Biblical Evidence that 50% of Homosexuals Will Be Raptured
Dr James McGrath has today posted two insightful blog posts over at Exploring our Matrix, which both follow the theme of Biblical literalism or letterism.
The first looks at Biblical literalism and homosexuality, which is reproduced below (with kind permission):
Biblical Evidence that 50% of Homosexuals Will Be Raptured
Here’s another example of how a literal reading of the English Bible is relevant to the question of homosexuality and salvation, considered from a conservative Christian viewpoint. The King James Version of Luke 17:34-35 reads:
I tell you, in that night there shall be two men in one bed; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left. Two women shall be grinding together; the one shall be taken, and the other left.
Pretty clear, isn’t it? Roughly one out of every two homosexuals will be raptured!
For many readers, this is probably an old joke they had heard before. But it does illustrate an important and serious point. Words change in their meaning, the connotation of English words in their contemporary usage provides a dubious ground for determining “what the Bible says,” and cultural context is relevant. There are cultures today in which two men sleeping in the same bed has none of the sexual connotations it does for American readers of the King James Bible.
But perhaps we should set aside such concerns, and encourage so-called Biblical literalists to take these verses at face value and believe them literally…
An excellent point, I’m sure you’ll agree.
The second blog post from Dr McGrath concerns Biblical literalism and the drive towards anti-evolutionism, for which I provide a link below and encourage you to pop over and have a read:
May 3rd, 2010 at 10:01 pm
The second link “Whi Anti-Evolutionism is Evil” contains a video of children being misinformed that really distressed me, and some commentary that rang all too true.
Christians have a strong sense that they are supposed to be going against the flow, that they need to dare to be different, that they need to stand up for their faith even if it means ridicule or persecution. What Ken Ham and others like him have done is to give Christians a way that they can feel that they are in fact doing this, standing up for their faith, by standing up for pseudoscience, instead of taking a stand for the things that really ought to distinguish a Christian: love for enemies, concern for justice, bringing together those whom society divides along lines of race, gender, status, and much else.
That is really all that the pseudoscientific, anti-Christian movement known as young-earth creationism is: an attempt to distract from the fact that Christians aren’t treating the Bible as the Word of God, taking it literally, or doing any of the other things Ken Ham and others like him claim to stand for – not when it comes to the Bible’s teaching about economic and social justice, concern for the poor and oppressed, renunciation of wealth, and most other matters of practice. And so young earth creationism deserves to be labelled as what it is: not merely “bogus science” but also a false Gospel.
May 4th, 2010 at 7:41 am
And so young earth creationism deserves to be labelled as what it is: not merely “bogus science” but also a false Gospel.
A loud amen to that.
Their problem is so deep rooted, and tied to their theology, and in particular the doctrine of the ‘fall’ of man. As far as the YEC’s are concerned, it you reject their literal interpretation of Genesis, then the Gospel itself falls apart, as Jesus is unnecessary, man did not need a saviour unless Adam fell.
It is so sad that they think Christ’s mission is not revelant without the literal reading of the 1st three chapters of Genesis.
I think that it is very sad that YECs believe that the foundation of all scripture is Genesis, yet Job was written yonks earlier, and really is the first book and earlier book of the Scriptures.
THey should come to Church, then they would know that the foundation of the Scriptures are the Gospels of our Lord.
May 6th, 2010 at 3:05 pm
Caral: You and Yewtree know so much more about theology than I do. Can you explain why the Christianity I was taught from childhood appears to be moving backwards?
It’s only in the past year or so I’ve become aware that there are still Christians who take the Bible literally. Reminds me of the Vatican’s treatment of Galileo.
If I had to subscribe to even half this stuff to call myself a Christian I’d opt out. I’m hugely suspicious of any faith that demands its followers deny their intellect. That’s how cults operate.