Not Like Women in Office: Scripture, Hermeneutics, and Same-Sex Relations
From the Forum Magazine, Fall 2015 - view the full issue here
In previous decades, the ordination of women was the most polarizing issue in the Christian Reformed Church. It divided families, friends, and congregations. Some left the denomination. Now we are having a similarly painful conversation about samesex marriage. Synod 1995 decided the debate about women in office by declaring that both sides are consistent with Scripture and allowing congregations to decide for themselves. Some of us hope that same-sex marriage will be resolved the same way, and others fear that it will. Many people on both sides view same-sex marriage and women in office as similar issues that stand or fall together.
But the issues are very different. One is about the church order, the other about the moral order. More basically, there are biblical texts affirming female leadership, and ordaining women can be defended from Scripture using the standard Reformed hermeneutics (that is, our method of interpreting the Bible). But there are no texts supporting same-sex relations, and none of the dozens of recent new interpretations is consistent with our approach to Scripture.
In this article I urge our denominational conversation to focus on hermeneutics to determine whether the Bible, properly interpreted, permits same-sex activity. I explain why the methods used to support it are different and problematic compared to the standard Christian Reformed approach to Scripture. I suggest that Synod commission a definitive study to address the current confusion and tension in the CRCNA.
It is important to note that I address same-sex activity, not sexual orientation, emotional intimacy, friendship, living together, or legal status. I also believe it is wrong for the church to focus on samesex activity while neglecting the sexual sanctity required of all members—single, married, and divorced.
We Must Engage Scripture Openly and Honestly
I understand why people question the church’s position. We feel compassion for family members, friends, fellow believers, and all people who suffer because of their sexual orientation and unwanted celibacy. It is diff icult for most of us not to empathize with the happiness of same-sex couples in love. We want to affirm and support them as persons. We wonder whether their happiness is truly displeasing to God. Didn’t he create us all with a need for sexual fulfillment? What if we were homosexual? We note that the church has revised its teachings about monarchy, slavery, and the roles of women. Reputable scholars claim that Scripture allows committed samesex relations too, and we believe them. In this way compassion moves some of us to affirm same-sex relationships and new readings of Scripture. I understand this journey because I know and care deeply about people with same-sex attraction—some in committed relationships. I too have reexamined the church’s exegesis for the sake of compassion and fairness to see whether I could support revision.
that the church has revised its teachings about monarchy, slavery, and the roles of women. Reputable scholars claim that Scripture allows committed samesex relations too, and we believe them. In this way compassion moves some of us to affirm same-sex relationships and new readings of Scripture. I understand this journey because I know and care deeply about people with same-sex attraction—some in committed relationships. I too have reexamined the church’s exegesis for the sake of compassion and fairness to see whether I could support revision.
that the church has revised its teachings about monarchy, slavery, and the roles of women. Reputable scholars claim that Scripture allows committed samesex relations too, and we believe them. In this way compassion moves some of us to affirm same-sex relationships and new readings of Scripture. I understand this journey because I know and care deeply about people with same-sex attraction—some in committed relationships. I too have reexamined the church’s exegesis for the sake of compassion and fairness to see whether I could support revision.
Scripture, Hermeneutics, and Arguments for Same-Sex Marriage
The denominational conversation must be based on our Reformed doctrine of Scripture and methods of interpretation. In my view, the standard reinterpretations of the texts about sexuality are based on approaches to the Bible that are not compatible with the Christian Reformed position. If they are not, then they lack validity for our denomination even though they are endorsed by evangelical or Reformed theologians.
T here are two main strategies of reinterpretation. I will call them the “validation” approach and the “divide and conquer” approach.
“Validation” is the typical mainline Protestant strategy. It argues that samesex relationships can model the same biblical values as male-female marriage. It is based on the modern theological assumption that the enduring truths of Scripture are compatible with “enlightened” scientific paradigms and moral intuitions. It holds that the Bible teaches the universal ideals of love, justice, inclusion, faithfulness, happiness, and quality of life (shalom), but not the particular culturally embedded views of gender, sex, marriage, and family expressed by the Bible’s writers. This approach validates same-sex relationships by claiming that our culture’s views of gender, sex, and marriage can express the same “biblical” values as the traditional views. The validation strategy does not need to reinterpret the texts that limit sexual relations to heterosexual marriage, because it does not believe that they teach universal norms.
