It is seeming to me that the split is inevitable because there is no willingness for two way dialogue. Am I losing hope prematurely?

Sadly, the split is inevitable, inasmuch as the Global South (GS) and their North American Network "staffers" (to avoid the offensive term "handlers") are not willing to accept diversity in Biblical interpretation.

In their GS communique they also made it clear that GS candidates for ordination are to be trained in GS (strictly orthodox) theological colleges and not in North American, Canadian and British institutions which honor the principles of academic freedom and diversity in Biblical interpretation. Their idea of true orthodox Anglicanism is a confessional church with a literalist - not historical - interpretation of defining documents: the Bible, the 1662 Prayer Book, the 39 Articles of Religion and the 1998 Lambeth Resolution on Human Sexuality (excluding from the latter any mention of dialoge and constructive engagement with Gays and Lesbians).

Obviously, the Anglican provinces in the Northern Hemisphere are not going to reverse course and throw into the waste bin two hundred and fifty years of Biblical and theological scholarship, beginning with the Age of the Enlightenment through the post-Modern era.

John Henry, it's incredibly expensive to train Asian and African clergy in the US and England and it only encourages a colonial mindset of dependency. Much better - and cheaper - for people who will minister in their own cultures to train there.
The servant church of the North and West can stil send out teachers (and books) to colleges like Bishop Tucker in Mukono or the new one being built in Kigali.

"Obviously, the Anglican provinces in the Northern Hemisphere are not going to reverse course and throw into the waste bin two hundred and fifty years of Biblical and theological scholarship, beginning with the Age of the Enlightenment through the post-Modern era."--John Henry

Amen!!!

This Christianity Today article is really sensational, if true...

I'd be quite careful about anything written in _Christianity Today_. They are extremely conservative, evangelical, and biblically literalist in their stance, and have a long and well known antipathy towards the Episcopal Church. Not saying they'd straight out lie or anything, but there will be a definite "spin" on anything they report.

A more well-rounded and less biased source for general religious news in the U.S. would come from sources like the _Christian Century_.

John:

Why dialog when there are no grounds for compromise? One side or the other must give up ground and compromise its ideals in order to come to an agreement--and neither is willing to do so. So, why delay the inevitable when it only leads to more bad feelings and less Christ-like actions. Let us divide while we still have some hope of doing so in an honorable and decent manner.

Steven

I agree with Steven. I think this view is starting to be more widely accepted. I do hope so. I think the outcome will be better for all of us.

"A new organization, SPREAD (the Society for the Propagation of Reformed Evangelical Anglican Doctrine)"

If any liberal came up w/ *this*, they would be accused of (tasteless) hyperbole! (But whatever "CT" sez, I guess . . . spread it! ;-p)

But if true, this really says it all:

"after 100 pages of analysis, the SPREAD paper advises: 'Provinces and bishops who leave the Anglican Communion should form an association of like-minded churches'"

Behold, the "Protestant Principle" triumphant (after all, if the deletion of "Protestant" from "ECUSA" is to be held against us, I guess that's what it's all about): the invention of the brand-new "Church of the Like-Minded"!

Adios, amigos! (well, "Adios, ex-Anglicans" anyway---and welcome back again, in God's Good Time ;-/)

The statment of the Church of Nigeria read: “The boundary of family identity ends within the boundary of the authentic Word of God.”

To the Church Christ is the Word of God.

"Obviously, the Anglican provinces in the Northern Hemisphere are not going to reverse course and throw into the waste bin two hundred and fifty years of Biblical and theological scholarship, beginning with the Age of the Enlightenment through the post-Modern era."--John Henry

Clearly JH and I differ on where things began to go wrong.

Yes Goran, Christ as revealed in the Scriptures is the word of God. I think somewhere therein, while his mother and brothers were looking for him, he gave more attention to strangers listening to his words and referred to those obedient to God as his family. May we all belong to that family of love and obedience.

Christianity Today says "Some [conservatives] worry waiting another 18 months plays into the hands of liberals who, conservatives say, have proven brilliantly skillful in playing "the long game" of wearing down their opposition with meetings and dialogue."

Oh no! Meetings and dialogue are wearing down opposition! How dreadful! How Christian!

I hope it's true.

Tunde,

When you write "Christ as revealed in the Scriptures is the word of God", you put your finger on a main point of disagreement. Christ is indeed the Word of God and the scriptures are a prime source of information about Him and His saving work and his teaching. But He is also revealed in the continuance of His saving work in the on-going work of the Holy Spirit, who guides us into all Truth, so be we are willing to listen and hear.

