Romans 1 cont - Authorial Intent
This post is a continuation of my last post on this subject – you might want to reread what I said last time.
In my previous post, I summarized Gagnon’s exegesis of Romans 1; and picking up where I left off, you will note, I have agreed without qualification with Gagnon’s interpretation - up till now, I have not contested his interpretation or questioned any part of his exegetical conclusions.
Well - and as I suspect you may have already guessed - there is a “but”; and actually a confession. I have to admit: I have not quite quoted Gagnon accurately - that is to say, I have misquoted him! If I quote Gagnon’s opening statement in full, this is what he really writes:
The material that follows Rom 1:18-32 is significant in determining Paul’s ultimate reason for citing homosexual practice and other sins. Paul’s point is not merely to condemn homosexual activity but to begin with a clear example of unethical conduct and then continue widening the net until it captures all of humanity.1
The italics contain a phrase not included in my original citation, and I left this phrase out on purpose - not because I wanted to mislead but actually because I wanted to make something very clear. My purpose, in misquoting Gagnon, is to demonstrate, using Gagnon’s own words, that the apostle Paul is not, in this passage, teaching about homosexuality; instead, he is assuming a shared and mutual prejudice upon which his argument absolutely depends. Unless his presumed “dialog partner” did not already condemn the homosexual person, she would not be drawn into the “net” (to continue using Gagnon’s metaphor) and the argument would not work! The point is subtle but important. It again emphases the minimal level of engagement of the author with the subject - there is no authorial intent here to teach about homosexuality. The apostle’s intention, as Gagnon’s exegesis makes clear, is to teach that Jews and gentiles are equally in need of the God’s grace. Though Gagnon suggests, in his opening remarks, that Paul’s point is to “not merely… condemn homosexual activity”, his own exegesis of the text does not support his conclusion!
If I translate my point into the language of speech act theory, the illocutionary force of the rhetoric is to bring the “imaginary dialog partner” (again see previous post) to the realization that she is, before God, in the same situation as the gentile and equally in need of grace.2 The intended perlocutionary effect is repentance before God and the full integration of gentile Christians within the church community at Rome. The modern day unintended perlocutionary effect, however, has been the exclusion of our gay brothers and sisters from our church communities.
The apostle’s argument is brilliant but almost rendered useless in a (post)modern context. I, for instance, do not fit the profile of his assumed dialog partner, and I do not condemn homosexual relationships, which means for me to understand the argument, and experience the full dynamic and force of the apostle’s teaching, I must exert considerable effort: first I must attempt to climb inside the mind of a first century Jewish Christian, and then I must try to read the text from his particular homophobic perspective. This is an important point because it empathizes that I must first put on prejudices and assumptions that are not my own before I can understand the text. But more importantly, it has to be also recognized that these prejudices are extra biblical – or could I say non-biblical? Although I recognize homophobic prejudice in the bible, and particularly in this passage, I do not find I am being instructed in it, but rather, that I have to adopt a homophobic perspective in order to interpret its instruction on another matter.
Gagnon is wrong to suggest that Paul, in this passage, intends to teach on homosexuality, especially as his own exegesis makes clear the apostle’s real intention for the inclusion of homophobic rhetoric. If Gagnon is correct regarding the function of this material, the apostle cannot be seeking to teach on the subject of homosexuality because if his audience did not already share his understanding and homophobic disposition, the apostle’s argument does not work. And if they already hold his position concerning homosexual relationships, it does not make sense for the apostle to be trying to convince them of it. The apostle is doing one thing or the other: either he is using homophobic prejudice to teach about the universal need for God’s grace - as Gagnon’s exegesis suggests; or else he is, indeed, teaching on homosexuality; Gagnon cannot have it both ways. And if Paul is teaching on homosexuality, then there is the further question of how this material functions within the larger corpus of the apostle’s teaching in this passage - which I believe, is a hard question to answer; I am convinced by Gagnon’s exposition and I find it difficult to consider an alternative interpretation.
I think it is extremely important to not let Gagnon of the hook lightly. His teaching does not support, in any way, his conclusion. Instead, I believe, it says something about his subconscious homophobic assumptions. I find it frustratingly hard to make those who would use these Pauline texts in this way understand this point. Those that want to make a stand on biblical authority must also, in some way, make a stand for original authorial intention; that is they must also be concerned with what the original author meant to say. That author will necessarily use prejudices, plausibility structures and presumptions, in keeping with her cultural and historical context, to formulate and construct her argument, and in so doing, will reveal her own beliefs and prejudices, but those matters are separate and distinct to the contents of her locution.