But Christians who affirm the historic doctrine of Scripture must reinterpret the relevant texts because the Bible is the full and final authority for everything it teaches. Their standard strategy is to “divide and conquer” traditional sexual ethics by proposing limiting interpretations of the passages about sex and marriage. They deconstruct the textual connections among the image of God, gender complementarity, marriage, sex, and reproduction. T hey claim that the seven texts about same-sex behavior are not universal but condemn only specific kinds of samesex behavior. Genesis 19 is against inhospitality and rape, not homosexual activity as such. Leviticus addresses pagan cultic practices, not sex in general, they say. Romans 1 condemns the emperor Caligula’s orgies and heterosexuals who unnaturally engage in homosexual acts, not all same-sex relations. 1 Corinthians 6 and 1 Timothy 1 are either unclear in meaning or only address inappropriate man-boy or master-slave sex. The divide and conquer approach concludes that Scripture does not reserve sex for heterosexual marriage or condemn faithful same-sex relationships.
Combined, the two strategies seem to make a good case. Divide and conquer argues that the Bible is not against same-sex unions. Validation claims that it implicitly affirms them.
Christian Reformed Hermeneutics and Same-Sex Activity
Both strategies are used by some members of the CRCNA and organizations that they support. Some used them a generation ago to justify women in office (“it’s a justice issue; Paul is out of date”), and they were accurately identified as “a new hermeneutics.” Neither strategy is compatible with our Reformed hermeneutics (hereafter RH). To explain why, I’ll introduce RH and then compare the three.
Our Reformed hermeneutics is not obscure or parochial. With all historic Christian churches, we confess a full, infallible, and definitive view of biblical teaching. RH continues the method of interpretation developed by John Calvin, who is widely regarded as the father of Protestant hermeneutics. His general method is still used even by non-Reformed denominations and scholars who embrace the Reformation view of Scripture and reject samesex activity—including John Stott, N. T. Wright, Gordon Fee, and Richard Hays. Nuanced in the Dutch Reformed tradition by Bavinck and Kuyper, our RH emphasizes the biblical narrative of creation, fall, redemption, and consummation. Gerhardus Vos promoted this hermeneutics, and Louis Berkhof spelled it out in The Interpretation of Scripture. Our RH is still alive and well. It leads us from the Bible to our confessions, ethical positions, and testimonies. It has been restated and applied in recent decades by synodical studies on the authority of Scripture, homosexuality, women in office, creation and evolution, inclusive language for God, and other important topics. RH is not unclear, arbitrary, or narrowly denominational.
What is the method? We confess that God speaks in Scripture today as he did in the past. To understand what God is teaching us, we must understand what the Bible meant to its original authors and readers and apply its teaching now. That is what good sermons and Bible studies do. Understanding Scripture involves both interpretation and application. I’ll explain and illustrate each aspect in relation to sexual norms.
Proper interpretation considers four factors that determine a text’s meaning: its grammatical, literary, historical, and theological dimensions. We must look for the clearest, most likely interpretation of each dimension in relation to the others, based on all available evidence, because we confess that Scripture is clear about the essentials of faith and practice. We must not manipulate the data or arbitrarily construct improbable meanings.
Grammatical interpretation seeks the meaning of the original Hebrew and Greek words and sentences. For example, Paul’s term arsenokoites (a male who has sex with a male) is a compound word derived from the Septuagint (Greek) translation of Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13. Phusis (“nature”) in Romans 1 connotes the universal normative order in Genesis 1, orthodox Judaism, and Greek and Roman Platonism, Stoicism, and Epicureanism in spite of diverse views of same-sex activity. (Nature can refer Grammatical interpretation seeks the meaning of the original Hebrew and Greek words and sentences. For example, Paul’s term arsenokoites (a male who has sex with a male) is a compound word derived from the Septuagint (Greek) translation of Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13. Phusis (“nature”) in Romans 1 connotes the universal normative order in Genesis 1, orthodox Judaism, and Greek and Roman Platonism, Stoicism, and Epicureanism in spite of diverse views of same-sex activity. (Nature can refer to an individual’s [sexual] nature in modern parlance.)
Literary factors include a text’s genre (narrative, poetry, law, etc.) and mode of expression (literal, figurative, symbolic, etc.). Genesis 19 is narrative, not law or ethical instruction. But Leviticus is law— the Holiness Code. 1 Corinthians 6 and 1 Timothy 1 list arsenokoitai with others who break the Ten Commandments— clearly an enduring judgment.
Historical interpretation focuses both on development within Scripture, such as Paul’s appropriation of Levitical sexual boundaries, and the historical context of Scripture—for example, views of same-sex activity among Israel’s neighbors and Paul’s contemporaries.
Theological or canonical interpretation is the culmination of RH: Scripture interprets Scripture. It considers individual passages within their books and ultimately within Scripture as a whole (tota Scriptura). Each text contributes to the meaning of the whole Bible, and each in turn has meaning within its book and in relation to the other books. The Bible is not a collection of isolated texts but is like a living organism in which each part shapes and is shaped by the whole body. Biblical doctrine emerges from theological interpretation. The teachings of all parts of Scripture on particular topics—including God, creation, sin, grace, and the Savior, as well as God’s will for sexuality—constitute a coherent unity.
