Theology for the Masses

I’d like to direct you all to this article from the New York Times Magazine about Mark Driscoll and the “new Calvinism.” It’s really interesting, and definitely highlights some important issues surrounding both Driscoll and the (relatively) recent Calvinism resurgence.

I find this quote, from the final page of the article, especially interesting:

Nowhere is the connection between Driscoll’s hypermasculinity and his Calvinist theology clearer than in his refusal to tolerate opposition at Mars Hill. The Reformed tradition’s resistance to compromise and emphasis on the purity of the worshipping community has always contained the seeds of authoritarianism: John Calvin had heretics burned at the stake and made a man who casually criticized him at a dinner party march through the streets of Geneva, kneeling at every intersection to beg forgiveness. Mars Hill is not 16th-century Geneva, but Driscoll has little patience for dissent. In 2007, two elders protested a plan to reorganize the church that, according to critics, consolidated power in the hands of Driscoll and his closest aides. Driscoll told the congregation that he asked advice on how to handle stubborn subordinates from a “mixed martial artist and Ultimate Fighter, good guy” who attends Mars Hill. “His answer was brilliant,” Driscoll reported. “He said, ‘I break their nose.’ ” When one of the renegade elders refused to repent, the church leadership ordered members to shun him. One member complained on an online message board and instantly found his membership privileges suspended. “They are sinning through questioning,” Driscoll preached. John Calvin couldn’t have said it better himself.

I’m personally not a very big fan of Driscoll. I think what he’s done on the cultural front is important and interesting…but this article highlights the exact reasons why his hyper-authoritarian militaristic brand of Christianity (and the Calvinist roots behind it) scares me. Any thoughts, comments, reflections?

Their women exchanged natural intercourse for unnatural (παρα φύσιν), and in the same way also the men, giving up natural intercourse with women, were consumed with passion for one another. Men committed shameless acts with men and received in their own persons the due penalty for their error. Romans 1:26-27

Perhaps no two verses have played a larger role in modern Christian discourse over sex and (homo)sexuality than Romans 1:26-27. Certainly, with the recent events in California, many are certainly turning to these verses for support of their angered positions…while others read them with disdain. I come to them now asking what role these verses really should play in our modern Christian constructions of what constitutes “proper” sex and sexuality (according to nature?). To begin, I’ll take a peak into the world of Paul…to see what (homo)sex(uality) meant for his contemporaries…to see how Paul’s words would work within antiquity’s discourse over such things. As it turns out, sex(uality) in antiquity was a performance that reflected and reinforced social hierarchy, which has startling (potential) ramifications for our reading of Romans 1:26-27.

To begin, many studies have shown that Greco-Roman conceptions of sex(uality) are quite different from our own. As Stephen Moore states, “the ‘logics of sexuality’ that underpin Romans 1.26-27, on the one hand, and the modern logics or sexuality, on the other, are so drastically different as to preclude any paraphrase of this passage that would attempt to assimilate it to the modern concept of homosexuality.” [1]

Greco-Roman notions of sex(uality) did not run strictly along the male/female dichotomy as many see it today.** While such a divide was strong, when it came to sex(uality), that line was quite permeable. Much more defined is the division between “active” and “passive,” between “hard” and “soft,” between “penetrator” and “penetrated,” and most importantly: between “superior” and “inferior.” While men were always the proper actors of the former categories…not all men could perform those roles. Those of the former categories are “honored,” while those of the latter categories are “shamed.” Here is where “sex” and “gender” become very different things in antiquity, and here is where we see their stark difference from modern times.

In antiquity, not all males were men: youths, slaves, eunuchs, and “sexually passive” males were something else. The highest status one could have was that of a free adult male (esp. rulers, magistrates, heads of elite households, patrons, etc.), everything/one else was considered “unmen” or at least “not fully men,” something less (women, youths, slaves, ‘effeminate’ males, eunuchs, ‘barbarians,’ etc.).

These lines of demarcation brought forth notions of “proper” behavior…behavior that was “according to nature.” While ancient writers often made appeals to “nature” for proper sexual behavior…they were really appealing to the reinforcement of their society’s hierarchical structures. Case in Point: Dio Chrysostom (2^nd c. CE) castigates “the man who is never satiated,” who through repeated sexual indulgences ultimately seduces young men of good families who are destined to hold public office. Dio deems this most offensive deed as “against nature” (Greek: παρα φύσιν) (Oration 7.151). For Dio, this crime “against nature,” is actually the treating of the city’s future leaders as if they were common slaves. It is a crime against class, against social hierarchy, for the young man is dishonored. He is dishonored not because he is damaged goods for his future marriage, but for his future standing in society. The crime here is treating upcoming “men” as “unmen,” making those who should be “active” actors into “passive” actors. Such deeds damage the integrity of the Greco-Roman social hierarchy, and are thus deemed “unnatural.”

Furthering these notions is the Oneirokritika of Artemidoros of Daldis (2^nd c. CE), an itinerant dream analyst who interacted with much more “common” people. It reflects relatively general understandings accepted by the public (free males that is) at large, and is called by some “a kind of ancient Kinsey report.”

