Context Is Everything

It is only when the bible is read in context that we can be informed and transformed.

The term “homosexual” wasn’t used until about a hundred years ago and Biblical Greek or Hebrew have no word that is the same as the word homosexual in English. The first translation of the Bible to use the word was only in the 1946 Revised Standard Version (RSV).

It is therefore quite astonishing to discover how translations have evolved from 1599 until 2017. Words like homosexuality and lesbian that are not in the original Greek appearing in a translation as in the case of The Passion Translation (TPT) in 2017!

1599 Geneva Bible (GNV) Romans 1:26-27
For this cause God gave them up to vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature.
And likewise also the men left the natural use of the woman, and burned in their lust one toward another, and man with man wrought filthiness, and received in themselves such recompense of their error, as was meet.

2017 The Passion Translation (TPT) Romans 1:26-27
For this reason God gave them over to their own disgraceful and vile passions. Enflamed with lust for one another, men and women ignored the natural order and exchanged normal sexual relations for homosexuality. Women engaged in lesbian conduct, and men committed shameful acts with men, receiving in themselves the due penalty for their deviation.

So where do we go from here? We look at the whole Romans Chapter 1 in context. Firstly God tells us in Romans 1:18 that ALL have no excuse for not knowing God. People turned to worshiping idols (verses 23 and 25). And verses 28 to 32 make it clear who it is that God is speaking to.

28 Since they thought it foolish to acknowledge God, he abandoned them to their foolish thinking and let them do things that should never be done. 29 Their lives became full of every kind of wickedness, sin, greed, hate, envy, murder, quarreling, deception, malicious behavior, and gossip. 30 They are backstabbers, haters of God, insolent, proud, and boastful. They invent new ways of sinning, and they disobey their parents. 31 They refuse to understand, break their promises, are heartless, and have no mercy. 32 They know God’s justice requires that those who do these things deserve to die, yet they do them anyway. Worse yet, they encourage others to do them, too.

And then the punchline follows directly after in Romans 2:1
“You may think you can condemn such people, but you are just as bad, and you have no excuse! When you say they are wicked and should be punished, you are condemning yourself, for you who judge others do these very same things.”

Romans 1:26 and 27 is clearly not speaking about God-fearing LGBT people.

Prof Jeremy Punt, University of Stellenbosch states the following conclusion in his paper: Romans 1:18-32 Amidst the gay-debate: Interpretative options

“The nature of Paul’s argument in Romans 1 suggests that it is in a certain way an elaborated version of the argument found in 1 Thessalonians (1 Th 4:3-6 in particular), and cannot simply be cited in arguing against homosexuality today. Paul is concerned about the purity of followers of Christ from Gentile stock and they should thus avoid the sexual practices of Gentiles who do not know God, inevitably practices in which people are wronged (Stowers 1994:97). Paul did not, however, provide specific directives for either lesbigays who know God or lesbigays in committed relationships that do not exploit anyone (cf Johnson 2006:135), because such identities were not readily available options in the first century CE. A sexual ethic informed by perspectives from the New Testament challenges the assumptions which make reproductive sex into a norm. For example, when Jesus or Paul talks about marriage, neither of them insists upon procreation “as a rational or functional justification” (Williams 2002:6). Sexual orientation or “constitutional” or “core” homosexuality was not considered options in ancient thinking about sexuality; neither were committed, caring same-sex relationships seriously contemplated in a context where homoerotic acts were necessarily conflated with “immorality, debauchery and licentiousness” (Johnson 2006:136). In short, Paul’s argument in Romans 1 cannot be applied directly to what modern people know about homosexuality, as much as his instructions about hair lengths and dress codes are also considered inappropriate for direct appropriation today. “

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