Besides prohibiting adultery, Jewish scriptures also apply their enthusiasm for the death penalty to homosexuality.
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This differs from the position taken by most world religions only by degrees, since the majority of them disapprove of homosexuality more or less strongly. In addition to this, Jewish scriptures include laws against having sex during a woman's period, as well as many other possible sexual infractions, which is a little odd when you consider that all these strict rules and moralizing come from the same scriptures that allow the rape of war captives.
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This particularly distasteful passage is not an isolated incident either, for the Old Testament is full of very unpleasant sex tales. Among the stories that will probably be skipped in Sunday school we have episodes of incest,
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gang rape,
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incest and rape simultaneously,
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public rape on the rooftops of Jerusalem,
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and quite a few other disturbing anecdotes.
These ugly and violent images of sex show up in yet another way. Over and over again, the prophets compare Jews who didn't share their enthusiasm for monotheism to women deserving horrific punishments for adultery. Jerusalem itself is often metaphorically portrayed as a whore who betrays her legitimate husband (God) by having sex with everyone (worshipping other Gods). In his role as
a rejected lover, God himself rails against those unfaithful to him by promising that their fate will be like that of two promiscuous sisters that he eventually caused to be raped, mutilated, and stoned to death for their sexual affairs with foreigners.
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Mmmm . . . nice, just the kind of speech to inspire love for such a God.
Despite all of this, Judaism does not characterize heterosexual sex as sinful or bad in and of itself. Sexual pleasure is highly regulated (particularly for women), and infractions are punished unmercifully, but as long as it stays within the prescribed laws it is approved by Judaism.
A very similar attitude is also found in Islam. Much like in Judaism, sex during a woman's period is taboo. Much like in Judaism, homosexuality is outlawed. Much like in Judaism, fornication results in harsh physical punishment: but whereas the Old Testament prescribed death by stoning, the Koran sentences the guilty individuals to “only” 100 lashes.
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And again, much like in Judaism, Islam also endorses the familiar double standards in the accepted sexual behaviors of men and women. Muslim men can marry non-Muslim women, but Muslim women can only marry Muslim men. Additionally, in some parts of the Muslim world, an obsession with severely controlling female sexuality continues to result in practices not found in the Koran, such as clitoridectomies and honor killings, as well as those sanctioned by the Koran, such as wife-beating.
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Male sexuality, by contrast, doesn't evoke the same level of violence and anxiety.
If you can get past all these obstacles, you may be able to get a glimpse of Islam's sensual side that has not been covered under the burqa and veils. The Koran, for example, provides a much more vivid description of heaven than any of the other monotheistic religions. Plenty of physical delights await good Muslim men in the
afterlife. In a passage that makes it clear even God is a boobs man, we are told, “But for the God-fearing is a blissful abode, enclosed gardens and vineyards; and damsels with swelling breasts for companions; and a full cup.”
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This same theme of Muslim males being able to enjoy eternity in the company of very hot, very available women is repeated multiple times throughout the Koran.
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Even in this life, Muslim men are given the green light to enjoy sexual pleasure as long they do so without breaking the rules.
Moving away from the pattern of Western religions, Christianity adopted a whole different type of sexual theology. Throughout much of its history, in fact, Christianity has been the only one among Western religions to declare open war against sexual pleasure in all of its forms. Whether Jesus would have approved of this or not is anybody's guess, since the New Testament tells us next to nothing about his view of sex. The writers of the Gospels don't even tell us whether or not Jesus was married. It would have been highly unusual for a Jewish man at that time
not
to be married, but this clearly is not enough evidence to conclude that he was. Knowing that a good mystery always attracts attention, the Gospels chose to remain silent (to the benefit of Dan Brown, who ended up making millions imagining what might have been in
The DaVinci Code
).
What the Gospels
do
tell us, however, is that Jesus' mom managed the considerably tricky business of getting pregnant without having sex. Did I say that the Gospels report this? Well, that's partially correct. The Gospels of Matthew and Luke include the wild story of the virgin birth, but Mark and John, the authors of the other two Gospels, must have slept in the day that this tale was being told, for they forget to mention it. Despite being missing in action from half of the Gospels, and being related in very different ways in the other half, the virgin birth is an article of faith for most
variations of Christianity. This is particularly important because—united with the belief that Jesus never married, and presumably never had sex—this idea of immaculate conception seems to cast a negative light on sex in general. As many Christian groups have later elaborated, the fact that Jesus was not born in the old-fashioned sperm-meets-egg way implies, at least indirectly, that sexual passion is inherently sinful.
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Adding fuel to this fire is a quote attributed by the Gospels to Jesus:
You have heard that it was said, “Do not commit adultery.” But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell.
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Some Christians interpret this quote to mean that sexual thoughts are as sinful as actions, and that Jesus makes the already super-strict sexual mores of Judaism even stricter. Others believe Jesus is teaching a master course in
reductio ad absurdum
—taking an argument to its extreme consequences in order to discount the argument. In other words, the former, literal interpretation presents Jesus as being ultra-conservative about sex. The latter, more metaphorical interpretation suggests he is having a good laugh at those among his audience who swear blind obedience to the laws rather than focusing on love and compassion. According to this view, Jesus is challenging the Pharisees and other devotees of strict legalism to take their views
to the next level. Why stop at stoning people to death for adultery? Aren't words and thoughts as bad as actions? Why not go after those as well? Given the impossibility of what Jesus suggests, the message of his speech would seem to be to lighten up—which is the exact opposite of what many Christians interpret it to mean. Unfortunately, the Gospel writers fail to tell us whether Jesus was smiling or foaming at the mouth while speaking those words, so we are left wondering whether this passage is an example of great humor or exhibit A in a theology of self-repression.
