Genesis 19

[Mort_Alz]

Genesis 19 recounts the story of Sodom and Gomorrah which is a typical go-to verse for the Church teaching on homosexual intercourse. I am in agreement with the Church, but I have a friend who tells me something more was going on in the story (besides the city being inhospitable, etc.)

He pointed out to me that the men who the sodomites wanted to have sex with were angels and that there was something deeper going on there. That the sin was more about having sex with something against ones own nature (i.e., not human).

He also goes to point out that this interpretation would make much more sense of the Biblical genocide in the Old Testament. That there were sometimes nations of people who were hybrid angel and human and that this was not in God’s plan. God’s commandments of genocide were thus geared not against humans, but against hybrid human angels and He was trying to preserve the Davidic line for the coming of Jesus.

Now, I have not looked very sincerely for sources on this, but he claims this was a common interpretation in the Church Fathers until St. Augustine.

Has anyone else heard of this?

 

[Cachonga]

Sounds like someone is really reaching to avoid the context. Keep in mind, when these angels are first encountered in Gen 18, Abraham sees them as men. Lot also treats them as men, and even the Sodomites demanded that Lot bring out the men that he took in. We know they were angels because that’s what Moses wrote (under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit), but there is nothing in the text to indicate that anyone knew they were angels (at least, not until sometime later, like when the fire and brimstone rained down on the cities of the plain).

The destruction of other races (genocide) was not a “cleansing” of human/angel hybrids (these were wiped out in the flood, along with everything else that wasn’t on the Ark). Instead, this was God’s just punishment upon sinful nations for the sins of the people. I would add that homosexual activity is “against ones own nature” (as Paul says, " For this cause God gave them up unto vile passions: for their women changed the natural use into that which is against nature: and likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another, men with men working unseemliness, and receiving in themselves that recompense of their error which was due." Rom 1:26-27 ASV)

As far as the ECF’s go. I would ask him for some specific citations for this claim. I am not aware of any, but I have not read very much of the ECF’s (I can look up citations easy enough, but generally I find the Scriptures to be far more reliable and consistent). In general, I do not believe the ECF’s were infallible in what they wrote (there are some things that are good and agree with Scripture, but there are also things that are really off the mark).

Hope this helps!

Pax!

 

[Ad_Orientem]

Sounds like the “nephilim” mentioned in Genesis 6. See the Catholic Encyclopedia article Demonology, and scroll down to “Demonology of the Early Christian Writers”. It mentions Church Fathers in connection with this.

 

[Catholic_Dude]

Genesis 19 recounts the story of Sodom and Gomorrah which is a typical go-to verse for the Church teaching on homosexual intercourse. I am in agreement with the Church, but I have a friend who tells me something more was going on in the story (besides the city being inhospitable, etc.)

Good to hear. When people say Sodom was about being ‘inhospitable’, they are distorting the text. St Peter tells us plainly that the issue was homosexuality:
God rescued righteous Lot, greatly distressed by the sensual conduct of the wicked (for as that righteous man lived among them day after day, he was tormenting his righteous soul over their lawless deeds that he saw and heard) (2 Pt 2:7-8)

He pointed out to me that the men who the sodomites wanted to have sex with were angels and that there was something deeper going on there. That the sin was more about having sex with something against ones own nature (i.e., not human).

That’s a myth that comes from the mistaken reading of Genesis 6, where some have mistakenly thought that the “Sons of God” mentioned in Genesis 6:1-5 were fallen angels who had sexual relations with women. Really, the “Sons of God” mentioned in Genesis 6 are the godly-linage of Seth, which is why it’s mentioned in Genesis 5.

The idea of man having sexual relations with an angel is something that’s really unbiblical and theologically impossible (since angels don’t have physical bodies and cannot reproduce).

 

[Deo_Volente]

Grace & Peace!

The issue with Sodom is not homosexuality per se (that is, not homosexuality as we understand it)…still less is it same-sex attraction. The issue is rape and abuse of strangers. The principle at work in Sodom is the same that was at work in the perversity on display at Abu Ghraib, the same that is at work in sexually abusive hazing rituals and practices, the same that is at work in any form of sexualized violence–it is the principle of power asserted through sexual humiliation and violence. (Keep in mind that Lot had every reason to believe that the people of Sodom would be satisfied with his daughters, suggesting that same-sex attraction is not the issue here.)

