The Sin of Sodom

Now the two angels came to Sodom in the evening as Lot was sitting in the gate of Sodom. When Lot saw them, he rose to meet them and bowed down with his face to the ground. And he said, “Now behold, my lords, please turn aside into your servant’s house, and spend the night, and wash your feet; then you may rise early and go on your way.” They said however, “No, but we shall spend the night in the square.” Yet he urged them strongly, so they turned aside to him and entered his house; and he prepared a feast for them, and baked unleavened bread, and they ate. Before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, surrounded the house, both young and old, all the people from every quarter; and they called to Lot and said to him, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us that we may have relations with them.” But Lot went out to them at the doorway, and shut the door behind him, and said, “Please, my brothers, do not act wickedly. Now behold, I have two daughters who have not had relations with man; please let me bring them out to you, and do to them whatever you like; only do nothing to these men, inasmuch as they have come under the shelter of my roof.” But they said, “Stand aside.” Furthermore, they said, “This one came in as an alien, and already he is acting like a judge; now we will treat you worse than them.” So they pressed hard against Lot and came near to break the door. But the men reached out their hands and brought Lot into the house with them, and shut the door. They struck the men who were at the doorway of the house with blindness, both small and great, so that they wearied themselves trying to find the doorway. Then the two men said to Lot, “Whom else have you here? A son-in-law, and your sons, and your daughters, and whomever you have in the city, bring them out of the place; for we are about to destroy this place, because their outcry has become so great before the LORD that the LORD has sent us to destroy it.” (Genesis 19:1-13)

You’d think this one would be pretty self-explanatory, but as with anyone who wants to twist Scripture to make their viewpoint work, it becomes complicated. The question here is, “What was Sodom’s sin?” As was mentioned in the previous posts, the homosexual agenda likes to make multiple arguments about the same passage, without recognizing that the various arguments are all contradictory. Same goes here. Two arguments are given:

1)    Sodom’s sin was inhospitality.

2)    Sodom’s sin was gang rape.

Its not that each argument is given individually by different proponents; it is that both arguments are given by singular opponents. So, which one is it? Was it inhospitality or gang rape? Can’t be both, if each is presented as the correct one. In actuality, both are right. But they’re not the only ones that are right. The question “What was Sodom’s sin?” is really a trick question. It assumes that Sodom only committed one sin. Homosexuals will play this game with the above two sins, in the hopes that you will think that they only committed one sin. The real question is, what is the sin that was committed that made the Lord destroy them? Ezekiel adds a bit of commentary:

Behold, this was the guilt of your sister Sodom: she and her daughters had arrogance, abundant food and careless ease, but she did not help the poor and needy. (Ezek 16:49)

Now, a word on this. One thing you need to learn about Biblical exegesis is to never trust anyone 100%. There are many expositors on the homosexual side that will quote this verse, and say, “See, we were right… they were inhospitable,” and they stop there. In doing so they prove themselves untrustworthy. The very next verse says:

They were haughty and did an abomination before me. So I removed them, when I saw it.

This is the reason you have to watch people that like to “proof text” positions. Anyone who states a position and then lists 50 passages after is probably grasping at straws and making more than a few assumptions about the texts cited. Same thing goes for someone who quotes a verse and never addresses the context. Be careful, and always check citations.

So, the problem here is this word “abomination.” In the Hebrew, it is the word to’ebah. It is the same word used in the Levitical law for a moral abomination. Homosexuals will immediately argue that there were many abominations, including eating pork, shellfish, wearing clothing meant for the opposite sex, remarrying after adultery, dishonest scales, homosexuality, and idolatry. They’ll state that it could have been any one of these, therefore the identity of the sin is unknown, and thus confuse your mind with faulty exegesis.

Let’s think this through. All we know about Sodom is written in the book of Genesis. We know that they were destroyed immediately after the issue with Lot and the angels. We know that they attempted homosexual gang rape, and were inhospitable. Of all we know about them, how many things can be identified as an abomination? One thing. Men lying with men. The only abomination we can spot in the story of the destruction of Sodom is that the men of the city wanted to “know” the angels. There is one giant giveaway that no one ever seems to focus on in relation to this issue, but treats as a separate issue unto itself: Lot’s offer of his daughters.

“Please, my brothers, do not act wickedly. Now behold, I have two daughters who have not had relations with man; please let me bring them out to you, and do to them whatever you like; only do nothing to these men, inasmuch as they have come under the shelter of my roof.”

Now to our mindset, the idea of offering your daughters is so offensive, that most focus on this verse as if it stood alone. There’s a reason it is there though, and I believe that this reason proves that the Sodomites were destroyed for homosexuality.

Lot offered his daughters as a more appropriate appeasement for their sexual desire.