But the static written word of God in Scripture cannot be the final word of God for the Church, for God's people, precisely because the written word _is_ static. Only the true Word whom we also encounter in worship and sacrament can be God's final word.

The Bible is the story of our encounter with the Living God who made and saved us. By reading and study we learn from it about that God and about our relationship with Him and with one another, but it is also limited. It is the product of its human authors and their understanding and experiences -- as first Israel and then the Church have grown and changed as a result of our relationship with God, by the grace that makes us rise to the challenge of living a life with God, so the depth of our understanding of God has deepened and our relationship has changed.

Each generation must read the Bible anew under the guidance of the Spirit in order to find in it the Living Word of God. Right now we are engaged as a church in a great testing because some of us are claiming to have been brought by the Spirit to a new understanding of human sexuality and even of marriage in the lives of men and women in the Church. Not everyone is in agreement and even the "two sides" reflect different nuances and understanding. Only the time will tell if this understanding is indeed of God, by the fruit that is borne in the lives of Christian men and women as a result.

But we cannot prejudge the results of this testing by saying, "The Bible says" or "Lambeth 1.10 says" -- the whole point is that we cannot agree on what the Bible says and what it means on this point. And if the conclusions about human sexuality in part of Lambeth 1.10 could stand as the last word on the subject, there would be no need for the listening process elsewhere enjoined on us in the same resolution. However tired of the process we are, we cannot as Christians abandon the process of testing and discernment before it is over. Or however bumpy the ride!

Abigail

'But we cannot prejudge the results of this testing by saying, "The Bible says" or "Lambeth 1.10 says" -- the whole point is that we cannot agree on what the Bible says and what it means on this point.'

Actually, the great majority of the Church, including its ancient, Greek speaking section, have been clear from the beginning about its consentient teaching on homosexuality. Only a modern minority has expressed doubts, while someone like Walter Wink dissents from the teaching but doesn't dispute what the Bible means.

Abigail:

I think you're preaching to the wrong choir. Besides, what's the point? The liberal side has already heard and accepted all of this. The conservative side has already heard and rejected it. We all argue past each other because neither side has any interest in, or intention of, changing their underlying viewpoints. If you think this is wrong, then I would suggest that you provide us all a good example by changing your own first. Once you have become a conservative and an expositor of the conservative viewpoint, I will give some additional thought to the liberal point of view. Until then . . .

Steven

I fully concur with Dr. Abigail Ann Young. Her comments are worthy of reflection. She is saying in her own words what Richard Hooker said in Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity (1553-1600) about the process of discernment of the meaning of Scripture by the Body of Christ, the Church.

Abp. Rowan Williams really captured and communicated very well what Hooker, one of the "fathers" of Anglicanism, said about Scripture and the need for discernment in his 26 October 2005 lecture at the Temple Church, London. To quote Dr. Williams summarizing Hooker: "Christian salvation comes from incorporation into the life of Christ, the eternal Son of the Father, who has shared his life with us through the incarnation. It is not a matter of adherence to a form of words, even inspired and inerrant words. The Bible is true but not a substitute for the living Truth which is Christ's person."

I don't think that the bishops of the Global South took Richard Hooker very seriously when they composed their 30 October 2005 Communique.

Yes, Steven, as you know, I agree.

What is so concerning, though, is that unless we deal with these differences swiftly - and that means either agreeing to live with each others differ5ences and giving the different views parity , or a split - we will continue as we are.

I would seriously like to ask those who want to communion to remain together two questions.

1. Do you accept that the respective 'sides' are not going to change their opinion?
2. Do you think it is reasonable or possible to continue as we are when there is so clearly no meeting of minds?

No super-spiritualism,please - just practical responses.

Dear English speaking, native, Calvinist but not wholly Anglican, somewhat condescending Mr Beaton, much into Bible translations but not found in Google, wrote: “Actually, the great majority of the Church, including its ancient, Greek speaking section, have been clear from the beginning about its consentient teaching on homosexuality. Only a modern minority has expressed doubts, while someone like Walter Wink dissents from the teaching but doesn't dispute what the Bible means.”

No Mr Beaton, the consensus you portray is a Myth. The invention of Sodomy is 2nd Millennium and ever mutating, new anti-gay “words” having been invented post Bailey 1955 (Judges 19.22, Jude verse 7, 1 Thess 4.3-7), along with pro-slavery (1 Cor 7.21) and misogynic ones (2 Peter 2.14).