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Given Jesus' relative silence about sex, then, how did Christianity come up with its ideas on sexual morality? The early Christian community was divided about this issue, just as it was about nearly everything else. At one extreme were those who viewed any type of physical pleasure as a trap set by the Devil; at the other people like the followers of the Christian teacher Carpocrates engaged in wild sex orgies in order to free the soul.
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In the midst of these very different standards, one man was more influential than any other in turning his own ideas about sex into official Christian doctrines. The man who hijacked Christianity . . . ehm, I meant to say, the man who
affected
Christianity so strongly was a former persecutor of Christians who became known as Saint Paul.
Paul's worldview was shaped by Judaism and certain branches of Greek philosophy such as Orphism and Neo-Platonism that taught a rigid dualism between body and soul. This approach viewed the human body as nothing but a prison, and physical pleasures were considered dangerous distractions clouding both mind and soul. So, the logical consequence was adopting a strict ascetic lifestyle that shunned worldly joys. In the Greco-Roman world, however, these
ideas didn't go very far and were mostly restricted to a tiny minority of obscure philosophers until Saint Paul injected them into his very successful brand of Christianity.
In 1 Corinthians 7, Paul breaks down his theology of sex: abstinence from all sex is the best option; if you are too weak to pull off celibacy, then you are allowed to have sex within marriage in order to avoid the more deadly sin of sex outside of marriage.
In addition to the gloomy branches of Greek philosophy mentioned earlier, Paul's extreme take on sex was influenced by something most Christians expected to happen any day: Jesus would return and the world as people knew it would come to an end. As Paul writes, “What I mean, brothers, is that time has become limited, and from now on, those who have spouses should live as though they had none . . . because this world as we know it is passing away.”
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If physical pleasures are a distraction, reasoned Paul, and we are running out of time for the end of the world is about to knock on the door, then it only makes sense to reject sex and anything else tying us to earth in favor of dedicating ourselves 100 percent to prayer and spirituality. Celibacy, therefore, should be the one and only ideal Christian behavior. In light of this, it's hardly surprising to notice that sexual love is never mentioned in positive terms throughout the entire New Testament.
But Paul and his fans didn't stop there. They turned sex into a crucial topic in Christian theology. Throughout the Greco-Roman world, 99 percent of the population considered celibacy unnatural and downright impossible to achieve, since the sex drive was just too powerful to resist. Taking this as a challenge, Paul's supporters argued that celibacy was indeed impossible
unless
one received God's grace—the only force capable of freeing humans from being slaves
to their natural instincts. Being able to resist sexual urges was seen as proof of divine help. Sex was thus transformed by Paul and his followers into a battlefield between the forces of good and evil, a true test to see if believers could reject the pleasures of this world for God. Incidentally, this is why celibacy has become a requirement for priests in the Catholic Church down to this day—something that allowed vast amounts of wealth to flow into the Church's coffers, since priests couldn't have legitimate heirs. Those of you who enjoy a good conspiracy theory can take this and run with it.
Paul's argument is what pushed many early Christians to flee to the desert and become hermits. But things didn't necessarily become simpler there. Tormented by visions of everything they were trying to avoid (everything from naked women to great-tasting food,) some turned to creative forms of self-torture such as burning themselves with fire every time sexual desire stirred in their bodies.
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Oddly enough, the sexual morality of cave-dwelling, apocalypse-fearing hermits from a tiny Jewish sect eventually ended up spreading all over the world. Aah . . . the last 2,000 years could have been quite a bit more fun had most Christians taken their cues from Carpocrates rather than from Paul.
The kick in the groin that is Paul's view of sex was later reinforced by another giant of early Christian theology: Saint Augustine. Celibacy, Augustine confirmed, is the best possible behavior. Sex within marriage for the purpose of procreation is a regrettable necessity—but you better not enjoy it, for that would be a sin. Knowing full well that the majority of his listeners would fall short of his commands, Augustine added that they should feel very bad about themselves for falling prey to lust, and that this proved they were sinners at heart and in need of redemption, but if they groveled enough they
could be forgiven. Those, however, who had any kind of sex outside of marriage were guilty of a deadly sin. Sexual pleasure, in his view, was a disease to be avoided at all costs.
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This negative obsession with sex left an indelible mark on Christian history, causing deep psychological wounds in millions of people around the world. Any time they thought about sex, Church authorities told them, they were in danger of buying a one-way ticket to hell.
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The heaviest forms of self-repression and shame about natural instincts were thus ingrained in the hearts of countless men and women. But the machine of oppression targeted women much more than men. Like in all patriarchal societies, exceptions to these super-stringent rules could be made for men, but the same courtesy was not applied to women. For many centuries, following the advice of some theologians, public opinion considered “. . . any woman who did not blush at the very thought of sex . . . a whore.”
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In addition to breaking the Catholic monopoly over Jesus' message in the West, Martin Luther gave Protestantism a radically different set of sexual ethics. Luther argued that celibacy is unhealthy and will most likely drive you insane. In his view, the clergy should not be required to abstain from sex, and sexual pleasure within marriage was not sinful. Any kind of sex outside of marriage, however, was still met with the most severe punishments in this world and the next. What Luther did was bring back the Protestant variations of Christianity within the framework of the sexual theology espoused in the West by Judaism and Islam. Unlike Catholicism, in fact, Protestantism, Judaism, and Islam rejected celibacy, approved of sex as part of marriage, and harshly condemned it in all its other forms. Even though this is clearly a step ahead compared to the rabid sexo-phobic views cherished by Saint Paul and Saint Augustine, the improvement
is only relative. Much of the uneasiness and shame about sex created over the centuries remained unaltered. And by promising hell to anyone enjoying sex out of marriage, Protestantism kept alive a culture of fear surrounding sexual exploration.