Kevin DeYoung

Spending my time refuting the dragon Gagnon, I tend to miss the younger serpents that slip through the cracks. Though DeYoung (a younger and prettier version of Gagnon) has been around for a while, for some reason it's only now he's gotten my attention.

Listening to DeYoung speak in a video really surprised me with what were elementary arguments (Sodom was destroyed because of homosexuality, etc.) I didn't see in anyway challenging (I later refute his attempt to refute Boswell in my "Late Nite Tapas" thread).

Like Brown's 9 questions, DeYoung goes the umpteenth mile with coming up with 40 to those who would affirm homosexuality with the Bible. Apparently, this was a clarion call to tons of bloggers who decided to take up his 40 question challenge and now he has shut up because of the countless responses that rained down on his head like rocks he never expected.

This is a response in a comment forum of yet another blogger who answered the challenge, worth repeating, about what DeYoung tried to accomplish with his 40 questions:

"I think Kevin DeYoung is quickly going to get tired of seeing all of these "40 Answers" blogs - for one simple reason: when he posed his asinine list of questions, he thought he was asking tough questions we wouldn't be able to answer in some sort of "Ha, GOTCHA!" fashion that has become the favorite weapon in the heterosexist arsenal of late. 

It's a pretty impotent weapon. Unfortunately, I think when he asked these questions, he wasn't really interested in getting answers (I say this about Charisma magazine with Brown's 9 Questions on this, my own blog). So on HIM, this is casting pearls before swine. However, I'm glad you're saying these things because others who follow his line of bilge might see posts like this one and begin to open their minds and hearts a bit."

DeYoung said; "If this volume makes no contribution beyond explaining why God opposes the homosexual lifestyle, a worthwhile goal will have been accomplished.” (DeYoung 2000). 

This is what he wants his great contribution to be? Telling gays God isn't happy with their lives? I thought it would be, I don't know, bringing the message of salvation to the homosexual?

If anyone wants to bring any of DeYoung's arguments, please be my guest. I doubt that will happen though as I've refuted what he's had to say came from better apologists.

Johnny SCOTUS And His Giant Robot

When SCOTUS passed gay marriage for all the land, I was 'happy.' Not a screaming out windows; "Free at last, Thank God almighty we are free at last!" Happy. The reason is because I went through years of a long back and fourth tug of war in my own state of California with fighting for gay marriage that started back with Prop 8's demon birther mama Prop 22 when the roller coaster ride first started with gay marriage in my state, in other words I felt I did my time when Prop 8 finally fell a whole two years before the SCOTUS ruling.
My best to all states and tell me where to register for wedding gifts (I hope all the states are registered at the same place and it's cheap because I'm not made out of money).


Soon after the ruling came in I saw a big spike in social media of anti-gay Christians losing their mind in all kinds of sloppy ways. They made it sound like instead of it being about gays getting married, it was something going out of the way to attack them personally, making it all about them. They were actually angry because gays bypassed them with asking them; "Can I get married with your kind permission?" Like my ability to marry can only be decided by them when I have all the same Constitutional rights they have according to our founding documents as an American. There isn't tiers of citizenship where a Christian American can trump the rights of a gay American. Our founding fathers made sure of that with trusting future generations would do good with what they were trying to say.


Justice Kennedy who favored in the ruling made a point that needs to be printed here and is at the heart of the decision:

"Marriage responds to the universal fear that a lonely person might call out only to find no one there. It offers the hope of companionship and understanding and assurance that while both still live there will be someone to care for the other."

This saying is Christ-like in echoing God with man not wanting to be alone:

"Then the LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper who is just right for him."

Geneses 2:18.

See this in contrast to the other judges who voted against gay marriage with them saying; "Let's keep it just for us and not lovingly broaden this for others."
 

