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Reflection: Sodom and Gomorrah
Genesis 19

by Rev. Elder Diane Fisher
Presented to gatherings in Eastern Europe

Other Languages:  Russian and Romanian

Introduction
Hi. It is so good to be with you, even if it is from a distance. I bring you greetings from the churches in the United States, and say hello to Leah and all of you who are gathered.  Florin has been telling me wonderful things about the community and how you’re doing, and he asked me if I would be willing to start to prepare some videotapes on homosexuality in the scriptures; and so I thought that today we would start with the Sodom and Gomorrah story.  The Sodom and Gomorrah story is one of those passages that the Christian right seems to like to use to clobber us with.  So, let me just refresh your minds about the passage.  This is a reading from Genesis 19…

Click Here to read Genesis 19 Online!
Courtesy of Oremus Bible Browser - NRSV

Now this passage is interesting, and, when we look at passages like this, we look at them in the context of the day and the time.  Now, during those days, if visitors came into a town to seek lodging, and were there and arrived after sunset, they were fair game to the townspeople. The townspeople could do whatever they wanted.  Well in this case, they were angels who had come to Lot’s home, and they were passing through, and the men came to have their way with the angels.  Now, this isn’t a case about how they were going to have sex with the people they perceived as men, but rather a case of hospitality.  Were they there trying to make the people feel hospitable?*  Lot is saying that these are guests, these are foreigners, they are in my home; and he offers his daughters, which I’ve never been very fond of, because I think, “What are you doing?!” and it just talks about the value of women in that day.  But Lot tries to get them to ignore them, but they still press on and they really want to get now not only those two angels but they want to get the “companionship” of Lot as well, they want to have sex with Lot.  So, it’s about men, banding together in the town and going after people that have come into the town and having sex with them, and its not about the fact that they’re men or women, its about the fact that they want to just abuse them; and it’s a case of unfettered** hospitality, they’re not being hospitable to this group of people, and so, when we look at the Sodom passage, it’s a passage about hospitality, and how to greet people who are coming into the city.  So Sodom and Gomorrah has nothing to do with having sex men-to-men; in one case it was angels, not men; and there was a prohibition against ever having sex with angels put on all of the people by God, it was one of those commandments, you do not have sex with angels; and they were trying to come and have sex with these angels, but they saw it as sport, not as sex; so, in considering this passage, just remember that its about hospitality, about how you welcome your neighbor, and what happens, and right after that if you remember the rest of the story, Sodom is destroyed, because of its lack of hospitality, not because the men of the town wanted to have sex with angels.

*This is an incorrect usage of the word hospitable.  You should translate this as “at home” (ca acasa).
**This is an incorrect usage of the word unfettered, which means unlimited.  You might say unfettered inhospitality, and that would make sense.

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