Sex and Genesis

This post will use frank language, but will not be vulgar.

In terms of thinking about what to write and how, the most valuable objective seems to be getting at how we think and why it is that way, something that it is easy to leave unexamined.

As our scripture study finishes with Genesis, three stories and how they are commonly perceived started sticking out to me. 

I suppose it really started coming together when we were talking about Er and Onan and Tamar and Judah, in Genesis 38. I had actually known that Onanism is one term for masturbation, though it hadn't made a deep impression on me.

(I was looking into Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace to see what all the fuss was, but it sounded like it would be a very annoying read. That never went any further.)

This time as we were approaching that chapter, I also saw a discussion online about how the story of Onan is used as the justification against masturbation. 

Onan is supposed to get Tamar, his brother Er's widow, pregnant.This is so that Er can still have posterity, and in very practical terms so that Tamar can have someone to take care of her in her old age (hold that thought).

Onan does not want to get Tamar pregnant. He may have hoped to take over Er's inheritance, or wanted his descendants to be his only... whatever. He spilled his seed on the ground. That's not guaranteed as an effective form of birth control but in this case it worked.

Somehow, "onanism" refers not to premature ejaculation, or pulling out, or dodging your brotherly obligations, but masturbation.

That's not masturbation.

The reason for the term appears to be the spilling of the seed part. While it is true that masturbation does not result in pregnancy, there are many other instances where people can have sex -- even in loving, legally sanctioned relationships -- and not have a baby from that sex. 

I am not saying this to say that masturbation is right; I think there are lots of good reasons for not doing it.  I do find it interesting that people (and I believe this is more in fundamentalist/evangelical circles than Latter-Day Saints) look at this story and think about masturbation rather than lying, family disloyalty, and going through the motions deceitfully to avoid public condemnation.

However, that probably makes interpretation of the other, earlier story make more sense as we look at our other sex term from the Bible: sodomy!

The sin of Sodom and Gomorrah was not homosexuality; it was wanting to abuse foreigners. It was about violence and humiliation. It was about rape. 

Why do we look at Genesis 19 and think that the issue is sex?

We might be weird about sex. We are not skilled at talking about it, which probably has several drawbacks.

I am not going to focus on that now, but instead note that while the King James version shows Lot trying to save his guests (hospitality was very important) by offering his daughters to them, the Joseph Smith translation say he didn't, but that the men at the door wanted to rape everyone.

I prefer to believe that Lot was not a terrible father, but there is a certain realness to the King James version, in that women are so clearly treated as not fully autonomous beings, but the possessions of fathers until such time as they become the possessions of husbands, followed by becoming the responsibility of sons. 

(This is one reason why Tamar needed children, and why it was so rotten of Onan to deny her children but still have sex with her.)

So let me go to one more story, that was actually skipped in the weekly reading assignments.

There is a lot of genealogy in those chapters, but there is also Chapter 34, where Dinah is raped by Shechem. Although Shechem offers to marry Dinah, her brothers Simeon and Levi initially agree on the condition of the entire clan getting circumcised, and then murder all of the men.

Simeon and Levi were certainly deceitful, and it is kind of gross to use a religious practice as a way to weaken everyone and slaughter them. I get that. I was also kind of glad when I first read it many years ago, that Dinah was rescued from her rapist.

It is not uncommon for there to be more modern interpretations where it was a love match and Dinah was willing. That may be easier to imagine because Jacob condemned Simeon and Levi's actions. However, we truly don't know how she felt. That was never captured, because what did her feelings matter compared to those of her brothers and father?

We should remember, when we are reading these passages, what kind of world it was. That doesn't mean that there couldn't be communication with God and inspiration; He meets us where we are, and that is a necessary blessing. However, we only have fragments. Even if we had more of the story, it might not apply, or it might be a tragedy that we haven't progressed beyond that point yet.

That is something to keep in mind. We will find our own perspective in there, and sometimes that perspective was even influenced by that very same material, but is it something that we have understood? Have we had good conversations about it? Have we reconciled our feelings about it?

Or, are we just going to look at it, judge our neighbors, and be weird about sex?

I have written before that I have no idea what chastity looks like without patriarchy. That doesn't mean that I don't value chastity, but I do believe there are things that we could understand that would make us happier and freer.

Can we at least work toward a better vision?