One thing I'm also noticing are religious leaders asking their followers to defy the ruling, not understanding by telling others to do that, they and those who follow them go against God Himself:

"All of you must obey those who rule over you. There are no authorities except the ones God has chosen. Those who now rule have been chosen by God. So whoever opposes the authorities opposes leaders whom God has appointed. Those who do that will be judged. If you do what is right, you won’t need to be afraid of your rulers. But watch out if you do what is wrong! You don’t want to be afraid of those in authority, do you? Then do what is right, and you will be praised. The one in authority serves God for your good. But if you do wrong, watch out! Rulers don’t carry a sword for no reason at all. They serve God. And God is carrying out his anger through them. The ruler punishes anyone who does wrong. You must obey the authorities. Then you will not be punished. You must also obey them because you know it is right.
That’s also why you pay taxes. The authorities serve God. Ruling takes up all their time. Give to everyone what you owe them. Do you owe taxes? Then pay them. Do you owe anything else to the government? Then pay it. Do you owe respect? Then give it. Do you owe honor? Then show it."

Romans 13:1-7.


One YouTube comment said this when I quoted the above verses:

"Christians are not to obey any law that contradicts the bible and God's holy nature. In the book of Acts, Peter and John are taken before the Jerusalem Council (Supreme Court) and told not to speak about Jesus Christ. This law by the Jerusalem Council goes against Jesus Christ command in Matthew 28:18-20 to go and make disciples of all nations teaching to obey all that I have commanded you. Peter and John have two commands before them one from God and the other from man. Who will they obey? God. from Acts 4:18; So they called them and charged them not to speak or teach at all in the name of Jesus. But Peter and John answered them, “Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge, for we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard." 

My comment back:

"This has NOTHING to do with fair laws that put all American citizens on equal footing with rights that follow; "loving others as yourself." Would you deny yourself marriage? Than if you deny it to another, you break the Golden Rule that we are to seek and follow with all our choices and decisions. Questions like gay marriage the Bible doesn't specifically address? Apply "love another as yourself" before all else to the situation to get your answer that also puts ALL the Laws and what ALL the prophets had to say in the backseat.

Peter and John loved others as themselves enough to share the soul saving message of salvation they themselves had to others and that is why they were able to break the law in good conscious."

He never responded back.


I find it interesting that the same states bucking the most against the SCOTUS ruling are the same states that also fought the hardest against segregation. Some things never change.

Missing Lesbians on Milk Cartons

Two simple and irrefutable points that blow out the water arsenokoitai is the aggressor (man) partner in a gay sexual union and malakoi the passive (girl) partner believed to be condemned in 1 Corinthians 6:9 and 1 Timothy 1:9.

1. If 'arsenokoitai' is the "aggressor" in a homosexual relationship and 'malakoi' the "passive" partner in 1 Corinthians, why is malakoi absent in 1 Timothy? An arsenokoitai would be missing the other half of his relationship. If they are a word pair, no other vice list with either malakoi or arsenokoitai, and there are many with malakoi prior to Paul and many with arsenokoitai after Paul, ever have them paired together.

2. If 'arsenokoitai' can be the catch-all word for both sides of a homosexual relationship, why does Paul bother using malakoi in 1 Corinthians? "Koites" was used centuries before Paul's usage and when used as a suffix in compounds it always indicated the penetrative aggressor, never the passive. That means it can't apply to both partners in an act and cannot be a catch-all term for all homosexual activity.

Neither one of us is a malakoi dumbass. 

I'm lost. Can you point me to the nearest gas station?

Baby Back Ribs

No decent exegete still sees the Sodom story as anything but a story about a people lacking a hospitality that was a life or death situation in the ancient world. Most people have a hard time wrapping their heads around the Sodom narrative being about hospitality, like I once did, instead of homosexuality because they go by our own current understanding of what hospitality is. We see the lack of hospitality today as not wanting to open the door for a neighbor who wants to borrow a cup of sugar or a weed whacker. The ancient world put the lack of hospitality of such grave importance, that the rest of the Israeli tribes went to war with the tribe of Ruben over it. And yes, there was a homosexual rape aspect to it.

The rarely mentioned Jude verse talking about Sodom I've already discussed (for a little more detail about Sodom and Jude talking about "strange flesh," go to my 'Sodom' tag post below).

