Making the case

Tobias Haller continues to do heavy lifting in graceful prose. His case for a positive view of same-sex relationships, informed by Scripture, tradition and reason, has now grown to nine parts, the most recent of which are here, and here.

The ninth part concludes:

The legal code of Deuteronomy is book-ended with citations that indicate its contents derive from God: These are the statutes and ordinances that you must diligently observe in the land that the LORD, the God of your ancestors, has given you to occupy all the days that you live on the earth... Moses and the elders of Israel charged all the people as follows: Keep the entire commandment that I am commanding you today. (Deuteronomy 12:1; 27:1) The same sort of general description applies in Leviticus, which often takes of the refrain of the need to keep all of the statutes and ordinances delivered by Moses. (Lev 20:22, 25:18)

Yet Jesus clearly distinguished between these collections of Law and the commandments of the Decalogue: when the young man asked him how he might inherit eternal life, Jesus cited only Decalogue commandments. (Mark 10:19, Luke 18:20 — though in Matthew’s version at 19:19 he added the Law on love of neighbor from Leviticus 19:18).

I by no means wish to suggest that because Jesus emphasized the Decalogue over the other laws, and set aside a number of the latter laws explicitly (more on this below) that all of these laws are no longer to be observed. I am merely observing here that this places these laws in a category in which we are able to review them for their applicability, in keeping with the general principle which Jesus affirmed as his own touchstone for moral action: loving one’s neighbor as oneself. This is the explicit conclusion reached in Jesus’ discussion with the lawyers concerning what is most important in the Law. (Luke 10:27-28; Mark 12:33-34)

As a bonus, have a look at Tobias' take on recent developments regarding the proposed Anglican covenant, which may see the light of day on Ash Wednesday.

Posted by Jim Naughton on February 4, 2008 8:00 PM | |
Comments (2)

But the rich young ruler as we call him could not give up his wealth and went away. The Episcopal Church is unable to surrender its own judgment to that of the large majority of bishops at Lambeth 1998 and is "walking apart" from many Christiand with whom we formerly shared communion.

Posted by TomRightmyer [TypeKey Profile Page] | February 4, 2008 8:59 PM

Tom Rightmyer echoes the slogan of those Episcopalians who have chosen schism, but the facts are not with him (or them). The Episcopal Church has walked apart from no one. Various other church leaders have publicly walked apart from the Episcopal Church, acting in some cases upon misinformation about the state of faith in the Episcopal Chu8rch supplied to them by our domestic schismatics.

Father Rightmyer is not one of them, and it surprises me that he defends this obvious spinning of the facts of who has done what.

Posted by William R. MacKaye [TypeKey Profile Page] | February 5, 2008 12:08 AM

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