

Surely, then, both malakoi and arsenokoitai are drawn from Leviticus 20: 13 and point respectively to passive and acive same-gender partners. Even the rabbis applied Leviticus 20: 13 to both active and passive sodomy. Philo used malakia of effeminacy and said that the same penalty applied to active and passive sodomy. Leviticus suggested to Paul the use of two terms. The Leviticus passage holds both partners responsible; both have done a detestable act and are to be put to death. Leviticus 20: 13 records the penalty. The list itself offers parallels to the summation of Leviticus 20: 23-24 (cf. 18:29-30).

The same observations can be made about the literary context of 1 Timothy 1: 10. Paul deals with perversions of teaching regarding the Mosaic Law (1:3-8), moves to legislation in general (1:9-10), and ends with the gospel (1:11).

Paul introduces the list of 1 Timothy in a deliberate way, by affirming that law is made not for the righteous but for the unrighteous in three ways: (1) the lawless and rebellious; (2) the ungodly and sinners; and (3) the unholy and profane (1:9). Such groupings correspond to legal or civil, religious and moral aspects of ethical life. Paul affirms that his list of vices, including homosexuality, reflects legal, religious, and moral concerns. In a biblical worldview, one cannot divorce civil (legal) concerns from the religious (impure) and moral (ethical).

This literary feature reinforces our observation that the Levitical code is carried over to the new era, so that even purity (religious) rules have ongoing, universal import for both the Christian and the non-Christian.

With the Law of Moses dominant, it is not surprising that the list of specific vices corresponds to the fifth through the ninth commandments, in order. The tenth commandment deals with inward desire, which law cannot proscribe. Since the list uses both single terms and doublets to refer to the Ten Commandments, in an alternating pattern of 2, 1, 2, 1, 2, andrapodistais (“slave traders”) would seem to represent the eighth commandment, rather than that accompanying the preceding arsenokoitai.

This point casts doubt on Scrogg’s narrow sexual definition of andrapodistais (“slave-dealers who procure boys as prostitutes”). Similarly, unlikely is Countryman’s idea of linking prostitution with “stealers of men” (male prostitutes who were “legacy hunters who used sexual attraction as bait”) or “slave traders.” Countryman must have arsenokoitai refer to prostitution or a similar offense, rather than to homosexuality. If the latter is the meaning, Paul would be invoking the Levitical purity rule against homosexual acts, and Countryman’s whole system of distinguishing the temporary purity rules from ongoing moral principles would be in jeopardy. According to the arrangement of the list, and the biblical and cultural meaning of arsenokoitai, however, it is a surer translation to view pornois and arsenokoitai as representing the seventh commandment and “slave traders” as alone representing the eight commandment.

The fact that Paul was addressing Christians in the city of Ephesus is significant to this whole discussion. From Ephesus Paul wrote to the Corinthians, eight to ten years later he directed his epistle to Timothy there. Homosexuals are explicitly linked to Ephesus. Philostratus claims that Apollonius of Tyana found the city full of homosexuals in the second half of the first century A.D. — the era in which Paul writes.

In the lists of 1 Corinthians and 1 Timothy, sexual sins are considered less serious than idolatry and murder but more wicked than property crimes. Within the sexual vices, the order is probably one of ascending sinfulness. Homosexuality is the worst, coming after prostitution or immorality, adultery, and effeminacy. The listing of homosexuality after effeminacy in 1 Corinthians reinforces the idea that the words together describe the passive and active partners in homosexuality. The rarity of the terms suggests this idea as well, as does the dual culpability of the partners, as stipulated in Leviticus. Again, the implications for the various revisionist interpretations are self-evident.

A Word with Clear Meaning

The preceding discussion of the literary structure of the contexts of the two passages justifies the claim that Paul coined arsenokoitai from Leviticus 20: 13. In light of the evidence, including the fact that no use of the term exists before Paul, it is strange that modern interpreters such as Countryman, Edwards, and Scroggs never consider the possibility that Paul himself coined the term from Leviticus 20. Of course, to have Paul so directly invoke the term and concept from Leviticus destroys the system of Countryman and Edwards, who restrict the Bible’s comment on homosexuality to temporal purity codes — a cultic worldview no longer in effect. This finding also contradicts all who refuse to find condemnation of adult mutuality in arsenokoitai. Mutuality must be included in its force in Leviticus 18 and 20. Leviticus condemns the behavior, whatever the motivation.

Two of Mendell’s questions remain. Why does Paul coin such a term? How does Paul expect his readers to understand the term?

Paul seeks to demonstrate the relation of believers to the Law of Moses. He wants to show which parts of the law of Exodus 20 and Leviticus 18-20 are universal moral standards, in contrast to those ceremonial and purity laws that are limited to Israel. These are the essential ethical elements in a biblical worldview. First Corinthians speaks to people who are acquainted with Judaism; note references to “Satan” and the penalty of being cut off (5:5), the “day of the Lord” (5:5), “leaven” (5:6-8), “Passover” (5:7), and judging angels (6:3). Deuteronomy 17:7 is quoted in 5: 13. Since Leviticus 18-20 became central to the Day of Atonement, which provided cleansing of the Sanctuary, the Holy of Holies, and the community, it would be natural for Paul to refer to this section of Leviticus (cf. Leviticus 16 and 23). In 1 Timothy 1, one of the main points is the topic of the believer’s relationship to law. Law has a role to play if it is used properly. This is an important point in light of the contemporary legal aspects surrounding homosexuality.

By coining a term, Paul makes reference to homosexuality explicit, within a Jewish and Christian worldview. Other terms were too general (such as porneia) or reflected Greek forms of homosexual behavior (pederasty). By coining a term, Paul both narrowly defines what he means and propounds a theological construct that homosexuality is sin. Paul denounces it as sin because it violates God’s law, it defiles the community and sanctuary, it places one’s position in the community and the afterlife in jeopardy, and needs to be atoned for by the sacrifice of the Day of Atonement — Christ. A biblical worldview is wrapped up in the term. That Paul coins a term reinforces the uniqueness of biblical morality.

Moreover, Paul assumes even among gentile readers a degree of knowledge of the Levitical system and the law. The contexts of 1 Corinthians 5-6 and 1 Timothy 1 refer directly or make allusion to Jewish law and culture.

Finally, how can Paul expect his Greek readers to understand the term? From the lexical evidence it is clear that compounds involving arseno- and arreno- and koite abound. The Greeks were adept at forming new compounds. Therefore, Paul coined a word which he knew would bring quick recognition.

The meaning of arsenokoitai is also aided by its place in both lists. It is tied closely to adultery — a concern of moral principle and not just purity codes limited to Israel. As Thomas Schmidt observes, “Every sexual act that the Bible calls sin is essentially a violation of marriage, whether existing or potential.” In 1 Corinthians 6:9-10, arsenokoitai with malakoi comes after adultery, and in 1 Timothy 1:10, arsenokoitai with pornois takes the place of adultery. So Paul refers to homosexuality as a “supplement ot, or a substitution for, adultery. ” Paul uses these terms to focus on the commandment not to commit adultery, which helps his readers understand the term and realize its moral force.

The word arsenokoitai is general, reflecting the passage in Leviticus 20: 13. Paul did not use androkoites (“male having sex with a male”), which would not have encompassed the prohibition of pederasty. Paul’s term expresses gender but not gender and maturity; he condemns “males who lie with males of any age.” It is also in accord with the three-fold use of arsen- in Romans 1: 27, where Paul condemns same-gender sexual behavior among men.

This also explains why the word did not catch on with the secular world after Paul. Gentiles would not appreciate the biblical context of Old Testament moral legislation — its worldview. Paul was ahead of his time in coining this word, but he coined the word to contradict his time. Perhaps for the same reason, the terms sodomites and sodomy are fading now from general secular usage. The biblical terminology is losing ground in our increasingly secular and anti-Christian society. No other explanation makes sense but that Paul himself coined a new term, derived from the LXX at Leviticus 20: 13.

De Young, J. B. (2000). Homosexuality: Contemporary Claims Examined in Light of the Bible and Other Ancient Literature and Law. Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications

There are two major stumbling blocks to repentance that you will have to fight: the love of the familiar and the fear of the unknown. Jesus makes an interesting reference to the love of the familiar when He refers to Himself as the “light which came into the world.” People, He said, were in darkness and unable to comprehend the light when it came to them. That at least partially explains the rejection of Christ by His own people (John 1: 11). But He takes it a step further and says that people were not only in darkness but that they actually loved it! (John 3: 19). Their deeds were evil, and they had no desire to change. The comfort of their present state made them unwilling to consider any other way of life.

Never underestimate the power of the familiar. It has kept countless people from change, even when change would save their very lives. The familiar, after all, may be unhealthy, but at least we know it. We relate to it. And we are all too prone to cling to familiar territory.

