Tackling Tradition 36: Romans 1:26 - 27

For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; 27 and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error.  (Romans 1:26–27, ESV)

Let’s outline this text again: 

Romans 1:18 - 32

Shema & Decalogue (Rom. 1:18 - 20) God’s Image testifies to His attributes & Law.  God created people. His temple bears His Image & runs according to his Law & Gospel.  This corresponds to Lev. 18 : 1 & 2.

A - Rom.  1:18 - 19. God’s wrath falls on those who suppress His image.  

B - Rom 1:20 - For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made so that people are without excuse. 

What is the teleological intent of the created order?  To serve as an epistemic warrant on par with God Himself? No!  It’s purpose is to serve as a pointer to God who is Himself the only sufficient epistemic warrant for all faith & practice. 

The morally natural teleology (design & function) of the Created Order is to serve as a testimony to ***God’s*** existence, attributes, & authority which alone serves as the necessary, reasoned, & principled epistemic warrant for interpreting reality in a manner congruent with the objectively true state of affairs. 

Historical Prologue related to the issue at hand. (21- 23), corresponding to Lev. 18: 3 - 5

Rom. 1:21–23 - For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things. 

The text describes the morally unnatural use of the created order.  People, even though in truth they knew God exists, chose to suppress God’s existence, attributes, & authority & substituted their own.  The result was idols crafted for pseudodeities that looked like people & animals.  

Prohibitions (24 - 28) corresponding to Lev. 18:6-23 

Rom. 1:24–25 Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, 25 because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen. 

As a consequence of their idolatry, God proverbed them via allowing them to do sex acts that resulted in worship of pseudodeities like Molech & Chemosh, worship which involved human sacrifices.  ***Twice*** this activity is related directly to pagan idolatry.   Paul is writing with the Greco-Roman temples in mind just as Moses wrote with the ANE pseudogods in mind.

Rom. 1:26–27: For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. 

If you interpret “natural” to mean “heterosexual” or “heteronormative” then you wind up with the UNNATURAL moral use of the Created Order as the epistemic warrant for human sexual ethics.  

That is often the result of running to Gen. 1 & 2 to understand Rom. 1:18 - 32 & Lev. 18 - but Paul’s source material is Lev. 18 not Gen. 1 & 2.

The NATURAL teleology of the Created Order is to serve as a testimony to ***God’s*** existence, attributes, & authority which alone serve as the necessary, reasoned, & principled epistemic warrant for interpreting reality in a manner congruent with the objectively true state of affairs.   The UNNATURAL teleology of the created order looks to human anatomy & physiology to do sexual ethics, & the only road to the tradition-bound view of the word “natural” does exactly that, thus  committing 4 epistemic, logical, & exegetical fallacies : Is-Ought, Vicious Circularity, Overspecification, & Category Error. 

If used as a response to a homosexual who appeals to his genetics to warrant his sexual ethics, the result for the apologist is Special Pleading.  

Romans 1:26 - 27

For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; 

• People committed to the traditionbound view of this text, because they insist on interpreting “natural” to mean “heteronormative” read “contrary to nature” as “homosexual.”  Doing so means they are tacitly reading the text like this: 

For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations (with men) for those that are contrary to nature (ie for those with  women) 

— but those words are not in the text.   They are words that people add to the text via their thought processes as a result of decades upon decades upon decades of being taught Ecclesiastical Tradition & Liturgical Philosophy about this issue.  

• The truth of the matter is that “natural” cannot mean “heterosexual/heteronormative” because doing so means that, following on the heels of an indictment against all humanity for suppressing the image & authority of God & substituting their own &/or that of animals, Paul & the LORD do an about face when addressing homosexuality & make the human image a sufficient epistemic warrant for sexual ethics.    

27 and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error.  (Romans 1:26–27, ESV)

• Here, men are said to have given up natural relations with women.  Doesn’t this justify reading “with men” into 1:26? 
• Absolutely not, for reasons related to the grammar & syntax already explained.   
• The text is referring to giving up morally natural relations with women, like sex not done for pagan pseudodeities & turning instead to sex with other men for the purpose of worshipping one or more pagan pseudodeities. 

Notice that in both cases, women gave up morally natural relations & men did too, and they turned to morally unnatural relations in general (male - female; all female, all male), & what made these morally unnatural acts is their intent to worship one or more pseudodeities.  In other words what makes sexual activity unnatural isn’t the “same sexness” of the relationship/sexual activity.  What makes sexual thoughts, words, & deeds morally unnatural in the Romans 1:26 - 27 is their vertical intent, ie their direction toward one or more pagan pseudodeities instead of the LORD.    

The text does not condemn sexual thoughts, words, & deeds of a sexual nature that are Godward.    In other words, as to the horizontal relationship between people,  there is such a thing as same sex (not just opposite sex) relations that are vertically (morally) natural, & “vertical naturalness” in the Romans 1:26 - 27 sense is that which is Godward by way of intent & not directed at one or more pagan pseudodeities. 

O LORD, Hear our prayer(s)!