Holy Censorship or Mistranslation?

Title: Holy Censorship or Mistranslation? Love, Gender and Sexuality in the Bible

Author: K Renato Lings

Editors: Rev J P Mokgethi-Heath, Rev Loraine Tullekin

Publisher: HarperCollins, 2021 (First)

ISBN: 9789354225413

Pages: 327

 

The holy books of all major religions came into existence many centuries ago and quite naturally, they echoed the socio-economic conditions then prevailing in their country of origin. Their claims of applicability to the whole of the world and for all time need not be taken seriously. What is then prudent for modern adherents of religion is to ignore those passages which run counter to the ethos and morality of the present and get on with their lives. However, there are people who believe in the literal validity of the ‘revealed’ text and argue that we find them anachronistic because we interpret those passages in the wrong way. Such scholars produce novel interpretations to make the holy books stand criticism in the modern world and this book is one of them. It is generally accepted that the Bible is rather harsh on sexuality and plays it down wherever possible. This book argues that it is not the case and one of its main purposes is to highlight the possible link between the current English Bible versions and negative attitudes towards same-sex love as due to mistranslation or censorship of important concepts. Whereas the book’s cover mentions sexuality, the narrative deals only with homosexuality which is equivalent to deceiving the unsuspecting readers. This book is a concise version of the author’s original work titled ‘Love Lost in Translation’, which ran into almost four times the number of pages as this book. Renato Lings was born in Denmark and is a scholar of classical languages, translation studies and theology. He has written and taught extensively on biblical interpretation, translation and issues relating to gender and sexuality. He lives in Spain.

 

Lings makes a distinction between cultural practices regarding marriage and love in the present to that of the Biblical era. Customs and traditions in those times were radically different from what is expected and done in our times and few people would advocate a return. Legal and social equality of husband and wife did not exist in antiquity. Women were the property of either her father or husband. Violence against them by an outsider was considered as an affront to the honour of their male masters and led to blood feuds. In view of this, the relevant parts should be read as a piece of cultural information about marital practices that suited the social structures of the times. Traditionally, marriage was regarded as an alliance between two families or clans. Love and attraction were accepted as valid basis for marriage only after the rise of the Romantic Movement in the nineteenth century. That the woman loves the man she is going to marry is stated only once in the Bible, in the case of Mikhal, daughter of Saul, who falls for David.

 

This book provides many examples of the case of mistranslation or censorship regarding sexuality. In the sexual realm, the tendency of English versions is towards mistranslation which does not reflect the cultural complexities governing the Hebrew and Greek universes. The apostles and early church fathers were celibate and this might have contributed to a touch of misogyny that eventually crept in. However, the author reminds Bible readers of how they are selective when it comes to paying attention to those parts of the Scripture that affect their life choices. In Genesis, when the Creator speaks of food that is apt for human beings, it explicitly suggests that they should be vegetarians or perhaps even a vegan. But this advice is nearly always ignored by Christians everywhere in the world.

 

After the cursory introduction, the author plunges straight into discovering approval for homosexuality in the Bible. The story of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah in Genesis is very well known as a lesson to practitioners of unnatural sex. Lings attempts to reinterpret the story in quite another way. As we know, two young men came to Sodom who were god’s representatives intending to investigate what is going on in the town. The townspeople amorously surrounded Lot’s house where they were lodged and asked him to let them ‘know’ the visitors. The Hebrew word for ‘know’ is yadah which is used many times in the Testaments in a sexual sense. Lings argues that probably the translators misunderstood it when the locals had wanted only to interrogate the newcomers, in the literal sense of the word. Also, Lot’s offer of his two unmarried daughters in lieu of the visitors is in fact just a promise to offer the girls as hostages in the safe and honourable custody of the people as long as the guests remained in Lot’s house. The people did not listen to the man’s entreaties and God destroyed the place with fire and brimstone. This should be acknowledged as a punishment for mistreating immigrants to the town in the light of another verse quoted from Exodus supporting the argument. Even the earliest translations of the Bible contain the story as we know it today and Lings’ version is palatable only to people who are strongly determined to accommodate the sexual minorities in the scheme of the Divine. Also, it is argued that some English versions are prone to exaggerate the language when confronted with what they perceive to be same-sex eroticism. In several cases, their renderings are considerably harsher than the Greek source (p.98).

 

After leaving the Old Testament which is written in Hebrew, Lings turns to the New, which is in Greek. Paul’s letter to the Romans categorically condemns homosexuality. Nazi condemnation of the gays was based on the Apostle’s letter. Here, the author claims that translators tended to regard several Greek expressions as references to same-sex relationships even when they simply describe unconventional behavior. What Paul expressed was concerns about idolatry and orgiastic practices said to be prevalent in pagan Rome. The book also includes a few examples where no deviant interest is involved as vindicating homo-eroticism. The love and dedication of Ruth to her mother-in-law Naomi in the Book of Ruth is a case described in detail. Both were widows and Ruth migrated out of her homeland for the sake of Naomi. This is alluded as a lesbian affair when nothing of the sort was indicated in the Scriptures. The relationship between David and Jonathan is also depicted in the same light. Jesus’ love for his best disciple described in the Gospel adds one more point to the author’s list as he claims that the wordings found in modern versions reveal considerable discomfort among translators and commentators in relation to the intimacy between males depicted in the narrative. Contrary to popular perception that it was John the Apostle being referred to, Lings suggests Lazarus, the person whom Jesus raised from the dead, as the best candidate.

 

The most startling claim in the book is that God created the first human being as a hermaphrodite! The Scripture says he created the groundling in his image, male and female He created them (Gen 1:27). This means a single being, both male and female, was created in view of a later verse which declares that a distinct female (Eve) was created out of it after some time. Is he unintentionally referring to the concept of Ardhanarishwara in Indian mythology? Lings suggests that this is an indication that the Creator has not limited to a single gender and the first human being is endowed with a dual nature containing an equal number of male and female components, or in other words, a bi-gender hermaphrodite (p.246-7). Then why did the Christian world not been able to find this out so far? The author provides an answer for this too. The early church did not read the creation story in the source language of Hebrew. They depended on the early Greek translation called Septuagint. Later, as the Roman church spread to Europe, it studied the Bible entirely in the Latin translation called the Vulgate made by St. Jerome. The Hebrew text was rediscovered only during the Reformation.

 

As noted earlier, there is a distinct element of cheating the readers in conveniently omitting the word homosexuality in the book’s subtitle. This is a marketing strategy as its inclusion would have considerably cut down the number of people who would read this book. This aspect is responsible for removing one deserving star from the book’s rating. The book is easily readable and the author’s scholarship in the Hebrew and Greek languages shine through the detailed analyses and arguments. Moreover, the postulates in this volume provide much food for thought for Bible scholars.

 

The book is not recommended for general readers.

 

Rating: 2 Star