Leviticus

[Wayne]

OK children open your Bibles to Leviticus 18:22. What does it say? here is what Leviticus 18:22 says:

ואת־זכר לא תשכב משכבי אשה תועבה הוא׃

[Lynne]

My Hebrew translation was not intelligible.

I went here

http://bible.cc/leviticus/18-22.htm

and I don't see any translation that speaks Truth to me.  I will check context before and after, but I have long been of the opinion that these are sociological statements and not of Divine origin, as is my opinion of most of the Bible, for that matter.

[Wayne]

Now here is what those words mean in English:
 
ואת         and with
־זכר         a man
לא           do not
תשכב      lie down
משכבי      wife
אשה         bed
תועבה      idolatry
הוא           he or it

[Wayne]

Hey Lynnie - yeah, bible.cc is a very good resource. (it was my favorite until I found the Blue Letter Bible). The thing is, those translations are going to say whatever the translators wanted them to say. In this case, they are blatantly dishonest.

Just read the words. Check each one, and see what it means. Here is the page at bible.cc where you can see what it actually says:

http://biblos.com/leviticus/18-22.htm

[Wayne]

Again, ignore the so-called translation. It is not a translation of these words. It is just something that somebody wanted to say, and they put it there, right there in the King James, as well as the Latin and everywhere else. But what they wrote is simply not what it says.

[Wayne]

OK so the "idolatry it" part means "it is idolatry." that is the more specific meaning of "it is an abomination" that is usually used. Fine, it strikes me as a throwaway phrase, like eww. But whatever, maybe there is something to be learned from it later. Anyway, we've got that part down.

[Lynne]

Yes.  It has been written and re-written too many times after the death of Christ by people with their own agendas to put much credence anywhere.

I was recently on a quest to figure out the exact wording of the commandment

Thou shalt not kill

vs

Thou shalt not murder

I'd have to find the link, but I believe I found that 'kill' is the most historical word, while more recent translations use 'murder'.  And there's a world of difference in that one little word.

[Wayne]

The more interesting part is still there:

And with a man do not lie down wife bed

wife-bed is the way Hebrew expresses "wife's bed"

Do not lie down with a man in the wife's bed

[Wayne]

What I'm saying is, the dogma is that the Hebrew text is the "real" text. Nothing else matters. The KJV, Latin Vulgate, all the translations and re-writings are just tools, shortcuts, somebody's suggestion. And the original text says:

Do not lie down with a man in the wife's bed.

This is the Leviticus phrase.

[Wayne]

Plain and simple, it does not say "do not lie with a man as you lie with a woman." Those words are not there. No matter how many translators claim that that's what it says, it still does not say that.