The Historical Situation Moses Addressed In Lev 18:22 and 20:13 Involved Shrine Prostitutes, Not Homosexuals

The human authors of the Old Testament testify to the ongoing presence of cult prostitution in Israel.

Israel disobeyed God and drifted into idolatry. God judged Israel for her sins of idol worship and shrine prostitution [not homosexuality] for the next fifteen hundred years.

Some Christians make the mistake of equating qadesh and qedeshah, men and women devoted to the Canaanite fertility goddess, with modern gays and lesbians. The Hebrew words qadesh and qedesha are found in the following verses.

1. Deuteronomy 23:17-18,

2. I Kings 14:24

3. I Kings 15:12

4. I Kings 22:46

5. II Kings 23:7

6. Job 36:14

Qadesh and Qedeshah are NEVER used in the Bible to mean homosexual.

It is inconsistent with Biblical truth and the facts of history to equate ancient fertility goddess worshipers with modern gay and lesbian Christians.

The meaning of Qadesh in Hebrew. This Link will open in a new page.

Notice that nothing in the context of these verses deals with a committed, faithful, noncultic partnership between two men or two women.

Wise students of scripture will also note that verses which mention sodomites are not talking about the geographical area called Sodom in the Bible.

Every verse in the Bible which mentions sod@mite or sodomites is referring to shrine prostitutes who worshiped the Canaanite fertility goddess.

The Hebrew word for Sodom is Cedom, an entirely different word than qadesh or qadesha. Cedom is from a Hebrew root meaning “to scorch or burn.”

False assumptions lead people to believe the Bible condemns committed, faithful, noncultic relationships between two men or two women when in actual fact, the Bible never condemns committed, faithful, noncultic, same sex relationships.

55 times our English Bibles use the word Sodom and related English words, sod@mite, sod@mites, Sodoma. Yet strangely enough, in Hebrew, Sodom and sod@mite are not related words. For this reason, its easy to draw the wrong conclusion, that Sodom and sod@mites are related when in fact, they are not etymologically related.

1. Never in any of the Sodom passages does God say that the sin of Sodom was homosexuality.

2. Never in any of the Sodom passages does God or a human author of the Bible link Sodom with homosexuality.

3. Never in any of the sodomite(s) passages does God or a human author of scripture link sodomites(s) with a committed, faithful, noncultic relationship between two men or two women.

On the other hand, whenever the Hebrew words qadesh or qadesha are used in scripture, they refer to a pagan worshiper of the fertility goddess. Therefore when we translate from Hebrew to English (or any other language) we must retain the original Hebrew meaning.

Because qadesh and qadesha did not refer to gay men or lesbian women in committed, faithful, noncultic relationships in any Biblical reference where those words are used, it is wrong to assert that qadesh and qadesha mean homosexual in the English when they clearly did not mean homosexual in the Hebrew.

Israelites were forbidden to bring the hire of a whore, a zanah, prostitute, or the price of a dog, kelev, a male shrine prostitute, into the house of the LORD.

Zanah is a Hebrew word which, in the Bible, means street prostitute.

Qadesh and Qedeshah are Hebrew words which, in the Bible, mean shrine prostitutes.

Two other times in scripture, God links qedeshah with zanah, whore, prostitute, Genesis 38:21-24 and Hosea 4:14.

At the time of this incident, Judah didn't even know he was having sex with his daughter in law. When Judah attempts to reclaim his pledge from Tamar (which he had given her so she would have sex with him), he asks:

“Where is [the qedeshah], the female shrine prostitute, who was openly by the wayside?” Genesis 38:12-30.

In Genesis 38:24, Judah is informed that his daughter in law has played the harlot, zanah, prostitute and is with child by whoredom, zanuwn, prostitution.

In this passage, the Holy Spirit links qedeshah and zanah because both are forms of prostitution.

Qedeshah is a Hebrew word with a specific meaning. God the Holy Spirit is careful to use the word qedeshah to only indicate shrine prostitutes. Qedeshah is never used to mean homosexuals in the Bible.

Serious students of scripture also note that the qedeshah in our Genesis 38:12-30 passage, was a female who had procreative sex with a man and became pregnant. This is not homosexuality.

Despite their sinful behavior, God forgives the sin of Tamar and Judah and places them and their illegitimate offspring, Phares and Zara, into the genealogy of Christ, Matthew 1:3.

God links the qedeshah, shrine prostitutes and zanah, street prostitutes because what they share in common is a type of prostitution.

“I will not punish your daughters when they commit whoredom, zanah, prostitution, nor your brides, daughters in law when they commit adultery, naaph, idolatrous worship: for themselves are separated with whores, [zanah], female prostitutes, and they sacrifice with harlots, [qedeshah], female shrine prostitutes.” Hosea 4:14.

“And there were also sodomites, [qadesh[, male temple prostitutes [shrine prostitutes] in the land: and they did according to all the abominations, towebah..." I Kings 14:23.

The Holy Spirit, in I Kings 14:23-24 uses the Hebrew word towebah to describe the abominations of Leviticus 18:22 & 20:13 and I Kings 14:23-24.

This Links the activity to shrine prostitution, not homosexuality as we define it today, a committed, faithful, non-cultic relationship between two men or two women.

“And he took away the sodomites, [qadesh], male temple prostitutes out of the land.” I Kings 15:12.

“And the remnant of the sodomites, [qadesh], male temple prostitutes...” I Kings 22:46.

“And he brake down the houses of the sodomites, [qadesh], male temple prostitutes [shrine prostitutes], that were by the house of the LORD, where the women wove hangings for the grove, asherah, sacred poles set up to worship the goddess.” II Kings 23:7.

II KIngs 23:5-20 provides the undeniable Link between shrine prostitutes and Molech worship.

