Instone-Brewer, an expert in Jewish thought during Jesus' era, writes that Christ's interlocutors were not asking him whether there was any cause at all for divorce, but whether he supported something called "any-cause" divorce, a term a little bit like "no-fault" that allowed husbands to divorce wives for any reason at all. Instone-Brewer claims Jesus's "no" was a response to this idea, and that his "except for sexual indecency" condition was not a statement of the sole exemption from God's blanket prohibition, but merely Christ's reiteration of one of several divorce permissions in the Old Testament — one he felt the "any-time" advocates had exaggerated.
Since the original Greek had no punctuation like quotation marks, this "expert" believes he can change Jesus' words by adding some punctuation? Viola - you can get divorced now. Jesus was only speaking to a specific kind of "no-fault" divorce and not divorce in general.
Whenever pro-gay biblical scholars add a comma or any other explanation for why the Bible doesn't condemn homosexuality, the Evangelicals scream bloody murder and accuse us of "twisting" the scripture to fit modern day morals.
Mr. Pot, meet Mr. Kettle.
The Time article explains it all away thusly:
Still, the controversy suggests that even the country's most rule-bound Christians will search for a fresh understanding of scripture when it seems unjust to them.
They'll just deny that fresh understanding to others who see the traditional condemnation of gays and lesbians as unjust.
I need some hip waders - the hypocrisy is getting mighty deep around here.
1 comment:
You could have some serious fun going through the bible and inserting "air quotes" wherever you presume Jesus or other speakers used them. In fact, I think that's how they came up with The Book of Mormon.
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