When that “familiar territory” is sexual activity, it becomes perversely dear to us. Even though we admit it’s wrong, we also come to see it as an old friend. It’s reliable and available, and it works. It eases our pain and temporarily satisfies us. To repent of habitual sexual behavior can be like abandoning a trustworthy buddy.

Compare this to drug addiction. A person just doesn’t fall into it. Somewhere along the line he discovers satisfaction through a chemical. It temporarily eases pain, helps him forget troubles, comforts him. It becomes his anesthetic, deadening his anxieties like a nurturing parent. Of course there are other ways he could deal with his problems, but this drug is familiar and has a good track record. Why give up something that works?

Meanwhile he is becoming addicted. What began as a comfort is now a necessity, emotionally and physically. To give it up means to go through physical withdrawal, which is hard enough. But it would also mean finding another way to cope with the inner conflicts which remain long after withdrawal. In fact, without the familiar coping mechanism formerly provided, those conflicts will be stronger and more painful than ever. The truth is, he must find other coping mechanisms, because the one he uses now will eventually destroy him.

God is the Author of legitimate need. He created us with the need for intimacy, bonding, love. If we, for whatever reason, do not get these needs met in the normal way, we will develop abnormal ways of satisfying them. Once these abnormal methods are part of our makeup, we’re frightened to abandon them. Like faithful old friends, we rely on them and cannot imagine doing without them. In that sense we all love the familiar dark, not necessarily for its darkness, but for its familiarity.

Fear of the unknown is just as tough to beat. When we give up the familiar, we turn toward the unfamiliar. It may be to our benefit to do so, but it still threatens us. The unknown, no matter how good, is still the unknown. We have never been there, so we’re not sure what to expect, nor are we certain what to do once we get there. At that point we long again for the comfort of the familiar.

Look at the Jewish people’s journey out of Egypt. They had been in a terrible situation, cruelly driven to slave labor by their taskmasters. They lived in bondage and prayed for deliverance, and God intervened. He brought them out of Egypt miraculously and promised them a new start in a good land. And for a while that sounded great.

Then the exodus and the problems began. When faced with difficult situations in the wilderness, they were prone to long for the familiarity of Egypt and to dread the unknown Promised Land. Think about the power the familiar held for them! They had treated worse than animals in Egypt, yet at times they would remember it fondly, saying, “At least we were fed regularly and had our basic needs taken care of it!” The unknown frightened them, making them turn toward the bondage that they could at least relate to. And when they finally approached the Promised Land, the terror of its giant inhabitants overshadowed all the benefits that would go along with their new location. In Egypt at least they had survived. How could they be sure they would fare as well in new territory?

If you have met your primary emotional needs through homosexual behavior in the past, you may also wonder how you will fare in new territory. “If I could know that someday I’ll feel as turned on to a woman as I do to a man,” a client once told me, “this would be easier. Then it wouldn’t be so hard to make all these changes, because I’d know someday it’s all going to pay off. But when I look at straight couples and their kids, and think about me living that way and really enjoying it, I can’t relate to it. I know where I want to be, but I can’t even think of what it would be like to actually be there. And even if I do get there, how am I going to handle it?”

Your love of the familiar (homosexual practices) and fear of the unknown (repentance and a new life) will be alleviated when you consider the joy that the unknown holds for you. Sure, it’s tough at times. But it also opens up a way of freedom, new relationships, and peace of mind. The good outweighs the bad immeasurably.

When the Israelites were finally ready to enter the land that God promised to bring them to, they sent out spies to see exactly what their new home would be like. Imagine the anticipation they were feeling! They didn’t know much about this place — only that, whatever it was like, it had to be better than Egypt where they had been slaves, or the wilderness where they had wandered for so long. So they waited for the spies to return, having told them to bring back a sample of the fruit the land was bearing and a report on the kind of people who were already living there.

The spies returned with good news and bad news. The good news was that the fruit was abundant, a sure sign of healthy land. In fact, the grapes they brought back as a sample were so large that they had to be carried on a staff between two men! There was cause for real optimism and good reason to charge right in and take over.

The bad news was that there were also huge, intimidating giants dwelling in this unknown territory. The children of Israel appeared to be no match for these guys, who were so big that, according to the spies, they made the average man look like a grasshopper (Numbers 13: 17-33). So the unknown held both promise and foreboding. It was wonderful and frightening at the same time. But in the end, the fear of the unknown was finally conquered by the conviction that the land could be — must be — entered into.

Fruits and giants — they’re part and parcel of the unknown. The fruit of leaving sexual sin is a new and better way of living. The giants scowl in the background. Loneliness, sexual temptation, misunderstanding from friends, and uncertainty about the future all loom large enough to make you chirp away like a grasshopper. The question is this: Are you going to cling to familiar, destructive ways simply because you can relate to them, or are you willing to abandon them in favor of a new way of living which is better, even though at this point you can’t relate to it?

I trust that you’re ready and willing to try something better, which means that you’re ready and willing to repent.

Dallas, J. (2003). Desires in Conflict: Hope for Men Who Struggle with Sexual Identity. Eugene, Oregon: Harvest House Publishers

Such researchers as Wright and Henry Mendell have definitively shown that arsenokoitai must be defined broadly. One cannot limit arsenokoitai to pederasty or to active male prostitution. It also includes same-gender orientation, condition or mutuality.

A major difficulty with the studies of Petersen and those before him lies in their applications of linguistics and philology to the modern term homosexuals. Petersen has an erroneous conception of meaning and dictionaries when he claims that the English and Greek meanings are incompatible.

Although homosexuality was (and still is) popularly understood in terms of sexual acts, historical evidence does not allow limiting ancient ideas of homosexuality to acts alone. Both acts and orientation or desire fit the total secular and biblical use of arsenokoitai — especially in light of the contexts of Romans 1, 1 Corinthians 1, and 1 Timothy 1. Paul was not ignorant of the immorality in the secular cultures of Rome, Corinth, and Ephesus. Paul’s epistle to the Ephesians includes strongly implied references to homosexuality (cf. Ephesians 4: 17-24; 5: 3-12; these verses include lists of vices similar to the lists in 1 Timothy 1 and 1 Corinthians 6).

The subsequent question arises: Does modern usage limit the meaning of homosexual to orientation or inclination, excluding acts or behavior? Petersen answers in the affirmative and cites as support the meaning that the coiner of the word assigned to it and its meaning in the standard Supplement to the Oxford English Dictionary. In a footnote, however, Petersen acknowledges that Webster’s Third New International Dictionary (1971) includes a reference to the one who “practices homosexuality” and “same-sex sexual activity” after the definitions referring to inclination and preference. He dismisses this as “popularized, perhaps Americanized usages,” as “slang,” and as a “corruption of the original meaning.” He indicts Webster’s lexicographers as “ignorant of the psychological facts of the case, even though they may be correctly recording the use of the word in popular speech.”

The problem is that Petersen has overlooked several important principles. The first principle concerns lexicography: Once a word has entered the stream of society it becomes defined by its entire context — what the users mean by it, regardless of the coiner’s definition. Dictionaries reflect usage, staying abreast of changes in meaning.

Popular and scholarly usage of homosexuals today includes same-gender sexual behavior; perhaps this has become the predominant definition. It also covers adult mutuality in homosexuality, If this be so, then the terms homosexuals and arsenokoitai cover a similar breadth of meaning.

A second principle is that meanings of words continually change. The earlier unabridged second edition of Webster’s New Twentieth Century Dictionary of the English Langugage (1965) does not allow for “practice” under the defintion of homosexual and uses only the words “sexual relations between individuals of the same sex” as the second definition of homosexuality. But only six years later, as we have seen, the third edition (1971) included “practice” and “same-sex sexual activity.”

For Petersen to insist on restricting the meaning to the earlier dictionary and to call the later defintion a “corruption” is to ignore the realities of any dynamic language. Nor is change always a degrading of meaning. The meaning of a word may become deeper and more profound in implication. It can take on new value, take on a new meaning, or be given a new concrete application.

In the case of the term homosexual, several kinds of change apparently occurred over the last half of the twentieth century because of the increasingly frequent use of the word in contexts ranging from popular speech to scholarship. Total usage, not just scholarly usage, determines meaning.

A third principle is that words usually mark out a field of meaning. Words usually do not have or keep a narrow definition or point of meaning. The historical-cultural research reflected shows that homosexuality — under whatever name — existed in various forms, including prostitution, pederasty, lesbianism, orientation, and mutuality of relationship. The Greeks and Romans employed scores of terms to describe the orientation and behavior. Therefore, although the strict etymology of arsenokoitai is simply “male-bed” or “lying with a male,” it is plausible that it has a general, broad meaning when the context does not appear to restrict it narrowly.

A fourth principle is based on the first three. No two words have or keep exactly the same area of meaning, so there are no true equivalent synonyms within a language and no exact equivalents between languages. This suggests that arsenokoitai may be translated “homosexuals” even though there may be some imprecision. Terms of the past and of today can never be exactly equivalent because the cultural contexts can never be identical, especially given the span of time since Paul’s day. It may well be that “sodomites” represents better the idea of arsenokoitai since these two terms with their moral and biblical settings represent contexts closer to one another. Yet this usages would not well match contemporary popular understanding.

