Jesus the Homosexual: Evidence From the Gospels

[Mariatenebre]

Why you continue to believe these two lies I don't know. But I'll remind you: the Bible is definitely not pro-slavery, and it doesn't even mention homosexuality. The first merely takes reasoning skills to recognize, the second requires knowing that they didn't even have the concept of homosexuality, so they couldn't have written about it.



No, the consensus is that Yahweh was the top deity from the start. The first association with anything Canaanitic is identifying Yahweh as El, the head of the Canaanitic pantheon.

That's probably where you're confused, because "El" was less a specific deity than an ascription of power to whatever local deity was considered supreme, almost more of a title than a name. When the term "YHWH El(ohim)" is first used, it is specifying which El is being talked about, namely the Hebrew El, who only later is revealed as not merely the supreme but the only El.

I know where the "seventy sons of El" bit comes from, but that is before any mention of Yahweh, and in context it isn't clear whether it is a son assigned to Israel or the chief deity taking Israel for himself and assigning all the other nations to seventy sons. Given the use of the name Yahweh once it comes around, the latter is more likely, but Yahweh isn't actually even mentioned in the source.



Logically, one has to decide if any proposed deities even have any claim to being worthy of worship. What you've described is the subjective smorgasbord approach I already noted. Any deity described as part of creation is logically excluded from consideration as no different in essence than we are -- just another part of the universe. So all the Greek and Roman and the vast majority of other claimants are logically rejected right off. History is only relevant to tell us whether claimants are ascribed attributes qualifying them for consideration at all; science is irrelevant because is has nothing to say on the subject by its very nature.

What people may be reviving is also irrelevant; the question is one of truth, and if their claimant doesn't meet the logical requirement for true deity of being greater than the universe, not part of it, then they're plainly not interested in truth (or logic).

Hence, your response here serves to confirm what I said: your approach is entirely subjective; it chooses on emotional criteria without even asking if the selected target claimant to deity deserves the appellation to begin with.


note: I once encountered a system wherein the "Earth deity" was regarded as a local emissary of the actual creator-deity; if a claimant is specified as having such a relationship to actual deity, it's in the running not on its own, but under the aegis of the actual claimed creator-deity.

Actually the Bible is pro slavery and never once condemns it. As for homosexuality while it is true that our modern conception of homosexuality did not exist at the time, same sex love and sexual relations were most certainly known at the time and condemned in the Bible.

Next you are wrong while El can refer to just a God in itself it specifically refers to the head deity in the Canaanite and Hebrew pantheon El Elyon. Also you are wrong again Yahweh has his origins in Canaan where he was one of El Elyon's sons. The verse you also mention describes Yahweh as one of El's sons who inherits Israel. Yahweh was in Canaan a brutal war god similar to the Greek Ares which explains why he is so brutal and cruel in the Bible and his name Yahweh Sabeoth means Yahweh head of the armies.

Age I (c.1200–1000 BCE): El, Yahweh, and the origins of Israel[edit]

Israel emerges into the historical record in the last decades of the 13th century BCE, at the very end of the Late Bronze Age, as the Canaanite city-state system was ending.[21] In the words of archaeologist William Dever, "most of those who came to call themselves Israelites … were or had been indigenous Canaanites".[22][Notes 2] Israelite religion accordingly emerged gradually from a Canaanite milieu.[23] El, "the kind, the compassionate," "the creator of creatures," was the chief of the Canaanite gods.[24] He, not Yahweh, was the original "God of Israel"—the word "Israel" is based on the name El rather than Yahweh.[25] He lived in a tent on a mountain from whose base originated all the fresh waters of the world, with the goddess Asherah as his consort.[24][26] This pair made up the top tier of the Canaanite pantheon;[24] the second tier was made up of their children, the "seventy sons of Athirat" (another name of Asherah).[27] Prominent in this group was Baal, who had his home on Mount Zaphon; over time Baal became the dominant Canaanite deity, so that El became the executive power and Baal the military power in the cosmos.[28] Baal's sphere was the thunderstorm with its life-giving rains, so that he was also a fertility god, although not quite the fertility god.[29] Below the seventy second-tier gods was a third tier made up of comparatively minor craftsman and trader deities, with a fourth and final tier of divine messengers and the like.[27] Yahweh, the southern warrior-god, joined the pantheon headed by El and in time he and El were identified, with El's name becoming a generic term for "god".[26]