Even with the Roman 1 verses, anti-gay scholars can't really take homosexuality outside of its idolatry context, so they just meld the two together to where you can't see where one starts and the other finishes in the hopes you don't see what they're doing.

I want to answer the argument that many sincerely want to be answered. The argument goes that Paul "made up" the Greek word arsenokoite in 1 Corinthians with compounding words 1 in Leviticus 20:13 ("a man shall not lay with a male") into one word and sticking it in 1 Corinthians and 1 Timothy, it looks like it's a clear-cut case Paul is condemning homosexuality with cleverly using Leviticus.

Correcting the Leviticus passage has a dual purpose. It shows Paul did not intend to make a general condemnation of homosexuality with the compound word arsenokoite and it destroys the argument Jesus didn't need to say anything about homosexuality because He expected you to understand He followed Levitical laws, so why would He need to say anything when Leviticus tells you how He feels about homosexuality already?

There's no question that Leviticus verses were written in the context of idolatry (Leviticus 20:2,3 tells you that and it's carried over to Deuteronomy with discussing the "quedesh" priesthood that isn't named in the Leviticus verses, but are the Moloch worshippers Leviticus is referencing) and that if Paul referenced it, he was referencing their homosexuality in the context of only their idolatry practices, but I will approach this as if it wasn't in the context of idolatry because that is the only argument that can be made to carry this verse as a general prohibition of homosexuality to the present day)

To start, read what I say as to why Leviticus is only in the context of idolatry and then go to what I say about the word itself (you'll find argument after argument from me on this blog refuting the claim arsenokoite means a homosexual).

Only if we can understand the exact Hebrew wording in Leviticus can we figure out what Paul was trying to convey with his new compound word arsenokoite if that was really what he was doing 2.

The literal Hebrew reads the verse like this:

Weth-zakhar lo tishkav mishkevey ishshah

Translated into literal English it reads; "with a male you shall not lie the lyings of the woman 3."

Now since Leviticus 20:13, like 18:22, is only directed at Israeli males and not women, a clear-cut and simple reading prohibiting all male homosexuality would read; "Weth-zakhar lo tishkav (with a male you shall not lie)," but instead we have mishkevey ishshah (lyings of the woman) put into the verse. English translators of the verse also place in "as with," making the verse, wrongly, read; "with a male you shall not lie as with a women." Translators inserted "as with" instead of "the lyings of a woman" because "lyings of a woman" was not a term they understood because the it's found no where else in the Bible. Now it can be said that the translators were only trying to fill in the blanks by putting in "as with" so the reading of it flows better, but the author of Leviticus meant it to read as it reads. Besides, there are other places in the Bible where the two words 'as with' is used, it's just not used here.

Now if we figure out what the term "lyings of a woman" is getting at, it will shed light on the actions of the males being discussed that are prohibited.

Like I said, Mishkevey Ishsha (lyings of a woman) is found nowhere else in the Bible, but if you go to Numbers 31:18, we find "mishkav zakhar 4" (lyings of a male) with what's coming from the male perspective of penetrating a woman. So "lyings of a woman" in turn must mean it's coming from the perspective of the one being penetrated.

We next go to the Talmud which gives a further explanation of the saying. There are only two ways a woman can have sex according to the Rabbis (Babylonian Talmud Sanhedrin 54a), vaginal and anal. They saw "lyings of a woman" as either one or the other. Since obviously, two men cannot have vaginal sex, the only other act it is talking about is anal sex, a prohibition to God's Israeli males to separate them from those pagan (cult anal sex) practices of the Canaanites with the "quedesh" in their land the Jews were entering, what is easily proven by the historical record.


In my first arsenokoite post I show a distinction between the two types of males who are forbidden to be penetrated in Leviticus 20:13 with the word 'zakhar,' a boy (pederasty) or a male cult priest with what would be an act of idolatry. In the CONTEXT it is given in Leviticus (Moloch worship), the prohibition is saying an Israeli man should not lie with cult Canaanite priests.

 
Also, most translators make the word "woman" (ishshah) which is also translated as "wife" in the verse into the incorrect gender word "female" (neqevah) that broadens the verse to make it even more of a general prohibition on "homosexuality" when it shouldn't.