Actually, it may be that Benkert in 1869 misread the history of homosexuality in ancient times, or was unacquainted with this history. He may have unwittingly altered the whole discussion of homosexuality by limiting his new term to the homosexual condition.

Petersen asserts that the cultures are so different that the words arsenokoitai and homosexuals are anachronistic. The ancients had no concept equivalent to homosexual desire, while the English term is more limited to homosexual desire. This stretches the cultural equivalence argument too far, for Petersen clearly is in error, as our look at historical-cultural evidence and linguistic principles have shown. Certain terms, such as arrenomanes, “mad after males.” used in the fourth century A.D., show that a “cognitive structure” for the homosexual condition existed long before 1869. In 1 Corinthians 6: 11, Paul refers precisely to that condition when he writes, “and such were some of you.”

The most that can be said in favor of Petersen’s position is that no ancient term is known to have referred precisely to exclusive sexual categories, as can be conveyed in terms homosexual or heterosexual, whereas moderns are more likely to refer to homosexuality or heterosexuality as one’s primary attraction. Our concept of a homosexual probably differs to some small extent from that of the ancients, who tended to speak of what they considered to be a number of equal options. Given that caveat, references appear in ancient writings to a condition that can best be described as mutuality, among persons they identified as exclusively homosexual. Greeks had terminology with definitions sufficiently broad that they cannot be limited to acts. Petersen goes too far in restricting the definitional ranges of both ancient and modern terms.

 De Young, J. B. (2000). Homosexuality: Contemporary Claims Examined in Light of the Bible and Other Ancient Literature and Law. Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications

Proper understanding of the translation of arsenokoitai as “homosexuals” begins with the historical and cultural evidence. There is a general agreement that arsenokoitai does not appear before Paul’s usage, so no earlier historical settings for this particular word can be compared. Yet we have already begun to see much evidence that homosexuality was understood before the lifetime of Paul.

Petersen, Bailey, Boswell, Scroggs, Countryman, and others claim that arsenokoitai cannot be defined by the homosexual condition, desire, propensity, or inversion. Nor can arsenokoitai refer to the modern idea of commited adult mutuality. First, these advocates believe we must limit the term to acts of a particular kind, whether male prostitution (Boswell, Countryman) or pederasty (Scroggs). Or, second, we must see that the ancients did not know of the homosexual condition or adult mutuality (Bailey, Petersen, Countryman, Nissinen). They knew homosexual behavior only as pederasty or prostitution. They only knew it as something that was opposed to one’s biological sex.

Both of these positions are faulty. The first position will be addressed on linguistic grounds. Regarding the second view, one may ask: Did not the homosexual condition exist before 1869? Adult mutuality in homosexuality would not seem to be a modern phenomenon, particularly if, as some claim, these patterns are universals. Universal patterns must have existed in ancient times, even if the people of the times lacked sophistication in discussing them. Indeed, there is evidence that the ancients, unbelieving and first-century Christians, knew about all forms of same-gender activity, including transvestitism, and same-gender orientation and mutuality. Even Petersen admits that Plato in Symposium could be the “sole possible exception” to ancient ignorance. He discounts even Plato’s understanding, however, believing that even in Symposium, “acts appear to be the deciding factor.” If Plato in any sense an exception, he is a significant exception; given his influence he could hardly have been a “sole possible exception.” From Plato and from other quarters, substantial evidence can be found for a knowledge of both the homosexual condition and mutuality.

Plato’s Symposium is a collection of speeches by several friends of Socrates on the subject of love, and at the end includes Socrates’ own thoughts. Symposium frankly acknowledges the homosexual condition and its language would extend to adult mutuality. Aristophanes posits that from the beginning there were three kinds of human beings — male, female, and a third gender composed of male-females or men-women (androgynon). The three types of human beings were part of the “original nature” (palai physis). Zeus sliced these human beings in half to weaken them so that they would not be a threat to the gods. Since then, each person seeks his or her other half, either one of the opposite sex or one of the same sex. The speech of Aristophanes then declares,

Each of us, then, is but a tally of a man, since every one shows like a flat-fish the traces of having been sliced in two; and each is ever searching for the tally that will fit him. All the men who are sections of that composite sex that at first was called man-woman are woman-courters; our adulterers are mostly descended from that sex, whence likewise are derived our man-courting women and adulteresses. All the women who are sections of the woman have no great fancy for men: they are inclined rather to women, and of this stock are the she-minions. Men who are sections of the male pursue the masculine, and so long as their boyhood lasts they show themselves to be slices of the male by making friends with men and delighting to lie with them and to be clasped in men’s embraces; these are the finest boys and striplings, for they have the most manly nature. Some say they are shameless creatures, but falsely: for their behavior is due not to shamelessness but to daring, manliness, and virility, since they are quick to welcome their like. Sure evidence of this is the fact that on reaching maturity these alone prove in a public career to be men. So when they come to man’s estate they are boy-lovers, and have no natural interest in wiving and getting children but only do these things under stress of custom; they are quite contented to live together unwedded all their days. A man of this sort is at any rate born to be a lover of boys or the willing mate of a man, eagerly greeting his own kind. Well, when one of them — whether he be a boy-lover or a lover of any other sort — happens on his own particular half, the two of them are wondrously thrilled with affection and intimacy and love, and are hardly to be induced to leave each other’s side for a single moment. These are they who continue together throughout life, though they could not even say what they would have of one another.

Should someone offer these two persons the opportunity to be fused for as long as they live, or even in hades, Aristophanes says that each “would unreservedly deem that he had been offered just what he was yearning for all the time” (192e).

Several observations about this passage are in order. First, the author gives consideration to lesbianism, as well as male homosexuality (191e). “Natural interest” (ton noun physei, 192b) reflects modern ideas of propensity or inclination. The words translated “born to be a lover of boys or the willing mate of a man” (paiderastes te kai philerastes gignetai, 192b) reflect the modern claims “to be born this way (homosexual).” The idea of mutuality (“the two of them are wondrously thrilled with affection and intimacy and love, ” 192b) is present. Aristophanes even speaks of “mutual love ingrained in mankind reassembling our early estate” (ho eros emphytos allelon tois anthropois kai tes archaias physeos synagogeus, 191d). He knows the idea of permanency (“These are they who continue together throughout life,” 192c). There is further mention of, and/or allusion to, permanency (see 181d and 183e), mutuality, “gay pride,” pederasty, homophobia, motive, desire, passion, and the nature of love and its works.

Second, clearly the ancients could think of love (homosexual or heterosexual) apart from actions. The speakers in Symposium argue that motive is crucial in homosexual affection: money, office, and influence bring reproach (182e-183a, 184b). They mention the need to love the soul, rather than simply the body (183e). There are two kinds of love in the body (186b), and each kind has its “desire” and “passion” (186b-d). The speakers discuss the principles or “matters” of love (187c), the desires of love (192c), and being “males by nature” (193c). Especially noteworthy is the speech of Socrates, who gives much attention to explaining how desire relates to love and its objects (200a-201c). People feel desire for “what is not provided or present; for something they have not or are not or lack.” This is the object of desire and love. Socrates clearly distinguishes between “what sort of being is love” and the “works” of love (201e). This ancient philosopher could think of both realms — sexual acts as well as disposition or being or nature. His words have significance for more than pederasty, as the speeches show.

Third, in Symposium, Plato anticipates virtually every element in the modern discussion of love and homosexuality. Petersen, Countryman, and others err when they claim that the ancients could think only of homosexual acts, not inclination, orientation, or mutuality. In addition, the evidence for ancient knowledge of the homosexual condition extends widely beyond Symposium, as historican K.J. Dover, Boswell, and others demonstrate.

Fourth, the Bible takes into account homosexual inclination and mutuality in the contexts where writers describe homosexual acts. In Romans 1: 21-28 Paul’s concern for disposition and inclination is shown by his choice of terms: reasoning, heart, become foolish, desires of the heart, lie, passions of dishonor, burned in the desire, men with men, knowledge, and reprobate mind (see also vv. 29-32). The catalog of vices (e.g., 1 Corinthians 6: 9-11; 1 Timothy 1: 8-10) are introduced by words describing how people “are” or “were,” and not by what they ‘do.” The habits of people betray them for what they are within, as also our Lord taught (Matthew 23: 28). The inner condition is as important as the outer act; one gives rise to the other (Matthew 5: 27-30; 15: 10-20).

Petersen makes other errors. The ancients apparently engaged in transvestitism. Canaanites, Syrians, people of Asia Minor, and Greeks, practised it, according to S.R. Driver and other scholars. Apparently, only a few moralists and Jewish writers condemned the practices. Seneca (Moral Epistles 47.7-8) condemns homosexual exploitation that forces an adult slave to dress, go beardless, and behave like a woman. In some detail, Philo describes the cross-dressing practices of homosexuals (On the Special Laws 3.37-41). In On the Virtues (20-21) Philo argues for the legal prohibition of cross-dressing. Even the Old Testament forbade the interchange of clothing between the sexes (Deuteronomy 22: 5).