What I am trying to say is that Paul, by modern day standards, may be a homophobe, and does make use of homophobic assumptions, and extra biblical theologies, to make his argumentative point, but it must be clearly understood that that these extra biblical assumptions are exactly that!
In my next post in this series, I will pick up on this point and will drill down into the nature of the extra biblical worldview resourcing the apostle’s – and his audience’s – understanding. We will then be in a position to reflect again on the apostle’s teaching and decide if this verse supplies any kind of mandate for us, as post modern Christians, to adopt a similarly homophobic stance concerning these matters.
- Robert A. J. Gagnon, The Bible and Homosexual Practice. Text and Hermeneutics (Nashville: Abingdon, 2001) 277. [↩]
- For an explantion of speech act theory see my blog entitled: “The New Testament Vice Lists“ [↩]
7 Responses to “Romans 1 cont - Authorial Intent”
You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
Saint Peter
Said this on March 7th, 2008 at 5:59pm:I managed to quickly plough my way through your first Romans bit only for you to do another! I’m at work so ignore the bad grammar and rushed sentences.
Here are a few thoughts (or should I say gay thoughts). Gagnon, he’s got a lot to say! Would it be fair to say that we could summarise the Romans 1 passage be saying ‘speck and log’? The list is used to say don’t go queer bashing because you’re just the same.
So, evangelicals highjack this text to address the issue of homosexuality. And they use it in such a way to support their own agenda and opinions. I feel that we are back to ‘speck and log’ here! You talk about it being a ‘homophobic discourse’, is it? The use of the word homophobic here is powerful but is it fair?
Homophobic means the fear of Homosexuality. Therefore, to say that it is homophobic is to say that the author thought (rightly or wrongly) his reader was fearful of homosexuality. Can we say that? And if so why? Was this because of godly insight? It would appear we are not allowed that interpretation. The reader was blind to godly things. I don’t think it is fair to call this a homophobic passage – especially if we are saying it isn’t about homosexuality. Is the text homophobic or is that merely your response to how others see it?
Homophobic is subtly used by some in the Church to imply a refusal to engage with, or think deeply, about homosexuality. I.e. you’re afraid because of your ignorance and narrow minded exposure. It can have shades of an inverted intellectual snobbery. A case of ‘I used to think like that until ……’ Why is it today that when people talk about how they are moving on in Christ they inevitably go on some rant about how things are no longer a case of ‘black and white’ and more about ‘shades of grey’. The Homosexual debate of course falls into this ‘grey area’ and it soon becomes clear that it is very ‘black or white’ that you must agree it is a grey area. What if it’s not? What is it is as simple as it may first appear? What if the traditional evangelicals are right and the gays go to hell! Could we accept that the Bible may say that! (Naturally we would be forced to rethink our views on hell).
Anyway, in your first article you write (quoting Robin Scroggs) ‘That the user or creators of these lists do not carefully select the individual items to fit the context with which they are dealing.’ Says who? On what authority do you speak? The fact that these vice list appear else where doesn’t therefore mean Paul didn’t carefully select his. It would be fair to say that it is on equal authority that the evangelical could state the list has been ‘carefully chosen’ because they are all sinful.
And with that I will finish
AJ
Said this on March 10th, 2008 at 7:38pm:Hey Saint Peter
Thanks for comments. I have replied to each of your points in turn…
You write:
I would suggest the summary to be: don’t go Gentile bashing as you – the Jew – are just the same; the list is used to blur the distinction between Jew and Gentile.
You write:
I agree; although, I think there are a lot of motivations for the conservative evangelical position – I will blog some more on this in my next installment in this series.
You write:
I think my choice of the word “homophobe” is totally fair. I did a quick check at dictionary.com and this is what I found:
All of the above I mean to imply in my selection of the word.
As for the cause / root of this homophobia, well, I think it could be many things but irrationality seems to be high on the list of possibilities. I do, though, agree that it could be god inspired; but my problem is: what does such a god look like? – certainly nothing like the God I worship.
You write:
I guess the one thing I am dogmatic about is that everything is grey. I am not trying to argue for my interpretation of these matters to be considered above another, but actually simply saying that all is interpretation – all is grey! My frustration is that the fundamentalist/conservative (Evangelical?) will claim a literal reading not really realizing that his (and I mean the male pronoun) reading is also an interpretation. I do not know any grounds on which to prefer one reading over another.
In this post, I believe, I have played by the rules of the Evangelical Hermeneutics game. Although I prefer to play by a different set of rules altogether, I have been reserved in my exegesis of this passage; in fact, I have not gone beyond the interpretation of a leading conservative Evangelical scholar! By doing so, and coming up with a different answer, and a different reading, I hope I have gone some way to demonstrate that the meaning of this passage is far from black and white. It may well be that mine – and Gagnon’s – interpretation is wrong; but hey, I don’t care! My point is simply to demonstrate another reading is possible; I will not insist others accept it as truth but I do insist they accept it as a valid interpretation and just as literal as any other!