Knowing now the correct Hebrew wordings, we can correctly translate Leviticus 20;13 as; 

 "An Israeli man of age shall not have anal sex with Zakhar (a male of some type of religious or age distinction) in his wife's beds." 

This is the correct literal translation and it's still ambiguous because you don't know if it's condemning idolatry with the "quedesh" or condemning anal sex with an underage male in the marriage bed of a male Israelite and his wife. Either way it narrows down the prohibition from the common belief the verse says;

"A man should not have sex with the a man as with a woman."

Anti-gay scholars with the verse like to dismiss the argument from pro-gay apologists who say homosexual orientation was not known to the writers of Leviticus, but these verses were conveyed by God who DID know of homosexual orientation. The problem is God didn't go above and beyond the restrictive act of anal 5 sex in condemning the love a man has for another man and prohibiting female homosexuality. You won't find it in Leviticus and in turn you won't find it with Jesus or Paul in his use of arsenokoite.

This is my counterargument to those who take Leviticus out of it's proper idolatry context and take it to mean a binding prohibition of homosexuality today.

1. Yale Bible scholar Dale Martin also points out the dangers of compounding ancient words and expecting them to have the same meaning in our present day.

2. I purposely leave out the discussion on Paul's Greek Septuagint translation of Leviticus here because it gives no further depth of what the Hebrew is saying. 

It was 1000 years from the Torah before the Rabbis, an elite, wrote on the Torah and what Leviticus tried to convey. Unlike the writers of the New Testament, the Rabbis in their commentaries never claimed to be inspired men, so if Paul was reaching to Leviticus to come up with arsenokoite, laws he said are dead to us, he was an inspired man quoting uninspired men with how they interpreted the Leviticus passages with what was one of SEVERAL interpretations they were never unanimous in agreeing on then or even today. 

3. I won't discuss the term "abomination" (to'ebah) because no matter the degree, it's still putting a taboo on what action is taking place in the verse.

4. Mishkevey in the singular. This is one of the times zakhar can be translated to just be 'man' when normally ish would be used. Remember when zakhar is used in the Hebrew Bible, 90% of the time it's in reference to a male, human or animal that serves some type of religious purpose. Because zakhar is so close in proximity to ish in the Levitical verse, zakhar wouldn't mean just 'man' when ish does the job.

5. Various arguments have been put forth as to why only the specific act of anal sex is so strongly prohibited to an Israeli male. Some of these arguments are the prohibiting of "mixing of seed" (semen with feces, semen with menstrual blood), the wasting of semen that would have been detrimental to the procreation of a people, or what would be seen as a disrespect of the sacredness of the penis (Israeli men would put one hand on their penis to swear a promise like we would put our hand on a Bible in court in swearing to tell the truth) with uncleanliness. Paul visits the sacredness of the penis in Romans verse 27 verse as I showed when he talks about the Galli priesthood with their practice of castration.

Absence of Malice

One of the most overlooked, if not the most glaring, arguments against a condemnation of all homosexuality from the Bible is the absence of any condemnation of lesbianism.

God is not a God of loose ends to not complete the loop of prohibiting homosexuality with men, but not women, yet that's exactly what you see when you read all the supposed anti-gay Bible passages. God or those He inspired to write like the Apostle Paul, weren't of the mindset of most human heterosexual males in having an abhorrence of male homosexuality, but is just dandy with the titillation of two women together. Lesbianism, or lack thereof, is never really addressed by anti-gay Bible apologists because it's a stumbling block for them. They gloss over it in hopes you do too.

It starts with Leviticus ("man shall not lay with male") where "woman shall not lay with female" is absent. If you look at all the other Levitical passages on what is prohibited (incest, bestiality, etc) woman are named in a separate catagory covered by all the same prohibitions as the men.*

(I leave out the Sodom story because the obvious is the women of Sodom played no part in it)

Next we move to Romans. Now many will say this is the 'smoking gun' passage that mentions lesbians. A little history lesson needs to be told here.