Another error is that Christianity came up with the “new labels” of natural and unnatural for sexual inclination and behavior. These terms did not begin with Paul in Romans 1: 26-27 but extend far back into ancient Greece. Paul’s non-Christian contemporaries used them. Plato, the Testament of Napthali, Philo, Josephus, Plutarch, and others used these words and related concepts.

 De Young, J. B. (2000). Homosexuality: Contemporary Claims Examined in Light of the Bible and Other Ancient Literature and Law. Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications

Christian Beliefs, Social Conformity, Authoritarian Attitudes Implicated

August 25, 2004 – A psychologist at Northern Illinois University who has analyzed the source of anti-homosexual attitudes in heterosexual males, recently published his findings in Psychology of Men & Masculinity (July, 2004; Vol. 5; No. 2, 121-131).

Wayne Wilkinson conducted research to test R.W. Connell’s 1995 paper suggesting that “hegemonic masculinity” (heterosexual male dominance in the culture) plays a role in heterosexual males’ negative attitudes toward homosexuality.

Wilkinson designed a series of questionnaires for 159 undergraduate men at a Midwestern public university.

His purpose was to measure the Gender Belief System (GBS) and Right Wing Authoritarianism (RWA) as a source of anti-homosexual attitudes in these heterosexual males.

He notes that Gender Belief System is typically learned through the socialization process in which that males come to believe that certain behaviors are masculine and others are feminine. In addition, he observes that researchers have analyzed Right Wing Authoritarianism as a factor in anti-homosexual attitudes, with religious fundamentalism and Christian Orthodoxy as being closely associated with right-wing beliefs.

Right Wing Authoritarianism, says Wilkinson, is characterized by a demand that individuals submit to authorities and social norms, and involves hostility toward groups that refuse to conform to societal norms.

In studying the source of anti-homosexual attitudes in his undergraduate volunteers, he tested each with a Right Wing scale, which included 30 items. Students were asked to respond to such statements as “Some of the worst people in the world nowadays are those who do not respect our flag, our leaders, and the normal way things are supposed to be done.”

In addition, he tested their attitudes by using a Christian Orthodoxy Scale, a Gender Role Conflict Scale, and a Morality Beliefs Scale.

According to Wilkinson, “As would be expected, all the masculinity variables, Right Wing Attitudes, and Christian Orthodoxy were positively correlated with the antigay attitudes scale. Overall, RWA was moderately correlated with the masculinity variables, whereas orthodoxy was uncorrelated to the masculinity variables.”

He observed, too, that previous research has shown that negative attitudes toward homosexuality are associated with lower educational levels.

NARTH President Dr. Joseph Nicolosi notes of this study: “The researcher’s implication that ‘anti-gay attitudes’ are based on ignorance and prejudice does not explain this phenomenon. Other writers have proposed–plausibly, I think–that there is a ‘natural homophobia’ inherent in men, which stems from a universal human aversion to feces. This aversion helps to protect men from engaging in sexual practices that are threatening to their masculine strength and dignity, and that de-stabilize the social order while eroding masculine friendship and healthy mutuality.“

Dr. Nicolosi continued: “And from an evolutionary perspective, an aversion to homosexual behavior helps prevent men from channeling their erotic energy into unproductive, non-procreative sex.”

York, F. (25 August 2004). Researchers Study Male Anti-Homosexual Attitudes., from http://www.narth.com/docs/researchers.html

The growing “ex-gay” movement, consisting of many loosely organised groups and organisations of those with a homosexual inclination who want to change, can point to an increasing number of profoundly improved or even cured persons. They use a mixture of psychological and Christian ideas and “methods”, and in practice emphasize the element of interior struggle. The Christian believer may have an advantage in the therapy of homosexuality because his belief in the (undistorted) word of God gives him a firm orientation in life and strengthens his will to dispose of what he feels is his darker side and to long for moral purity.

The therapy of homosexuality is a psychological, spiritual and moral affair, even more so than the therapies of a number of other neuroses. Conscience is involved, as are man’s spiritual efforts, which teach him that giving in to homosexuality and to the homosexual lifestyle is irreconciliable with real peace of mind and being authentically religious. So many homosexuals try obsessively to reconcile the irreconcilable and imagine that they can be devout as well as homosexually active. The artificiality and self-deception of such attempts are apparent, however; they end up living as homosexuals and forgetting about Christianity or creating their own homosexuality-compatible version of Christianity to cover up their conscience. As for the therapy of homosexuality, the combination of spiritual-moral elements and psychological insights in all probability offers the most fruitful perspectives.

Aardweg, G. (1997). The Battle for Normality: A Guide For (Self-)Therapy For Homosexuality. San Francisco: Ignatius Press

Without a strong determination, a “good will“, no change is possible. With it, improvement is certain in the majority of cases, and in a minority, even a cure — a deep inner change in overall neurotic emotionality and a beneficial reversal of sexual interests — is achievable.

But who possesses that “good will”? Most afflicted persons, including those who militantly profess their gayness, somehow still have the desire to be normal, repressed as it may be. Only a minority, however, really wants to change — and wants it with some constancy, rather than as a mere impulse that is perhaps recurring, but quickly fades away. Even among those with the best resolution to fight their homosexuality, there is a good deal of second thought, a hidden cherishing of the alluring homosexual desires. So a good will is for the most part still a weak will; and, of course, the will’s weakness is easily reinforced by all the social pressures to “accept one’s homosexuality.” To persist in the resolution to change one must cultivate in oneself such motivators as a clear view of homosexuality as something unnatural; a sound moral and/or religious conviction; and, where applicable, the will to make the best of an existing marriage relationship that is reasonable, apart from the sexual aspect. Being well-motivated is not the same as practising rigid self-bashing, self-hatred, or a fearful compliance with moral prescriptions simply because they are imposed by society or religion; rather, it is to have a quiet and strong feeling that homosexuality is incompatible with psychological maturity and/or moral purity, with the deepest stirring of one’s conscience, and with one’s responsibility before God. To strengthen regularly one’s moral resolution to fight the homosexual side of the personality is therefore crucial for a good outcome.

Aardweg, G. (1997). The Battle for Normality: A Guide For (Self-)Therapy For Homosexuality. San Francisco: Ignatius Press

It is intended for homosexually inclined persons who want to do something about their “condition” themselves but do not have the opportunity to visit a therapist with healthy ideas on the matter. For, indeed, there are few of them. The chief reason for this is that the topic of homosexuality had been neglected or ignored at universities, and if mentioned at all, emphasis is placed on the “normality” ideology: homosexuality is just a natural sexual alternative. So there are far too few medical people, behavorial scientists, and psychotherapists who have even a rudimentary knowledge of this subject.

He who wants to overcome emotional problems needs a realistically understanding and encouraging guide to whom he can speak his mind, to help him discover important aspects of his emotional life and of his motivations, and to coach him in his struggle with himself. That guide need not necessarily be a professional therapist. Preferredly, he should be, but on the condition that he has healthy ideas about sexuality and morality; if not, he may do more harm than good. Occasionally, a physician or pastor with a balanced and normal personality and a capacity for realistic human insights can fill this role. If there is no one better qualified available, it may even be advisable to ask a sensible and psychologically healthy friend or relative to function as guide, as far as possible.

Aardweg, G. (1997). The Battle for Normality: A Guide For (Self-)Therapy For Homosexuality. San Francisco: Ignatius Press

Aberrant means straying from the right or normal (natural) way, or deviating from the usual or natural type. The word is from the Latin, ab + errare meaning “to wander, to go astray.” For the purposes of our discussion, from a Biblical standpoint what is normal and natural is (1) that which is according to creation, and (2) that which is consistent with the revelation of truth as given to us by God in the Bible. In a fallen world, it is not safe to say that what is common or popular is “normal.” A moral consensus by experts in society is invalid if it contradicts the Bible. But we can not take our guidelines from “mother nature” either. Violence is found in nature, and sexual perversion among some of the animals—but these are not features of the creation as God intended it from the beginning. Nature has become corrupted by evil as has man (Rom. 8:19-23). When the Apostle Paul speaks of sexual activity that is contrary to nature, he is referring to behavior that has departed from the Creator’s intentions when He made us. (Note: The specific term “contrary to nature” occurs in Romans 1:26 referring to lesbian conduct, and in the following verse to refer to male homosexual activity.)

