[Article] What is the Sin of Sodom?

[Mythicalbio]

What Is The Sin Of Sodom? | Scott Eric Alt

From the article: Based on the actual text, “the sin of the Sodomites” is violent rape. It is sexual assault. It is not, however, “gay sex” understood as sex between two consenting men. That is a sin, and a grave one, but it is not the sin of Sodom” that cries to heaven for vengeance. No Catholic ought to treat it as though it is.

Fr. Dwight Longenecker agrees: “It is arguable, therefore, that it is unfair to use the word “sodomy” for all homosexual behaviors. Sodomy is not less than that. It is more than that .” Its “proper definition” would be “rape or sexual violence of any sort,” especially the gang rape that the text describes.

One more verse is instructive here, and that is Hebrews 13:2. “Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by this some have entertained angels without knowing it.” By “entertaining angels,” the author refers to Sodom, since the guests in Lot’s house were angels and the men of Sodom did not know it. They feared that any stranger who came into their midst might be a foreign enemy. (Sound familiar?) Violently raping men was a way of showing “zero tolerance.” But not every stranger is an enemy; some might be angels. That —a particularly egregious and brutal inhospitality to a stranger—was the sin of Sodom. It was not acting upon homosexual attraction.

One must also take note of what the other sins are that cry to heaven for vengeance. Murder is one. Slavery is another—the cry of the foreigner, the orphan, the widow, the oppressed. And defrauding workers of a just wage is the last. What all of these have in common is that the victims of these sins are utterly helpless before those more powerful. The sin against them cries to heaven because God is their only recourse. Homosexual sex, understood consensually, does not fit this category. But sexual assault does.

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[StudentMI]

Sodomy has always been applied to more than homosexual sex.

Homosexual sex is still sodomy and still a sin.

 

[Mythicalbio]

The Church doesn’t dogmatize terms, it does so for ideas. Either way, the main reason I like this tbh is making it equal in type to the other three great sins that cry out. I love the symmetry. Also the article explicitly says it is a sin, which it is.

 

[StudentMI]

The Church doesn’t dogmatize terms, it does so for ideas.

It does so with realities as well.

 

[njlisa]

Orthodox Judaism unequivocally condemns the homosexual act
described below and same-sex relationships in general.

Leviticus 18:13: If a man lies with a male as with a woman, they have committed an abomination; the two of them shall be put to death; their bloodguilt is upon them.

However, the Orthodox Jewish tradition teaches that God destroyed
Sodom for being selfish and unwelcoming to strangers.

Check out this article from Chabad for more details.

P.S. I’m Catholic.

 

[njlisa]

This video, which is heavy on Hebrew terminology, is intended for a Jewish viewership. It also uses the Jewish study method of drawing parallels from other Scripture. If you hang in there, the sin of Sodom is explained.

Fyi: Sodom is pronounced “said-DOME.” And Lot is pronounced “Lote.”

The Real Sin of Sodom and Gomorrah: City of Justice? | Aleph Beta

 

[Vico]

… That is a sin, and a grave one, but it is not the sin of Sodom” that cries to heaven for vengeance. No Catholic ought to treat it as though it is.
…

Lot in Sodom, Genesis 8:

4 But before they went to bed, the men of the city beset the house, both young and old, all the people together. 5 And they called Lot, and said to him: Where are the men that came in to thee at night? bring them out hither, that we may know them: 6 Lot went out to them, and shut the door after him, and said: 7 Do not so, I beseech you, my brethren, do not commit this evil. 8 I have two daughters who, as yet, have not known man; I will bring them out to you, and abuse you them as it shall please you, so that you do no evil to these men, because they are come in under the shadow of my roof.