No writing from a church Father in commentary ever saw lesbianism in the Roman 1 passage, that is until John Chrysostom in the 4th century all of a sudden saw lesbians in the passage like it appeared out of thin air when it wasn't there before. This one reading from this one early church father put lesbianism on the map for the first time and centuries later it became as good as Gospel. The Church with bated breath couldn't wait to swallow it fast enough with wanting to close the homosexual loop. Paul DID have several word choices to describe lesbians (hetairistria, tribas), but they are never used by him in Romans or in anything he wrote.

We next go to 1 Corinthians and 1 Timothy. The word "arsenokoite" is found in both books and is translated as "homosexual" in the New Revised Standard Version edition of the Bible, the version most quote from because it gives a supposed condemnation of all homosexuality without ambiguity. The prefix of arsenokoite is 'arseno,' that in the Koine Greek (Paul's Greek) translates as "male" (koite means "lying the bed"). Now since the word "homosexual" covers both male AND female homosexuality in a broad term, we know the word "homosexual" shouldn't be there because it only states males with 'arseno.' Those who know the Greek breakdown of the word arsenokoite like to keep quiet about why the word "homosexual" shouldn't be in 1 Corinthians and 1 Timothy because it fools you into thinking women are included.

Ironically, it's female homosexuality that is the strongest argument against ALL condemnation of homosexuality in the Bible.

*My argument has always been the Levitical prohibition of "man shall not lay with man" is only in the context of idolatry and shouldn't be taken further than that.

Resource Me

Two great sites for LGBT Jews:

ESHEL (Orthodox)
In the L.A. area, JQ

Gagnon's Poor Passion

David Kyle Foster, who first posted this video on YouTube, pushes Gagnon videos on his website. And of course, he's yet another "ex-gay" who blames homosexuality for the same-sex trauma he experienced as a boy. He also blames it for his drug addiction, sex addiction, and steak fat addiction. He probably sat in a dark room thinking what else he could pin on homosexuality (this one makes the fantastic claims that 85% of lesbians come from abuse to all gay men have an "arrested emotional development"' because "not one of them had a loving father"). I don't know what it is, but ex-gays either come off as creepy, fanatical, or feign this hyper-happiness with glassy eyes like they're in a cult. David falls in the first category.

He won't let anyone post a refute on this Gagnon video because he's afraid Gagnon is going to be made fun of in the comments section (exhibit: A) he can't control, so he just hoards this video that gives Gagnon the opportunity to bullet his arguments without a challenge.

Since Foster will delete any dissenting view or negative comment on all of his YouTube comments (I believe he's literally checking comments on the daily and is ready and waiting with his trigger finger on the delete button), I thought I'd bring Gagnon here.

Gagnon pulls the same stunt on his own YouTube channel with even a little length of a refute. Gagnon also refuses to debate the audience with any type of a Q&A after one of his speaking engagements because he's a control freak with a debate setting.

[Updated: Someone contacted me and stated Gagnon will answer little questionnaire cards submitted by the audience, cards he can either reject or accept as long as they don't talk, but this is very different with having a dialogue back and forth with someone in the audience who can point out the contradictions and errors of what he's saying after he's said them.]

This blog has pointed out the error that's the "moral, ritual and ceremonial" paradigm enough to what's being presented by Gagnon here. The man thinks Paul speaks from the center of these Old Testament prohibitions with almost everything he wrote, as if the old Pharisee Saul didn't really completely die to the Law, but still makes a guest appearance from time to time. He misses the very core message of Paul who said the old prohibitions are dead to us and ignores Paul saying in 2 Corinthians; "He has made us competent as ministers of a new covenant--not of the letter but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life" and again in Romans; "But now, by dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code." It's re-stated in Acts; "Now then, why do you try to test God by putting on the necks of Gentiles a yoke that neither we nor our ancestors have been able to bear?" And in Hebrews; "The former regulation is set aside because it was weak and useless." "The law is only a shadow, not the realities themselves."
Even the ancient Jews believed the new "Messianic Torah" would replace their written Torah; "The Torah that a person learns in this present age is trifling compared to the Law of the Messianic King" (Koheles Rabah 11:8).

