Does the Bible prohibit lesbian relationships?

Article published on the gay website Christian 101 (United States) in November 2010, freely translated by Roberta Z.

Considering only the sacred scriptures, the lesbians are considered exactly the same way as homosexuals, so much so that in the Bible the lesbians are never mentioned in a negative way. Even homosexuals are never mentioned negatively in the Bible. The verses used by some homophobic Christians against homosexuals refer to the cult of sacred prostitution.

The sacred prostitutes were devoted pagan of the goddess of fertility and were not lesbians. Many people who know what the Bible says about it, recognize that no verse in the Bible says that sacred prostitutes were lesbian.

Many Christians erroneously argue that, if Levitico 18:22 and 20:13 prohibit homosexual relationships, then the same verses, by inference, must prohibit lesbian relationships. For this reason, many Christians believe that Paolo's antilesbian affirmation in Romans 1:26 is his understanding of the Hebrew of Levitico 18:22: "For this God abandoned them to infamous passions; their women have changed natural relationships in relationships against nature".

The problem of this line of thought is that the ancient Jewish did not receive Levitician 18:22 and 20:13 as prohibitions of lesbism. Levitico 18:22 and 20:13 were written around 1450 AC up to 2500 years later (1100 AD) no Jewish rabbi associated those verses with same sex pairs. If those verses had spoken of lesbians, the Jewish lay writers or the human authors of the Old Testament would not mention this important fact?

In the XII century AD Moses Maimonide found a correlation, however he still insisted on the fact that the lesbian orientation did not prevent a woman from marrying a Jewish priest. Therefore, a preacher today who reads a ban on lesbism in the steps of the Levitician, and then transfer this false statement to Romans 1:26, will always understand the last step incorrectly.

Paolo in Romans 1:26 speaks of idolatry, not of lesbism, not of homosexuality, not bisexuals, not of transgender. The sexual orientation that Paolo condemns in Romans 1:26 and 1:27 is the orientation linked to idolatry; The specific orientation to which Paolo refers and who unites men and women is sacred prostitution.

Rabbi Jacob Milgrom*died on June 6, 2010 at the Hadassah University Hospital in Jerusalem for a cerebral hemorrhage due to a fall. He was 87 years old. Author of 3 volumes, including Levitico: a new translation with introduction and comment, in two volumes. Rabbi Milgrom illustrates eight interesting reasons why the lesbians are not mentioned in Levitico 18:22 and 20:13, nor elsewhere in the Old Testament.

Eight reasons why lesbians are not mentioned in Levitico 18:22 and 20:13

First, There is no penetration by man.
Second, There is no insemination.
Third, Women were a lower class, therefore lesbism did not endanger the family structure, since women were forced to marry a man.
Fourth, Since sexuality between women did not deliver the risk of procreation, lesbism did not ask any problem in establishing the paternity of the children.
Fifth, Some assert (falsely) that lesbism could be unknown to the Israelites and the Canaanans. Since lesbism is not mentioned in any legal material in the ancient Near East of that period, there was no reason to legislate against.
Sixth, A woman could not lose her "male honor" in a sexual relationship with another woman.
Seventh, Sexual activity between women does not go against male domination.
Eighth, Male writers were more interested in men and their behaviors than women and their behaviors.

Rabbi Milgrom continues by commenting: "This prohibition of the Bible is addressed only to the Jews. The non-Jews must respect it only if they reside in the Holy Land, not if they reside elsewhere (see the final exhortation in Levitico 18: 24-30). Therefore, it is not correct to apply this prohibition on a universal scale [...] What is the foundation of this ban [...] throughout the list of prohibited sexual unions (in Levitician 18 and 20), There is no ban on lesbism. Could it be that lesbism did not exist in antiquity, or that the Holy Scriptures were not aware of it? The lesbians existed and developed, as certified in an old Babylonian (pre-Israelite) text and in the work of the Sappho lesbian poet (born in about 612 BC, in the period of the first temple), which came from the island of Lesbos (hence the word "lesbism"). But there is a fundamental difference between the homosexual acts of men and those of women. In the lesbian act there is no escape of the seed, therefore life is not symbolically lost, and therefore lesbism is not forbidden in the Bible [...] Lesbian couples have a further advantage: not only do not violate biblical law, but through artificial insemination each can become the natural mother of its children. So from the Bible we can infer the following:

1. The lesbians, presumably half of the world homosexual population, are not mentioned.

2. More than 99% of homosexuals, i.e. non -Jewish, are not mentioned. This leaves a restricted number of Jewish homosexual men subject to this prohibition (Levitician).

* Jacob Milgrom's observations are taken from his articulated advertised on Bible Review, Vol IX, n. 6, December 1993, published by the Biblical Archaeological Society of Washington DC

Original text: Are Lesbians Treated the Same As Gays in the Bible?