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From: mls@panix.com (Michael Siemon)
Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian
Subject: Re: ARSENOKOITAI: NT Meaning of
Message-ID: <May.20.05.02.01.1993.22847@athos.rutgers.edu>
Date: 20 May 93 09:02:02 GMT
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			    Conviction of Sin

		A meta-exegetical or methodological essay


In article <May.14.02.10.06.1993.25123@athos.rutgers.edu>
REXLEX@fnal.fnal.gov writes:

>I can't post it all at once, so it will come piece meal and not daily.

I look forward to reading it.  When I got to the library last week, it
was with the object in view to look at some articles that have appeared
over the last few years, since my previous look at the literature.  Un-
fortunately, they had moved the journal back-issues, so I didn't get a
look at the articles I was hoping to find.  I will continue to reserve
my own judgment on _arsenokoitai_ until I have seen the latest scholarly
work, and I can hope that REXLEX's posting may give some meat to chew on.

However, what I *can* do now, is to point out the methodological issues
-- what needs to be shown for anything to be concluded in this matter.
If the article REXLEX posts addresses these issues, so much the better;
if not, you will perhaps understand why the problem is hard.

>                 James B. DeYoung

writes, _in abstractu_:

>this study argues that Paul coined the term arsenokoitai, deriving it
>from the LXX of Lev 20:12 (cf. 18:22) and using it for homosexual
>orientation and behavior

	[it is only a minor point, but let me make it anyway; De Young has
	already contradicted his own prior assertion in this abstract that
	the ancient analysis of these issues was concerned with actions and
	NOT with orientation.  I doubt this will have much bearing on the
	article as such, but thought I should point it out from the start.]

The hypothesis De Young is advancing is that Paul a) coined the word and
b) his intended meaning for it was in reference to the Levitical law.  The
questions I wish to raise are

	1.)  how would one go about confirming the truth of this hypothesis?
and	2.)  what follows if one accepts (or stipulates, for the sake of the
	     discussion) that it is correct?

Note that b) is independent of a); I consider b) far more plausible than a),
which seems merely to be a counsel of despair over finding nothing in the
literature contemporary with Paul to clarify this word.  So far as I know,
Paul does NOT in general invent words anywhere else in his letters.  Unless
you have an otherwise-established pattern of coinages, it is *not* sound
methodology to assume it -- particularly if he gives no hint in the immedi-
ate text to "fix" the coinage's meaning for his audience.

As yet, the extract presents no evidence at all.  What do we need to confirm
or reject the hypothesis? (which, I should say at the outset, I find somewhat
plausible; I certainly know of nothing which makes it an *impossible* way
of construing this problem passage.)  I'm going to set aside for the moment
the question of whether Paul might have coined this usage, to look at the
more tractable question of what it means.  For this there are, in principle,
two kinds of evidence that can be adduced, internal and external.  That is,
we can look at the text of Paul's letter for clarification or look outside
that to prior or contemporary writings that Paul might have relied on, or to
derivative writings that have some claim of access to Paul's meaning.

The single WORST problem with this word in Corinthians is that there IS no
internal evidence for Paul's meaning.  He uses the word totally without an
explanation or hint as to his meaning, save that its inclusion in a list of
negatives implies that it has for him SOME negative meaning.

We are left, as the only "internal" clue, with the etymology or formation
of the word -- which is indeed the reason that De Young (and others before
him) have associated it with the Leviticus prohibition of men VERBing with
other men, where VERB is some standard euphemism for having sex ("lie" in
Leviticus, "bed" in Greek).  One problem is that "bedders" (_-koitai_) is
not, as far as I know, USED that way in Greek.  THEREFORE, I offer one
serious test which de Young's hypothesis *must* pass or be rejected:

	o  find a body of Greek texts contemporary with Paul (or not much
	   prior to his day) such that the _X-koitai_ formation implies
	   "men who have sex with X"  [obviously, the "best case" is to
	   find such usages of _arsenokoitai_ itself.]

such texts would be confirmation that the word *can* be read that way.
It is worth emphasizing that compound words are NOT in general under-
standable by projecting what the READER may imagine by the juxtaposition
of the roots.  Existence of such parallels doesn't *prove* the hypothesis
correct -- but it goes a long way towards making such a usage (whether or
not original with Paul in the specific case of X == _arse:n_) possible
of comprehension by his readers.

My "test" moves in the direction of external evidence.  If Paul does NOT
in his text explain his word (and he does not), then he has to expect his
readers to already know the word (which stands against its being a coinage)
or to expect that it mimics word formations that they *do* know, such that
they can guess his meaning without too much floundering.