Homosexuality was never 'absolutely' proscribed in the New Testament. You have the homosexuality entwined with idolatry in Romans 1 where Paul patterns his sin list in Romans from other idolatry vice lists popular in his day and from Deuteronomy that mirrors Romans word for word. Paul only spoke on homosexuality through the narrow lens of idolatry or exploitation with Gagnon taking these examples to make a blanket statement on homosexuality using clever and deceptive hermeneutics tricks and I already brought up Gagnon's error with seeing homosexuality with being equal as exploitive homosexuality, so I don't need to go further with correcting this view he continues with now and later in the video with his interpretation of "arsenokoites" that's easily refuted by me all over this blog. This is a perfect example of Gagnon's "half-readings" I first brought up in my critique of his book. He quotes extensively from David F. Greenberg's book; "The Construction of Homosexuality" (an book I've also read) in his book. Greenberg gives an exhaustive narrative of homosexuality through the ages as a practice without condemning comment or consequence, all documented by Greenberg, all deliberately left out by Gagnon.

Gagnon brings up his two children and what they KNOW is wrong and equating that with how we are suppose to feel about homosexuality, we should KNOW it's wrong. Gagnon believes so strongly and so deeply homosexuality is so contrary to anything right or good or holy, he's incredulous you can't see it. This is a tactic of his to make you feel foolish with what he thinks you should see as a given. This is Gagnon who sees homosexuality as the equivalent of "a child touching a hot stove."

He takes apart the easy argument of those who bring up the "abomination" of mixing two types of cloth with the "abomination" of homosexuality in Leviticus. Why doesn't he bring up the more complex issue of divorce Christ takes away from Moses? The sin of usury in the Old Testament Christ actually carried over unlike homosexuality? Breaking the Sabbath that also calls for the death penalty? Circumcision the Old Testament says is a "forever" act? Or the other slew of what the Bible calls "abominations?"

Leave it up to Gagnon to make the story of the woman who was going to be stoned to be about the woman's adultery and not about how we are to be merciful and not judging, what Christ tells us to go and 'do likewise' in Luke 10:37. What do we get out of what Jesus did in here according to Gagnon? Saving someone for the future "Kingdom of God" who may choose not to repent. Is it this? Or is it Jesus showing the example of bestowing mercy over the letter of the law (James 2:12,13) to the crowd of witnesses? What made Him an enemy to the Scribes and the Pharisees who brought the woman to Christ to be stoned according to "The Law." By implication Gagnon says Jesus would have took part in the stoning if He could, but begrudgingly stops Himself for the singular reason of saving her for "The Kingdom." This is yet another case of Gagnon not being able to take his head out "Old Testament" weights and balances and missing the mark that Christ did what He did to give an example to the listeners around the adulteress and to us.

Paul called out a man at the church in Corinth with what he was doing that hurt another with what was a transgressional relationship, Gagnon says it's the same with two non-related homosexuals (ironically, Gagnon has stated that the Corinthian man's incest is preferable to homosexuality even when the Bible gives no such account of Paul taking a stance with a homosexual man in the church). He takes the Greek word "Porneia" (harlotry) in the verse describing the Corinthian man's sin and carries that description to mean homosexuality. In all Biblical instances the word is used, without exception, it is either in reference to a breaking of a marriage obligation or prostitution and is never carried over to homosexuality, what Gagnon would have you believe that again is him broadening a prohibition beyond it's clear and stated borders.

Gagnon gives away his bias against Homosexuality with saying tolerance is not loving, but then he says to show tolerance to the divorced with the excuse it's a "one time sin" and immediately it stops being a sin or living in a state of sin.

His question of; "Are homosexuals at risk?" He answers his own question because to him there is no other answer. Gagnon uses the term "Aggressive Love" that to him translates as fighting legislation that would stop gay children from being bullied in school to writing letters to church bodies telling then to kick gays out, THIS is Gagnon's "love" in action, a love he thinks he sees with Christ. Unlike what Gagnon believes, love does not dishonor others or demands its way... just ask Paul (1 Cor 13:5), a 'good disciple' of Jesus.