The word malakoì in 1 Cor 6.9, which a 1000 years ago in both East and West was proclaimed to refer to “men that masturbate” and has acquired that meaning in modern Greek, for both women and men, in the modern 20th century, medically defining West where Masturbation had become un-sellable as a Lethal Sin, was re-defined to essentialist catamita: “passive gay man”, through Pater Zerwick’s Analysis philologica novi testamenti graecae of 1966, to correspond symmetrically to the following word; arsenokoîtai, which since Tomas ab Aquino has been said to refer to sodomitas: “active” gay men.

The n e w Western meaning of malakoì refers to an essentialist symmetrical sexual orientation as i d e n t i t y in late 20th century fashion. In the East the teaching remains the 10th century one: “men who masturbate”.

Curiously, the obsolete reference to 1 Cor 6.9 is still found in The New Catholic Encyclopaedia of the same year, its Roman reader being unable to find it in the 1970 New American Bible, which following the 1947 REV pretends that both words t o g e t h e r mean “homosexual” (a word only minted in 1869).

So what for a 1000 years had been an (heterosexual) a c t i v i t y for all, in 1966 was changed into a new essentialist symmetrical i d e n t i t y for the identification of the brand new social minority (homosexual men and women).

Not the Church Catholic, not East and West, not 2000 years, not Tradition, not Reason, but a late 20th century social politics from the USA.

Brother Goran, it seems you have little sense of irony, so I won't comment on your adjectives for me. Your statement that 'malakoi' in 1 Cor 6.9 was understood (by whom?) 1000 years ago to mean 'masturbators' is, even if it is true, irrelevant, as we're talking about how the word was used 2000 years ago: synchronic rather than diachronic linguistics. By apt way of comparison, you surely know that the word 'gay' didn't mean homosexual in English (native or any variety) even 80 years ago. The ancient meaning of the word as denoting 'effeminate, passive homosexuals' is affirmed by LXX scholar Priscilla Turner as well as Robert Gagnon, wrt Philo (The Bible and Homosexual Practice, 306-312). Plenty of others (by no means conservatives) agree: Victor Furnish, Robin Scroggs, Bernadette Brooten, Joachim Becker ('Lustknaben'). Only the late Prof Boswell and Dr Countryman suggest your understanding, and they have been heavily critiqued (Boswell especially on adelphopoiesis). I wonder what their scholarship tells us about the sociology of knowledge. The meaning of 'arsenokoitai' is not in doubt.
charis kai eirene soi,
Mark

Goran, you are wonderful! You are another reason to choose the Church of Sweden over the Church of Nigeria any day of the week!

Best regards from Brooklyn, NY USA.

Göran wrote: "Not the Church Catholic, not East and West, not 2000 years, not Tradition, not Reason, but a late 20th century social politics from the USA."

Which is really the core of the problem WRT the issue with our GLBT brothers and sisters - a "perfect storm" of poor translations, poor understanding of the Mediterranean cultures of the 1st cent CE, and an extremist, conservative socio-political movement in the modern day West.

The fact that this horrid combination is repeatedly hammered on as an "orthodox" viewpoint quite frankly sickens me. Could there *be* a more Orwellian twisting of "orthodox" than this ?

Dr. Abigail, if I buy your idea, I’d be in a fix for not considering same from my Islamic friends who believe Mohammed was part of the ongoing revelations.

Yes, time will tell. Sadly though, either way, many would have been led astray. Permit me to make the simple end result test I do with my Islamic friends. Put yourself on each side of the disagreement and imagine at the end you were wrong! What do you stand to lose? Are you prepared to forsake that?

Sure you now understand why we expect leaders to speak the truth they believe and not try the fence balancing act.

Dear Göran, Your assertion that "the word "malakoì" .... was re-defined to essentialist catamita: “passive gay man”, through Pater Zerwick’s Analysis philologica novi testamenti graecae of 1966...." is not historically accurate since in my RSV (1959 Edition) the words malakoi and arsenakoi were already translated together as "homosexuals" in the 1 Cor 6.9 list of unrighteous people who will not inherit the kingdom without cleansing.

