Jewish laws

First, let's notice that these laws in Leviticus form part of the laws given to the people of Israel. If you examine these laws and the way in which they were given, you will find that while some are moral laws, some are meant to distinguish the Israelites from the other nations. The Bible itself makes it plain which are which – as I will show.

Of course, disobedience to any command from God is 'sin', whether the command is temporary or permanent, moral or ceremonial. And a flagrant, deliberate transgression of a ceremonial law can be far worse than an accidental transgression of a moral law, since it is an expression of blatant disregard for God. Nevertheless, the Bible makes a clear distinction between different types of commands, even to the people to whom both types were very binding and serious.

To give one example of God very definitely prioritising his own commands, I present Hosea 6:6:

For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.

So, if it comes down to choosing between showing love to someone (e.g. by feeding a starving family with your lamb) and sacrifice (taking the same lamb to be a burnt offering at the temple), it is a no-brainer: God does not care one iota for sacrifices, relatively speaking (even though he himself commanded them). And this example illustrates that failure to understand the varying priorities God puts on his own law could have horrific consequences – you might leave a family to starve in order to perform a ritual that achieves nothing in itself. Jesus himself quotes this verse from Hosea to rebuke the Pharisees of his own time and their use of the Old Testament law (Matthew 12:1-8).

Semantic range

Second, let's notice that the same word being used does not mean that same level of disapproval is being expressed. I might say "slugs are disgusting" and "a grown man fancying a 5 year old girl is disgusting", but it doesn't mean I have the same level or even same kind of disapproval towards those things, even though "disgusting" is an appropriate word for both, in different ways. The Hebrew words have similar semantic range (including physical and moral disgust), so the argument is going to be a lot more subtle than "the same word is used" (although, in fact, it isn't the same Hebrew word in the two verses in question).

The actual phrases used

Next, let's look at the actual phrasing of these laws, and the way in which things are called 'abomination/detestable/unclean'. We find 4 basic usages:

1. Something is called 'an abomination before the LORD'

2. Something is called, or commanded to be, 'an abomination to you'.

3. Some action is called simply 'an abomination'

4. Some object is called simply 'an abomination'

Under 2), the 'you' is the people of Israel. I am also including under that heading the usage 'you shall abominate/you shall detest'.

There is an important distinction between 3) and 4), and especially so in the Hebrew mind, when you consider that all objects are considered as having been made by God himself, and are (at least originally) 'very good' (Genesis 1:31), which makes it curious that any object in creation should be called 'an abomination'.

The items in usage 4, described simply as 'abominations', include things both from usage 1) and 2). That is, both things which are detestable to the LORD and those which are detestable for the Israelites end up being described as simply 'detestable', or 'a detestable thing'. For the former, we have idols described as 'abomination', since idol worship is an abomination to the LORD (Deuteronomy 7:25-26). In fact, in many cases 'abomination' is almost synonymous with 'idol'. For the latter, we have Deuteronomy 14:3, which refers to forbidden foods as 'abomination'. (I think this is the only example).

Although usages in categories 3) and 4) by themselves can be ambiguous, the distinction between 1) and 2) is nonetheless quite real. It expresses the difference between something that is, in itself, offensive to God, and something that the Israelites must regard as detestable. (Why are the Israelites to abominate something which is fine in itself? In part, to distinguish them from the other nations. They were to be a 'holy' nation, and the food laws and other laws about cleanliness enforced a separation in lifestyle that was meant to constantly reinforce that distinction. Their holiness and separation was meant to reflect the holiness of God - Leviticus 11:45-47.)

Now, the next important observation is this:

Setting aside instances of 3) and 4) where they are ambiguous, we find a consistent pattern. The animals forbidden in the food laws are repeatedly described as 'detestable to you' (Leviticus 11), 'unclean to you' (Deuteronomy 14:3-20). However, we never find the forbidden foods described as 'detestable to the LORD' or similar.

