Homosexuals are not still condemned in the Bible

Thank you for your argument, Pro. Before getting into my rebuttal I’ll say a bit about my approach. Because you included quotes from several Christian books of the Bible, I’ll assume that we’re talking about a Christian perspective of Scripture and not, say, a Jewish one. With this in mind, it follows that if even one verse from the New Testament denounces homosexuality and isn’t contradicted anywhere else, my side is the right one. So I’ll very quickly breeze over most of the verses you used, because my argument rests on only one of them.I wasn’t going to use the Book of Leviticus anyway, because if we’re following a Christian perspective, the laws of the Old Testament are abolished and is replaced with the law of Christ. Many verses back this up (Romans 10:4, Galatians 3:23-25, Ephesians 2:15). And I agree that the Sodomites could be interpreted as something other than gay. However, throughout your arguments, I’ve found a major lingering problem. You make sweeping assumptions without a single source to be found. You say that when two males had sex in the ancient Middle East, it was usually an act of violence or rape. Where did you get this idea? A book? A website? You give us nothing but your word, which on this site is not enough.You make the even more dubious assumption that homosexuality “as we know today” didn’t exist at all in premodern times, saying things like “Two women having reciprocative feelings of love towards one another wasn't even recognized as existing in the world until 1900 AD”. Where could you possibly have heard this, and why so specific a year? What about Sappho, who lived five centuries before Christ and whose home island is the origin of the word “lesbian”? She wrote erotic love poetry towards women, and this was recognized by scholars long before “1900 AD”. [1]“Sexual orientation was not even discovered yet, so while same-sex behavior existed (almost exclusively pederasty or prostitution) it had nothing to do with gay people.”Perhaps we should’ve defined homosexuality before starting this debate, because it seems we have wildly different ideas of what it is. Merriam-Webster’s definition is the one I will stick by: “of, relating to, or involving sexual activity between persons of the same sex”. [2] Sexual orientation wasn’t discovered back then? There was no “discovery”; there have always been different orientations, even before history. There weren’t any pride parades or LGBT summits back in ancient Judea, but that doesn’t make the gay people at that time any less gay. My point is, it’d be highly appreciated if Pro would offer up at least one source to back up what they are saying.Now, onto my main argument. You accuse 1 Corinthians 6:9 of being a mistranslation. First of all, you again neglect to cite a source. If I was told this by a professor of Greek linguistics, I’d be convinced, but I see no research before me. Here is what I have found on the internet: gotquestions.com, an evangelical website unreliable in the realm of science but excellent at Biblical scholarship, breaks down the word arsenokoites you mentioned. [3] It is a compound word combining the words for “male” and “bed”. Koitai, the “bed” word, is obviously sexual, as it came down to English as “coitus”. The intent is clear: Paul is saying that gays will not go to Heaven. This is the quote I rely on when I say that the Bible condemns homosexuality.With all due respect, your attempt to “debunk” this verse in particular was rather flimsy. Let’s examine some of the things you said.“Conservative Bible translators corrupted the verse and translated it as "homosexuals" in 1959 A.D.”Again, no source and no explanation. I’m baffled, to be honest; please elaborate on what happened in 1959.“the word ‘homosexual’, as we know today, refers to women too.”It almost seems like you’re admitting that Paul is denouncing male homosexuals. But if you do that, then I win the debate. At no point does the Bible specifically condemn lesbians, though it’s implied, because it says marriage is only between a man and a woman (Matthew 19:4), and that sex outside of marriage is immoral (1 Corinthians 7:2). If you want to say that 6:9 doesn’t count because it’s only about gay dudes and not gay girls, you should’ve called this debate “ALL homosexuals are not still condemned in the Bible”, and even then, your argument wouldn’t really work.I’ve already responded to your comment about homosexuality not being recognized until 1900, which I eagerly await a source on.“No one really knows what it (arsenokoites) actually meant”No, plenty of people know what it means, including me now. You say that it was always used to refer to economic exploitation. Can you give any examples? Because the list in 1 Corinthians had plenty of sexual sins.That’s about all the points I wanted to make this round. Good luck, Pro!Sources:1. https://www.britannica.com...2. https://www.merriam-webster.com...3. https://www.gotquestions.org...