The Oneirokritika separates sexual acts into different categories, most important of which are those that are “according to nature” (κατα φύσιν) and those “against nature” (παρα φύσιν). Intercourse “according to nature” is sex with a social inferior, which includes women, prostitutes, and slaves. The prostitutes and slaves can be male so long as they are the passive partner, for “to be penetrated by one’s house slave is not good” (1.78). This is not because of the sexual act itself, or even because of the slave’s maleness…the problem is that a social inferior is represented as a sexual superior.

Intercourse “against nature” in the Oneirokritika encompasses many activities, including (but not limited to) the penetration of a woman by another woman, bestiality, and necrophilia. Since sodomy of prostitutes/slaves/boys was ok, the dividing line of “according to/against nature” certainly is not reproductive potential. Rather, unnatural acts either do not reproduce social hierarchy or run counter to it. Bestiality and necrophilia are not “perversions” in the modern sense, but rather are outside conventional fields of social signification. If a man gains advantage over a sheep or a dead body…so what? Perhaps most telling is the prohibition of women “penetrating” other women. This is not simply “lesbian sex” in the modern notion, but rather a woman (a social inferior) performing the work of a man (a social superior). “Let not women imitate the sexual role of men” warns the Hellenistic Jewish author known as Pseudo-Phocylides (192).

Sex “according to nature” thus becomes a game of active/passive, penetrator/penetrated, and most importantly: social superior/social inferior. The act of penetration “reproduced” the societal notions of honor and shame, of status and class. To be the penetrator was to be the social/sexual superior (adult free males in all cases), and to be penetrated was to be the social/sexual inferior (women, prostitutes, boys, slaves, etc.). Any sexual activity that violated this social hierarchy could thus be categorized as “against nature.

So What?
What does this mean for Romans 1:26-27? Well, being that we can never truly lock down “authorial intent,” we can see how one’s language would fit into the discourses of their day. Given the very specific language of Paul, especially in comparison with his near contemporaries (esp. παρα φύσιν)…it seems that Romans 1:26-27 reflects/participates in particular notions of superior vs. inferior, of penetrator vs. penetrated. The “sexual logic” of Romans 1:26-27 thus comes from a societal hierarchy entirely different from our own. With this in mind, Stephen Moore offers an “amplified” version of these verses (based on the RSV with his own notes in parentheses):

Their women exchanged natural relations (of domination versus submission, designed to display social hierarchy, they themselves assuming the inferior position by accepting male penetration) for unnatural relations (in which no display of domination or submission occurred and consequently no social hierarchy was exhibited, because no penile penetration took place), and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women (the male assuming the dominant position, penetrating the woman and thereby exhibiting and reaffirming his social superiority over her) and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men (in which one partner would necessarily end up the loser in the zero-sum game of honor versus shame, passively accepting penetration and thus defeat at the hands of another). [2]

So, what does all of this mean? It means that Paul’s condemnation of these acts comes from a cultural logic that simply does not work for us. Sex and sexuality in Paul’s world was based on a very particular social hierarchy (free adult males “on top” with women, slaves, boys, etc. below). The question becomes, if we have a very different notion of society and what sex(uality) represents…how do we read Paul? Can we simply adopt his prohibitions wholeheartedly, despite the fact that the Greco-Roman societal/sexual logic behind them contradicts and offends our own? Should we, as Christians, uncritically conform ourselves to a 1^st c. CE worldview? What role, if any, should verses such as this play in our own formations of proper sex(uality)?

1. “the notion of homosexuality is plainly inadequate as a means of referring to an experience, forms of valuation, and a system of categorization so different from ours. The Greeks did not see love for one’s own sex and loves for the other sex as opposite, as two exclusive choices, two radically different types of behavior. The dividing lines did not follow that kind of boundary.” – Michel Foucault. The Use of Pleasure. [↩]
2. From Moore’s article “Que(e)rying Paul: Preliminary Questions” in: Auguries: The Sheffield Jubilee Volume. Much of the references and the argumentation here comes from this article (in an admittedly abbreviated form), which is an excellent read and comes highly recommended. Moore gives far more examples and presents them in a much more eloquent way than I ever could. [↩]

I heard an interesting quote the other day that I found interesting. I think I’ll present it without any context or commentary and see what sort of comments/responses in evokes. I have my own thoughts, but I think this quote could provoke very interesting (and hopefully fruitful) discussion. It’s short, so here it goes:

I’d rather do violence to a text than violence to a person.

Discuss.

“In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was a formless void and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind from God swept over the face of the waters.” Genesis 1:1-2

Does the Bible, specifically Genesis 1:1-2, support a doctrine of creatio ex nihilo (creation from nothing)? Would such a doctrine have made sense to ancient Israelites/early Christians? How does Gen. 1:1-2 fit into the schema of it’s contemporary ancient mediterranean understandings of the creation of the world? If something was there, then what was/is it? Further, what is really at stake in the answers to these questions?

I’m currently reading a lot about this in one of my classes and have some thoughts…but I’d like to see what you guys have. Certainly, those familiar with Hebrew could contribute much to our understanding of what the text itself (may) say(s).