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Burdock
Guest
These threads just go round in circles. I do not believe that tge bible speaks of the evils of contraception, and I dont think the majority of catholics do either. I was told on these forums that I shouldn’t recieve the eucharist if I didnt believe or adhere to this teaching.
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Rau
Guest
Can you explain why post #505 and #507 are not persuasive?
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Abu
Guest
THE SIN OF ONAN: IS IT RELEVANT TO CONTRACEPTION?
By John F. Kippley
Extract:
nfpandmore.org/2006_SIN_OF_ONAN.pdf
[My emphases]
By John F. Kippley
Extract:
nfpandmore.org/2006_SIN_OF_ONAN.pdf
- Biblical scholar Manuel Miguens has pointed out that a close examination of the text shows that God condemned Onan for the specific action he performed, not for his anti-Levirate intentions. He notes that the translation “he spilled his seed on the ground” fails to do full justice to the Hebrew expression. The Hebrew verb shichet never means “to spill” or “waste.” Rather, it means to act perversely. The text also makes it clear that his perverse action was related toward the ground, not against his brother. “His perversion or corruption consists in his action itself, not precisely in the result and goal of his act . . . In a strict interpretation the text says that what was evil in the sight of the Lord was what Onan actually did (asher asah); the emphasis in this sentence of verse 10 does not fall on what he intended to achieve, but on what he did.”4
- In the context of the entire chapter, Genesis 38, it is clear that Onan is only one of three persons who violated the Levirate. We have seen above that Judah admitted his fault in violating the Levirate, and Shelah also was guilty because he should have assumed the Levirate duty when Judah failed in his responsibility. When three people are guilty of the same crime but only one of them receives the death penalty from God, common sense requires that we ask what that one did that the others did not do. The answer is obvious in this case: only Onan engaged in the contraceptive behavior of withdrawal; only Onan went through the motions of the covenantal act of intercourse but then defrauded its purpose and meaning.
- The traditional anti-contraception interpretation is reinforced by the wider context of the Bible. The law of the Levirate and the punishment for its violators are spelled out in Deuteronomy 25:5-10. An aggrieved widow could bring the offending brother-in-law before the elders; if he still refused to do his duty, she could “pull the sandal off his foot, and spit in his face, and she shall answer and say, ‘So shall it be done to the man who does not build up his brother’s house.’ And the name of his house shall be called in Israel, The house of him who had his sandal pulled off” (9-10). Embarrassing, but hardly the death penalty. Note also that Deuteronomy has no qualms about the death penalty for sexual sins: chapter 22: 22-25 prescribes death for adultery and rape.
- The text must be interpreted in the context of the rest of the Bible’s teaching about love, marriage, and sexuality. It can be stated without fear of contradiction that the teaching against unnatural forms of birth control is in perfect harmony with the biblical teaching against sexual immorality including sodomy, fornication, and adultery. On the other hand, it is admitted by pro-contraception dissenters that the acceptance of marital contraception entails the logical acceptance of every form of sexual behavior between consenting adults. Or, at the least, dissenters can find no natural law basis for proscribing such behaviors, only pragmatic grounds such as health or immediate social consequences.5 The “logic” of contraception cannot say a firm NO to anything that is mutually agreeable. As secular humanist Walter Lippmann wrote in 1929, “the central confusion has been that the reformers have tried to fix their sexual ideals in accordance with the logic of birth control instead of the logic of human nature.”6
- The way in which the Church has understood the Scriptures throughout the centuries is the most important part of interpretation, and there is no question that the anti-contraception interpretation of Genesis 38 has been the interpretation over the centuries. St. Augustine wrote: “Intercourse even with one’s legitimate wife is unlawful and wicked where the conception of the offspring is prevented. Onan, the son of Judah, did this and the LORD killed him for it.” Pope Pius XI quoted Augustine in this way in Casti Connubii, the 1930 encyclical in which he reaffirmed the Christian Tradition shortly after the bishops of the Church of England accepted marital contraception.
[My emphases]
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Rau
Guest
You seem to be ignoring the specifics in the posts that undermine that view. Why was he sentenced to death if the crime was merely the failure of a duty to his brother’s wife, for which the penalty was public humiliation?
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Rau
Guest
Were there an explicit statement in the Bible, say, a commandment, forbidding contraception - would you accept that contraception is wrong?
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Gorgias
Guest
Hmm… that seems to be quite an odd argument; you seem to be suggesting that unless the Bible condemns a particular means for committing a sin, then that means is OK. By that argument, if the Bible condemns murder, but doesn’t mention murder by pistol or by nuclear bomb, then firearm assaults and nuclear war are morally ok?
No, clearly the means aren’t what the Bible condemns, so much as the immoral act itself. So, if the Bible condemns contraception through pharmakeia, we naturally conclude that contraception is what is being condemned, not just the one particular means by which is it carried out.
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Bookcat
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I have answered these ideas already above …see those answers if you wish to continue any circles
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Bookcat
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cena
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The punishment for not fulfilling his duty was getting spit in the face by the elders and getting his sandals removed or somewhere along those lines. (I cited the law from Deut earlier)Not even close to death
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Brendan
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And the Church accepts that, and provides a means by which that can be achieved. It is called abstinence.
The goal can be a just one, but the means by which the goal is obtained must also be just.
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Hoosier_Daddy
Guest
Weird that God would include it in Holy Scripture for all time if it was not meant for us.
Do you have a resource showing which parts of scripture are not for us in this advanced world we live in?
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Hoosier_Daddy
Guest
Yeah, you say that like it is not to be given the same weight as the interpretation of Burdock…
Should we all follow you?
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Burdock
Guest
If a man died childless his brother was duty bound to produce heirs with his widow. It was to do with rightful inheritance, nothing to do with masturbation or contraception.
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Rau
Guest
And your great expertise in discerning the meaning comes from what source? Your capacity to ignore compelling contrary evidence - to not even address it in your posts - comes from where? Is it personal fear?
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Burdock
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If a man died childless his brother was duty bound to produce heirs with his widow. It was to do with rightful inheritance, nothing to do with masturbation or contraception.
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Rau
Guest
Yes, and the law prescribed the punishment of public humiliation for rejecting that duty.
Onan - was punished by death - far more than his due for rejecting the duty! His sin was clearly something beyond rejecting the duty. And we read in the Bible that God was displeased with “what he did” - not his motivation - but “what he did” - in the moment.
Think about it. Why was death - which is far beyond the requirements of the law - his punishment? What did Onan do - to which God took grave exception?
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Burdock
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I often refercto the Lion handbookvto the bible, that is the explanation given there. Also my daughter is doing a theology degree and when I discussed it with her she also said that it was referring to the law at the time nothing to do with contraception. Its seems its a catholic belief
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