No comment is needed further with Gagnon's claim the only problem the Pharisees had with Christ was because he was pushy with an even more intensified Old Testament ethic while at the same time being loving, I really wonder if Gagnon believes this stupidity himself.

This is one of Gagnon's weakest argument (I'm assuming your stopping the vid and reading what I say as he's talking), along with the since discredited "science" in his book, that somehow men and women are to be 'complimentary parts' to each other and is a large part of why he believes as he does. I point out this error of his in my review of his book; "The Construction of Homosexuality... " and another reference to his work is another solid treatise on this pagan-based belief. Gagnon goes to bogus science because he can never show the "consequence" of homosexuality he compares to vices that do have notable consequences in Paul's vice lists.

When Gagnon brings up the fact Christ never talks about homosexuality with saying Christ never brought up incest either, he misses the fact Sodom was brought up to Christ. Instead of leading Christ to expand further with what was the sin of Sodom, Christ says nothing other than making it a case for inhospitality.* When Christ comes across the same sex practicing Centurion, He says nothing other than to admire the faith of the Centurion, When Christ does speaks on marriage, he's quick to bring up "born eunuchs" Gagnon himself concedes could fit the the historical definition of a homosexual.

He claims that the Christians of Paul's day would have seen homosexuality as a given prohibition from the Old Testament like incest, let's look at that closer.

Gagnon states; "There is no record of a Jew practicing homosexuality in early Judaism" and "There is no dissenting opinion anywhere in Judaism on the subject of homosexuality," he's wrong (see; "Wrestling with God and Men: Homosexuality in the Jewish Tradition" by Steven Greenberg and "Jacob's Wound: Homoerotic Narrative in the Literature of Ancient Israel" by Theodore W. Jennings Jr).

Gagnon's false claim of the Greek term "Malakoi" he tries to pass off as meaning an effeminate 'gay' man is easily refuted by myself and others (see "Love Lost In Translation" by K. Renato Lings with outside sources referenced: 490 - 499).

The Hebrew expression mishkav zakhar is the Hebrew translation of "lying of a male" from Numbers 31:18 and is only describing the act of penetration. 

This is a refutation of Gagnon saying Leviticus is an absolute prohibition on homosexuality even outside of it's idolatry context with outside sources referenced (see; Myth 2# and 2-3 A – Seven Myths in the Homophobic Interpretations of Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13) that also addresses Gagnon's other points mentioned in the video.

It's worth repeating with what scholar Jean-Fabrice Nardelli has to say on Gagnon that needs no further comment:

"Once and for all, let it be said that Gagnon is an inaccurate and poor student of Biblical homosexuality: he is far too opinionated and self-indulging for someone who would have us believe in his impeccable judgement (whence my jibe at his status as an ayatollah), has no grasp whatsoever of the major ancient Near Eastern languages apart from Masoretic Hebrew, never consults scholarly literature in other tongues (German and French Bible studies simply do not exist for him), and he is ridiculously parochial in his selection of primary and secondary sources (they are principally American, and wherever possible come from the Evangelical right). Just consult any piece of his which appears on his website; you will discover that he is all rhetoric and blistering, with virtually nothing in guise of scientific apparatus. I would have been loathe to expose him for what he is had he been decent enough not to charge his opponents with gross dishonesty. So let us not mince words any longer. As a parting shot, I shall like to adduce a point which speaks volumes about his academic credentials: in more than a decade, Gagnon only produced one large book (under, one might add, the covers of a religious publisher, not an academic press) and a handful of papers in peer-reviewed journals; such an output for a senior scholar, coupled with the fact that at well over fifty he is still an Assistant Professor in a second-rate theological seminary, comes on a long way, I think, towards explaining his tooth-and-nail stance as an ideologue and his preference for online preaching over academic work."