The divide and conquer strategy is contrary to theological interpretation. But it is consistent with (post) modern theological hermeneutics, which regards the Bible as a collection of socially-historically limited, diverse, and sometimes incompatible perspectives. According to RH and all historic Christian doctrines of Scripture, however, God intends us to combine everything it teaches about his will, creation, sin, grace, obedience, gender, sex, marriage, and chastity as we interpret the relevant texts about sex. Biblical doctrine therefore includes the normative order of creation—the image of God, male-female complementarity, marriage, and procreation—and all kinds of post-fall sexual aberrations that are narrated or explicitly judged. Jesus himself reaff irmed marriage as instituted by God in Genesis 2. Theological interpretation leaves no room for non-sinful kinds of sexual relations outside of heterosexual marriage or for sinful kinds within marriage. “Divide and conquer” puts asunder what Scripture joins together.
The final aspect of our hermeneutics is application. A crucial question asks which biblical imperatives are still normative and which were intended by God as temporary. RH uses theological interpretation to answer. Given everything that Scripture teaches, we can regularly distinguish what is temporary from what endures, and thus we no longer insist on monarchy or permit slavery. We also realize that the cultural specificities of Old Testament cleanliness and civil and ceremonial laws were fulfilled in Christ and are no longer in effect. Thus some precepts in Leviticus, such as methods of menstrual purity and criminal penalties, no longer hold. But the Levitical sexual boundaries that these instructions point to remain in force because the creation order, the Ten Commandments, and the virtues that image God in Christ are universal norms that still guide our lives. For RH, specific commands and applications of biblical imperatives are universal and enduring unless Scripture allows that they are not. The mainline validation approach has the opposite effect, relativizing particular biblical standards to current value-ideals.
The texts about homosexual activity almost certainly teach or imply that all same-sex acts without exception are sinful. Genesis narrates homosexual acts and a number of heterosexual sins in light of the creation and fall in Genesis 1–3. Holiness in Leviticus includes all of life and domestic relationships, not just cultic practices. Paul lists a term derived from Leviticus with other sins against the Commandments. His judgment in Romans 1 is almost certainly universal, as stated above. Straightforward exegesis, theological interpretation, and sound logic can only conclude that these texts regard all kinds of same-sex activity as contrary to the will of God. The reason Paul did not address “faithful” same-sex relations is not his limitations but their impossibility according to Scripture. The Bible need not explicitly judge each kind of same-sex behavior, just as it need not condemn every kind of murder or disrespect for parents. If Scripture is not clear about sexual boundaries, is it not clear about any specific ethical issue.
After following the conversation for decades, I am still convinced that the conclusions about biblical teaching adopted by the CRCNA in 1973 are sound and relevant for ministry. I remain open to considering revisions that claim to fit RH, but I do not see how any could be valid.
What is at stake?
If the hermeneutics supporting same-sex marriage is legitimate, then it can be applied to other ethical and doctrinal issues as well. There are progressive Christians who use these methods to validate consensual temporary and open marriage, friendship with sexual benefits, and other “compassionate” sexual relations that supposedly enhance people’s lives. They also support “compassionate” quality-of-life abortion and euthanasia. CRCNA members who affirm same-sex marriage might not agree with these other positions, but they have no right to object from Scripture. It is arbitrary and self-contradicting to claim that the Bible allows same-sex unions but rules out sexual friendships and requires lifelong commitment in marriage.
Problematic methods of interpretation readily spill over into doctrinal and confessional matters. For example, some Reformed theologians who support same-sex marriage use the same hermeneutics to claim that Christ’s death on the cross is not about God’s displeasure and just punishment of sin. T hat view of the atonement cannot be right, they say, because it validates child abuse, blood sacrifice, retribution, and capital punishment.
These examples illustrate that sexual ethics, hermeneutics, and confessional orthodoxy are inextricably interrelated. If the approach to the Bible that supports same-sex marriage cannot reliably generate and defend the creeds and confessions, then it is not compatible with our Reformed understanding of Scripture or the Covenant of OfficeBearers. Are we reforming our sexdrenched, pleasure-worshiping culture or being transformed by it? The unity and integrity of the CRCNA before God are at stake.
I therefore hope that Synod will authorize a conclusive study of biblical sexual boundaries. Let all the methods and arguments for and against same-sex relations be evaluated thoroughly and fairly. If the study committee competently applies our Reformed doctrine of Scripture and hermeneutics, I am conf ident that it will reaffirm and update our current position. I realize that this outcome will cause pain for some, but faithfulness to God requires it. So does our ability to be a church that welcomes, loves, and disciples all people, whatever our sexual identity and sins may be.
(written by John Cooper, Professor of Philosophical Theology, emeritus)