El and his sons made up the Assembly of the Gods, each member of which had a human nation under his care, and a textual variant of Deuteronomy 32:8–9 describes the sons of El, including Yahweh, each receiving his own people:[25]


When the Most High (Elyon, i.e., El) gave the nations their inheritance,
when he separated humanity,
he fixed the boundaries of the peoples according to the number of divine beings,
for Yahweh's portion is his people,
Jacob his allotted heritage.[Notes 3]

In the earliest literature such as the Song of the Sea (Exodus 15:1–18, celebrating Yahweh's victory over Egypt at the exodus), Yahweh is a warrior for his people, a storm-god typical of ancient Near Eastern myths, marching out from a region to the south or south-east of Israel with the heavenly host of stars and planets that make up his army.[30] Israel's battles are Yahweh's battles, Israel's victories are his victories, and while other peoples have other gods, Israel's god is Yahweh, who will procure a fertile resting-place for them:[31]


There is none like God, O Jeshurun (i.e., Israel)
who rides through the heavens to your help ...
he subdues the ancient gods, shatters the forces of old ...
so Israel lives in safety, untroubled is Jacob's abode ...
Your enemies shall come fawning to you,
and you shall tread on their backs. (Deuteronomy 33:26–29)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yahweh

It is true that later Yahweh and El were identified as one but originally they were separate entities.

Next actually one decides whether something is to be worshiped by their moral status and their Godly status. Also a God is not greater then the universe rather their presence gives form to the universe. In Greek religion for instance the Gods were not separate from the forces they represented. For instance without Aphrodite people would not be able to feel any form of love nor have sexual relations, without Athena we would all be stupid and war would be completely barbaric and there would be no civilization. It is true that each pantheon has a creator deity like in Arabia they have Allah and Allat who are the Arabian forms of El Elyon and Athirat who are the Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother and the source of Gods and men but the other Gods are no less important. In fact without them there would be no form and function in the universe.

Ultimately it makes no sense for gays to try to make Jesus into some Hellenic LGBT deity when he wasn't and there are many LGBT deities for people to identify with.

 

[Mariatenebre]

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Actually when it comes to Greek myths I have watched the Great Courses with Dr. Elizabeth Vandiver on ancient Greek religion and it was very informative and I have studied ancient polytheistic origins of Hebrew religion. [Text: Removed]

 

[kallipolis]

[Quoted Post: Removed]

All historians work with a bias that reveals to their readers, and listeners all that they believe serves their agenda.

Scholars are as human, as the rest of us.

 

[Kulindahr]

Actually the Bible is pro slavery and never once condemns it. As for homosexuality while it is true that our modern conception of homosexuality did not exist at the time, same sex love and sexual relations were most certainly known at the time and condemned in the Bible.

Same-sex love is never condemned in the Bible; it is barely addressed, and when it is it is praised (cf. David and Jonathon).
The Bible is not pro-slavery; nowhere does it praise slavery, which is what pro-slavery would require. It tolerates slavery and ultimately makes it impossible, a position concluded almost immediately by early Christians -- and later ones, who drive the anti-slavery movement.

Ultimately it makes no sense for gays to try to make Jesus into some Hellenic LGBT deity when he wasn't and there are many LGBT deities for people to identify with.

Again the smorgasbord approach, which requires a denial of truth.

I forewent quoting the center of your message. Suffice it to say I give little credence to speakers who can't even pronounce the ancient names right, which tells me they aren't even familiar with secondary sources, only tertiary at best. But I will respond to the Enuma Elish point: having read both it and the Hebrew scriptures in the original, there's a connection only if you assume that religions are man-made. Without that, the best conclusion is that there is a primary source behind the two, neither being derived from the other.

 

[Kulindahr]

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I've read most of what's been mentioned in the originals, and done papers on several of the topics. Pertinent to Maria's video, I've read thousands of pages about the whole JEDP hypothesis, which ends up a loser because there is little agreement on what parts of the Old Testament allegedly came from which editor/redactor. Pertinent to her claims about El, linguistically she's just wrong -- in fact originally the word wasn't a reference to a person at all, i.e. to more of a force behind the scenes than to a god.

The question she ignores is whether there's any divine reality or if it's just a smorgasbord of human inventions. The video clip and her posts all land in the latter option. I approached it from hypothesizing that the divine might be real, and then looking at different claims to being revelation. Only those which posit a creator outside the universe are worth considering -- rationally, any entity inside the universe is just a fellow being, subject to the same parameters of existence as humans. That pretty much narrows things down to the Old Testament and Buddhism.