You write:
Well, I quoted Scroggs work as my authority, Scroggs quoted his sources, and they quoted their sources, etc.; at the end of the day, all is relative – see my blog entitled “Relativity.”
Saint Peter
Said this on March 11th, 2008 at 5:27pm:I don’t get how you say that the root of ‘this homophobia’ is quite likely to be ‘irrationality’ and then say that you agree it could be God inspired. Because the logical conclusion would be that God is irrational – which of course doesn’t hold together with the old ‘… same, yesterday, today and forever’ stuff. Maybe, if it is not ‘homophobia’ - then it is not irrational?
And now we go for the big point …… and I will just go for it ….
Here it comes ………
Is it not that the whole issue is simply the fact that some people just aren’t prepared for the text to suggest that Homosexuality is wrong and some people aren’t prepared for the text to imply that Homosexuality is an acceptable lifestyle.
Surely for every person that says the God they worship is different to the one who inspires homophobia there are those that embrace a God that has a disgust of Homosexuality. I accept that we all come to the text with baggage, both emotional and cultural, but there comes a danger that what we are actually saying is that ‘I am only going to allow this text to mean what I need it to say about a certain issue’. Or, even, ‘I am only going to allow this text to present a certain image of God’.
Are we not allowing our emotional barometer to be our core hermeneutic?
Back to the ‘vice list’. We have fornicators; idolators; adulterers; effeminate, homosexuals, thieves, the covetous, drunkards, revilers and swindlers.
Are we going to get a blog explaining that ‘adultery’ is acceptable? Or is that black and white? Surely the same hermeneutic for homosexuality can be used for that? Or should we question what Paul really meant by adultery? The text seems to be the telling the reader to question their attitude towards others – speck and log – but I don’t think it has anything to say about the vices, and as already said, it isn’t about homosexuality…. Or adultery for that matter.
When I read the text homosexuality doesn’t jump out as a ‘grey’ area. It only seems to jump out for those that have an agenda. ‘Grey areas’ always are pushed by our emotional preferences and presented as spiritual enlightenment. For me, in that list, ‘drunkards’ would be the greyest area. Why? Because, I love a good beer or two and my hermeneutic will not allow that to be me. But surely this says more about me than the text or God?
AJ
Said this on March 11th, 2008 at 7:37pm:Hey Saint Peter
At last I seem to have rattled your cage! Replying to your points then….
You write:
Hmmm… not certain what you are getting at with the “same yesterday, today and tomorrow” stuff but I did not mean to suggest that homophobia is irrational and God inspired; I meant that, I believe, the homophobic position to be motivated by an irrational fear. My comment about it being god inspired was simply to agree with you that that could be a possibility - but really one I do not believe to be true of the God I worship.
You write:
Cool…
You write:
Well, here you get to the nub of the issue and I agree the theological debate around homosexuality is one of hermeneutics. I absolutely agree that the bible can be said to say almost anything. I am convinced that meaning resides predominantly with the reader and not the text - we get back what we bring to the text. The “danger,” as you describe it, is real and actual, and inescapable – this is the case whether we like it or not.
Hermeneutics is a passion of mine – I know, I don’t get out enough – and I do not want to go off topic here, but I am personally in a place where I can no longer consider the bible to be the sole moderator of Christian truth. For many reasons, which I will blog about elsewhere, I am convinced that truth resides within the interpretive community and it is this community which brings a measure of stability to meaning – it is necessarily contextual and relative.
You write:
Well, you will certainly not get a blog from me explaining that adultery is acceptable, but neither will you get a blog from me claiming anything to be black and white. In fact, I have not yet written a positive blog on the subject of homosexuality; so far, it has been my intention simply to demonstrate that an alternative interpretation is possible, and valid, and as “literal” as the homophobic reading; and it seems, you agree with my interpretation.
You write:
Well, there is so much I could say here. We all have an agenda and that is the point; there is no neutral position - I find in the text what I bring to it. I agree, some might speak of “grey areas” as a strategy for obfuscating what they really believe to be black and white, but for me, it is an epistemic reality - and it is within this reality I must work out my faith; I might like my world to be otherwise – actually I don’t – but that does not alter it.
………………………………
Reading back over your comments as a whole, I realize we are coming from very different perspectives in terms of how the bible functions in normalizing belief. This is off topic for this thread but I will write another post where we can discuss further.
