Robert,
My point with respect to
porneia was that our English Bibles translate it with the highly specific term "fornication", which means "voluntary sexual intercourse between two unmarried persons or two persons not married to each other." In Greek the term is non-specific, and it is used in the New Testament to described a wide range of sexual sins. While the New Testament writers probably would have classified fornication as a kind of
porneia, that is not the necessary or exclusive meaning of the term; the Christian condemnation of fornication, then, relies on inference rather than on an explicit biblical prohibition.
rcrocket wrote:I then pointed out the two hundred years of anteNicean father commentary disagreed with you completely and without exception.
You haven't actually cited any Ante-Nicene Fathers, so I'm not really sure what you think they establish. But I am assuming you think they establish that early Christians considered pre-marital sex a kind of
porneia. I don't disagree with that assessment, and don't think it controverts any argument I have made.
You respond by mushing together Platonic thought with Christian doctrine to claim that Platonic minimization of the importance of the physical means that sex was considered sinful. Huh?
Actually I said "Hellenistic," not Platonic, and I referred to a negative view of the passions as well as to a negative view of matter. Negativity toward the passions was more a Stoic concept than a Platonic one, though in the first century Judaism and Stoicism and Platonism and Christianity were all so mushed together that it's sometimes hard to tell where the one ends and the other begins. Thus the term "Hellenistic".
My point here was that the (presumed) apostolic view of pre-marital sex was rooted in a historically-conditioned worldview, and that since we don't share that worldview or its presuppositions, we should not feel bound to submit to its strictures (especially where the biblical text does not make said strictures explicit).
The fathers denounced for two hundred years extramarital sex and did not even come close to the position you now think Christians should adopt.
Is there some reason we should have expected them to?
See, in particular, the entry "Fornication" in Metzger, The Oxford Companion to the Bible," pointing out that grounds for divorce could include both pre-marital and extra-marital sex.
It is significant that this was grounds for divorce, but not for stoning, purification, or other religiously-imposed punishments. A non-virginal bride is used merchandise, and can be discarded as such, but the offense she has committed (as I indicated in my last post) is against the honor of husband and father rather than against God.
St. Ambrose's writings plainly demonstrate the view -- and non-Greek I might add -- of the penalties for pre-marital sex.
St. Ambrose can hardly be described as "non-Greek." Ambrose's
very Greek way of reading the Bible was what enabled Augustine to reconcile biblical Christianity with his Neoplatonic and Stoic worldview.
Your view is what I would call a "new age" view of Christianity; Jesus feeding his lambs; accepting all people; love and peace for all, including adulterers and homosexuals, abortionists, infanticidists. Your continued pro-gay and pro-Hedonistic stance just will never fly with God. As the Study Guide for the NIV points out, for Rev. 2:20 -- the sin of Thyatira was tolerating a woman in their congregation who promoted sexual immorality. Pergamum's sin was tolerating a man in their congregation who promoted sexual immorality. Rev. 2:14.
No doubt your "old age" deity will cackle with glee as I burn for all eternity in the fires of hell, and as worms devour my rotting flesh. I'll take my chances with the Jesus who feeds his lambs, thank you very much.
I beg to join your "Great minds..." Club... Plllllllllllleeeeeeeeaaaaaaassssssssssssseeeeeeee... It's where I belong... Well, at least on this topic.
I think we have room for one more.
(Hmm... we need some kind of hazing ritual for this club of ours...) Cheers, Roger!
-Chris