At any rate, her hatred of Abrahamic monotheism overrules her objective approach to the Bible, and especially to Jesus. On topic, the evidence is not at all in favor of Jesus having been gay -- it's about as solid as that He was married to Mary Magdelene, or that the Romans let Him off the Cross before He was dead, which is to say that there's almost enough to hang a hat on but not enough to support even a light jacket (to indulge in metaphors). OTOH, there's no evidence at all that He was anti-gay, and since He's the top authority in the Bible, what Paul and anyone else has to say must be viewed through that fact.

(Just BTW, theologically a case could be made that He was bi, but again it's little more than conjecture.)

 

[Mariatenebre]

Same-sex love is never condemned in the Bible; it is barely addressed, and when it is it is praised (cf. David and Jonathon).
The Bible is not pro-slavery; nowhere does it praise slavery, which is what pro-slavery would require. It tolerates slavery and ultimately makes it impossible, a position concluded almost immediately by early Christians -- and later ones, who drive the anti-slavery movement.



Again the smorgasbord approach, which requires a denial of truth.

I forewent quoting the center of your message. Suffice it to say I give little credence to speakers who can't even pronounce the ancient names right, which tells me they aren't even familiar with secondary sources, only tertiary at best. But I will respond to the Enuma Elish point: having read both it and the Hebrew scriptures in the original, there's a connection only if you assume that religions are man-made. Without that, the best conclusion is that there is a primary source behind the two, neither being derived from the other.

Same sex romantic and sexual love is condemned in the Bible. Homosexual sex between men is explicitly condemned. As for David and Johnathan there might be some credence for them being lovers but this idea is denied by all mainstream Abrahamic sects. Although many of the so called Abrahamic heroes and prophets did things that violated their religion. Such as Solomon who worshiped other Gods besides Yahweh. As for slavery, slavery is allowed in the Bible. Nowhere is slavery prohibited in the Bible and the conditions in which you are allowed to treat slaves are not good. Also spare me the whole Christian anti slavery movement as they did not have the Bible on their side in fact the slave owners used the Bible to back them up especially the verse about slaves obeying their masters.

Actually no the inclusivity of other Gods was a facet of the ancient worlds. The polytheistic world was very open to the concept of multiple Gods and there was true religious tolerance. Really the Abrahamic religions hold to a denial of truth because again their texts do not stand up to scientific or historical scrutiny and the polytheistic origin of the Hebrew religion is accepted by all mainstream scholars. Further more it is also accepted by modern scholars that the Hebrew Bible indeed is derived from earlier Mesopotamian stories. Again scholarly consensus accepts that Hebrew monotheism is derived from earlier Hebrew and Canaanite polytheism.

I've read most of what's been mentioned in the originals, and done papers on several of the topics. Pertinent to Maria's video, I've read thousands of pages about the whole JEDP hypothesis, which ends up a loser because there is little agreement on what parts of the Old Testament allegedly came from which editor/redactor. Pertinent to her claims about El, linguistically she's just wrong -- in fact originally the word wasn't a reference to a person at all, i.e. to more of a force behind the scenes than to a god.

The question she ignores is whether there's any divine reality or if it's just a smorgasbord of human inventions. The video clip and her posts all land in the latter option. I approached it from hypothesizing that the divine might be real, and then looking at different claims to being revelation. Only those which posit a creator outside the universe are worth considering -- rationally, any entity inside the universe is just a fellow being, subject to the same parameters of existence as humans. That pretty much narrows things down to the Old Testament and Buddhism.

At any rate, her hatred of Abrahamic monotheism overrules her objective approach to the Bible, and especially to Jesus. On topic, the evidence is not at all in favor of Jesus having been gay -- it's about as solid as that He was married to Mary Magdelene, or that the Romans let Him off the Cross before He was dead, which is to say that there's almost enough to hang a hat on but not enough to support even a light jacket (to indulge in metaphors). OTOH, there's no evidence at all that He was anti-gay, and since He's the top authority in the Bible, what Paul and anyone else has to say must be viewed through that fact.

(Just BTW, theologically a case could be made that He was bi, but again it's little more than conjecture.)