There are two different approaches to morality and ethics in society. Both give valid insights and both are helpful. The first approach deals with outward behavior, with conduct that is observable by others. Wrong behavior is behavior which damages God, oneself, or others. A wide variety of forms of harmful conduct are restrained by government, by law, by punishment, and by education. It is well known that these efforts do not solve the problem at the source. Restraint of human evil does make life bearable in a society that would otherwise revert to anarchy and lawlessness in short order. The courts of the land, are supposed to measure outward behavior against fixed moral guidelines and to determine guilt or innocence largely on the basis of objective evidence. Objective evidence does not always deal fairly with motivations for behavior, with mitigating circumstances, with the nuances connected with crimes of passion. Man made laws in today’s world typically have little to do God’s Law and the lack of justice in today’s courts is legend.

The second approach in dealing with harmful or dysfunctional behavior in individuals or in society is to treat wrong or harmful behavior as disease. The cure for such inappropriate behavior is supposed by many today to be therapy or education or re-training of the offender. The liberal minded who reject the Biblical revelation of man’s total depravity assume that man is basically good and can be improved by dispelling man’s ignorance or by ministering to him understanding and tolerance. From a Biblical point of view it is true that wrong behavior is indeed the fruit on the plant whose root is man’s depraved nature and sinfulness. Jeremiah is quite clear about this when he says,

“The heart of man is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked, who is able to understand it?” (Jer. 17:9)

The words of Jesus,

“Jesus called the people to him again, and said to them, ‘Hear me, all of you, and understand: there is nothing outside a man which by going into him can defile him; but the things which come out of a man are what defile him.’ And when he had entered the house, and left the people, his disciples asked him about the parable. And he said to them, ‘Then are you also without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into a man from outside cannot defile him, since it enters, not his heart but his stomach, and so passes on?’ (Thus he declared all foods clean.) And he said, ‘What comes out of a man is what defiles a man. For from within, out of the heart of man, come evil thoughts, fornication, theft, murder, adultery, coveting, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, foolishness. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a man.’” (Mark 7:14-23)

The cure for sin prescribed in the Bible is spiritual regeneration and a cleansed interior life. Only out of a renewed spirit comes truly changed behavior that is acceptable in the sight of a Holy God. External fixes are no better than band-aides on cancer. Hopefully, diseases of the soul and spirit can be mollified, corrected or healed by physicians of the soul and by the priests of the Living God.

This author assumes that the first premise is valid. The Bible gives us the absolute moral standard which reflects the very character of God. God is our Creator and Jesus is our judge. Government, courts or law, schools and human institutions need constant reformation as these, too, will be judged by God. Though justice is long-delayed or even subverted during this present life, absolute justice comes eventually to all men. Solomon states this in Ecclesiastes:

“The end of the matter; all has been heard. Fear God, and keep his commandments; for this is the whole of man. For God will bring every deed into judgment, with every secret thing, whether good or evil” (Eccl. 12:13,14).

This essay emphasizes that the deepest healing of sin and morally dysfunctional behavior takes place when men and women receive the grace of God and avail themselves of the inner cleansing and healing offered by the risen Lord Jesus. Broken sinful men and women can and do become whole persons by the grace of God. Our emphasis is on the second method of dealing with human evil-outlined above—in what ways are we broken people and how is that we can become whole?

Genetic Factors and Sexual Orientation

From time to time scientific papers have claimed to show evidence for genetic factors that account for adultery, prostitution, promiscuity or homosexuality. Should such factors be discovered human beings are not thereby excused for their behavior by any means. God always makes full provision for any individual to live a fulfilling life, pleasing to Him, regardless of inborn predispositions, family life, handicaps or faulty environment. Once we agree that man is totally depraved in the sight of God we may as well begin also to look for defective genes that lead to gossip, pride, irresponsibility, laziness, or a violent temper. Eventually all behavior will then be excusable on biological grounds alone. It is characteristic of modern man not only to deny God but to attempt by all means possible to rationalize or excuse behavior that is clearly wrong-harmful to society and repugnant to God.

It is certainly possible that some personality types are more predisposed to homosexuality, for example. Genetic defects affecting the sexual organs or hormone imbalances are rare. There is no evidence that homosexuality is due to hormonal imbalance, and homosexuality is quite a different condition than transsexuality for instance. A good deal of sexual behavior is clearly learned behavior and governed by habit patterns and associated “brain wiring.” Behavioral malfunctions can be transmitted, but not genetically, as far as is known. Dysfunctional, illegal, inappropriate, or immoral sexual behavior must be explained on some other basis than appealing to bad genes.

Jesus Christ gave his life as a sacrifice for all men and for all their sins. The theological statement that Christ was a substitutionary sacrifice means that He took my place and yours and that He identified 100% with our condition in such a way that “he who knew no sin was made sin for us, so that we might become the righteousness of God in him” (2 Cor. 5:21).

“The Sins Of The Fathers”

“The LORD, the LORD, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but who will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation” (Exodus 34:5-7).

In some manner (exactly how we do not know) certain moral weaknesses in one generation tend to propagate into subsequent generations. The influence Noah’s drunkenness (Gen. 9:20-27) had on his grandson Canaan is an example. Probably it is maladjusted behavior in dysfunctional families which communicates information (mostly unconsciously) causing a particular form of aberrant behavior (such as alcoholism or homosexuality) to spring up one or more generations later. It is well known that involvement in the occult can cause demonic obsession and related moral problems such as incest, for several generations. Unclean demonic spirits can plague those who are promiscuous or involved in pornography, and so on.

Childhood Response Patterns to Life

New born infants are helpless, totally dependent, and do not at first think of themselves as differentiated from their total environment, especially from their mothers. Their emotional tape recorders are running even before they are born. At first a baby does not see itself as separate from even its environment. He or she is an extension of Mother and one with the environment. It is not long until it discovers, however, that it has some control over its immediate environment. Children learn how to avoid pain by modifying their behavior one way or another, and they learn how to get their needs met also. We might even say that some children soon learn to be clever and diabolical. Since all parents treat their kids differently, spoiling them, over-indulging them, losing patience with them, disciplining inconsistently and so on—the principle of avoiding pain and maximizing pleasure plays a part in early childhood experience. It is during this time of life that children learn to “choreograph the flesh.” When, as Christian adults, we revert to behaving “in the flesh” we usually lapse into patterns of behavior that have worked for us in the past by trial and error. These are by nature selfish patterns designed to serve our own best interests as we perceive them.

The term “flesh” refers to our sinful inheritance from Adam—it is deceitful, manipulative and contriving. The spirit of the Christian has been redeemed and regenerated, his soul (mind, emotions, and will) is being renewed, however the body has not yet been redeemed and is the seat of many of these desires and passions of the flesh, (Romans 8:10,11).

A commonly quoted verse in Proverbs has been misunderstood by some: “Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old, he will not depart from it” (Prov. 22:6). Many parents have assumed this verse meant that if children were given lessons in the Bible when they were young, they would come to God eventually, later on in life if not sooner. The passage actually teaches that parents are to understand each child as he or she is—that is to figure out who they are as person—and then train each one of them according to that child’s own way. It is such personalized knowing of one’s offspring that helps insure against the child’s developing a detrimental fleshly response to life early on.

Research in recent years places emphasis on bonding of parent and child. A child should learn experientially at the earliest possible stage that he or she is loved unconditionally, and wanted, and valued. Nothing is more devastating than rejection, real or imagined, especially when we are young and most vulnerable. However in view of the total depravity of mankind resulting from the fall, we ought not to be surprised at the many different ways in which evil can surface in any one of us, regardless of the quality of our upbringing. Though fallen, we bear the image of God our Creator, and we are the supreme objects of His love for us because His Son, our Lord Jesus, has died in our place.

Mothers usually instinctively love, care for, nourish and pay constant attention to their children. This is (sadly) not universally so in our world. Baby boys and baby girls certainly need to sense that mother loves them and treasures them and always will. The Apostle Paul writes, “…woman will find her fulfillment in bearing children, if they (the children) continue in faith and love and holiness, with modesty” (1 Timothy 2:15.). If a son ends up in jail, or drunk on skid row, a mother carries this as not only sorrow but as a possible indicator of her own personal failure. If on the other hand, children do well in life, this is a mother’s joy and reward. Ideally the father should also begin to show affection for his child as soon as possible after birth and spend much quality time with his son or daughter thereafter. In this way the father gives affirmation from a man’s point of view. He also provides a secure male role model of accepting, caring love.

Archetypes

All human beings have certain experiences in common. In the world around us we observe rooted patterns of human behavior that are more than one generation deep. They are more than mere human customs or traditions, they are universal responses to instincts and to the world. Carl Jung called these deep seated response patterns to life, “archetypes.” The Greek word tupos (type) means a blow or imprint, such as the impression made by a seal, a stamp, or a die. Arche means beginning. Although the word archetype is not in the New Testament, in psychology it has come to mean strong patterns of response or behavior ingrained in man from of old. Faced we a given stimulus, human beings tend to be influenced in their behavior by archetypes that lie in the subconscious. In Jungian psychology archetypes are given great importance. Jung believed the archetypes had positive and negative aspects, that is, they could be helpful or harmful to us. The archetypes are said to be “numinous” that is, invested with great power, like magnets or force-fields. When as person draws too near to a particular archetype he can be overwhelmed or captured by its field. Some of the contents of an archetype can be brought into consciousness (for example, by coming to understand a variety of mothers and fathers in the real world, and by observing good marriages and bad). In this way our understanding of human behavior patterns and culture does not remain at the primitive stage of childhood where myths and imaginary beings inhabit the world as we first suppose it to be. The goal of Christian discipleship is to know God and thereby to know ourselves. We can not hope to relate to others with a greater depth or wisdom than we have attained first in our intimate knowing of God. This fact is summarized by the two Great Commandments which Jesus taught were at the heart of all of the Law and the Prophets. Carl Jung never gave a clear statement to let us know whether or not he ever became a true Christian. Much of his teaching is gnostic. We must use Jung’s insights into the unconscious with care.