On the other hand, there are various things which are described as 'an abomination to the LORD', and these are never described in terms of 'this shall be an abomination to you'.

(For completeness, I will note that there is a third category - other laws about cleanliness, including a person/object showing symptoms associated with infectious diseases and things to do with bodily functions and dead bodies. These are described as simply 'unclean', and never 'unclean to you', nor 'unclean to the LORD'. Note that sometimes the language indicates that 'clean' or 'unclean' is a status not a state, and note also that the stronger abomination/detestable language is not used for these things).

When we examine things which are "an abomination to the LORD", what do we find? We find many things (especially in Proverbs), which can be fairly well summarised under these headings:

1. Idols and idol worship (Deuteronomy 7:25; 12:31; 27:15)

2. Insulting and false worship (Deuteronomy 17:1, Isaiah 1:13, Proverbs 15:8, Deuteronomy 23:18)

3. General 'external' ethics - dishonesty and injustice (Deuteronomy 25:16, Proverbs 11:1; 12:22; 17:15; 20:10; 20:23), murder, violence (Proverbs 6:17), child sacrifice (Deuteronomy 18:12)

4. General 'internal' ethics - pride (Proverbs 6:17; 16:5), making evil plans (Proverbs 6:17), general badness (Proverbs 3:23; 11:20; 15:9; 15:26)

5. Occult practices (Deuteronomy 18:12)

6. Matters of sexual ethics: re-marriage laws (Deuteronomy 24:4) and transvestite behaviour (Deuteronomy 22:5)

With regards to Leviticus 18:22, a distinction based solely "to the LORD" or "to you" is not enough to tell us which category homosexual practice falls into, since it is described simply as "an abomination" in that passage. But even without going any further, we can make a decision, since it belongs with sexual ethics, and clearly does not belong to the one category which has been carefully labelled as "abominations to you" (eating certain animals). So we would be right, on this basis, to conclude that the force of "abomination" there is "abomination to the LORD". If you don't accept that, you must at least conclude that this warrants further investigation, and you cannot simply say "well God hates shrimps too". In fact, "God hates shrimps" is now exposed to be a particularly bad paraphrase in light of a careful reading of the words used. It should actually read: "God commanded the Israelites to hate shrimps".

However, there is much stronger evidence about what category homosexual practice belongs to, even in the Old Testament.

Sins of the nations

The Old Testament repeats again and again the following idea: God destroyed and displaced the peoples living in Canaan and gave their land to the Israelites, not because the Israelites were better, but because of the wickedness of the peoples living in the land (and also because of his love for the Israelites).

There are many instances of God working in this way in general, but with regards to the people of Canaan this thread goes back to Genesis 15:16, where Abraham is told that his descendants will spend time in Egypt before coming back to the land of Canaan (the land promised to Abraham), because "the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete" (they haven't become wicked enough to deserve being violently kicked out).

When the time comes for the people of Israel to go and take this land by force, God makes clear to them certain things – that He is giving them the power to drive out the peoples, and that if they copy the practices of the wicked people who he is driving out, they will be driven out too.

One passage where God says this is Deuteronomy 18:9-12. And another is Leviticus 18, where the commandment regarding homosexual practice is found. I will quote the beginning of the section, and the few verses around this commandment which close the section:

18:1 And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 2 “Speak to the people of Israel and say to them, I am the Lord your God. 3 You shall not do as they do in the land of Egypt, where you lived, and you shall not do as they do in the land of Canaan, to which I am bringing you. You shall not walk in their statutes. 4 You shall follow my rules and keep my statutes and walk in them. I am the Lord your God. ...

21 You shall not give any of your children to offer them to Molech, and so profane the name of your God: I am the Lord. 22 You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination. 23 And you shall not lie with any animal and so make yourself unclean with it, neither shall any woman give herself to an animal to lie with it: it is perversion.

