Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 19)

Have you ever walked past a person who was looking for a handout and totally ignored them? I hate to say it, but I know I have. If you have too, then, in a way, we are both guilty of the sin of Sodom. Let me explain. The sin of Sodom was not homosexuality, as has been taught: it was inhospitality. If there was a sexual component to the sin of Sodom, it was not male on male sex, it was rape and abuse. Now, how do we know this? First, we have to look at the rest of the story — the part that usually is not taught in Sunday School.

Here’s a brief summary of the whole story. Abram had a nephew named Lot who eventually moved into the city of Sodom. In Genesis chapter 14, we read about four kings who go to war against five other kings. Two of the kings on one side of this war were the king of Sodom and the king of Gomorrah. As a result of losing the war, all the animals, people and valuables of the city are taken away as plunder, and Lot’s family is among them.

Uncle Abram hears about this and comes to the rescue, bringing everyone and everything back home safe and sound. Naturally, the king of Sodom felt deeply indebted to Abram, so he offered to let Abram take whatever he wanted. But Abram refuses, saying, I will take nothing but what the young men have eaten, and the share of the men who went with me — Aner, Eshcol, and Mamre. Let them take their share. (Gen. 14:24). God sees that Abram doesn’t take advantage of this situation and so God makes a covenant with Abram to give the land to Abram’s descendants.

In Genesis chapter 18, three visitors (angels) visit with Abraham (in chapter 17, God changes Abram’s name to Abraham) and the Lord tells Abraham they are on their way to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah because there are no righteous people living there; the cities are totally evil. Abraham knows Lot is living in Sodom, so he barters with God and gets God to spare the city if ten righteous people can be found. So the angels set off for Sodom with new orders — find 10 good people or else destroy the city.

Remember that Lot wasn’t from these parts. He was an alien living in a foreign land. He dressed differently, looked different, acted differently, and to top it off, his uncle just saved the city and didn’t ask for anything in return. Then, along come three strangers marching into town and where do they stay but at Lot’s house. Don’t you think the people would be just a little suspicious?

Sodom wasn’t a very nice place to live. It was in the middle of the desert. There were tar pits, (Gen. 14:10) wild animals, wild people, kings fighting, etc. So staying outside at night in these parts could easily mean death. Also, at this time in history, the cardinal rule was to offer hospitality to any traveler or stranger who came to your door. This rule was so strict that you could not harm even an enemy who had been offered shelter for the night. When you took someone in, you were pledging yourself to protect them, no matter who was chasing after them, even if you had to fight for them. The whole system worked because of one simple principle — the person you save today might be the person who saves you tomorrow.

But that’s not the greeting these three strangers get. No one takes them in, no one extends hospitality or mercy, no kindness is offered to these strangers by the people of Sodom; only the foreigner, Lot, takes them in. Next thing we know, we have an angry, suspicious mob banging on Lot’s door, and that’s when we come to the infamous verses in Genesis 19:4-5.

⁴But before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, both young and old, all the people to the last man, surrounded the house; ⁵and they called to Lot, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us, so that we may know them.” (emphasis added)

What does this have to do with homosexuality? Not much, really, as we will see. Since about the 12th century, this story has been used to condemn homosexuality. That’s about the time the term “sodomite” came into use, and it refers to someone who engages in anal sex. From this time forward, the sin of Sodom was said to be male homogenital acts, and the thinking behind this Biblical account came to be that God destroyed the city of Sodom because of homogenital activity. But is that what really is going on?

To answer this question we have to understand what is meant by the phrase “...that we may know them.” In the New Testament, “to know” sometimes means to have sex with. (Luke 1:34) In the Old Testament, the verb that is translated “to know” occurs 943 times. In 10 of those times, the word has a sexual meaning, and this passage from Genesis is one of those 10.