So you assertion that: "what for a 1000 years had been an (heterosexual) a c t i v i t y for all, in 1966 was changed into a new essentialist symmetrical i d e n t i t y for the identification of the brand new social minority (homosexual men and women)" may sound authoritative, but it is false!

ps I am not convinced that Mark is so very condescending!

Tunde, thanks for your reply.

Of course you are right -- the argument for progressive revelation is very similar to the argument made by Muslims and (I think also) followers of Bahaii about new, supplanting, revelations. But here we have not only the tests proposed in Deuteronomy and in Acts for judging such claims but also the argument of continuity.

The type of progressive revelation for which I am arguing involves the kind of re-thinking that one sees in the Prophets vis-a-vis the Torah, but not absolute contradiction. If Mohammed was a greater prophet than Jesus that absolutely contradicts most of the New Testament. To say that the sexual morality of the Holiness Code is deficient for reasons that are partly dependent on the culture and circumstances of Ancient Israel and her Canaanite neighbours is not to contradict the Code's proper emphasis on purity and morality in our relations with our neighbours and with God.

What if in the end I am wrong about this? I put trust in God who knows my heart and who saved me. He knows that, even if I am wrong, I am striving to speak the truth in love as I believe it. I am deeply grieved by the way that people on both sides are judging the faith and the salvation of others and I am trying not to do that -- it's not for me to say who is or is not saved or who is or is not a "true" Christian or a "true" Anglican. God alone can judge our hearts and our sincerity.

I don't expect the church always to be of one mind on everything, but I expect us to try to disagree as Christians, with charity to one another.

Abigail

Another interesting post from Mr Beaton.

Miss Turner and Professor Gagnon cannot possibly affirm “the ancient meaning of the word”. Only Ancient texts can – if we manage to read them without our own late cultural lenses ;=)

“Plenty of others”. Indeed. Most every scholar seems to have his or her private interpretation.

This should be cause for some concern. It seriously undermines the idea that the late 20th century concept of “homosexuals” may at all be in the Good Book. So yes, indeed, what does this tell us of the sociology of knowledge? Inbreeding, anyone?

Now, apart from creative linguistics, there are 2 levels here. Both post Pearl Harbour.

By that time, the naming process; the minting of the words “homosexual” (1869) and “heterosexual” (1890), together with notions of a Third Sex produced the idea that the new social categories “looked” in opposite ways; that they was identifiable, real. So the mustering office of the American Fleet at San Francisco rejected a certain number of drafted, because it thought they belonged to the new (unknown) category.

Continuing this line, in 1952 the new category was put on the list of mental disorders. Only a few years later there were studies that showed there were no identifiable mental differences between the two newly invented categories.

In 1955 D.S. Bailey published his Homosexuality and the Western Christian Tradition, in which he dealt a severe blow to the 2nd Millennium sexualization of the story of Sodom in Genesis 18-19 (in the 1st Millennium there is only poor isolated non Jewish authority Philo of Alexandria).

Dr Bailey’s book caused confusion in exegetic circles. The 48 biblical references to Sodom (amongst them Jesus himself in Luke 10.12 and Matt 10.15) were corrected to material in most translations were they hade been rendered as sexual, but to counter this, Judges 19.33, 1 Thess 4.3-7 and Jude verse 7 were “sodomized” to underpin the exploded Renaissance absurdity, that sungenwmetha autois be “to know in the Biblical sense”.

The root gnw; to know, occurs some 943 times in the OT and NT, only 9 of them in sexual circumstances, and in these we invariably find the aorist imperfect egnw-; knew), never syn-genw-metha, which is a different word altogether ;=)

These developments within Academia correspond to the legalization of Sodomy for “heterosexuals” from 1961 onwards, that changed the American sodomy laws (1802ff) into “homosexual conduct” instead, sometimes (as in the Texan 1973) including the use of a dildo for lesbians but not for “heterosexuals”.

Now, as anyone can se, this is (as I wrote in my previous post) a change from a theoretically (and if it could have been conceived of as such: “heterosexual”) a c t i v i t y for a l l, to orientation as i d e n t i t y for the identification of the new social outcasts.

Groups such as Focus on the Family modernized further, changing “heterosex” from a lesser celibacy for those week in the Flesh, as it had been in Academic Theology in both East and West for a 1000 years, to God’s gift in Creation for the hetero-married, this by way of creative readings of Genesis 1-2 – the earliest instance of this new paradigm seems to be Don Williams’s The Bond That Breaks: Will Homosexuality Split the Church? 1978.