*Gagnon brings up Sodom in not this video, but elsewhere in an attempt to force the story from lack of hospitality he admits is the jist of the story to homosexuality. My response is here that also covers Jude 1:7. He makes the lack of hospitality with Sodom about homosexuality and then says no ancient Jews never practiced homosexuality, yet Jeremiah 23:14 says this about the people of Israel; "...They are all like Sodom to me; the people of Jerusalem are like Gomorrah." You can't have it both ways with making Sodom about homosexuality and saying the Jews didn't practice homosexuality when Israel was like Sodom.
As you can see, Gagnon has thoroughly been refuted with what are his general arguments he condensed in the above video on homosexuality and the Bible.

Hate in the Name of Christ

I prayed on if I should make this post. I always believed anti-gay theology would grow an ugly fruit that Christians could no longer deny because of it being the Doctrine of Demons that it is. This is it's fruition, it's ugly flower in full bloom. I couldn't call myself a Christian if I turned my back on the horrors done in the Name of my God.

Rev. Joseph Adam Pearson, Ph.D.

What I love about Pearson is that he's a Bible thumper's thumper, a real conservative and hard liner with the Word of God like your dad, he just happens to believe the Bible doesn't condemn homosexuality.
His book on-line.

Michael Craven

I made the big mistake to write a comment to Michael Craven on his site. I should have known better when he thinks all of America is going into some moral morass because I get googly eyed with boys and because of "secular humanists" (I thought that terminology went out in the late 80's with Evangelicals). Apparently Michael missed the Scriptures that we are to be set apart from the world and not in a tug of war with it. We are to live at peace with our neighbor, not demand our way with them, we are to preach the "Good News," not force un-believers to act like they were.
This is what I first wrote him and his response:
http://www.battlefortruth.org/ArticlesDetail.asp?id=236&rr=1#resp

The actual article is harmless enough with coming from an anti-gay Christian, but how does Michael really feel when in a different article on homosexuality he says:

"In short, social acceptance of deviant sexual behaviors (homosexuality) represents the final stages of a society working to rid itself of all traditional mores related to sexual conduct. The jettisoning of sexual morality renders the individual and its attendant society devoid of its productive energy. Such societies diminish because their collective creative energies are redirected toward the fulfillment of their personal sexual appetites (hedonism)."

Of course what you don't see is my final comment to Michael he didn't want to post with what he wrote me back so it looks like I had no response to him or the Scriptures he brings up (in one part of my post I say I believe the Bible is the inspired Word of God, breathed by God and is inerrant. I guess that popped his bubble of claiming I'm a "Liberal Progressive," so he just rather not post it).

Michael loves to put people in boxes who he believes are picking fights with Christianity in what's  his made-up; "Culture War." People he labels; "Secularists," "Homosexuals with an agenda," "Liberal Progressives" and a list of others with scary titles who are either fighting Christianity coming into the world or kicking out of the world the Christianity it still has left. Notice his fighting words (battle, war)? People like him are always needing to see a spiritual enemy behind individuals and "Homosexual Activists" are one of his combatants (Any homosexual who has the nerve to demand the same rights as a heterosexual is an "activist)." It's lost on Michael that there are not tiers of citizenship in America where you being a Christian American citizen somehow trumps the citizenship of a Gay American in the Bill of Rights or the Constitution in, like it or not, a secular society we all have to live in.

I DO believe in spiritual enemies, but not the ones Michael believes in, gay men and women. To Michael, the simple, and you could even say the boring way, of 'Loving your neighbor as yourself' just isn't thrilling or enough for him. Jesus wants us to love one another like we were in a love story movie, Michael wants to make it into a movie for boys with explosions and knife fights and kicking Satan's ass. To him, why should it be about anything else when he's all geared up and ready to go with fighting battles that will turn the tide in what he sees as a war of good and evil on a grand scale? Even accusing me of; "... attempting to transform the world to accommodate my behavior." I can do that??? This is my response to him saying to me; "...most Bible scholars agree” with the argument of omission, suggesting that since Jesus doesn’t directly condemn homosexual behavior then homosexual behavior must be okay. This is an oft quoted and erroneous rebuttal when trying to align homosexual behavior with Christian faith."

I love his last line of him saying he sees an "inner conflict" with me. He knows he doesn't see this, it's just a little trick to make his brittle followers second guess anything I have to say.