Got a question regarding homosexuality and the new testament

[flamin lib]

Is there a reference to homosexuality from Jesus in the New Testament? I've searched and couldn't find one.

Also, is there a reference from Jesus about the relevance of the Old Testament after Christ's birth and Ascension?

[tjwmason]

1. Not from Christ

But there is from St. Paul (I think that it's on Romans, but can't remember off-hand). Suffice it to say they're all subject to much debate among biblical scholars anyway.

[flamin lib]

2. Thanks, any key words to search on?

[BobbyinPortland]

4. Try Paul vs. Jesus or

Homosexuality And The Bible.


It really shouldn't matter what the Bible says simply because it was written by fallible men in archiac times. Fear was then and still is the great motivator for prejudice and exclusion.

However, knowing what it says is good for when you have to lock horns with a fundie.

[Tux]

9. Paul?

Why is some guy's opinion considered the word of god anyways?
How can people believe in divine revelation? Seems to require too much faith and based only on someone saying it's true.

[nickinSTL]

3. Romans 1:26-27

<26> For this reason God gave them over to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged the natural sexual relations for unnatural ones, <27> and likewise the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed in their passions for one another. Men committed shameless acts with men and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.


Found this on the 'net.

[flamin lib]

8. Thanks.

So it was God who made them the way they were? Seems sort of unfair to make them do things and then be angry with them for being unable to resist the will of God . . .

[saltpoint]

5. tjwmason has it right. Jesus does not address the --

-- subject of homosexuality anywhere in the NT. That's left to Paul and his letters. Paulists may, if they wish, believe that homosexuality is a sin. Christians are free to believe as they choose but may not use Jesus as a reference on this topic, no matter what Jerry Falwell says.

There is a steady voice among some scholars that suggests that Jesus may have had an intimate relationship with John. tjwmason is right again that scholars are going to find almost anything connected to NT writing to be debatable, but the possibility of such an intimate relationship cannot be entirely dismissed.

A mysterious, unnamed man appears in Mark's gospel as Jesus is being taken away by the sentries. The man gives Jesus a white garment and then, before he can be apprehended, flees naked away from the procession.

14:51 And a certain young man followed with him, having a linen cloth cast about him, over naked : and they lay hold on him;

14:52 but he left the linen cloth, and fled naked.

The man's appearance fades with each successive appearance in the gospels and is very seldom commented on from Sunday church pulpits.

[Lerkfish]

6. first one, no. Jesus never mentions homosexuality.

Paul does, at least once, but in the context of pagan worship.

The second question is trickier.
Jesus does say he has come to fulfill the law, not destroy it. Yet, all his criticism of the Pharisees is that they fixated on the letter of the law, not the spirit of the law.
Its open to interpretation whether that means the old laws have passed away.
I think instead he makes the point that the old law convicted the spirit of man to know he was guilty of sin, but the new covenant brings grace to forgive him anyway.

[Igel]

7. From Jesus, no.

He quoted the OT rather a bit, revoked the Mosaic dispensation of divorce, and presumably agreed with the prohibition on adultery (although that's a rather strong implicature, not an actual statement), and agreed the Pharisees, I think it was, should tithe their mint and rue.

Nothing from Jesus concerning the canon or OT after resurrection/ascension, as far as I remember. Best you can do on the relevance of the law after his birth is the "jot and tittle" reference (using the KJV translation) and "not change the law, but fulfill it" (which has two interpretations: to fulfill the requirements, thus invalidating it; or to complete it, adding things that were missing).

A quick googling showed that the following NT passages are cited (I haven't looked, so if the references are wildly astray, ignore them): I Cor. 6, Rom. 1:26-27, maybe I Timothy 1:10.

[flamin lib]

10. Thanks to all who replied. DU is the best! What a brain trust!