Missing Fathers

A small child may not see its father’s importance or role in the home as being of the same subjective weight as that of its mother. A major deficiency in the family today is surely the “missing” American father. Fathers who are truly never there (as in the case of single moms raising kids with no man around the house) probably do less harm than fathers who are at home every day but passive, recessive, detached and uninvolved (at least in the perception of the child). This is especially serious on three counts. First, God is a Father—our first dim notions and ideas of what God is like are modeled after the father image, the father archetype we acquired in earliest childhood. It is a father’s responsibility to show love, compassion, touching, caring concern for his children from the day they are born, if the child is to find it easy to know the Father-heart of God. It is the father’s job not only to provide for his family, but to lead and protect, to set limits and safe boundaries.

At first mother is the most important person in the child’s world upon whom the child is most dependent. But the child’s psyche is also recording impressions about father, about marriage, and about siblings and other persons in and around the family circle. The most important of these factors: mother, father, and marriage, are imprinted in the child’s mind as archetypes. They will be deeply rooted in the child’s way of viewing the world, and they are in all of us.

Children need to see from actual experience that mothers and fathers do not have the same, identical priorities in life. They are not carbon copies of one another—men and women are different in emotional priorities as well as in their physical features. Early in life a child realizes that adults come in two sexes. The child then begins to integrate into himself or herself the total masculine/feminine inheritance received from his parents. Ideally a child of either sex should not be afraid to being like his father as well as like his mother while still becoming a distinctively his or her own male or female person.

Women do their best when they are given strong, steady, regular encouragement and loving leadership by their husbands. Women who do not receive this regular assurance from their husbands (or from God if there is no husband present), tend to become insecure, over-protective of their children, and often live their lives unfulfilled and anxious. In such cases, the child may not receive as much affirmation as he or should ought to receive from either a father or a mother. In this way deep-seated needs to be loved and accepted, fears and anxieties of all sorts, even a sense of inadequacy may be transmitted to the child. He or she then may grow up with a great deal of unfulfilment. Persons who grow up starved for love and affection are more vulnerable to exploitation and seduction. Or they may be given to excess striving for approval which they never find.

In the terms popularized by John Bradshaw, we could say that numerous people in today’s society live “shame-based” lives. “Toxic shame” is generated in a child when his or her needs are not being met by parents and the child assumes this indicates the child (not the parents) are no good, flawed, damaged and worthless. Some parents are strict in their discipline. They put well-defined boundaries in and around the child, usually to keep the child from ranging too far from principles for wholesome living in later life. Consistent discipline, lovingly applied produces security in a child. Undisciplined children are often insecure and of course may find themselves without any built-in moral restraints later in life.

Too much discipline, or discipline for the wrong reasons is not the right approach anymore than too permissive an upbringing. Our purpose here is only to call attention to discipline as one of the factors that influences our early development for good or for ill.

Some recent psychological studies have shown that lack of adequate early-childhood affirmation from the parent of the opposite sex tends to set the stage for heterosexual promiscuity in later life, or the inability to develop and keep a stable marriage. Until a few years ago it was believed that male homosexuality was predisposed by over-protective mothers who held back their sons or controlled them, preventing them from entering the rough and tumble world of boyhood. Newer studies by Elizabeth Moberly (Ref. 1) , an English psychiatrist, and Leanne Payne (Ref. 2), an American Christian leader and scholar, have shown that the primary predisposing factor in homosexuality is a lack of same-sex affirmation. Leanne Payne points out that both boys and girls need to be “called forth” from identification with their mothers, by their fathers, in order to see themselves as whole, independent men or women.

Men especially can not live out their inner sufficiency of love and affirmation unless they have first received this reservoir from Another. A boyhood situation in which dad is a recessive or non-existent influence may leave a young boy without a positive role model and an innate feeling that if God exists He is hostile and non-affirming. Homosexual males are frequently troubled by same-sex envy or sexual covetousness—because they feel incomplete and are seeking their missing qualities in other males. Joseph Nicolosi’s (Ref. 3) research has shown that boys usually begin to bond with their fathers between ages 3 to 5. This bonding requires that the boy sees himself as different in kind from his mother and by nature more like his father. Young girls do not need to make this radical transition—breaking a close bond with mother in order to identify with the world of father and the priorities of masculinity. This is not to argue that father’s are unimportant in the raising of girls, there is ample evidence that this is definitely not the case. The whole idea is that masculinity is fragile and is born out a background “sea” of femininity. Hormonally this is the case in fetal development. It is also true in childhood when it becomes time for a boy to move away from mother towards father-an often risky step.

The “mother” is an important archetype as well that real woman who was physical mother to us. The archetype of the “great mother” formed an important plank in Jung’s model of human sexuality and of the unconscious. Mother earth, mother nature, the great mother goddess, the virgin mother and the great harlot of the Bible are all positive or negative of this deep influence in life in Jungian theory. It is not our purpose to lend credence to all that Jung believed by any means, in fact we urge caution is attempting to integrating many of his ideas into a Christian world-view. But most of us can think of examples of boys or even men we know who remain under mother’s influence and unconscious control well beyond a appropriate age for separation from mother, if there is no father, if father is unapproachable, cold, or indifferent, and/or if mother is controlling, manipulative or possessive.

Human father’s are our first models in life of what God is like! The absence of a warm, loving, caring father in the home leaves a vacuum in the child’s heart and makes it difficult for the child to establish a close, intimate, trusting relationship with God as Father.

In our discussion of man as created in the image of God, and man as conscious/unconscious we alluded to the possibility that unpleasant, traumatic experiences in life can be repressed into the unconscious where they may lay dormant possibly for years.

In Freudian psychoanalytic theory, these traumas cause fractional portions of the life-energy (called libido) to flow backwards into the conscious and into these “complexes” which become “energy laden” or as Jung would say, “numinous.” When blocks, inhibitions and barriers are removed, these complexes tend to surface, like volleyballs submerged in a swimming pool. This is desirable become the previously unavailable repressed energy necessary to maintain the complex now becomes available to consciousness. The content of the “neurosis” can be integrated into one’s view of self in a health manner, by God’s grace, and this speeds along the individual towards the wholeness which is God’s goal for him or for her. Though we are not aware of the existence of these complexes until they are near the surface, their existence means we have less available creative energy available for living real life and the influence of the complexes will make themselves felt in our unconscious behavior patterns, usually in a detrimental way.

The Latency Period and Adolescent Influences

Complex and varied emotional factors of early childhood enter into the equations of a child’s emerging sexual identity. Most psychologists claim these influences are most important during the first three to six years of life. During the latency period, prior to puberty peer influences (especially in today’s world) begin to strongly influence a child’s ideas of what it will be like to grow up. Television apparently now puts far more into the brain of the average child than he or she will ever learn in school. Our adult behavior patterns will be the inevitable result of the kind and quality of information we programmed into the computers of our minds—according to the principle of computers, “garbage in equals garbage out.” Because of readily available pornography, movies and TV shows full of explicit or at least inferred sexual immorality, because of antichristian sex education programs in the public schools, many youngsters begin to act out aberrant sexuality even before puberty imitating what they suppose “normal” adult behavior will be like.

Puberty varies in age of onset in different parts of the world. Girls usually begin to sexually mature earlier than boys. Biological clocks turn on the increased production of male and female sex hormones at puberty which produce the physical developmental changes in the bodies of young men and women. Freudian psychoanalytic theory believes that children during adolescence pass through an auto-erotic stage of development, followed by perhaps a short season of homo-erotic experimentation. Unless development is arrested, or regresses due to trauma, the third stage of normal psycho-sexual development is the emergence of sexual interest in and attraction for the opposite sex. Rights of passage, such as the Jewish Bar Mitzvah are valuable traditions in marking the transition to adult responsibilities and challenges.

In addition to loving our children and granting them unconditional love and periodic affirmation, all children require moral teaching, training, sex-education, and discipline. They need not understand, and indeed can not understand, why they are being disciplined in every instance. The important thing is for them to learn respect for authority, obedience, and acceptable social and societal behavior. In addition to unconditional love, conditional love is also important for all of us to learn in childhood, because many rewards in life are delayed and postponed, or they come only through hard work and patience. We live in a world where we must work to earn a living and pay our own way. God loves us unconditionally, but that is of little value to us if we do not take steps to grow and learn to please Him by re-ordering our actions and life-styles. Sex education surely is primarily the responsibility of parents and the church beginning at a very early age. By providing good role models, a good home life, and Biblical understanding, Christian parents should diligently seek to help their children find the Lord Jesus at an early age and to grow up to be balanced and whole citizens in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation.