There is clearly a sexual reference here. But when a man rapes a woman, it has nothing to do with sexual gratification. It’s all about power and control. So, is this passage talking about homosexual attraction, or is something else going on? First, if this passage was about a group of men wanting to have sex with a group of male strangers that had just came into town, it wouldn’t make sense for Lot to offer his daughters as sexual objects to the mob. But that’s what happens. By the way, nobody seems shocked and upset by this part of the story. When was the last time you heard a sermon about Lot’s willingness to let his daughters be gang raped? But I digress.

During this day and time, Lot’s daughters were his property. He could do whatever he wanted to them and with them. Some scholars believe the mob just wanted to learn more about the strangers and other scholars believe they wanted to have sex with them. Both are equally possible and unfortunately there is no way to ever know for sure which is right. But one thing we do know is that during this time the victorious side in a war would often rape the women, kill the children and insult the men by treating them like women — in other words forcing them to be penetrated. So this isn’t a case of the men of Sodom wanting to make love to the strangers. They wanted to rape, humiliate and abuse them, which is a direct violation of the standing rule to offer hospitality and protection to strangers.

So what was the sin of Sodom if it wasn’t sex? In its historical context, the story is about abuse and offense against strangers, insult to the traveler and inhospitality to the needy. In other words, being hard, cold, cruel, unloving, uncompassionate to someone in need. When you add the male-on-male rape issue, there is an additional offense of sexual abuse, gross insult and humiliation. The point of the story is not sexual ethics because there are none. This story is no more about sex than it is about pounding on a door. In this story, both the sex and the door pounding are incidental to the story. The main issue is abuse and assault in whatever form they take: male-on-male, male-on-female, and today we could add female-on-female but that wouldn’t even have crossed their minds back then. In short, whenever this passage is used to condemn homosexuals, it is being misused.

In addition, there are several other similar Biblical passages that shed light on the sin of Sodom. In the book of Judges, chapter nineteen, there is a story of an Israelite from the tribe of Levi who was traveling with his servant and his concubine. They come into the town very late in the day and are looking for someone to take them in. Read Judges 19:16-30 (NRSV):

¹⁶Then at evening there was an old man coming from his work in the field. The man was from the hill country of Ephraim, and he was residing in Gibeah. (The people of the place were Benjaminites.) ¹⁷When the old man looked up and saw the wayfarer in the open square of the city, he said, “Where are you going and where do you come from?” ¹⁸He answered him, “We are passing from Bethlehem in Judah to the remote parts of the hill country of Ephraim, from which I come. I went to Bethlehem in Judah; and I am going to my home. Nobody has offered to take me in. ¹⁹We your servants have straw and fodder for our donkeys, with bread and wine for me and the woman and the young man along with us. We need nothing more.” ²⁰The old man said, “Peace be to you. I will care for all your wants; only do not spend the night in the square.” ²¹So he brought him into his house, and fed the donkeys; they washed their feet, and ate and drank. ²²While they were enjoying themselves, the men of the city, a perverse lot, surrounded the house, and started pounding on the door. They said to the old man, the master of the house, “Bring out the man who came into your house, so that we may have intercourse with him.” ²³And the man, the master of the house, went out to them and said to them, “No, my brothers, do not act so wickedly. Since this man is my guest, do not do this vile thing. ²⁴Here are my virgin daughter and his concubine; let me bring them out now. Ravish them and do whatever you want to them; but against this man do not do such a vile thing.” ²⁵But the men would not listen to him. So the man seized his concubine, and put her out to them. They wantonly raped her, and abused her all through the night until the morning. And as the dawn began to break, they let her go. ²⁶As morning appeared, the woman came and fell down at the door of the man’s house where her master was, until it was light. ²⁷In the morning her master got up, opened the doors of the house, and when he went out to go on his way, there was his concubine lying at the door of the house, with her hands on the threshold. ²⁸“Get up,” he said to her, “we are going.” But there was no answer. Then he put her on the donkey; and the man set out for his home. ²⁹When he had entered his house, he took a knife, and grasping his concubine he cut her into twelve pieces, limb by limb, and sent her throughout all the territory of Israel. ³⁰Then he commanded the men whom he sent, saying, “Thus shall you say to all the Israelites, ‘Has such a thing ever happened since the day that the Israelites came up from the land of Egypt until this day? Consider it, take counsel, and speak out.’”