External evidence, that is, texts other than Paul's own and lexicographic
or social/historical considerations that might be adduced, then come into
the picture.  *If* there are other uses of the word, not dependent on Paul,
which *have* sufficient internal (contextual) evidence -- or some gloss by
a contemporary scribe -- to show a derogatory reference to male homosexu-
ality, or similar _-koitai_ formations used in similar ways, *then* one
has grounds for

	o  denying that Paul coined the word
and	o  assuming that his readers might understand his meaning

Do you see the problem?  If Paul coined the word, then he REQUIRES his
readers to share enough context with him to COMPREHEND his coinage and
its intent -- in this case that they would (stipulating De Young's guess)
understand him to be referring to the Levitical "universal" prohibition
of male-male sex (this, mind you, in a context where Paul has emphasized
at least to OTHER congregations (and so one assumes to the Corinthians --
how else to explain 1 Cor. 6:12, and the Corinthians having to be pulled
back from overinterpreting their freedom?) the NON applicability of Torah
law to his gentile converts!)

Among the considerations that make it implausible for Paul to have coined
the word, its first element is archaic -- _arse:n_ is an old Attic or
Ionic form of what in even classical (let alone koine) times would be
assimilated as _arre:n_.  To me, this implies that we are even more than
usually needful of external evidence to pin down meaning and usage.  What
is Paul doing inventing a word in obsolete Attic formation?

And if he *didn't* coin the word, but picked it up like the others in
his list as common terms of derogation, then his meaning will be -- for
his readers -- constrained by that common meaning (since he gives no
other.)

I cannot emphasize enough that Paul DOES NOT TELL US what he means by
this word.  We (and his original readers) are guessing.  They, at least,
had a contemporary context -- and maybe Paul had used this very word and
explained it in great detail to them in person.  But we have no trace of
evidence of that, and to *suppose* it is mere fantasy.

So -- we are *desperately* in need of external evidence about this word.
And it seems to be exceptionally meagre.  That is precisely the problem.
I can think of several more or less equally plausible hypotheses about
the word:

	a)  it was a standard gutter term of abuse for (some or all, maybe
	    very specific, maybe very general) homosexual male activities

	b)  it was a term of abuse used by Jews about the awful homosexual
	    Greeks (which may or may not be consciously associated on their
	    part with the Leviticus passage)

	c)  Paul invented the term -- and again there may or may not be an
	    association with Leviticus in his doing so.  He may or may not
	    intend the word to have an explicit and universal application
	    with absolute and clear boundaries.  [Since none of his OTHER
	    words in that list have such character, this last seems to me
	    about the *least* plausible of the hypotheses I'm advancing.]

Of these, I'd say off the top of my head that a) is most plausible -- but
I still have reservations about that, too.

If the word NEVER appears before Paul, and in later uses has some evidence
of depending on Paul, then one can opt for Paul's coining it.  If it does
appear before him, he might *still* have coined it being unaware of prior
use (in which case, his coinage is inherently confusing!) but one should
normally demote c) on the basis of any earlier uses (especially if they
can be shown to have been at all common in the places Paul traveled.)  In
either of the a) or b) cases, one has to take into account Paul's relation
to the community of usage he picked the word up from -- and whether it be
from the Greek or Jewish communities, Paul's relations are hardly straight-
forward!

There is, so far as I have yet seen, little or no external evidence to aid
us in selecting one of these (or some other) hypothesis.  Your guess is as
good as mine (or maybe worse or maybe better, depending on a lot of things).
But it remains -- so far -- guesswork.  And I don't know about you, but I
for one WILL NOT equate human guesswork with the will of God.  By all means
be convinced in your own conscience about what Paul is getting at -- as he
says elsewhere on what was in HIS day a major controversy of somewhat this
same character (Romans 14:22-23)

	"Hold on to your own belief, as between yourself and God -- and
	consider the man fortunate who can make his decision without going
	against his conscience.  But anybody who eats in a state of doubt
	is condemned, because he is not in good faith, and every act done
	in bad faith is a sin."

For my part, I cannot see any way to resolve Paul's meaning in the use of
_arsenokoitai_ without directly applicable external evidence -- and by
the nature of such external evidence, it will never reach to certainty
of constraining Paul's own intent.  Paul, like Humpty Dumpty (and me, and
all the rest of us) *will* use words in ways that are personal choices --
and sometimes leave his readers puzzled.  If that puzzlement leads you
to God, it may be blessed -- if it should lead away (as some of Paul's
words HAVE led some people), then Paul's intense communicative effort to
contrive his meaning in our souls may have some regretable consequences.
I have always found Paul to be a fantastically reliable guide -- if I
read him "in the large", if I can see him lay out his position in detail
and hammer it home time and time again.  I am much less certain about his
meaning in his many brief and cryptic passages (such as this one.)

In my usual discursive way, I have gone on at great length about the first
of my intended meta-exegetical points -- what would be needed to confirm
that Paul a) coined or b) in any case meant the word to mean the same as
the Leviticus prohibition.  My second point is to *stipulate* this hypo-
thesis, and follow up what it implies for both his initial readers and
for later Christians.  Given my verbosity, this will be tomorrow night's
meditation :-)
-- 
Michael L. Siemon		I say "You are gods, sons of the
mls@panix.com			Most High, all of you; nevertheless
    - or -			you shall die like men, and fall
mls@ulysses.att..com		like any prince."   Psalm 82:6-7