So sorry, how the understanding and misunderstanding of words such as malakoì or any other word has changed several times over the ages, is anything but “irrelevant”.

It might be added that the precise meaning of “arsenokoîtai” is anything but clear – it may never be established beyond doubt – most every scholar having his or her own private explanation...

It is instead the meaning of “malakós” that is clear. It means “soft” (of textiles, cf Luke 7.25 and Matt 11.8), in a secondary sense “sloppy”. In Antiquity, it approximates Pater Zerwick’s modern “passive gay man” (without any notion of “orientation” or “identity”) only in the combination malakós thelu; sloppy cunt – and then from “cunt”, not from sloppy.

Dear Dave,

The conflationary trick of the RSV of 1947 is "only" an example amongst many of how Dynamic Equivalence translations are made; changing two d i f f e r e n t words into one new modern c o n c e p t.

But it is Pater Zerwick's s y m m e t r y of 1966 that is important. Because this reflects the new modern, that is post industrialization, essentialist paradigm.

Before the 19th century, there was one spieces: Man; comprised of men, women, priests and children.

The former wore hat and sword, the latter frocks ;=)

In pre-modern society the ideas of "gender" and their attributes were different to ours.

The one spieces was organized on a scale; men were mature, perfected, women un-perfected, children mere potentiality.

Which actually meant that women could become men. Herstory is full of women who have clothed as men, gone out to war and come back marrying girls!

Industrialization changed this. The new middle class was organized antagonistically: men became "manly" and women were put on pedestals to inertia; pure, silly, hysterical. To remedy this, the hystera was removed by operation...

So yes, something has changed. And that change is not yet completed. Hence the Anglican troubles.

I am not entirely sure that the meaning of "arsenokoitai" is all that clear. For instance, the common attempt is to derive it from Lev 18:22 on the basis that the two root words in this portmanteau come together. But they don't come together grammatically; they are in two different phrases. The verse in question actually refers to "koiten gunaikos" (bedding of a woman, so to speak). If you want to find a grammatically (and lexically and syntactically) compelling source for "arsenokoitai" I would suggest a better selection of verses is Numbers 31:17,18,35; where you actually have "koiten arsenos / andros" in a meaningful grammatical structure. The meaning here is, "one who has slept with a man" and is referring to women; in this context, virgins.
So while I am not suggesting that "arsenokoitai" might not well include men who sleep with men, I would like to suggest that the range of meaning might be broader and include women who sleep with men (but who are not married to them, i.e., prostitutes and concubines, "loose women") as well.
I realize that this has wandered rather far from the topic of the thread.
As is well known, the usages of this word are far too rare in the earliest period to give a precise indication as to meaning.

Göran said: "the word "malakoì" .... was re-defined to essentialist catamita: “passive gay man”, through Pater Zerwick’s Analysis philologica novi testamenti graecae of 1966...." (rather than “men who masturbate”).
Dave said: "[this] is not historically accurate since in my RSV (1959 Edition) the words malakoi and arsenakoi were already translated together as "homosexuals".

Dear Göran, Just to rub it in, my King James Version translates malakoi as "effeminate" ("made like woman")... not far off the concept of a “passive gay man”... and 1611 is well before 1966 ! And nothing to do with masturbation...

Fancy theories burnished with eloquence do not make up for lack of truth.. Please do check *all the facts* more carefully.

Dear Dave,

I have checked most carefully. There are of course still facts I haven't found. However, King James Version is not among those.

We have been through this before, I belive, what the people behind KJV in 1611 meant by "effeminate" is not what you, or anybody else, spontaneously would connote with "women", after the radical upheaval of "gender" in the 19th century revolution from pre-modernity to modernity.

Do read my previous post again!

Thanks Abigail, You are right, there should be room for disagreements.

Wished you still consider what you stand to lose if wrong. If I am wrong, I stand to lose an earthly lifetime of 'enjoying' whatever my flesh wants me to and risk a scolding for telling gay folks they need repentance.

Massively away from the concept of a 'passive gay man' - which as a concept didnt exist in biblical times. What did exist was the rite-of-passage of pederastic extra-marital same-sex activity, carried out by men who wouldn't have had a clue what the concept of 'gay' meant!

Which is why trying to find anything useful from the Bible on this subject is about as likely as finding instructions as to how to fly a helicopter or boot a computer. It's about time liberals said this loud and clear - that the Bible needs to be deconstructed and recognised for its severe limitations. Not trying to justify an ancient book as if its anything other than an ancient book!

