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Romans 1:26-27
Summary:
Context - Romans 1:18-32:
-rhetorical context: condemnation of idolatry
-social context: gender roles and expectations
Paul's argument:
Paul’s main focus is planes (1:27), the going aside from the way intended by putting another thing in the place of God. His argument is this: God has demonstrated his wrath against those who suppress the truth about him (1:18), a truth which is evident in creation (1:19-20). These people have rejected him by turning to other things (1:21-23); so God has given them over to impurity and bodily dishonour (eis akatharsian tou atimazesthai ta somata auton), because they have substituted false, created gods for the true creator God (1:24-25). The "bodily dishonour" is shown in homoerotic acts (1:26-27). They have also been given over to a debased mind and wrong deeds (1:28-32).
Paul's argument against goes from the specific charge of idolatry to a description of those practices. This description then moves to less Gentile-specific behaviour (28-32); this is to prepare the listener/reader for his bombshell in 2:1, "you do the same things!" The references to homoerotic acts are preceded by an explicit reference to the worship and service of created things (v25), implying a cultic context for them. The argument may be paraphrased thus: "Those Gentiles! Aren't they irreligious? They worship the creation instead of the creator! Look, they have homosexual sex in their rituals! And they're dreadful people anyway. Oh, and don't point the finger, because you're just as bad."
Text: dia touto paradoken autous ho theos eis pathe atimias, hai te gar theleiai auton metellaxan ten physiken chresin eis ten para physin, homoios te kai hoi arsenes aphentes ten physiken chresin tes theleias exekauthesan en te orexei auton eis allelous, arsenes en arsesin ten aschemosunen katergazomenoi kai ten antimisthian hen edei tes planes auton en heautois apolambanontes.
Terminology:
pathe atimias - "dishonourable" passions, not "degrading" (eg NIV) - probably not homosexual "desire", because the ancients regarded homosexual and heterosexual acts to be motivated by the same kind of desire. It more likely refers to the desire to be penetrated, which was "dishonourable" in ancient eyes.
ten physiken chresin, lit. "the natural function" (vv26, 27) - chresin "function" is commonly used to describe sexual intercourse (eg Xenophon Symposium 8, 28; Plato, Leg. 8, 841a). The phrase thus means "the natural mode of sexual behaviour."
para physin - "against nature" - Nissinen sees para physin as reflecting the active/passive gender roles (Nissinen 106). Women became active participants in sex and men became passive participants.
-note also Philo's interpetation of sexual intercourse kata physin as procreative. Paul's understanding of these behaviours may be that be that they are "against nature" because a) they transgress the accepted male-active/female-passive paradigm, and b) they are not potentially procreative.
antimisthian - a "corresponding reward" for their error. Some of the suggestions concerning the nature of this reward have included sexually-transmitted diseases (including HIV/AIDS), or effeminacy, recalling Philo's "disease of effeminacy" (Spec. Leg. 3.37). However the reward is most likely to be the behaviour itself. The error is idolatry, the reward is the behaviour. WisSol states that the Lord punished Israel using the objects of their idolatry "so that they might learn that one is punished by the very things by which one sins" (WisSol 11:15-16 cf 12:23).
(Verse 24 - tais epithymias ton kardion auton - "to the desires of their hearts", ie their wish to worship other gods; ("sinful" is a questionable interpolation by the translator.)
The strength of the ritual/idolatry argument increases if a contemporary example of such a group can be found. If such a group existed the readers of Paul's letter could immediately see the point of his argument.
Two subcultures in Rome were known for homoerotic activity. The cinaedi (sing. cinaedus) were a subculture revolving around certain bathhouses, brothels, and private homes, possibly from late C2 BCE. They gave excessive attention to hair, make-up, and clothing, and were known for their effeminate speech, dress and movement. Writers were very critical of them:
Gellius Attic Nights 1.5, 6.12 (fl C2 CE, describes C2-1 BCE)
The other subculture was the Galli, priests of Cybele (magna mater), descending from Hellenized Anatolian fertility cults.
C1BCE
C1CE "What is a woman's crevasse to you, Baetius, you Gallus?… That tongue ought to be licking men's midriffs. Why was your dick cut off by a sherd of Samos if cunt was so appealing to you, Baetius?" (331 Taylor) - also 2.45
C2CE 51 - And on these days Galloi are made. For while the rest are playing flutes and performing their rites, frenzy soon enters into many, and many there are who just came to watch who subsequently perform the act. I shall describe what they do. The young man whom Fortune has given to do this casts off his clothing and rushes into the center with a great shout, and takes up a sword, which has stood there many years for this purpose, I believe. Then he immediately castrates himself and runs through the City bearing in his hands those parts he has cut off. And from whatever house into which he shall cast these, he gets female clothing and womanly adornments. Thus they do when they castrate themselves.
C5CE The Mother of Gods has her rites, in which the beautiful youth Attis, whom she loved and castrated in feminine jealousy, is lamented by those called Galli, who themselves suffer the same misfortune. Such performances are more disgusting than any obscenity on the stage." (Trans by Henry Bettenson)(cf 2.7, 7.24)
-interpretation that Romans 1 refers to the "Fall" of humanity in Genesis 3, and that homosexuality is a symptom of the Fall. But Romans 1 describes the invention of idolatry, not the Fall. (Martin 1995:334) |