24 “Do not make yourselves unclean by any of these things, for by all these the nations I am driving out before you have become unclean, 25 and the land became unclean, so that I punished its iniquity, and the land vomited out its inhabitants. 26 But you shall keep my statutes and my rules and do none of these abominations, either the native or the stranger who sojourns among you 27 (for the people of the land, who were before you, did all of these abominations, so that the land became unclean), 28 lest the land vomit you out when you make it unclean, as it vomited out the nation that was before you. 29 For everyone who does any of these abominations, the persons who do them shall be cut off from among their people. 30 So keep my charge never to practice any of these abominable customs that were practised before you, and never to make yourselves unclean by them: I am the Lord your God.”

So, 'lying with a male as with a woman' is one of the 'abominations' for which God drove out the nations of Canaan by the hand of the Israelites. These are nations to whom God had not sent any special laws, yet he expected certain standards of behaviour even from them. Nowhere are we told that God drove the people out for failure to comply with the food laws given to the Israelites, nor to many other ceremonial laws they were given.

In fact, the Hebrew scriptures are clear that regarding food, God gave different commandments to those outside the people of Israel. To Adam , before the fall, God gave all green plants as food (Genesis 1:29-30). To Noah, after the fall, as the ancestor of all living humans, this was massively broadened, when God says:

Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. And as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything. (Genesis 9:3)

The food laws given to the Israelites are therefore distinctively Jewish laws, and much narrower than what he allowed for mankind in general. Yet with regards to sexual conduct, as well as other moral things such as child sacrifice, and 'religious' things like occult practices, God's attitude is very different – God severely judges nations for their failures in these areas, and that includes homosexual practice.

The Prophets

Next, in investigating the difference that the Old Testament makes between different types of sins, we come to the prophets who reminded the people of God's laws. Since the people of Israel were in general a pretty wicked bunch — a reflection of mankind in general – the prophets mainly preach God's judgement. They tell the people that, for their disobedience, God will certainly bring the judgements he promised (in places like Leviticus 18 and Deuteronomy 28:15-68), and they will be 'vomited' out of the land.

If the distinction I have made between different types of commandments is valid, we would expect the prophets to concentrate on the more 'major' sins – things that are an abomination before the LORD, and not just the ritual cleanliness laws. And this is exactly what we do find. The prophets spent their time on the different things that are "abominations to the LORD", as listed above. They spoke out vehemently against idol worship, against social injustice (Amos especially), insulting and false worship (Isaiah, Malachi), violence (all of the prophets, e.g. Ezekiel 8:17, Isaiah 5:7), child sacrifice (Ezekiel 16:20-21), marital unfaithfulness (Malachi 2:14) and many other specific things.

Mention of food laws is extremely rare, even to these Israelites on whom those laws were binding. Eating of pig's flesh is mentioned in Isaiah 65:4 as an instance of how the people 'provoke' God – as if they had gone down a list of forbidden things and done them all just to spite God. I'm struggling to find other examples. So, again, we are forced to recognise that the food laws really belong to a different category to other moral laws.

Jesus

Much is made of the fact that Jesus did not specifically mention homosexuality once. However, the people who want to use this as an endorsement of homosexual behaviour fail to realise that his silence means exactly the opposite.

Notice first of all that Jesus very clearly believed in the authority of the Old Testament, and derived his teaching from it. For example, when questioned on the subject of divorce, he responded with quotation from the Old Testament (Matthew 19:3-6), or, on another occasion he responds with "What did Moses tell you?" (Mark 10:3). He believed the Old Testament to be infallible (John 10:35), produced by the power of God through human agents, so that it can be described both as the word of the human author and the word of God (e.g. Matthew 22:31-32; 24:15). In Matthew 23:2-3, despite all the negative things he says about the Pharisees, Jesus tells his disciples to listen to what they had to say because they sat in Moses seat, teaching God's law. He rebuked people for their ignorance of the Old Testament, making it clear that a failure to understand and believe the law will lead to many mistakes and heresies (e.g. Mark 12:24).