Actually the consensus of mainstream historians is that indeed Yahweh came from Canaanite and Hebrew polytheism. Hebrew monotheism is a late invention during the Babylonian captivity of the Jews. Further more El indeed referred to originally the supreme God of the Canaanite Pantheon. Specifically to the leader of the Canaanite Gods who has equivalents in many differing Middle Eastern cultures such as Allah in Arabia and Anu In Sumer and Babylon.

As to the Divine reality again your perception that there must be a God outside of the universe is as foolish as saying that they are merely humans like us. What I have stated before and was the consensus of most traditional peoples is that the Gods bring form and function to the universe. That they are both above and beyond us and with us in the universe at the same time. Since the Hellenic religion was mentioned according to the Hellenes the Gods brought life into the universe. Without say Athena we would all be stupid and there would be no civilization. Without say Hermes boundaries would not exist and souls could not get into the underworld. Of course in most religions there are creator Gods however by any objective reason Yahweh fails on all accounts of being a creator.

 

[Kulindahr]

^
Repeating your falsehoods about a religion of which you display immense ignorance and which you do not understand, especially when you have a record of biased hatred toward it, does not make your case stronger.

BTW, no, in most religions there are NOT "creator gods", most of them are merely shapers of something that already existed.

 

[Jacquemar]

Does anybody have at least a link to an article on the origin of YHWH (or is it YHVH?), something written by someone who has a achieved a degree of notoriety for their scholarship? I prefer books, but... I'm interested.

 

[kallipolis]

Does anybody have at least a link to an article on the origin of YHWH (or is it YHVH?), something written by someone who has a achieved a degree of notoriety for their scholarship? I prefer books, but... I'm interested.

YHWH or the four letters is well discussed by Biblical experts without need for choosing an author who has "notoriety."

I recommend the following book that is very popular among my peers:

http://www.jstor.org/stable/3267021?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

For those preferring a well researched essay the "I am, that I am" discussion can be found here, with enlightening Biblical background:

http://www.jesuswalk.com/names-god/3_eternal.htm

 

[Mariatenebre]

^
Repeating your falsehoods about a religion of which you display immense ignorance and which you do not understand, especially when you have a record of biased hatred toward it, does not make your case stronger.

BTW, no, in most religions there are NOT "creator gods", most of them are merely shapers of something that already existed.

Actually in most religions there are creator Gods who give form and shape to the universe. In Greek religion the creator deity is Chaos alternately there is also Chronos and Ananke. In Egyptian religion the original deity who weaves reality into existence is the Goddess Neith. In Arabian Paganism the creators are Allah and Allat. In Japanese religion toe Kotoamatsukami created the universe.

Also nothing I have said is based on falsehood but rather the consensus of modern scholars.

 

[Kulindahr]

Does anybody have at least a link to an article on the origin of YHWH (or is it YHVH?), something written by someone who has a achieved a degree of notoriety for their scholarship? I prefer books, but... I'm interested.

I'm not aware of any actual books on the subject. The article at the Ancient History Encyclopedia isn't bad, though it's skimpy.

It does point out the one thing that destroys the conjecture that Yahweh was a Canaanite god, namely that the name was in use before the Hebrews settled in Canaan. If anything, the source would be Midianite; they lived on the east, and possibly also the west, side of the Gulf of Suez (both Abraham and Moses had Midianite wives, and the name Yahweh was given to Moses when he was in or near Midian).

 

[Kulindahr]

YHWH or the four letters is well discussed by Biblical experts without need for choosing an author who has "notoriety."

I recommend the following book that is very popular among my peers:

http://www.jstor.org/stable/3267021?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

For those preferring a well researched essay the "I am, that I am" discussion can be found here, with enlightening Biblical background:

http://www.jesuswalk.com/names-god/3_eternal.htm

Mettinger is certainly qualified in Hebrew; I look forward to an enjoyable read.

BTW, it appears the book is available free here in ePub format: http://microbialecophysiology.com/c...essage-everlasting-names-free-electronic-book

 

[Mariatenebre]

I'm not aware of any actual books on the subject. The article at the Ancient History Encyclopedia isn't bad, though it's skimpy.

It does point out the one thing that destroys the conjecture that Yahweh was a Canaanite god, namely that the name was in use before the Hebrews settled in Canaan. If anything, the source would be Midianite; they lived on the east, and possibly also the west, side of the Gulf of Suez (both Abraham and Moses had Midianite wives, and the name Yahweh was given to Moses when he was in or near Midian).