1. God placed the Levitical prohibition of male-male intercourse in the specific context of forbidding Molech worship, Leviticus 18:21-22.

2. God deals with shrine prostitution in the Bible under the rubric of Molech worship.

3. Molech worship included worship of Molech’s fertility goddess consort, Ashtoreth.

4. Molech worship is described as abomination-towebah, Leviticus 18:27-29.

5. Shrine prostitution is described as abomination-towebah, II Kings 23:13.

6. The Holy Spirit tells us the reason King Josiah destroyed the high places is so “that no man might make his son or his daughter to pass through the fire to Molech.” II Kings 23:10.

This passage, in II Kings 23:5-20, links sodomites, male temple prostitutes or shrine prostitutes, with worship of Molech. Because God links Molech and shrine prostitutes, wise Christians must also make and affirm this link. It is dishonest for nongay Christians to refuse to acknowledge this clear teaching of scripture.

Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13 are not talking about homosexuality in general. Scripture is quite clear on this.

“no man might make his son or his daughter to pass through the fire to Molech.”

If God intended us to believe the problem was homosexuality, God would have stated that clearly and unmistakably. Instead, God made it clear that the qadesh and qedesha were shrine prostitutes.

“They die in youth, and their life is among the unclean, qadesh, male temple prostitutes [shrine prostitutes].” Job 36:14.

These were not homosexuals in the sense in which we use the word homosexual today. They were idolatrous pagans, shrine prostitutes who rejected Jehovah and worshiped Ashtoreth, the Canaanite fertility goddess.

"the worship places of religious cults in ancient Palestine were located atop hills and mountains."

Fertility goddess temples contained idols, an asherah pole representing the fertility goddess and massebah, stone pillars which were phallic symbols, representing the male deity.

Dr. Martens links six religious activities to the pagan worship of the ancient Canaanites:

1. burning incense

2. offering sacrifices

3. eating sacrifices

4. praying to false gods

5. [shrine] prostitution, and

6. sacrificing children to the false god.

The Levitical prohibitions, Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13, were linked to Molech worship and Ashtoreth worship [shrine prostitution].

The entire list of forbidden acts in Leviticus 18 and 20, such as sex with a sister, sex with a step-mother, sex with a menstruating woman, sex with an animal, same sex activity in worship of the Canaanite fertility goddess and sacrificing children are said to be the doings of the Egyptians and Canaanites, Leviticus 18:3 & 21, 20:2-5 & 23.

These pagan practices, including shrine prostitution, were forbidden for Israel.

Marrying a close blood relative (incest) was a practice which came to be associated with the Egyptian cult of Osiris. Isis, the Egyptian Queen, was called Mother of God and Lady of Heaven. She was both mother and wife of the reigning Egyptian king. When God gives Moses the Law on Mt. Sinai, the practice of marrying one’s sister or aunt, is prohibited.

(From Margaret Murray, The Splendor That Was Egypt, Hawthorn, 1963, pp. 105-106).

“23 While the lawgiver of the Egyptians, ridiculing the cautious timidity of the others as if they had established imperfect ordinances, gave the reins to lasciviousness, supplying in great abundance that most incurable evil of intemperance both to body and soul, and permitting men fearlessly and with impunity to marry all their sisters...

24 But the most sacred Moses, rejecting all those [Egyptian] ordinances with detestation, as being quite inconsistent with and at variance with any praiseworthy kind of constitution, and as laws which encouraged and trained people to the most disgraceful of all habits, almost preemptorily prohibited any [marital] connection with a man's sister, whether by both parents, or whether only by one of the two.”

(From Philo, Special Laws, III, IV, 23-24).

You may read Philo, Special Laws. at the Early Christian Writings website. This Link will open in a new page.

God prohibited His people from worshiping false gods like Molech and Ashtoreth.

Whatever name you give them, shrine prostitutes, cult prostitutes or temple prostitutes, God prohibited the same sex activity connected with fertility goddess worship.

“homosexual cult prostitution appears to have been the primary form in which homosexual intercourse was practiced in Israel.”

Isn't it interesting that one of the most vocal opponents of gay Christians devotes more than ten pages of his book to proving that shrine prostitutes were a major problem in ancient Israel, while insisting that the Levitical prohibitions do not address the problem of shrine prostitutes?

If Dr. Gagnon is right, that shrine prostitutes were a major problem in ancient Israel, (and I believe he is right, on this particular point), it makes more sense to understand Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13 as prohibiting the primary form [shrine prostitutes] in which homosexual intercourse was practiced in Israel but NOT as a universal prohibition of all homosexual practice, which is unrelated to fertility goddess worship.

In plainer words, Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13 were not intended to prohibit lesbian practice, a committed, faithful, noncultic relationship between two women. Lesbianism is not mentioned or addressed anywhere in the Old Testament.

And Leviticus 18:22 and 20:13 were not intended to address a committed, faithful, noncultic relationship between two men.

This understanding fits culturally, doctrinally, historically and linguistically.

This understanding, that Lev 18:22 and 20:13 refer to shrine prostitutes, is a faithful, hermeneutically sound way to interpret scripture.

This understanding honors God and honors scripture, rightly divided.

And, this understanding upholds the holiness and sanctity of the infallible word of God.

1. The Babylonian Talmud On Sodom.

2. Inhospitality As The Sin of Sodom.

3. Hospitality Means Loving Strangers.

4. History And Scripture Clearly Identify The Sin Of Sodom.

5. In The Bible, sodomites were shrine prostitutes, not homosexuals.

We’ve studied Shrine Prostitutes. Click here to return to GayChristian101 Home Page.

Our powerful new, 400 page book can be ordered now. Gay Christian 101 - Spiritual Self-Defense For Gay Christians.