Right away, everyone’s red flags start going up, but hold on, let me explain. In general, the first thought most people have is that there is some kind of a lack of respect for women, or that this concerned the fact that women were not held in as high regard in those days. I don’t think that is the case here. If the issue was simply that the men of the city had strong sexual urges, and nothing was particularly wrong with those urges except that they were being inhospitable, Lot could have offered either himself or his sons. Why his daughters then? Let’s make a couple analogies.

You are out on a stroll with your dog and come upon a serial killer attempting to kill another person. If you intercede, you will certainly die. If you shout out, you will die. So, you offer the killer your dog in place of the victim. He kills the dog, and is filled with memories of the past, killing squirrels as a child.

The second scenario is a little more along the lines of the story. Think about a young, single man who is struggling with his sexual urges. He relates to you that he’s at his boiling point, and ready to commit a sin with a woman. A possible suggestion to the man is masturbation in order to sate his urges. He goes through with it, and his urge is held at bay.

In both scenarios, you have a person about to commit a sin. In both situations, a potential lesser sin is substituted for the greater sin. I think you get where I’m going with this. Lot’s offer of his daughters is a response to the wickedness of the act the men of the city wanted to commit. He is essentially saying, “Take my daughters and if you have to sin, sin with them; but please… for the love of all things holy- don’t sin in the way you are about to!” Lot’s terrible offer is proof of how wicked the actions of the men were. It was a much greater sin for a man to lay with a man than for a man to lay with a woman that was not his wife. Even in Levitical law, adultery is not considered an abomination, but homosexuality is. This view is the only view that makes sense of all the information we are given. Here are some questions:

1)    If the men’s sin was that they were inhospitable, how would the offer of Lot’s daughters help that? –It wouldn’t have.

2)    If the men’s sin was gang rape, how would the offer of Lot’s daughters be any different? – It wouldn’t.

3)    On the other hand, if the sin was homosexuality, would the offer of Lot’s daughters have helped the situation if the offer had been taken? –Yes.

In looking at the passage with these questions in mind, only the last question seems to make sense of the passage. Ezekiel states that they were destroyed for committing an abomination. Homosexual actions are the only abomination that we know they committed. Lot’s daughters prove it. Let’s go to the New Testament now for further testimony.

[Edit-- I want to state that I'm not condoning the action of replacing greater sins for lesser sins. I believe that in the historical sections of the Old Testament, the authors' positions were to simply tell what happened. That said, there are a lot of things in the OT that when scrutinized, weren't the most moral of decisions. Think about the entire story of Gideon. He was a deceiver, a murderer, and a doubter of God. But he was commended as a good Judge. How about Deborah? She drove a tent stake through a man's head. Same thing here. Lot may have exchanged a lesser sin for a greater sin, but I'm not saying he was justified. Given the situation he was in, that was the decision he made and the author just told it as it happened. I hope that clears things a bit. -Mike]

And angels who did not keep their own domain, but abandoned their proper abode, He has kept in eternal bonds under darkness for the judgment of the great day, just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the cities around them, since they in the same way as these indulged in gross immorality and went after strange flesh, are exhibited as an example in undergoing the punishment of eternal fire. (Jude 6-7)

Whatever these angels are (my belief is that they are the “sons of God” of Genesis 6), they, “in the same way as [Sodom and Gomorrah] indulged in gross immorality and went after strange flesh…” Lets look at a couple words.

“Gross immorality” is the word ekporneuo, and has the idea of “giving oneself over to fornication.” It is made up of two words, ek- which means “from, out of” and porneuo or “fornication,” where we get our word “porn” from.

The second word group is “strange flesh.” In the Greek, it is sarkos heteros, meaning “flesh of a different kind.” The idea is that the flesh they committed fornication with was of kind that was not natural to them.

The two terms, being in the same context and both being the reason for the destruction of the angels and people of Sodom and Gomorrah, are interrelated. In the case of the angels, they committed fornication and went after strange flesh because they abandoned their proper spiritual body (οἰκητήριον) by taking on human form and taking wives of human women. In the case of the Sodomites, they committed fornication with people that were also not their lot- men. Notice the conjoining phrase “in the same way as these,” which is there to show that the sins of the two groups are correlated. They both were sexually active in a way that is not proper for them.

The fact here is that any action of sexuality between men is an abomination before God. There is no idea here of “committed same-sex relationships,” it is the very action that is condemned. We’ll get more into this in the next passage, as we look at the Law presented in the book of Leviticus, which is crucial to our understanding not only of the subject, but of who Jesus and Paul were, which we will discuss much later.

My challenge- read the book of Leviticus! There’s a lot in there, and even though we live under grace and not under law, it doesn’t mean we throw the book out! So do yourself a favor and read a book of the Bible that you probably wouldn’t even look at if no one told you to do so!

Grace and peace,

Mike