You do realize that the consensus of historians is that Moses did not exist and the Exodus story never happened. Jews were never enslaved by the Egyptians nor did the Egyptians ever enslave a whole race of people. Also you find evidence of Yahweh's worship in Canaan and other Middle Eastern areas where usually he was a war god and one of the 70 sons of El Elyon.

 

[Jacquemar]

I'm not aware of any actual books on the subject. The article at the Ancient History Encyclopedia isn't bad, though it's skimpy.

It does point out the one thing that destroys the conjecture that Yahweh was a Canaanite god, namely that the name was in use before the Hebrews settled in Canaan. If anything, the source would be Midianite; they lived on the east, and possibly also the west, side of the Gulf of Suez (both Abraham and Moses had Midianite wives, and the name Yahweh was given to Moses when he was in or near Midian).

Thank you! That was a very interesting. I just wish that there was more to it.

I have a book of Canaanite myths/peotry that draws parallels between the Canaanite hymns and the Hebrew psalms, in terms of structure and imagery.

 

[Kulindahr]

You do realize that the consensus of historians is that Moses did not exist and the Exodus story never happened. Jews were never enslaved by the Egyptians nor did the Egyptians ever enslave a whole race of people. Also you find evidence of Yahweh's worship in Canaan and other Middle Eastern areas where usually he was a war god and one of the 70 sons of El Elyon.

No, the consensus is that Moses is a mythological figure, which is not the same as saying there was no Moses.

One of the problems for scholars looking for the origins of Yahweh's worship is that there is no evidence of him in Canaan -- an issue since it is believed that most of Israel were actually assimilated from Canaanites. Egyptian evidence places his original worshippers in northern Arabia -- hardly a part of Canaan. Worship of Yahweh in Canaan came later, leading to the question of how he "moved", since gods in antiquity were generally geographically constrained (indeed this "movement" is seen as evidence for some sort of migration that is behind the Exodus story, since it indicates that at least a significant number of those who worshipped Yahweh migrated from near the Gulf of Suez into Canaan).

 

[lambdaboy]

Some one has to convince me there was a Jesus. Then explain why his name was Jesus and every one havd names Like Mary Joe and Mat absurd!

 

[Benvolio]

Some one has to convince me there was a Jesus. Then explain why his name was Jesus and every one havd names Like Mary Joe and Mat absurd!

No one has to convince you of anything. He was not named Jesus, not they Mary, Joe or Mat.

 

[Kulindahr]

Some one has to convince me there was a Jesus. Then explain why his name was Jesus and every one havd names Like Mary Joe and Mat absurd!

Jesus was a popular name back then -- actually, Yeshu was a popular name, but it came to us through the Greek and got Germanized to give the "J" sound instead of "Y" and the "s" on the end.

Same with Joseph, BTW -- it was Yosef (pronounced yo-safe), but the Hebrew letter at the front got Germanized to a J.

"Mary" was "miryam"; "Mat" was short for Matthias.


Next? or do you want to sound more absurd by asking why they didn't use English names from today?

 

[Mariatenebre]

No, the consensus is that Moses is a mythological figure, which is not the same as saying there was no Moses.

One of the problems for scholars looking for the origins of Yahweh's worship is that there is no evidence of him in Canaan -- an issue since it is believed that most of Israel were actually assimilated from Canaanites. Egyptian evidence places his original worshippers in northern Arabia -- hardly a part of Canaan. Worship of Yahweh in Canaan came later, leading to the question of how he "moved", since gods in antiquity were generally geographically constrained (indeed this "movement" is seen as evidence for some sort of migration that is behind the Exodus story, since it indicates that at least a significant number of those who worshipped Yahweh migrated from near the Gulf of Suez into Canaan).

Actually the consensus is that there was no Moses. For one there is no evidence of the Exodus. The Egyptians never owned a whole nation of people as a slave, nor did they use them to build their massive stone monuments. The Hebrews actually started out as barbarian tribes in Canaan called Apirut. They were lower class people who eventually came to dominance. Yahweh certainly was worshiped by various Canaanite peoples such as the Shasu.

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Evidence_for_the_Exodus

 

[Benvolio]

On the other hand there must be some small portion of truth in the Moses story. The story shows some knowledge of Egypt. The name Rameses is real, and Moses is an Egyptian name. Egypt had a period of monotheism at about that time.