Jesus categorically denied that he had come to abolish "the law" (meaning Moses' laws and the OT in general). Instead, he claimed that he had come to "fulfil" the law (Matthew 5:17-18). In the sermon that follows, Jesus used the formula "you have heard it said ... but I say to you ..." several times. A naïve understanding of these words suggests that he was overruling the Old Testament scriptures he quotes, but in each case he was actually overruling a false interpretation (which sometimes included a false quotation) of those verses, restoring the correct interpretation, and usually bringing out a stricter, more demanding aspect of the basic law that was given by Moses. For example:

You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ [quotation from Exodus 20] But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart. (Matthew 5:27-28)

You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.’ ["love your neighbour" is a quotation from the Old Testament, "hate your enemy" is not]. But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you... (Matthew 5:43-44)

Many other texts can be added to show the extremely high opinion Jesus had of the Jewish scriptures. In that context, we expect that if Jesus wanted to overrule anything in the Old Testament, he would have made it explicit.

Do we find that Jesus said anything to overrule the Israelite food laws? Yes, we do:

And he said to them, “Then are you also without understanding? Do you not see that whatever goes into a person from outside cannot defile him, since it enters not his heart but his stomach, and is expelled?” (Thus he declared all foods clean.) (Mark 7:18-19)

Since these rules were only ever specific to the Jews, and God never expected other nations to obey them, nor judged them for failure to comply with them, and since Jesus understood himself as the Messiah who would be the light for all nations, not just the Jews (Isaiah 49:6), it is neither surprising nor scandalous for Jesus or his followers to teach that obedience to distinctively Jewish laws is no longer required, and that we essentially are to revert to the commands given to Noah, and other commands that are clearly moral and not ceremonial. Paul gave further explanation of this change in his letter to the Galatians (e.g. see Galatians 3:24).

Similarly, the letter to the Hebrews addresses the OT Jewish sacrificial system on the basis that Jesus 'fulfilled' these things by being the person to whom they all pointed (see John 2:19-21, John 1:26).

On the other hand, Jesus never revoked the Old Testament attitude towards homosexuality.

But even if you ignore this huge amount of evidence and start with the assumption that Jesus didn't believe the OT to be in any way God's word, and you're a 'New Testament only' kind of person, you've still got huge problems trying to interpret his silence on homosexuality as approval:

The people around Jesus uniformly believed that homosexual conduct was a sin. Jesus did address sexual ethics – in Matthew 15:19 he condemned 'sexual immorality' (which, in the ears of everyone around him, included homosexual practice). His teaching on sexual ethics (especially divorce) only ever tightened existing understanding, and he appeared to be working in exactly the same framework as everyone else – namely, that marriage is the only permissible context for sexual relations. In Matthew 19:4-6 he made Genesis 2 the basis of his teaching on divorce, which describes only heterosexual monogamy. If Jesus actually wanted us to believe that homosexual practice was now OK after all, or that homosexual marriage is now a possibility, he did an extraordinarily bad job of communicating it! The argument from Jesus' silence on this matter works entirely in favour of the position that homosexual practice remains a sin.

Jesus was also silent on the issue of kidnapping, cannibalism and drunkenness. Are we to assume that Jesus wants us to believe that all of these things are now OK? Jesus had no need to condemn any of these things, or homosexual practice, since he was in agreement with everyone around him that these things were wrong.

Paul

Unlike Jesus, Paul had a lot to do with people from a Greek culture. In Greek culture, homosexual practice was quite common and often accepted. So it is not surprising to find that Paul actually has something to say on the subject. (Had he said nothing, we would still have been forced to conclude that homosexual practice was a sin, since that is what the Old Testament and Jesus' teaching leaves us with).

(Some may object that Greek culture did not contain 'homosexuality', which they define to be of an entirely different nature to the pederasty common in Greek culture. In response to that, I would say that none of the Biblical commands ever make a distinction between 'monogamous', 'stable' homosexual relationships or any other kind. They are condemned with language which refers simply to the sexual act – more on this below).