Saint Peter
Said this on March 12th, 2008 at 5:25pm:No, you’ve not kicked my cage. I don’t live in one (blog coming on that one too!). I think it is more the case that I still don’t see it as a homophobic text. As said previously, I see the use of that wording, ‘homophobic’, as a judgement statement. I.e.: to be homophobic is to be irrational, therefore, wrong. Would you say that this text is afraid of commitment because it mentions adultery? Or in fear of those that steal? Or ‘motivated by an irrational fear’ of any of the others named in the vice list?
It not so much that I want one hermeneutic to fit all. It’s more a case of constancy. I don’t see how looking at this text you can say that Homosexuality is a grey area and the others aren’t.
You write:
‘You will certainly not get a blog from me explaining that adultery is acceptable, but neither will you get a blog from me claiming anything to be black and white.’
So, am I to understand that adultery is a grey area because nothing is black and white? Or is it one rule for one of the items on the vice list and a different rule for another? So would you hermeneutically say that you could have written all these blogs on adultery? I.e. we can swap any of the words over and it still stands up? Those that are faithfully to their spouse are ‘irrational’. Those that have a dislike of fornicators; and thieves have an irrational fear?
It is not that you have written a positive blog on homosexuality but you have used words such as ‘irrational’ and implied a lack of understanding for those that see it as black and white. The idea is that to move to a grey area in any issue is to progress - to be wise - to develop - or even the desired goal. Although we agree the Bible can be used to say almost anything. I would want to aim to not ‘get back what we bring to the text’. If it serves merely as a mirror of my own views, phobias and preferences then why bother?
AJ
Said this on March 14th, 2008 at 8:37am:Hey Saint Peter
Good stuff; addressing each of your points then….
You write:
Again, I think I must emphasize that I did not “say that Homosexuality is a grey area and [that] the others aren’t”; I have said almost the opposite – all is grey! But, I think, I get what you are hinting. Are you suggesting that, although I believe all to be grey, I am still making value judgments? Well, that would be a correct statement. Although I am a theoretical relativist, of course, in practice I am not; there is no contradiction here - I am as context bound as anyone; although I recognize theoretically there is no basis for absolute value judgments that does not stop me from personally making them. It does, though, alter how I make such truth claims; I must predicate all such claims – implicitly or explicitly - as my personal position; though, I may claim a universal application, I cannot defend or support it philosophically.
You write:
I am a homophile and that colours what I read in the text; to repeat my mantra: I find what I bring… I – the first person singular pronoun implicitly underlying the contextual nature of this value judgment – believe the homophobic disposition to be unchristian; similarly, “I” also believe adultery and theft to be unchristian and wrong. “I” believe they are wrong for all sorts of reasons but significantly, not because the bible tells me so! I believe these things are wrong for reasons/influences I cannot make explicit: God (my/a god), culture, science, tradition, conscience, ideology, theology, philosophy, sin, the Holy Spirit (my/a holy spirit), no doubt all, and more, impact on my understanding, and shape who I am – the interpreter!
I do not consider the bible to be a repository of truth – theological or otherwise. It is not a foundation upon which I build my theological or ethical understanding. Indeed, if it were, I reckon the picture of God, I derive from it, would be at best, schizophrenic, and at worst, psychotic; and my ethics, extremely questionable. Thank God I do not approach this dangerous book innocent and without prejudice; else imagine the ethical code I might derive from reading Deuteronomy or the conquest narratives of Joshua! You might argue that the New Testament tempers these extreme and repugnant texts, but why should it be that way round? If I am to approach the text from a truly neutral perspective, who is to say that I might not end up preferring the Old Testament over the New?
The reality is, though, I am not a dispassionate reader; my engagement with this text is not neutral. I bring all that I am to it and I enter into conversation with it and I interpret - thank God!
You write:
I have used the term “irrational” to describe the homophobic position – not to describe the homophobe’s hermeneutics; his/her hermeneutic is as rational as the next.
That said, I do believe those who live in a black and white world are deluded with respect to their epistemic situation.
You write:
We could definitely go off topic here, but I do believe we get back more than we bring; there is at least the hermeneutic circle: the text changes us – the interpreters – we then read it differently, it changes us again, we read differently again as a result, and so we continue. This process may not lead us to objective truth but is does affect change – and it is not the only dynamic in the system. Frankly though, I am not all that interested in objective truth; I do, though, want to be changed – see my post entitled “Principles Sminciples”.
Believe Differently » Blog Archive » Living with PMT #1
Said this on May 2nd, 2008 at 1:16pm:[...] as we seek to work out our lives and love our neighbour. This is the same issue which came up in my conversation with Saint Peter. [...]