And the scars to your soul, Tunde? And to those of others?

Tunde, if you are wrong you risk being placed among the Pharisees who while not entering heaven prevented others from doing so. How many people are turned from God by the language of judgment, rather than brought to Christ?
If those who "enjoy" the flesh are wrong, as you say, those who are in Christ will be forgiven, for they "loved much."
For what it is worth, I forgive you your attitude, even though you do not repent of it. I trust and hope and believe that God will forgive all who seek to serve him, even when they are mistaken, as I well may be. But God is my judge and my savior -- not you.

We need to get back to the ancient sources to determine what MALAKOI and ARSENOKOITAI (1 Cor.6:9-10) meant during the first century AD and in the life of the early Church.

There is no consensus on MALIKOI, as shown by a quick reference to Liddell & Scott's Greek-English Lexicon, ed. Stuart Jones & McKenzie (1968). The Lexicon also refers to males with high-pitched voices. That could be castrati, eunuchs (although the Gk NT consistently uses EUNOUCHOI-Mt. 19:12, Acts 8:27). Given the fact that women didn't perform as actresses in feminine roles in Greek and Latin plays, and their roles were played by MALAKOI, it might refer to (effeminate) male actors. It is signifcant that actors were excluded from Christian baptism by the early Church until, during the catechumenate, they moved into other acceptable professions. Origen, a teacher of catechumens in Alexandria, had a falling out, in the years 230-231, with his Bishop Demetrius, which forced him to transfer his activities to Caesarea. The ostensible cause of his estrangement from his bishop was his ordination by Palestinian bishops, who did not hesitate to ordain a "eunuch," although, according to the views of that time, eunuchs/castrati were not suitable candidates for ordination [Karl Baus, From the Apostolic Community to Constantine: Handbook of Church History (Freiburg: Herder, 1965), Vol.I, p.235].

To all intents and purposes, MALAKOI might have had a wider meaning than allowed by Dr. Robert Gagnon. And definitions were subject to change by early Church synods.

It is interesting to check St. Jerome's Latin term for MALAKOI. It is MOLLES ("soft" or "effeminate ones"). He doesn't use the term CATAMITI ("young men who served as cup-bearers"). CATAMITUS is derived from Ganymedes, the cup-bearer of Jupiter/Zeus. Cicero uses the term as one of contempt for Mark Anthony [cf. Lewis's Latin Dictionary for Schools (1889)]. In Roman politics it was acceptable to demean one's opponents by implying that they were homosexuals. It is through Cicero's usage that CATAMITUS came to mean "toy boy", "boy prostitute", "Lustknabe," etc. (E.g., Mark Anthony being alleged to have been Julius Caesar's "toy boy".) Too, St. Jerome uses the Latin MASCULORUM CONCUBITORES for ARSENOKOITAI, which can refer to "male or female concubines who lie with males". Concubinage, male or female, was quite common in Roman antiquity, its culture being a "macho" culture, males gaining the respect of fellow-males by not being too attached to their domineering Roman wives.

The whole meaning of the terminology needs to be explored further with due regard to Greek and Latin sources in order for us to understand whom the NT authors - viz. Paul - are referring to.

John Henry wrote: "We need to get back to the ancient sources to determine what MALAKOI and ARSENOKOITAI (1 Cor.6:9-10) meant during the first century AD and in the life of the early Church."

Yes we do. And I think you are quite right that it is useful to look at the first translations, such as the Vetus latina from 2nd century North Africa - nothing to do with St Jerome's tranlation of the Psalms, Job and the Gospels 250 years later, nor the 12th century Parisian pro mandatory celibacy Versio vulgata.

Liddell & Scott also, is much to anachronistic. What we see is what we look for!

Trying to squeese modern concepts into ancient texts won't help, as shown by those that read our post 1960ies concept of homosexual orientation as identity into Paul, Smyrna, Clement and the Ezraic redactors of Leviticus 18.

Not to mention that the use of Genesis 1-2 as a paradigm for a mandatory heterosexist interpretation of Biblical texts, cannot be traced further back than the 1970ies ;=)

Some people posting here know more about biblical language and interpretation than others.

http://www.nwnet.org/~prisca/Brief.htm

is a place to start.

A quick glance at Ez. 16:28 in Hebrew and Greek is quite enlightening. The Hebrew of Ezekiel was first rendered into Greek somewhere between 150 and 50 BC.