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[videogamer]

Got news for ya. The Bible doesn't have a damned thing to do with US law.

IIRC, people in power like Scalia think that the people in government should be able to legislate morality. Not making a value judgement or anything...

 

[Phoenix]

However, in the Bible it has homosexuality as a sin in Leviticus as well as other books in the Bible.

Actually no.

There are two Hebrew words which are often associated with homosexual passages and which are mistranslated in many English versions of the Hebrew Scriptures (Old Testament):
bullet qadesh means a male prostitute who engaged in ritual sex in a Pagan temple . This was a common profession both in ancient Israel and in the surrounding countries. it is often mistranslated simply as "sodomite" or "homosexual." (e.g. the King James Version of the Bible, Deuteronomy 23:17). The companion word quedeshaw means female temple prostitute. It is frequently mistranslated simply as "whore" or "prostitute." A qadesh and quedeshaw were not simply prostitutes. They had a specific role to play in the temple. They represented a God and Goddess, and engaged in sexual intercourse in that capacity with members of the temple.
bullet to'ebah means a condemned, foreign, Pagan, religious, cult practice, but often simply translated as "abomination." Eating food which contains both meat and dairy products is "to'ebah" A Jew eating with an Egyptian was "to'ebah." A Jew wearing a polyester-cotton garment would be "to'ebah."


The use of the word "homosexual" in English translations of the Bible

The words "homosexual" and "homosexuality" are not found in the original Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek texts. These words date from the late 19th century. The authors of the Bible did not understand sexual orientation and thus did not write about it. Biblical authors had little or no understanding of same-sex committed relationships. Their languages had no words for these concepts. Rather, they assumed that everyone was heterosexual, but that some heterosexuals engaged in sex with persons of the same gender. Thus, when you see one of these words in an English translation of the Bible, it is important to dig deeper and find what the original Hebrew or Greek text really means.

Source

 

[God's Hand]

Someone help me understand... Is marriage a religious thing or is it a legal thing?

 

[Phoenix]

Someone help me understand... Is marriage a religious thing or is it a legal thing?

BOTH! The church has one governanace of marriage and the state has a seperate completely unrelated governance of marriage.

 

[teiresias]

Someone help me understand... Is marriage a religious thing or is it a legal thing?

If someone wants to have a wedding ceremony in a church and be married in the eyes of whatever god they worship and then not go to the courthouse and get a marriage license then yes, it's purely religious.

But the minute you go to the courthouse and get a marriage license you've entered into a legal marriage where the government is recognizing your relationship and granting privileges, benefits, detriments, and many other contract-like obligations to the union. One does not affect the other, after all, the government doesn't prevent atheists from getting married.

 

[Gorey]

Woohoo for my home. It's still pretty divided here, though, perhaps moreso than you'd think. Local gay rights initiatives in my town where very contentious, and I live in Northampton, one of the most progressive communities in MA.

 

[fart]

Someone help me understand... Is marriage a religious thing or is it a legal thing?

it's a hot, sexy thing

 

[Phoenix]

it's a hot, sexy thing

Very Zapp Branigon-esque of you

 

[AniHawk]

So why can atheists marry without being the attacked by the religious right? I always thought that was cute.