Unfortunately in today’s society most adolescents learn not from godly parents or from church, but from peers, magazines, television and non-family sources. Tragically, in the teen-age years nearly every young person in today’s society discovers sexual experience with another person, taking this to be healthy and normal. But, our first sexual experience seems to deeply imprint us, sometimes setting in concrete harmful patterns of sexual behavior that will last for a lifetime. Because sexual activity is pleasureful, it is re-enforced by experience (regardless of whether it is right or wrong-although a guilty conscience can be a deterrent).

Pastor Brian Morgan of Peninsula Bible Church South notes that homosexual behavior, for example, is safer in terms of person-to-person psychological risk, and less demanding compared to relating to the opposite sex. Adult wholeness requires much more self-giving and willingness to relate to another person whose ways of thinking and responding are not those of one’s own sex. Freud and others believed that homosexual behavior was a form of arrested development. Until the sexual revolution in the last half of our century, doctors and psychologists dealt with homosexuality as a form of pathological, neurotic behavior. When gay rights became politicized, lobbying efforts by the gay community pressured the American psychoanalytic community into changing its standards to reflect the secular view that homosexual lifestyles were normal. Similar pressures have resulted in many states dropping their old laws prohibiting homosexual acts, sodomy and such. California is among the states where a consenting adults law on the books removes penalties for sexual acts between two adults regardless of sex or type. Secular humanistic groups who deny the existence of God and moral absolutes have dominated the educational system in the past few decades. This situation reflects a widespread breakdown in Biblical values and a sad devaluation of the traditional family unit which as Christians know is the basis for a stable and healthy society. Incest and childhood sexual abuse can do horrendous damage to children. Often the trauma is repressed and even forgotten. The common occurrence of these problems, along with violence, promiscuity and wide-spread divorce shows that our society today is in an advanced stage of breakdown (see Rom. 1:18-32).

Psychological theories often call attention to repressed or buried memories and experiences which can generate neurotic and even psychotic behavior if not dealt with. In addition to sinning against others, we have all been victims. Sometimes victims even blame themselves for what has happened to them. Children may imagine that things went wrong in the family because they were born. Or, they attempt to take on the unresolved conflicts of their parents and make them their own. Carl Jung’s view of wholeness (which he called “individuation”) supposes that the unconscious is a friend not a foe, and that there is an innate striving for wholeness within man which attempts to resolve buried inner conflict and to reconcile outer reality with inward. Thus, in the right circumstance repressed libido and the emotional content of traumatized areas in the unconscious can surface, become integrated, and be healed in the light of day. Jung, though probably not a Christian, seems to go so far as to recognize that such healing is a work of God’s grace.

George Gilder is his classic book, Men and Masculinity points out that virtually all of the crime, violence, drug dealing, and numerous pressing social problems arise from unmarried adolescent young men. Marriage he notes, is often the only way such men ever learn to be responsible. They are irresponsible and reckless pagans until civilized by the demands of pressures of marriage.

In Conclusion

Knowing and better understanding ourselves because of the Searchlight working of the Holy Spirit in us is more important than mere conformity to external rules or laws or traditions-even in a godly society. Appropriating the mercy and grace of our God depends upon seeing ourselves as we really are. We must not fail to accept the changes God wishes to work in us to make us over again into men and women who are re-modeled not after the First Adam, but the Second.

Finally, though I have had to speak at some length about sex, I want to make it as clear as I possibly can that the centre of Christian morality is not here. If anyone thinks that Christians regard unchastity as the supreme vice, he is quite wrong. The sins of the flesh are bad, but they are the least bad of all sins. All the worst pleasures are purely spiritual: the pleasure of putting other people in the wrong, of bossing and patronizing and spoiling sport, and back-biting; the pleasures of power, of hatred. For there are two things inside me, competing with the human self which I must try to become. They are the Animal self, and the Diabolical self. The Diabolical self is the worse of the two. That is why a cold, self-righteous prig who goes regularly to church may be far nearer to hell than a prostitute. But, of course, it is better to be neither.” (C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity)

Dolphin, L. (9 May 1991). Aberrant Sexuality., from http://www.ldolphin.org/Aberrant.html 

Society has two views of homosexuality. The traditional view holds that homosexuality is an aberration, the orientation is a disorder, and the behavior is pathological. The opposing view is that homosexuality is a normal variant in the human condition that is determined before birth and that homosexual behavior is natural for those so oriented.

The gay community has been tremendously successful in gaining acceptance for the second view. This view, however, rests on a number of questionable premises, which if false, lead us back to the traditional view. In the following article we will continue to examine the premises put forth by those accepting homosexuality as “normal.”

Homosexuality is simply a normal variation in the human condition. It occurs in every culture, in every age, and although a majority are heterosexual, just as some people are left handed, a minority is homosexual in their orientation.

Is this assertion true, or is homosexuality a disorder, a sign that something has gone wrong in an individual’s development? Is homosexuality something that is inevitable for a certain percentage of the world’s population, and therefore should simply be accepted, or is it a distortion or dysfunction that should be resisted, and if possible, cured?

As with the question regarding homosexuality being prenatally determined, the burden of proof should be with those who say it is normal and natural. I say this because the only hard evidence that we have-the biological evidence-clearly indicates that it is a disorder, in that homosexuality represents a tendency to want to use body parts for some purpose other than that for which they were designed. The penis and vagina are certainly constructed for male-female intercourse. Their complimentary shapes, the location of highly sensitive nerve endings show, without a doubt, the Divine intent.

Regardless of where you stand on the pleasure-relational aspects of sexuality, man and woman’s sexuality is inextricably associated with reproduction, and two men or two women cannot reproduce. Therefore, homosexuality is a condition that, in a fundamental way, is contrary to nature. Biologically, it is simply not natural or normal.

The advocates of acceptance of homosexuality, however, have put forth a great effort to convince the world that homosexuality is in fact both natural and normal, that it is simply different, and that only because it is the orientation of a minority, do we classify it as a disorder or perversion. They have been quite successful in this effort.

When we talk about what is normal, we are talking about what is in accordance with the norm; what is common. When we talk about what is natural, we are talking about what is in accordance with nature. Most arguments favoring homosexuality as normal and natural, therefore, are aimed at creating an impression that homosexuality is extremely widespread, that it occurs everywhere in nature. Furthermore, human sexuality is viewed as an extremely fluid thing in which all sorts of variations are just going to happen.

If you listen to gay advocacy groups, over and over again, you will hear these arguments used. There isn’t space here to fully refute this whole approach, but I ask you to consider what is really being said, and what evidence is really being offered. We will look at two of the most common statements made by advocacy groups.

1. Ten percent of the world is gay.

I have heard this expressed with tremendous certainty, as when one gay activist said, “Don’t forget, one child in every ten born in the world, in all countries, in all ages is a homosexual.” The 10 percent statistic has been used so much that it is often simply assumed to be true in newspaper and magazine articles and by much of the public.

Where did the 10 percent figure come from? As far as we can tell it is a misinterpretation of the first Kinsey Report (Sexual Behavior in the Human Male [1]) in which it was stated that “10% of the males are more or less exclusively homosexual for at least three years between the ages of 16 and 55.” There are several problems here. Apart from the many legitimate concerns about Kinsey’s statistical methods and the fact that the study covered only U.S. males, Kinsey, on the same page states that, “4% of the white males are exclusively homosexual throughout their lives after adolescence.”

Those who first quoted the 10% figure from Kinsey were obviously consciously trying to mislead. Others later have used the figures innocently. In fact, we don’t know what percentage of ours or any other culture is homosexually oriented. Before Kinsey, the estimates, coming primarily out of England, Germany and the U.S. were between 2 and 5%. Later, more objective estimates in the United States project a maximum incidence of 5% among males and less among females.

The bottom line, however, is that whether it is 5% or 10% does not matter. Figures tend to be exaggerated by many homophiles because they believe that in numbers there is legitimacy. Not so. A significant number of people are criminally inclined, but that does not mean that they are not somehow distorted in their orientation.

2. Homosexuality occurs in all cultures and has been accepted in many.

This usually is accompanied by the statement or implication that Judeo-Christian culture just happens to be hard on homosexuals. Obviously, we can’t review culture by culture here, but let me suggest that you look carefully at the examples given of homosexuality in other cultures. Invariably, they involve either pederasty (sex by men with boys) or, in rare instances, a limited period of approved homosexual behavior during adolescence.

Certainly, homosexual behavior could have occurred in all cultures to varying degrees, but that says nothing about it being normal or natural. In fact, most cultures, including the Greek, up until its final years, classified homosexuality as a crime deserving the severest of penalties.