When Ezekiel rails against Sodom (16:49) he writes: “Behold this was the iniquity of Sodom thy sister, pride, fulness of bread, and abundance, and the idleness of her, and of her daughters: and they did not put forth their hand to the needy, and to the poor.” The sin of “inhospitality” doesn’t quite encompass the degree of Sodom’s cruelty, here, but it does encapsulate and refer back to the prophet’s understanding of what it means to refuse the needy and poor–it in no way distorts the text. When Peter speaks against the Sodomites, we would do well to remember that cruelty is referred to the sin of Lust, not to Wrath, and is well-described by the phrase “sensual conduct of the wicked.”

This is not to say that Bible speaks well of or approves of homosexual sexual conduct when it does speak of those things. It is just to say that when we speak of the sin of Sodom, we deceive ourselves if the first thing that comes to mind is a gay couple.

(Also, with reference to congress with angels, it is believed that it is just that which is referred to by Jude when he writes of going after “strange flesh.” It could have been a reference to Sodom, but is definitely a criticism of gnostic heresies which spoke of a “Bridal Chamber” “sacrament” in which one would be joined in sexual congress with one’s angelic double.)

Under the Mercy,
Mark

All is Grace and Mercy! Deo Gratias!

 

[po18guy]

Your friend is grasping at straws. The Sodomites clearly believed that they were men, and called them by that term. Does this friend also forget that angels are spirit beings and have no physical bodies?

Genesis 19:5
New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (NRSVCE)
5 and they called to Lot, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us, so that we may know them.”

 

[Michael19682]

The principle at work in Sodom is the same that was at work in the perversity on display at Abu Ghraib, the same that is at work in sexually abusive hazing rituals and practices, …suggesting that same-sex attraction is not the issue here.)

Under the Mercy,
Mark

All is Grace and Mercy! Deo Gratias!

2 Cor 11:12-15

And what I do I will continue to do, in order to end this pretext of those who seek a pretext for being regarded as we are in the mission of which they boast. 13* For such people are false apostles, deceitful workers, who masquerade as apostles of Christ. 14And no wonder, for even Satan masquerades as an angel of light. 15So it is not strange that his ministers also masquerade as ministers of righteousness. Their end will correspond to their deeds.​

The fact that all of the town surrounded the house in Sodom is so strange as to suggest that the spirit of its denizens was corrupted. The Lord says that the “outcry” against Sodom and Gemorrah was great. This brings that offense on par with murder, which is at that time is the only other sin that is said to “cry out to heaven for vengeance”. Presumably, the Lord God himself must intervene because in both cases “in-kind” punishments only perpetuate what everyone will eventuall learn is wrong, repaying sin with sin is repellent to God, like mouldy, mottled wheat or rye is to a hungry person.

Thus arrival of the angels as guests of the “resident alien” Lot suggest, in a sinister plot development, that the men of Sodom saw a potential to fulfill their bodily lust with them. That Abraham and Lot thought these angels were men, and that Moses through the Spirit of God only knows they are angels, we see that the Jewish reader of the story would know (or not know) how to classify them only according to his faith in Moses, who was privy to the truth of their non human nature by the power of God. This Gensis story may be interpreted as a prefigurement of the origins of the self serving anger in the declarations of the ancient Pharisees, who, when questioning the blind man cured by Jesus, say “We are disciples of Moses…” and in so doing eventually are led by Satan to blaspheme the spirit. Just as the Pharisees could not classify Jesus because they were figuratively blinded by the power of his dual nature, so do the angels of the Lord appear to the reader shedding blinding light upon the sodomites. In the case of Lot, the light saves him and the angels from sodomy, a form of bodily abuse. Jesus does not call the twelve legions of angels to his own defense.

If the sodomites all were expecting a fulfillment of their evil lust, then who did they think the angels were? Even though the light was struck on them after they had sought sexual relations with the angels and had abused Lot physically, they had also seen them prior to that night. If Satan masquerades as an angel of light, then the case is essentially one of mistaken identity. The denizens of Sodom thought the angels, or one of them, or Lot, was Satan or one or two of his ministers. Evil seeks its own destruction. They couldn’t have read Paul’s second letter, and that discussion is perhaps one which would detail a debate on just how humanly spirited that form of sexual relations is, in other words, how genetic such a preference is. The fact the lord did nothing until it affected an entire community, it’s young and old alike, perhaps says that no matter its genetic foundation, it should not be promoted or taught as alternative. If it is, it is.