Reply #151: Do you want websters...

[Andy_Stephenson]

definition? Of course I know what it is...sheez. The idea of "homosexuality" was not a term used in 1st century Judea...Therefore I submit when Jesus talks of enuchs...He is talking in a term his peers would understand...

"The reason why some people now accuse exclusively homosexual men of being sodomites is that, over time, the ancient, even primeval distinction between types of men, based on the presence or absence of heterosexual arousal in them, has been deliberately erased by patriarchal religious leaders. This erasure actually began with the emergence of rational scientific philosophy, but reached a critical turning point in the writings of the "fathers of the church", who were claiming to emulate a heterosexually abstinent role model, Jesus, at a time when absolute abstinence from heterosexuality traditionally implied queerness as well as spiritual holiness. In order to lay claim to the holiness of abstinence while escaping the queerness of it, church leaders declared the greater virtue of their strong, manly abstinence based on will power as opposed to the abstinence of holy eunuchs based on their natural inclination. Since even willed abstinence from heterosexuality laid church leaders open to the social shame of being called eunuchs and non-males, they used their influence to promote the view of maleness as an anatomical characteristic alone, and they redefined "eunuchs", whether "born so" or man-made, as those who lacked reproductive organs. Once redefined as males, exclusive, innate homosexuals became fair game for prosecution as sodomites, because they were subjecting their "male bodies" to sexual penetration."