There is evidence that homosexual behavior occurs far less frequently in some cultures than it does in the West. Obviously, differing cultures would evidence differing degrees of secrecy regarding sexual behavior and there have been no widely-accepted surveys of homosexuality in non-Western countries, so hard evidence is almost impossible to come by. Anecdotal evidence is available however.

Theologian and psychiatrist Ruth Tiffany Barnhouse quotes an incident in which an American mentioned homosexuality to a group of doctors at the Canton Hospital in the People’s Republic of China, and only one member of the medical staff understood what homosexuality was. [2] I asked two missionaries to Africa about homosexuality on that continent, and both related that they had been told that it was unknown until the Westerners arrived. Anecdotes don’t provide certainty, but in the absence of hard numbers, ask people from Asia and Africa this yourself.

1. Alfred C. Kinsey, Wardell B. Pomeroy and Clyde E. Martin, Sexual Behavior in the Human Male (Philadelphia: W. B. Saunders Company, 1948), p.651.

2. Ruth Tiffany Barnhouse, Homosexuality: a Symbolic Confusion, (New York: The Seabury Press, 1979) p.157.

Medinger, A. (2004). Homosexuality and the Truth: is It Natural and Normal?, from http://www.pureintimacy.org/gr/homosexuality/a0000058.cfm

There is often a high degree of narcissism in male homosexuality. The process of seeking to change and grow in manhood requires a self-focus that can actually contribute to narcissism. There is, however, a way to counter this and even become less self-focused as the Lord is healing us.

A man is his most wholesome and appealing when he is outer-directed, when he has little consciousness of himself. His face is towards the world, towards others, hopefully towards God. The world is a joyous challenge, something to be both overcome and delighted in. His lack of self-consciousness draws people to him.

Those of us who sense a deficit in our manhood, by our very focus on our shortcomings, are turned inward. Excessively conscious of our appearance, how we are coming across to others, how we compare with other men. In our striving to be men, we manifest an inner directedness that is the antithesis of healthy manhood.

In this respect, we are not unlike adolescent boys trying to prove their manhood. But in the adolescent, such a focus is a normal step in development, so expected that it can be seen as desirable, even endearing.

Sadly, many men who are not from a homosexual background, seem never to emerge from this stage. Constantly needing to prove their manhood (to themselves as well as others) they pursue any outward manifestation that will show that they are men: body building, womanizing, excessively aggressive behavior. Their focus is decidedly on themselves. They are, in a word, narcissistic.

A primary way that the homosexual man differs from the narcissistic heterosexual is that the homosexual has at some level given up attaining his own manhood; he seeks to draw it from others. The narcissistic heterosexual never gives up. He is determined to prove his manhood. But like the homosexual, he is doomed to failure. The fact that he is focused on himself, that he gives such great importance to outward appearances, dooms him to perpetual adolescence.

How are those of us who have decided to come out of homosexuality, and are determined to become men in the truest sense of the word, to avoid this narcissistic trap? Homosexual men are often narcissistic enough to start with. The stereotypical fastidiousness of the male homosexual – his grooming, his clothes – often give him away. One man in our ministry tells how a friend shared with him, “Oh, I always knew you were gay. I could tell by your furniture.”

How can we examine and measure ourselves – necessary steps if we really want to change – without perpetuating, or even intensifying, our self-absorption?

It is difficult, but it is possible.

I discovered a key answer to this problem in the statement of a newcomer to our ministry. He said, “Manhood is something we give away.”

We grow as men when we see our manhood as something we desire for the sake of others. When we desire manhood so that we can protect and defend, help and serve, provide safety and security for others, we will grow into men. And it is the practice of helping, protecting, and serving that develops our manhood.

An active member of one of our sister ministries is a woman with quite severe cerebral palsy. When I visited the ministry, I observed the men regularly lifting her in and out of cars, from a wheelchair to a sofa and back. Their manhood was wonderfully visible in this act of helping and serving.

In the book, And The Band Played On, although gay author Randy Shilts may not have recognized what he was describing, there is a beautiful illustration of this. A homosexual man, very mild and passive in his nature, came down with AIDS. The person who took care of him in his final months was a bold aggressive lesbian woman. The two were close friends; in fact you soon could see that they genuinely loved each other. As the man became increasingly sick, his tough lesbian friend became more and more tender and fragile. Her strength seemed to fade away as her love for the dying man cut deeper and deeper into her heart. On his part, the more vulnerable she became, the stronger he became in his desire to protect her. Wanting to shelter her fragile heart, he grew stronger and stronger. What Randy Shilts was describing was the forming of a man (and a woman).

At the Exodus Conferences until a few years ago, on Fridays before the closing banquet, we had “makeovers” in which hairdressers (mostly men) did the hair and make-up for women for many of whom such expressions of femininity had been very threatening. Watching these men gently and sensitively serving these women, I always knew I was witnessing a beautiful display of manly strength.

Jesus was the ultimate man. He never had to prove it, but how clearly He demonstrated it. Gently talking with the woman at the well, protecting the life of the woman caught in adultery, kindly humoring His mother when she insisted He do something about the wine having run out at the wedding in Cana, taking the little children up into his arms, His manhood shines forth. Washing the feet of His disciples, He provides those men He has chosen to follow Him an example of manly strength put under control for the purpose of serving others.

If I were a creator of advertising, there is one picture I would use every chance I could because it is an image that will draw the attention of almost everyone, man, woman or child. It is a picture of a young man walking down a path holding the hand of a little toddler, a little two- or three-year-old boy or girl. It symbolizes manly strength under submission for the purpose of guiding and protecting someone who is so much smaller and weaker. It is almost irresistible. It is an expression of God’s purpose for manhood, that it be in service to others.

It would be wonderful if we could just “be” men, but for many of us our backgrounds have made that almost impossible. Perhaps our culture has made it impossible for any men to be men unconsciously. But, there is a way in which this consciousness does not have to turn to narcissism. It is that we live according to the principle that our manhood is something we give away, something God created in us that we might use to bless others.

Medinger, A. (2004) Manhood Without Narcissism., from http://www.pureintimacy.org/gr/homosexuality/a0000062.cfm

For homosexuals who are committed to thinking biblically, this may begin to challenge their ideas on homosexual orientation. But a very significant question remains: Why does it feel natural? The biblical answer is relatively straightforward. Like many other sins, homosexuality does not have to be learned. The child who never witnessed a temper tantrum can be proficient at throwing them; it is an instinctive ability of the human heart. Homosexuality is natural in the same way that anger or selfishness is natural. They are embdedded in our fallen humanness. Indeed, homosexuality is “natural”, but only in the sense that it is an expression of the sinful nature.

The fact that most homosexuals cannot remember consciously choosing homosexuality is also readily explained by Scripture. Most sin works on a level where we do not self-consciously choose it. To use Old Testament language, our sin can be “unintentional,” but that does not make us less responsible for our violation of God’s will (Leviticus 5: 14 – 19; Numbers 15: 22 – 30). Sin is more than mature, rational, conscious decisions. It is our moral inclination from birth.

Welch, E. T. (1998). Blame It on the Brain? Distinguishing Chemical Imbalances, Brain Disorders, and Disobedience. New Jersey: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing

The process of exposing the heart comes through the Holy Spirit’s application of Scripture. The goal is to understand what God says, to learn to “think God’s thoughts.” One way into Scripture is to understand that there actually is something deeper than homosexuality. As summarized in Romans 1, homosexuality is an expression of an idolatrous heart. This is our deepest problem. We have an instinct that switches our allegiance from God to our idols. What are our idols? Comfort, pleasure, power, personal meaning, self-esteem, and so on. The possibilities are endless, but they all have one thing in common: an allegiance to self. We rebel against God, and we choose to live for our glory rather than God’s. We choose to obey our own desires rather than God’s Word. Homosexual desire or activity is an expression of the idolatrous instincts of our hearts.

Welch, E. T. (1998). Blame It on the Brain? Distinguishing Chemical Imbalances, Brain Disorders, and Disobedience. New Jersey: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing

Some suggest that the meaning of arsenokoitai is unclear. However, Robin Scroggs, in The New Testament and Homosexuality (Philadephia: Fortress Press), 106-8, has shown that the word is derived directly from Leviticus 18: 22 and 20: 13 and is used in rabbinic texts to refer to homosexual intercourse.

Welch, E. T. (1998). Blame It on the Brain? Distinguishing Chemical Imbalances, Brain Disorders, and Disobedience. New Jersey: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing

Oxford University professor Alister McGrath indicates rightly that we live in a time when “openess and relevance are more important than truth. This, however, is intellectual shallowness and moral irresponsibility.” Michael Foucault has similarly observed that “truth” in a post-modern world is nothing more than a compliment.

Welch, E. T. (1998). Blame It on the Brain? Distinguishing Chemical Imbalances, Brain Disorders, and Disobedience. New Jersey: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing