Sodom and Gomorrah

Sodom (סְדוֹם, Standard Hebrew Sədom, Tiberian Hebrew Səḏôm) (31°04′19″N 35°24′00″E / 31.072°N 35.400°E / 31.072; 35.400) was the chief town of a group of five towns on the plain of the Jordan River in an area that constituted the southern limit of the lands of the Canaanites (Genesis 10:19). Lot, a nephew of Abram (Abraham) chose to live in the city. According to the Bible, both Sodom and Gomorrah (עֲמוֹרָה, Standard Hebrew ʿAmora, Tiberian Hebrew Ġəmôrāh, ʿĂmôrāh)—called as a group The Cities on the Plain—were destroyed by God for their sins. Opinions differ as to what the sin actually was.

The Biblical text

In Genesis 19, the final episode in the story of Sodom is described as the angels visit Lot to warn him to flee:

But before they lay down, the men of the city, even the men of Sodom, compassed the house round, both old and young, all the people from every quarter: And they called unto Lot, and said unto him, Where are the men [angels] which came in to thee this night? bring them out unto us, that we may know them. (KJV) (In this context, "know" is often interpreted as a euphemism for sexual intercourse.)

Lot refused to give the visiting angels to the men of Sodom and instead offered them his two daughters. The men refused to accept this compromise. The angels saved Lot from an assault. Lot and his family were then instructed to leave the city, and Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed with fire and brimstone by God.

It is often postulated that the sin of Sodom was homosexuality and rape.

It is not by chance that the passages preceding the events in Sodom have to do with Abraham's hospitality and the gifts of God bestowed on him for his gracious action. First we see hospitality and the way we should act, then inhospitality in that the people of Sodom seek to mistreat the newcomers. The biblical text itself seems to suggest that the sin is based in inhospitality to some (if not a major) extent:

Ezekiel 16:49-50: Now this was the sin of Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy. They were haughty and did detestable things before me. Therefore I did away with them as you have seen.

This idea is supported in the Gospels when Jesus compares an inhospitable reception to Sodom:

Matthew 10:14-15: If anyone will not welcome you or listen to your words, shake the dust off your feet when you leave that home or town. I tell you the truth, it will be more bearable for Sodom and Gomorrah on the day of judgment than for that town.

However, inhospitality was not the only sin:

Jude 7: Even as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.

Biblical scholars debate the proper English interpretation of this passage. Some scholars feel that the "strange flesh" is a reference to homosexuality, while other scholars feel that the "strange flesh" involved refers to the citizens of Sodom seeking to engage in sexual relations or the rape of non-mortals.

Judges 19 [1] tells a very similar story, this time involving the town of Gibeah.

The view of Josephus

Flavius Josephus, a Jewish historian, wrote:

"Now, about this time the Sodomites, overweeningly proud of their numbers and the extent of their wealth, showed themselves insolent to men and impious to the Divinity, insomuch that they no more remembered the benefits that they had received from Him, hated foreigners and avoided any contact with others. Indignant at this conduct, God accordingly resolved to chastise them for their arrogance, and not only to uproot their city, but to blast their land so completely that it should yield neither plant nor fruit whatsoever from that time forward." Jewish Antiquities 1:194-195 Harvard

Islamic views

The Qur'an does not mention Lot's cities as Sodom or Gomorrah, instead the names can be deduced from similarities between the biblical and Islamic stories.

In contrast to the biblical text, the Qur'an 7:80-84 clearly states homosexual behavior by Lot's people, which is said to be 'beyond bounds'. The part translated as 'men' is in the Qur'an written as ar-rijal (الرجل), counterpart of an-nisaa' (النساء) or 'women'.

"For ye practise your lusts on men in preference to women : ye are indeed a people transgressing beyond bounds." [7:81]

Furthermore, it is mentioned that the behaviour was the first among mankind:

And (remember) Lut: behold, he said to his people: "Ye do commit lewdness, such as no people in Creation (ever) committed before you." [29:28]

Allah's punishment did not come before their arrogant challenge and Lot requesting Allah to do so (29:29-30). Similar challenges were done to some prophets, e.g. Nuh, Hud, and Saleh by their corresponding people. After Muhammad it is known that God's direct punishments are postponed until the end of the World.

Jewish views

Classical Jewish texts do not support the concept that God destroyed Sodom and Gemorrah because their inhabitants were homosexual. Rather, they were destroyed because the inhabitants were generally depraved and uncompromisingly greedy. Rabbinic writings affirm that the primary crimes of the Sodomites were terrible and repeated economic crimes, both against each other and outsiders.

A rabbinic tradition, described in the Mishnah, postulates that the sin of Sodom was related to property: Sodomites believed that "what is mine is mine, and what is yours is yours" (Abot), which is interpreted as a lack of compassion.

Another rabbinic tradition is that these two wealthy cities treated visitors in a horrible fashion. One example is the story of the "bed" that guests to Sodom were forced to sleep in: if they were too short they were stretched to fit it, and if they were too tall, they were cut up. This is considered to be an adaptation of the Greek myth of Procrustes.

Talmud on Sodom

The Babylonian Talmud (Sanhedrin 109a) provides a number of examples of what the crimes of Sodom were. Their sins had to do with cruelty and greed.

The men of Sodom waxed haughty only on account of the good which the Holy One, blessed be He, had lavished upon them...They said: Since there cometh forth bread out of (our) earth, and it hath the dust of gold, why should we suffer wayfarers, who come to us only to deplete our wealth. Come, let us abolish the practice of traveling in our land.

There were four judges in Sodom named Shakrai (Liar), Shakurai (Awful Liar), Zayyafi (Forger), and Mazle Dina (Perverter of Justice). Now if a man assaulted his neighbour's wife and bruised her, they would say to the husband, Give her to him, that she may become pregnant for thee. If one cut off the ear of his neighbour's ass, they would order, Give it to him until it grows again.

In modern terms, the Talmud suggests that the Sodomites were condemned for restricting immigration and for institutionalizing the law of "might makes right".

Midrash on Sodom

The Midrash compilation "Pirke de Rabbi Eliezer" offers a number of reasons why the Sodomites were considered evil.

Rabbi Ze'era said: The men of Sodom were the wealthy men of prosperity, on account of the good and fruitful land whereon they dwelt... Rabbi Nathaniel said: The men of Sodom had no consideration for the honour of their Owner by not distributing food to the wayfarer and stranger, but they even fenced in all the trees on top above their fruit so that they should not be seized; not even by the bird of heaven... Rabbi Joshua... said: They appointed over themselves judges who were lying judges, and they oppressed every wayfarer and stranger who entered Sodom by their perverse judgment, and they sent them forth naked...

Again in modern terms, this story suggests that they were condemned for inclosure of the commons, and for perversion of justice.

Current usage of the term sodomy

For whatever reason, the classical Jewish views on Sodom are relatively unknown, compared with a Christian view that tends to interprets the text as referring to homosexuality. Thus the story of Sodom has given rise to words in several languages, including English: the word "sodomy", meaning acts (stigmatized as "unnatural vice") such as anal sex, and the word "sodomite", meaning one who practises such acts. However the word "sodomy" was not known to be used in such context until the 13th century.[2]

The account of Sodom is part of the basis for many Christian denominations' condemnation of homosexuality.

Modern historical approach

Some biblical scholars believe that a sin was attached to the story of Sodom to justify the destruction of the cities, which may be based on an authentic account of a natural cataclysm, possibly an earthquake in the region. It is known that the towns are described as lying along a major fault, the Jordan Rift Valley, the northernmost extension of the Great Rift Valley of the Red Sea and East Africa. It is also possible that the sin of the inhabitants appearing in the original text was edited out and lost.

The historical existence of Sodom and Gomorrah is still in dispute by archaeologists, with some believing they never existed, some believing they are now under the Dead Sea, and others claiming that they have been found (under other names) in the region to the southeast of the Dead Sea. One candidate for Sodom is a site known as Bab edh-Dhra. Bab edh-Dhra was an Early Bronze Age city located near the Dead Sea, and bitumen and petroleum deposits have been found in the area, which contain sulfur and natural gas (as such deposits normally do). The theory is that an earthquake opened a nearby pocket of natural gas. Natural gas, being lighter than air, drifted up. However, instead of dissipating harmlessly the gas reacted with the fires burning in the city (the smallest flame could have set off the natural gas). As a result, the city was devastated.

Those who believe that the city never existed assert that the name "Sodom" is a derivative of the word "scorched", implying that such a name could have been given only after the city's alleged destruction, not before.

Also, the Bible says that upon learning of Lot's capture, Abraham sets forth with an army of 318 soldiers, chasing the Mesopotamians "unto Dan" (Gen. 14:14). The words "unto Dan" are taken to indicate northern Israel", and although the tribe of Dan moved to Israel well after the Exodus -- when Genesis was written -- there are other indications that this region may already have been called 'Dan' even before that, as also in the Book of Enoch 13:7, that was not considered "apocryphal" until the Sanhedrin declared it so at Yavneh in 90 AD, and is still canonical in Ethiopian Orthodox church.

Reformist Torah approach with Hebrew translations

"Before they had gone to bed, all the men from every part of the city of Sodom—both young and old—surrounded the house"

The traditional interpretation of this story largely stems from the unfortunate translation of the word enoshe 582 in Genesis 19:4. Most versions say "men", which is incorrect. The Hebrew word enoshe is not gender-specific; it indicates mortals or people. The word esh would have been used to mean "man" or eshal to mean "woman" if gender specific terminology was meant. This mistranslation gives the impression that just the men of the city had surrounded Lot's house and the further impression that they were all homosexuals out to have sex with the angels. The word enoshe is used in Genesis 17:23 with the word zechar meaning "male" demonstrating this point.

There is no Old Testament text in which yadha refers to homosexual coitus, with the single exception of this disputed Sodom and Gomorrah story in Genesis. The less ambiguous word shakhabh, however, is used for homosexual, heterosexual, and bestial intercourse. Shakhabh appears fifty times in the Old Testament; if it had been used instead of yadha in the Sodom story, the meaning of the text would have been unmistakable. As it is, we have no grounds to assume that the men of Sodom wanted to rape the visitors. We simply know that their intentions were unfriendly.

Looking at the scriptures in Hebrew, we find an interesting usage of a couple of different words. When the mob cries out "Where are the men who came in to you tonight?", the Hebrew word translated "men" is again enoshe which, literally translated, means "mortal". This indicates that the mob knew that Lot had visitors, but were unsure of what sex they were. The Hebrew word for "man" (utilized in this same passage in Genesis 19:8) is entirely different. One has to ask: Why would homosexuals want to have sex with two strangers if they were unsure of what sex they were?

Note that these women that Lot offered were virgins. Note also that the Sodomites were pagans. Virgin sacrifices to idols were a common practice in Sodom. Therefore, it can be concluded in another way that Lot was offering his daughters as virgin sacrifices to appease the mob in an effort to protect the visitors. By 50 AD, we find the first time that the sin of Sodom is associated with homosexual "acts" in general. In the Quaestiones et Solutiones in Genesin ("Questions and Answers on Genesis") IV.31-37, Philo interpreted the Genesis word yãdhà as "servile, lawless and unseemly pederasty."

References

Gagnon, Robert A.J. (2002), The Bible and Homosexual Practice: Texts and Hermeneutics, Abingdon Press, pages 71-91.

External links and sources

Wyatt Archaeological Research Ashen city-shaped remains in the vicinity of Masada, that stretch for miles, with deposits of sulpher in 'ball' shapes (i.e. brimstone), a type of sulpher found nowhere else on planet earth. Ron Wyatt's account of his re-discovery of this ancient city.

Harvard University The 1975-1981 Excavations At The Town Site Of Bâb Edh-Dhrâ
University of Melbourne Bab edh-Dhra "Bab edh-Dhra is located on the South-East edge of the Dead Sea in Jordan, not far from Numeira (identified with Gomorroh)."
University of Notre Dame Expedition to the Dead Sea Plain "One of the most important transitions in human history involved the establishment of the world's first cities approximately 5,000 years ago in the ancient Middle East. In the eastern Mediterranean region (Israel, Palestine, Syria, Lebanon, and Jordan), people built the first walled cities during a period archaeologists call the Early Bronze Age (EBA, c. 3500–2000 BCE). In the EBA on the southeastern Dead Sea Plain (Map 1), people began burying their dead in extensive cemeteries, creating a landscape of the dead. Interestingly, they soon built two walled towns next to the cemeteries that they had used for a few centuries. In these settlements, called Bab edh-Dhra' (pronounced "bob-ed-draw") and Numeira (pronounced "new-mere-a"), people established the way of life that we read about in the Bible. In fact, for the writers of the Bible, the desolate nature of this stretch of shore along the Dead Sea and the visible ruins of Bab edh-Dhra' and Numeira may have helped them to identify this area with the stories of the ill-fated sites of Sodom and Gomorrah."
Atlantic Baptist University Sodom and Gomorrah
Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance This site has an extensive coverage of both the liberal and conservative Christian views of the story of Sodom and Gomorra.
Sodom and Gomorrah at the Catholic Encyclopedia