Sound familiar? This story is very much like the Sodom story. Here the terrible thing that was done was rape, inhospitality to a stranger, abuse. In both stories it’s not about who is having sex with whom; it’s about the sexual assault, cruelty and abuse.

In the sixteenth chapter of Ezekiel, the prophet Ezekiel is railing against Israel because she has not kept God’s law (Torah) and he’s comparing her to a prostitute. To get a flavor of what he’s saying, read Ezekiel 16:35-39:

³⁵Therefore, O whore, hear the word of the Lord: ³⁶Thus says the Lord God, “Because your lust was poured out and your nakedness uncovered in your whoring with your lovers, and because of all your abominable idols, and because of the blood of your children that you gave to them, ³⁷therefore, I will gather all your lovers, with whom you took pleasure, all those you loved and all those you hated; I will gather them against you from all around, and will uncover your nakedness to them, so that they may see all your nakedness. ³⁸I will judge you as women who commit adultery and shed blood are judged, and bring blood upon you in wrath and jealousy. ³⁹I will deliver you into their hands, and they shall throw down your platform and break down your lofty places; they shall strip you of your clothes and take your beautiful objects and leave you naked and bare.”

The image conveyed here is that, because of what Israel had done, the nation would be stripped bare and forced to stand naked before an angry mob — an image not unlike Lot’s daughters in Genesis and the concubine in Judges. Now read Ezekiel 16:49-50:

⁴⁹This was the guilt of your sister Sodom: she and her daughters had pride, excess of food, and prosperous ease, but did not aid the poor and needy. ⁵⁰They were haughty, and did abominable things before me; therefore I removed them when I saw it.

The prophet clearly says the guilt of Sodom was arrogance, lack of concern, not helping the poor and needy — the stranger, the alien, the helpless — they were haughty and ruthless, therefore God removed them.

In the Apocrypha, the book of Wisdom chapter 19 verses 13 and 14 indicate the sin of Sodom is very similar; ... for they justly suffered because of their wicked acts; for they practiced a more bitter hatred of strangers... but ...made slaves of guests who were their benefactors (emphasis mine). Remember that the guests in Lot’s story were really angels sent from God and they were treated abusively. The phrase here, “made slaves”, may refer to a common practice of the day where the master of the house could use his slaves for sexual purposes.

Finally, Jesus comments about the sin of Sodom in Matthew 10:5-15. What is Jesus saying about Sodom here?

⁵These twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions: “Go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans, ⁶but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. ⁷As you go, proclaim the good news, ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near.’ ⁸Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons. You received without payment; give without payment. ⁹Take no gold, or silver, or copper in your belts, ¹⁰no bag for your journey, or two tunics, or sandals, or a staff; for laborers deserve their food. ¹¹Whatever town or village you enter, find out who in it is worthy, and stay there until you leave. ¹²As you enter the house, greet it. ¹³If the house is worthy, let your peace come upon it; but if it is not worthy, let your peace return to you. ¹⁴If anyone will not welcome you or listen to your words, shake off the dust from your feet as you leave that house or town. ¹⁵Truly I tell you, it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah on the day of judgment than for that town.”

Summary
The bottom line is that the story of Sodom and Gomorrah is not, in any way, about sexual orientation, or mutually respectful male-male sexual relationships. It is about rape, sexual abuse, inhospitality, turning your back on strangers, and so on. Anyone using this story against homosexuality is just plain wrong, and they are misusing the Bible to say something it does not say. Fortunately, you don’t hear this passage used to clobber LGBT people much any more, and that’s because the incorrect understanding of the story is finally being exposed and the correct understanding is now being taught.