The Christian Bible is made up of the Old Testament and the New Testament, the former making up about two-thirds of the entire compilation of scripture known as "The Bible".

Now, if a Christian fully professes Christianity as dictated by the Bible, then this includes the whole Jewish law and he must eat Kosher food and never touch pork. He must also be circumcised and never work on the Sabbath day. He must celebrate Passover, and his sister and mother must observe complicated cleansing rituals when menstruating and always keep their heads covered. (Orthodox Jewish women wear a wig to cover their heads, as noted that night, and fanatical Jewish men wouldn't even press the elevator button on the Sabbath day, considering it "work".) Basically, the list is endless.

And all these are prescribed in significant detail in major books of the Bible, for example Deuteronomy and Numbers. In the book of Numbers (chapter 19, verses 11-13, which was picked out at random) it is said: "He who touches the dead body of any person shall be unclean for seven
days...if he does not cleanse himself on the third day (which involves killing a cow) and on the seventh day, then he will not become clean and shall be cut off from Israel..." The Christians who claim to profess "all" of Christianity should trying doing that!

But you need a microscope to find any references about gays.

The solitary reference which is overused and misleadingly amplified is the Lot story. It's one of the corner stones of anti-gay teaching, and there are perhaps only 3 or so references in the whole Bible that talks about gays. I guess Christianity's story about Lot is similar to Islam's, or almost.

Anyway, it is the story about Lot who was staying in a city called Sodom. In the story, Lot was visited by an angel of God disguised as a man. Some townsfolk outside his house jeered at Lot (who was a foreigner) and basically said: "C'mon, bring out your friend, he looks good for a fuck..." But Lot refused because it violated the laws of hospitality (???), and offered his daughters instead!! What does a sane human being make of that? What kind of a father was Lot?? How much morality does this story uphold anyway, if at all??

Or another passage about Abraham who was prepared to murder his own son and then burn his body at the behest of God. He nearly did it. What kind of a story is that if you take it literally? What if a devout Christian one day has a dream to kill his mother and then place her body on an alter of sacrifice? Would we call this sanity today if he took it literally? But if the Abraham story was taken as a metaphor for supreme sacrifice, then it makes sense and provides both meaning and application in modern living.

Flipping over to the New Testament, Jesus repeatedly tells people to give all their wealth to the poor. "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God." (Referenced in 3 Gospels--Matthew chapter 19, Mark chapter 10 and Luke chapter 18.) Have the Christians given away all their wealth to the poor? Why not take this literally? After all, it's mentioned thrice emphatically--surely it's important! Yet Forbes Magazine lists a long string of church-going Christian billionaires whose personal fortunes are larger than national economies. Nonetheless Jesus uttered not a word about gays, yet the Christians are totally obsessed with incriminating their lifestyle.

In fact, marriage as a contract is never properly discussed anywhere in the Bible, although Onan (already married) was obliged to marry his brother's widow as well, and was apparently condemned because he did not want to get her pregnant, therefore "spilling his seed on the ground..." This is the only reference to masturbation, although it sounds more like coitus interruptus! But why interpret this imprecise verse (in an oddly literal way) to mean a divine ban on masturbation?

Jesus actually threw out the ten commandments (Deuteronomy) because when interpreted in a strictly literal or overly religious way, you get a bag of garbage--with a heavy toll on society. In dismissing them, Jesus instated only two commandments--which he proceeded to spell out as you rightfully quoted from Matthew that night. With it, he dismissed the petty religiosity that came with it, including the irrelevant Sabbath laws, amongst others. (It's interesting to note that the man-made consequences were large: Jesus was eventually condemned to death for healing the sick on the Sabbath, whilst a murderer was eagerly set free.) And if Jesus consciously disregarded the Sabbath laws and other itsy-bitsy religious details without a moment's hesitation because they were insensible, shouldn't Christians follow their Teacher in following suit?

Throughout the Bible, Jesus utters not a single word about gays, but he spoke loads against the rich, the cheats, the corrupt, the hypocrites and especially the self-righteous do-gooders--those who are entrenched with the "holier-than-thou" attitude, who think they are pious, and who eagerly pass judgment upon others (condemning them to death if necessary.) These are the people Jesus holds utmost contempt towards (and who, understandably, killed him), and the bulk of the Gospels' message is that we never ever become "snakes" like them. (Oh yes, Jesus called them snakes.) But have the Christians, by some strange irony, become the very type of people Jesus censured most vehemently? It was even predicted that if Jesus were to come back again, it would be the super-spiritual, mega-righteous, hyper-religious zealots who'd kill him again!

And yes, Paul disagrees with homosexuality, but he also condones slavery and the subservience of women to men as well. Hence, history is full of christian slavemasters and slavemongers who use the Bible to justify their human trade; or Christian chauvinists who use Paul's epistles to "rightfully" reduce the woman into obedient servitude. So what does the Christian make of that?

In short, if you tried to follow the Bible literally, verse after verse unfalteringly, you would go mad. Therefore, nobody does that—from whichever denomination or religion--because it is an impossibility.

What people do is "cherry-pick" the passages that appeal to them and their prejudices (or hidden motives), and discard the rest. Now, this is called "interpretation"--and is used to justify the Iraq war, the bombing of Bali, the endless bloodshed in Palestine, the assasination of Ghandi, the list is endless. Yes, actual texts from Scripture are quoted, alongside chapter and verse numerals for convenient referencing to lend that "interpretation" divine credibility. So God's name is always used, and on both sides. One sage once said: "The greatest disasters happen not when right meets wrong, but when right meets right."

What is necessary for you and I is to read through the Bible or Quran or Torah or Veda, etc, ourselves, and let the wisdom that belie such books talk to us individually and personally--some portions in a literal way, others in a metaphorical way. Since "cherry-picking" is done anyway, it is more constructive that we choose our own literal and metaphorical "cherries" that make us self-confident, honest and contributing members of society—rather than let others choose for us the cherries that will only reduce us into a bunch of confused, guilt-riddled and self-loathing losers.

Written by
Z

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